Dying Iowa voter confronts candidates

AP ^ | 25 Dec | DAVID PITT

[flowerplough]

A little over a year ago, Kathy Stangl received a devastating prognosis: Doctors told her she had only a few months to live.

Then April came around and Stangl, still very much alive, did what comes naturally to Iowans — she started meeting presidential candidates.

"I just think we have a unique opportunity here. It's a rare privilege to talk to everybody running," said Stangl, a 56-year-old mother of two from Des Moines who has an incurable lung disease. "I see the caucuses as a big round-robin open-table job interview. Why should we hesitate to ask any questions?"

Stangl hasn't hesitated, attending nearly 50 events with presidential hopefuls from both parties and talking one-on-one with several. She tells them about her illness and gives her pitch for directing more health care dollars toward research, early intervention and prevention.

[flowerplough]

Dowd-conferred Cindy Sheehan-like "absolute moral authority"?

[Cicero]

I think this woman has her priorities seriously screwed up. How about her two kids, for instance? Wouldn’t it be nice to spend a little time with them over the holidays? And maybe with her husband, if she has one?

[Uriah_lost]

They use these types because they know that our basic decency makes us loathe to criticize them.

[Harmless Teddy Bear]

Wouldn’t it be nice to spend a little time with them over the holidays?

Maybe they can't stand her. People who have "A Cause" are rarely nice people to be around.

[digger48]

Sometimes you’re dealt a bad hand.

The Government can’t fix everything.

But I’ll wager those on the left told her they could, if it weren’t for those heartless, bastard Republicans who’d rather she just die.

[facedown]

Stangl asked what he (Huckabee) would do as president to change the national health care system.

There's the nut of it.

[Antoninus]

Stangl asked what he (Huckabee) would do as president to change the national health care system.

I other words: "If only the government ran healthcare. Then none of us would ever die."

[TornadoAlley3]

[whitedog57]

Can you say:

A terrible tragedy has befallen me. I am going to ignore my family and launch a self-absorbed campaign to call attention to why everyone else should pay the price my for tragedy.

[Chode]

can you say viralinducedmicronodularcirrhosis of the liver???

i knew that you could.

[originalbuckeye]

The Dem party has come so far from ‘Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country’. Many Americans expect the government to fix everything. But, of course, the Dem candidates have actually offered to fix everything.

[LibFreeOrDie]

http://www.emedicine.com/radio/topic415.htm

Mortality/Morbidity: ...a recent retrospective study of the largest LAM patient series to date calculated 5-, 10-, and 15-year survival rates of 91%, 79%, and 71%, respectively. Patients can live more than 20 years after the initial diagnosis.

[dbacks]

And hillary promised to personally cure the disease!

[IGOTMINE]

Nice catch. Also, she has the option of a lung transplant.

I smell a Democrat scam.

[nj26]

“And hillary promised to personally cure the disease!”

Yes wasn’t that on Hillary’s gift-wrapping list (in her recent tv commercial), in between “universal health care” and “universal pre-K”? “Nobody dies”, just like Eva Peron’s promised “immortality”.

[Carbonado]

More manufactured “news” created specifically for the purpose of promoting a Liberal political agenda.

Is there ANY victim they will not use? Is there ANY level below which they will not stoop?

Liberalism + MSM = filth.

[FRForever]

Sorry, I don’t get it. Somebody discovers she’s dying and you want her to go sit in a corner and shut up? Nor does it say anything about her party affiliation. And it’s quite possible for somebody to take 50 2-hour chunks out of their 365-day year and still have plenty of time to spend with their kids.

You’re going to have to explain to me why it’s a bad thing that this woman is speaking her mind.

[denydenydeny]

Someone should tell this woman that 5-year survival rates for cancer patients are much higher in the USA than in Canada or the UK.

[linn37]

I want to hear what answers they give her. Thats a lot more enlightening then the lame debates where you get very little idea on how they would actually manage the country.

[Kickass Conservative]

You know what, we’re all dying.
That being said, I have Leukemia. My Oncologist told me I had 10 years when I was diagnosed two years ago at age 52. I did the Chemo thing and am currently in remission. It won’t last and I’ll have to have Chemo again and again until it proves ineffective. Then we try a Bone Marrow Transplant. Looks like I don’t have a matching sibling, so it will risky at best.
With this being my health issue, the ONLY question I would have for anyone running for President is: WHAT ARE YOU GOING TO DO TO FIX THE PONZI SCHEME KNOWN AS SOCIAL SECURITY? INSTEAD OF HAVING AN ASSET WORTH OVER A MILLION DOLLARS TO SPEND BEFORE I DIE, I HAVE NOTHING TO SHOW FOR THE LAST FORTY YEARS OF WORK AND $200,000 (PLUS) THAT THE GOVERNMENT STOLE FROM ME.
Yeah, that would be a big story on Yahoo wouldn’t it?
Give me a break. Boo hoo... There are innocent children being murdered in the womb and cancer wards full of other kids that will never have the life I’ve had.
God, I hate the victim mentality that will turn this once great land into a third world socialist failure.
I’m the luckiest guy walking the earth...