Jon Stewart Hits GOP for Defending ‘Freedom’ on Obamacare but Not NSA Surveillance

Before sitting down with Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) for an extended conversation about surveillance and religious liberty last night, Jon Stewart returned from his week-long vacation with a deep dive into the congressional fight over a proposed extension of the Patriot Act.

While Paul wants to let the Patriot Act expire as scheduled on June 1, many of his Republican colleagues have been arguing vigorously that it is the only thing preventing America from experiencing another 9/11.

“I guess the lesson here is that saving American lives is sometimes more important than civil liberties and government overreach,” Stewart reported. “You know, unless you’re obviously trying to save those lives by providing health insurance.”

From there, we were treated to the inevitable montage of the same Republicans arguing for the Patriot Act describing the Affordable Care Act as an “unprecedented overreach” into Americans’ lives.

When Stewart learned that an estimated 45,000 people die every year because they don’t have health insurance, he exclaimed, “Fuck! How do we make that the thing the government cares about? Do we have to rename Type 2 diabetes ‘Osama bin unable to process insulin’?”

Watch video below, via Comedy Central:

[Photo via screengrab]

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