House passes health care bill

[we vs us]

Ah, the conundrum of the left-leaning idealist:  only accept everything you want or compromise for incremental change. 

Problems for the Democrats:

1) a fractured caucus, created by Dean's 50 states strategy.  Dean said:  we'll run someone in every election, even in districts where they're guaranteed to lose.  The result was much Dem success but a group that, in order to win, had to run with what would win on the local level.  In many cases that includes conservatives that wouldn't normally be considered Dems.

2) lobbyist money: everybody takes it, everybody's beholden.  Even in those moments when there's a flash of honest deal-making, no one will believe it because in most every other case the lobbyists rule.

3) a minority party dedicated to obstructionism (compare the use of the filibuster since the R's lost congress vs any other time in American history and you'll be stunned by the numbers).

4) weak leadership:  Pelosi's got more leverage in her chamber than Reid (mostly because of a bigger majority) but both are fairly squishy with the rank and file.  Reid in particular, has the Lieberman problem undermining him at every turn and he hasn't been able find the leverage to shut him down.

5) Passive-aggressive white house leadership:  they watched the way the Clintons tried and failed to pass a monolithic healthcare bill without much congressional buy in, so decided to foist the burden for being the public face of the bill onto congress.  Obama's offered encouraging speechifying but not much else (and IMO his lack of specificity led directly to the death of the public option).  Behind the scenes you have Rahm Emanuel breaking kneecaps but Obama's been visibly removed from the policy making.  Regardless of what the GOP might say, Obama is the single biggest thing the Dems have going for them at this point with the public, and they've kept him away from the fight. 

Or I should say he's kept himself out of the fight.  He's responsible for how this has gone down, so he owns successes and failures . . . and that includes abdicating a lot of the responsibility to other parties.   

[Conan71]

Ah, the conundrum of the left-leaning idealist:  only accept everything you want or compromise for incremental change. 

Problems for the Democrats:

1) a fractured caucus, created by Dean's 50 states strategy.  Dean said:  we'll run someone in every election, even in districts where they're guaranteed to lose.  The result was much Dem success but a group that, in order to win, had to run with what would win on the local level.  In many cases that includes conservatives that wouldn't normally be considered Dems.

2) lobbyist money: everybody takes it, everybody's beholden.  Even in those moments when there's a flash of honest deal-making, no one will believe it because in most every other case the lobbyists rule.

3) a minority party dedicated to obstructionism (compare the use of the filibuster since the R's lost congress vs any other time in American history and you'll be stunned by the numbers).

4) weak leadership:  Pelosi's got more leverage in her chamber than Reid (mostly because of a bigger majority) but both are fairly squishy with the rank and file.  Reid in particular, has the Lieberman problem undermining him at every turn and he hasn't been able find the leverage to shut him down.

5) Passive-aggressive white house leadership:  they watched the way the Clintons tried and failed to pass a monolithic healthcare bill without much congressional buy in, so decided to foist the burden for being the public face of the bill onto congress.  Obama's offered encouraging speechifying but not much else (and IMO his lack of specificity led directly to the death of the public option).  Behind the scenes you have Rahm Emanuel breaking kneecaps but Obama's been visibly removed from the policy making.  Regardless of what the GOP might say, Obama is the single biggest thing the Dems have going for them at this point with the public, and they've kept him away from the fight. 

Or I should say he's kept himself out of the fight.  He's responsible for how this has gone down, so he owns successes and failures . . . and that includes abdicating a lot of the responsibility to other parties.   

Well reasoned.  I think Dean needs to be careful.  If they make the party too beholden to the more liberal faction, I think you might see an implosion not unlike the back-lash in the GOP from the moderates against the far right.

Point 5 you made was a pretty good analysis.  The Obama team and everyone else on board in Congress knows that if they want to keep him in office until 2016, they have to keep the focus on Congress on the most controversial issues, not the White House.  I can't believe we are already 11 months into this admin, this year has flown past.  And yet, we are not over-run with radical muslims and we haven't become a total socialist republic...yet 

Just think, the campaign for 2012 starts in about 12 months.  GHACK!!

[guido911]

12 months Conan? Hell, it started last August.

[RecycleMichael]

I don't think real campaigning has started.

Opposing party hacks take shots at you immediately and you have staff people already postioning and photographing you immediately as well. You can generalize it and call it campaigning, but it is all pre-game.

The real campaign for President happens one year out. That is when you have to have staffers on the ground in the early battleground states. The January and February primaries mean everything as to who will win.

[Conan71]

I don't think real campaigning has started.

Opposing party hacks take shots at you immediately and you have staff people already postioning and photographing you immediately as well. You can generalize it and call it campaigning, but it is all pre-game.

The real campaign for President happens one year out. That is when you have to have staffers on the ground in the early battleground states. The January and February primaries mean everything as to who will win.

Nope, candidates were announcing about six weeks after the 2006 mid-term for POTUS '08.

[FOTD]

The Republijerks "NO EVERYTHING" campaign will fizzle....


Sen. Whitehouse: There Will Be A 'Reckoning' For GOP's 'Desperate, No-Holds-Barred Mission Of Propaganda' (VIDEO)
http://tpmlivewire.talkingpointsmemo.com/2009/12/sen-whitehouse-there-will-be-a-reckoning-for-gops-desperate-no-holds-barred-mission-of-propaganda.php

"On the Senate floor yesterday, Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) slammed Republicans for their "desperate, no-holds-barred mission of propaganda, falsehood, obstruction and fear," which he said will result in a "day of judgment" by the American people.

Whitehouse began his monologue by quoting 1950s intellectual Richard Hofstadter, warning that a right-wing minority could create "a political environment in which the rational pursuit of our well-being and safety would become impossible."

"The malignant and vindictive passions that have descended on the Senate are busily creating just such a political climate," said Whitehouse. "

[Conan71]

Did you really listen to all 5:27 of that blow-hard's speech?  I was asleep after 1:02.

[FOTD]

Did you really listen to all 5:27 of that blow-hard's speech?  I was asleep after 1:02.

Proof dear COCO....you have ADD!

The sausage makers are all ill from the bill making process.

[guido911]

Oklahoma legislators seek to opt out of the new federal health care system:

http://www.rightsidenews.com/200912237893/politics-and-economics/lawmakers-file-qfreedom-of-healthcare-choice-actq.html

The Freedom of Healthcare Choice Act is coming to a polling station near you. According to the article:

The proposed constitutional amendment would

    *      Prohibit any law or rule from directly or indirectly compelling any person or employer to participate in any health care system;
    *      Allow any person or employer to pay directly for lawful health care services without paying any penalties or fines;
    *      Permit a health care provider to provide directly purchased lawful health services without paying any penalties or fines; and
    *      Stipulate that subject to reasonable and necessary rules that do not substantially limit a person's options, the purchase or sale of private health insurance will not be prohibited.

Looks to be a testing of the contours of the 10th Amendment. All I know is that if enacted it will make ruf unhappy, so I am pleased. 

[USRufnex]

Yawn.

South Carolina Now 24th State to Defend Health Care Choice
November 23, 2009
http://www.alec.org/Content/NavigationMenu/ALECNEWS/PressReleases/release_4/default.htm

The proposed South Carolina constitutional amendment preserves the rights of individuals to pay directly for medical care—something not allowed in single-payer countries like Canada—and prohibits any individual from being penalized for not purchasing government-defined insurance.  Any state attempt to require an individual to purchase health insurance—or forbid an individual from purchasing services outside of the required health care system—would be rendered unconstitutional. The measure may also cause a federalism clash if Congress passes a law with either of these provisions.

Similar constitutional amendments have been filed or pre-filed in twelve states—Arizona, Florida, Indiana, Michigan, Minnesota, New Mexico, North Dakota, Ohio, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, West Virginia, and Wyoming. An additional twelve states have indicated their intent to introduce this legislation—Alabama, Alaska, Georgia, Kansas, Louisiana, Missouri, Mississippi, New Hampshire, Oklahoma, Montana, Tennessee, and Utah. Arizona's measure, which passed the legislature in June, will be put before voters on the 2010 ballot.

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***Well I guess that sinks the single-payer legislation the Senate just passed.... oh, wait.
Boy howdy, if this means these states won't be enforcing fines for the people who violate their requirement to purchase health insurance.... well.....

My objection is that Obama campaigned on making healthcare more affordable to the uninsured without resorting to mandated coverage for the working poor or those twentysomethings who may want to forgo insurance for a few weeks/months/years.....

Do those who can't afford insurance get fined?  jail time?  community service?

In these times of local and state budget cuts, will we see people who aren't "legally insured" mowing lawns at LaFortune Park or picking up litter on 11th St to pay for their "crimes"?

I'm sure that when the time comes, our courageous Republican state legislators will bravely defend the young and the poor who fall behind on their government-mandated healthcare payments to private insurance bureaucracies..... /sarcasm.

[brianh]

I think we should scrap this whole bill, instead I propose that we ban health insurance providers and medicare altogether.  I am fine with paying out of my own pocket if everyone else is. Insurance is a giant ponzi scheme anyway which is already illegal.  It should be considered a dangerous product like heroin or communism.

[Red Arrow]

I think we should scrap this whole bill, instead I propose that we ban health insurance providers and medicare altogether.  I am fine with paying out of my own pocket if everyone else is. Insurance is a giant ponzi scheme anyway which is already illegal.  It should be considered a dangerous product like heroin or communism.

James Burke of the TV show "Connections" could take your post all the way to anarchy.  Insurance is by its nature, socialistic.  It is one that is usually even accepted by most conservatives as a necessary evil.  Where to draw the line will always be a point of contention.

Edit: added "Connections"

[Hoss]

James Burke of the TV show could take your post all the way to anarchy.  Insurance is by its nature, socialistic.  It is one that is usually even accepted by most conservatives as a necessary evil.  Where to draw the line will always be a point of contention.

Except that on both sides, if the insurance lobbies weren't paying the lawmakers so much in campaign contributions, they wouldn't give two spits about insurance either way.

[USRufnex]

I think what we're gonna get is Romneycare..... is that gonna be an improvement over the current system?.... I think so.
Is the "individual mandate" gonna be a violation of one of Obama's healthcare promises?.... I think so.

Romney a victim in health care debate
By ANDY BARR | 9/26/09 6:44 PM EST
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0909/27610.html

Conservative attacks on his program have forced Romney to defend his once lauded achievement and to cede leadership to others in the party on one of his strongest policy areas.

"Naturally there are critics," Romney spokesman Eric Fehrnstrom said. "Liberals are unhappy that it wasn't a single payer and conservatives objected to the individual mandate. But the fact is Mitt Romney created a workable affordable system that insures everyone and keeps personal choice and private insurance intact."

"Elements of the Romney plan are being copied by Republicans and Democrats," Fehrnstrom pointed out. "Governor Romney is proud of what he got done in Massachusetts. He knew, a lot of us knew, the bill wasn't perfect. Anything that revolutionary couldn't be perfect."

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Some in Massachusetts have stepped up to defend Romney, agreeing with the former governor that cost estimates are in line and blaming current Democratic state leadership for any growth in the price tag. So far though, Romney has few defenders on the national level.

"The major public criticism, false though it may be, is that it's breaking the bank and that it's unaffordable and that hasn't been the experience," said Michael J. Widmer, president of the Massachusetts Taxpayers Foundation, which recently released a study defending Romney. "The Massachusetts plan has been criticized from both the left and the right, whether it's Howard Dean or David Brooks."

"The left and the right have been critical of the Massachusetts experiment because nobody thought any state could achieve universal access without violating ideological principles," Widmer said. "Really from the very first moment the bill was signed you've seen all these interests working to make sure the bill is portrayed as a failure."

[nathanm]

James Burke of the TV show "Connections" could take your post all the way to anarchy.  Insurance is by its nature, socialistic.  It is one that is usually even accepted by most conservatives as a necessary evil.  Where to draw the line will always be a point of contention.

Edit: added "Connections"

Awesome show, if a little dry, btw.