Category: Health care

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Conservativism Domestic issues Health care Politics The Opinionsphere

The most conservative senator is liberal favorite Olympia Snowe

[digg-reddit-me]Ezra Klein makes a very important observation in comparing Senator Olympia Snow’s approach to health care to more right wing approaches:

For all the talk of Olympia Snowe’s relative liberalism, this is a very conservative answer. It’s not necessarily a Republican answer, or a Tea Partier’s answer, but it’s a small-c conservative answer: It’s respectful of tradition, wary of unintended consequences, and suspicious of excessive ambition.

Klein continues:

[T]he health-care reform plan we’re likely to get is extremely conservative. It builds on the employer-based system, and because that system seems to work better than the individual market, puts in place some new structures to give folks on the individual and small-group markets the same advantages (size, scale and competition, mainly) that seem to have worked for large employers. As I’ve noted before, the basic structure of the plan actually looks a lot like the plan proposed by moderate Republicans in 1994. Only this year, Democrats are proposing it.

The fact that Olympia Snowe is the only currently serving Republican to date to sign onto a bill is substantially similar to what the moderate Republicans proposed in 1994 helps demonstrate – as does so much else – how far from common sense and how far to the right the Republican Party has moved.

To a large degree, the Republican Party is no longer conservative in any meaningful sense – it is a party of reflexively anti-Obama, right wing radicalism.

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Barack Obama Criticism Economics Election 2008 Financial Crisis Gay Rights Health care New York City Politics The Opinionsphere

Must-Reads of Last Week: Data Warfare, Gay Rights, McCaughey, Summers, and Yankee Tickets

Data Warfare. Marc Ambinder got hold of Catalist’s after-action report on the 2008 elections – describing how effective the Democrats were in pushing their voters to vote. According to the report, the combination of the effectiveness of data targeting and the pull of Obama’s candidacy made the difference in at least four states: Ohio, Florida, Indiana in North Carolina.

Gay Rights. Andrew Sullivan takes on the Weekly Standard‘s arguments in favor of Don’t Ask Don’t Tell and continues his crusade to push the gay rights movement to agitate for change instead of simple accepting leaders who make the right noises. He continued over the weekend:

The president wasn’t vilified on the streets on Sunday as he has been recently. We are not attacking the president; we are simply demanding he do what he promised to do and supporting the troops who do not have the luxury of deciding to wait before they risk their lives for us.

We know it isn’t easy; but the Democrats need to know we weren’t kidding. You cannot summon these forces and then ask them to leave the stage. We won’t.

Remember: we are the ones we’ve been waiting for. Not him, us.

A Professional Health-Care Policy Liar. Ezra Klein recommends: “Michelle Cottle’s take down of professional health-care policy liar Betsy McCaughey is deservedly vicious and unabashedly welcome.” The entire article is illuminating, but I want to point out Cottle’s nice summary of McCaughey’s brilliance at debate:

Ironically, her familiarity with the data, combined with her unrecognizable interpretation of it, makes it nearly impossible to combat McCaughey’s claims in a traditional debate. Her standard m.o. (as “Daily Show” host Jon Stewart recently experienced) is to greet each bit of contradictory evidence by insisting that her questioner is poorly informed and should take a closer look at paragraph X or footnote Z. When those sections don’t support her interpretation, she continues to throw out page numbers and footnotes until the mountain of data is so high as to obscure the fact that none of the numbers add up to what she has claimed.

But it is Klein, in recommending the article that gets at the heart of why McCaughey is so effective:

She’s among the best in the business at the Big Lie: not the dull claim that health-care reform will slightly increase the deficit or trim Medicare Advantage benefits, but the claim that it will result in Death Panels that decide the fate of the elderly, or a new model of medical ethics in which the lives of the old are sacrificed for the good of the young, or a government agency that will review the actions of every doctor. McCaughey isn’t just a liar. She’s anexciting liar.

Summers. Ryan Lizza profiles Larry Summers for the New Yorker. Read the piece. This excerpt isn’t typical of the approach of the Obama team that the article describes, but it touches on something I plan on picking up later:

Summers opened with a tone of skepticism: The future of activist government was at stake, he warned. If Obama’s programs wasted money, they would discredit progressivism itself. “I would have guessed that bailing out big banks was going to be unpopular, and bailing out real companies where people work was going to be popular,” he said. “But I was wrong. They were both unpopular. There’s a lot of suspicion around. Why this business but not that business? Is this industrial policy? Is this socialism? Why is the government moving in?”

Noblesse oblige. Wright Thompson for ESPN explains the reason for the exorbitant prices and examines their affect on the loyalty of longtime fans. The article provides a close-up view of the  of the corrosive effect of the concentration of wealth and Wall Street culture – and how it destroys what the very things it enriches.

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Barack Obama Criticism Health care Politics The Opinionsphere

Maintaining the Fragile Right Wing Coalition

Or, Matthew Continetti on the Health Care Debate Part II

[digg-reddit-me]I spent the first part of my response to his recent article pointing out some inaccuracies as well as pointing to a lack of clarity of purpose in the piece. But the reason I chose to write about it is this part at the end:

The upshot has been liberals who cavalierly demean and degrade the sentiments of the people. Liberals contemptuous of democracy and ready to embrace from-the-top, one-size-fits-all, technocratic solutions. For such liberals, the failure to obtain their policy preferences calls into question the very legitimacy of the American polity. In August, the Washington Post business columnist Steven Pearlstein–who normally tries “not to question the motives of people with whom I don’t agree”–found himself, like Howard Beale, mad as hell and not gonna take it anymore: “Republican leaders and their ideological fellow-travelers,” he wrote, have “become political terrorists.” Last week in the New York Times, Thomas Friedman wrote that America’s “one party democracy is worse” than China’s “one party autocracy,” because in China “one party can just impose the politically difficult but critically important policies needed to move a society forward in the 21st century.” In this week’s Time magazine, Joe Klein worries that “the Limbaugh- and Glenn Beck-inspired poison will spread from right-wing nutters to moderates and independents who are a necessary component of Obama’s governing coalition”; after all, if the moderates and independents knew what’s good for them, they’d support Obamacare.

Isn’t it possible, though, that the moderates, independents, and “right-wing nutters” who traveled to congressional town halls and voiced their opposition to the president’s big-government initiatives doknow what’s good for them–or, at least, know that Obamacare may turn out to be bad for them? That it might be too costly and too onerous for an American economy with high unemployment and staggering fiscal imbalances? That today’s reform, like others in the “history of our progress,” may lead to unforeseen distortions and crises down the road? Fixated on its attempt to manipulate the economy in ways that produce its desired social outcomes, the White House has neglected the only real “public option”: listening to the public. Determined to pass health care reform even over the objections of popular opinion, the Democrats are practicing a hubristic and antidemocratic politics.

And they will come to regret it.

The reason I highlight this section is that Continetti almost asks several questions which would likely be seen as prescient if he had posed them honestly. For example, inherent in this conclusion is the question:

  • “Might the vocal minority that opposes health care reform know that it will turn out to be bad for them?” or as Continetti puts it, “Isn’t it possible though, that the moderates, independents, and ‘right-wing nutters’ who traveled to congressional town halls and voiced their opposition to the president’s big-government initiatives do know what’s good for them–or, at least, know that Obamacare may turn out to be bad for them?”

Continetti is unable to acknowledge the majority support for reform – or the plurality support for even Obama/Pelosi/Reid-branded plans for reform when they were little understood at all but for a few weeks at the nadir of the debate. He thus reverses the poll results, coming up with this sentiment: “Determined to pass health care reform even over the objections of popular opinion, the Democrats are practicing a hubristic and antidemocratic politics.” This inability to pose questions that are consistent with reality undermines any intellectual seriousness he may pretend to. These types of questions – this type of piece – might be appropriate, or at least understandable – in an op-ed in some small-town paper or in a forum where Continetti was trying to influence others. But instead, in a magazine that is supposed to be for the intellectually serious and right wing, ideology trumps seriousness.

Here are some other questions almost raised by Continetti that seem worth exploring:

  • “Might health care reform be even more costly and onerous for an American economy with high unemployment and staggering fiscal imbalances than the status quo which already is too costly and too onerous for most Americans and is getting worse?” (Continetti fixes this question by deleting the reference to the status quo.)
  • “Might health care reform lead to unforeseen distortions and crises down the road?” (This general doubt survives intact. A conservatism of doubt based on this sentiment would be an extremely valuable part of America’s political landscape. Unfortunately, we have a right wing of certainty that seeks to remake the world otherwise.)
  • “Is it really fair for liberals to claim their failure to obtain their policy preferences calls into question the very legitimacy of the American polity?”
  • “How do technocratic solutions undermine our democratic institutions?” becomes “Liberals [because they are] contemptuous of democracy [are] ready to embrace from-the-top, one-size-fits-all, technocratic solutions.” (Never mind that liberals seem rather quick these days to accept federalist solutions to vexing issues – including most recently on the public option. I’ve tried to explore this question already in a few pieces: Is Obama Leading Us To A Technocratic Dystopia? and An Encroaching Technocracy.)

Continetti – though clearly intelligent enough to understand where these various liberals and progressives are coming from – manages to elide the truths behind their critiques. He conveniently never mentions in his piece that public opinion (even among Republicans) is strongly in favor of a public option and various other aspects of “Obamacare.” This was one of the core reasons for the critiques of Pearlstein, of Friedman, of Klein. But Continetti, in what is a familiar technique for those reading his piece with some independent perspective on what he writes of, once again inserts a malicious motive in place of an honest assessment of what his opponents believe.

Continetti seems aware of legitimate questions about Obama’s policies and politics – but he chooses instead to invent strawmen positions to oppose which conveniently unite the fractious right-wing. Reading the piece, you can feel his mind at work trying to create a synthesis of the traditional view of conservatism as William F. Buckley standing athwart history yelling, “Stop!” with the populism and identity politics of Glenn Beck and Sarah Palin. He is able to balance the rhetoric of each adequately, to appeal to each without undermining his argument, but at the cost of ignoring reality. This consensus is less about any particular policy, as it is about anti-liberalism. Instead of proposing conservative policies or even dealing with the pragmatic liberal agenda Obama has pushed, Continetti chooses the only argument left to him: he demonizes the opposition.

Continetti, like much of the right wing (except for libertarians and paleo-conservatives), seems aware of legitimate questions about Obama’s policies – but chooses to invent strawmen positions to oppose as a reality-based approach would fracture the anti-Obama coalition.

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Barack Obama Criticism Foreign Policy Health care National Security Politics The Bush Legacy The Opinionsphere The War on Terrorism

Must-Reads: Uighurs, Gay in Middle School, Vidal, Larison, the Public Option, and the End of Pax Americana

The Worst of the Worst? Del Quinton Wilber tells the story of two of the “worst of the worst,” the Uighur brothers Bahtiyar Mahnut and Arkin Mahmud. Neither brother was affiliated with the Taliban or Al Qaeda or had any reason to bear ill will towards the United States before their long detention. Bahtiyar, the younger brother, recently turned down an offer from the nation of Palau to leave Guantanamo to stay and look after his older brother, who was captured and turned over to the United States only because he went searching for his brother at their parents’ request. Arkin is the only one of the Uighurs not to be invited to Palau because he has developed serious mental health issues while in American custody.

How Things Change. Benoit Denizet-Lewis in the New York Times wrote on Sunday about a new reality that would have been unimaginable even a decade ago – of gay and lesbian middle schoolers coming out. It’s hard to describe how moving the piece was in how it so clearly suggested progress (reporting on the happy side of the news without focusing on the bad.) Slate’s Culture Gabfest followed up with an excellent discussion of the issues suggested by the piece – and even managed to link it to Fox’s new hit Glee. (Relating to the link to Slate’s Culture Gabfest, I must apologize for the lack of a direct one. The podcast doesn’t seem to be posted anywhere that accessible, but if you search for or subscribe to Slate’s iTunes podcast feed, it will be readily accessible.) Relating to Glee and gay youth, I would also recommend this interview of the creator of Glee by Terry Gross.

Gore Vidal. I’m not sure I agree with anything Gore Vidal said in his interview with Tim Teeman for the Times of London, but he proved interesting time and again, speaking of his long series of supportive letters to Timothy McVeigh, his disappointment with Obama, and his conviction that America is “rotting away at a funereal pace” and that a military dictatorship is coming. His opinions carry a unique weight given his proximity to so many centers of power in his time – from presidents to Hollywood to the media, and his series of perspectives on the matter, as historian, intellectual, novelist, activist.

A Hawk versus a Sane Person. Daniel Larison demonstrates once again thatThe American Conservative is one of the few magazines out there providing a coherent conservative worldview instead of mere anti-Obama bile with his post comparing Obama’s and Bush’s foreign policies:

What conservative critics ignore and what Andrew only touches on towards the end is that the Bush administration oversaw setback after failure after defeat for American influence and power. Iran has become a far more influential regional power thanks to the folly of Bush’s invasion of Iraq, democracy fetishists helped to strengthen the hold of Hamas in Gaza to the detriment of Palestinians and Israelis, and Russophobes helped to encourage Saakashvili’s recklessness with talk of NATO membershop and provoked Russian ire with the recognition of Kosovo that led to thede facto permanent partition of an American ally. Hawks have routinely unleashed forces they do not understand, cannot control and are unwilling to contain, and they still have the gall to shout “Appeasement!” when someone else tries to repair some small measure of the damage they have done. Compared to this partial list of Bush’s major failures, Obama has done reasonably well simply by not persisting in some of his predecessor’s errors, but it is far too early to speak of success or payoff and it is a mistake to measure Obama’s success in the way that his supporters wish to do. [my emphasis]

The secret to understanding where so many conservative and right wing publications have failed is their failure to acknowledge – as Jesse Walker of the libertarian Reason magazine does that “Obama is no radical.”

The Dearth of Support for the Very Popular Public Option. Ezra Klein continues his excellent health care blogging with a post describing the problem of the distribution of support for the public option. Klein explains:

It’s not a coincidence that the chamber representing the American people will pass a bill including the public option while the chamber representing American acreage is likely to delete it. The public option has majority support. But a lot of that popularity comes because a lot of people live in liberal centers like California and New York. It actually doesn’t have a majority in Nebraska, where not very many people live, or, I’d guess, in North Dakota, where even fewer people live. In the American political system, it’s not enough to be popular among the voters. You also have to be popular among wide swaths of land. Didn’t you watch “Schoolhouse Rock”?

The political answer this suggests is to allow individual states (or states banding together) to create a public option within their borders – which not coincidentally is exactly where the debate is now headed.

Pax Americana. Michael Lind at Salon describes the end of Pax Americana. Lind gives short shrift however to defenders of American empire – never clearly articulating their point of view as he attempts to debunk it. For a rather effective defense of the alternate point of view, I would look to Niall Ferguson’s excellent Colossus: The Price of America’s Empire. (Ferguson is rather influential among conservative circles, and was one of McCain’s advisors in the 2008 election.)

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Barack Obama Criticism Health care Politics The Opinionsphere

Matthew Continetti on the Health Care Debate: A Nihilist’s Defense of the Right Wing Hardline

[digg-reddit-me]I had written a few pieces some weeks ago criticizing the Obama administration for relying too much on technocratic instead of democratic institutions, though I attributed a good deal of the problem to the flaws which are so glaring in our democratic institutions. (Is Obama Leading Us To A Technocratic Dystopia? and An Encroaching Technocracy.) So I was a bit excited to see The Weekly Standard pick up on this subject in a piece by Matthew Continetti called “Technocracy in America.” I had a vague recollection of The Weekly Standard as a serious intellectual journal that – while right wing – took issues seriously.

What I found instead was something profoundly unserious at almost every point. The main thesis of the piece was that liberals hated democracy and that conservatives attacks on health care were justified. Despite it’s title, it barely touched on the idea of technocracy, except as a glancing reference to insinuate that Democrats hate the people. Most opinion pieces can be characterized as

  • propaganda meant to stiffen the spine of the already committed or cleverly persuade without honest discussion the unconvinced;
  • a polemic which is meant to advance the case for a controversial position as far as possible; or
  • civil discourse which is designed to educate and engage  and requires a good faith effort to understand and explain one’s opponents’ views.

This piece fell almost entirely into the first category. Which was disappointing. For the first portion of the piece, Continetti attempted to explain Barack Obama’s approach to health care – and it reads like an inoculation, an attempt to shape the audience’s perception of Obama’s words so that they prove ineffective, rather than an attempt to accurately describe them. Continetti starts out with the presumption that one of the core principles of liberalism is a “contempt for debate and smug sense of moral and intellectual superiority” which he describes as the reason Obama believes his health care plan is a good one. He distorts Obama’s message combating lies about health care reform by saying that Obama – by pointing to the various lies and calling them such – is saying that “There is no legitimate basis for opposition. There are only lies.”

Continetti then moves to several questionable assertions of fact meant to undermine the President’s claims – that:

  • it is a “widely held view that the best improvement to the Democrats’ grandiose plans is to scuttle them and start over with a set of targeted insurance reforms” (Continetti doesn’t cite any polls here – and perhaps that is because polling has consistently shown that a majority of the public supports Obama’s reform plans when the policies are described, but that support has weakened for what is perceived to be Obama’s plans);
  • that in “a world where money is fungible,” of course any spending on health care will go to abortions (But couldn’t the same argument be used to say tax cuts funding abortions?); and
  • that illegal immigrants would get health care under Obama’s health care system because “who would ever tell José and Maria No mas when they show up at the emergency room in need of care?” (Of course, Continetti conveniently omits that this is also the status quo.

Continetti – as he works for The Weekly Standard – also realized he must defend Sarah Palin against charges that she was hyping charges about “death panels.” She wasn’t, Continetti argues – she was merely creating “an extrapolation based on an analysis of the facts” when she wrote on Facebook:

The America I know and love is not one in which my parents or my baby with Down Syndrome will have to stand in front of Obama’s “death panel” so his bureaucrats can decide, based on a subjective judgment of their “level of productivity in society,” whether they are worthy of health care. Such a system is downright evil.

My “extrapolation based upon an analysis of facts” is that Sarah Palin can’t read as at least one of the facts that Palin based her “extrapolation” on was an idiot’s reading of one of the hundreds of articles Dr. Ezekiel Emanuel wrote back in the 1990s.

But then, at the very end, I almost had hope. Amidst the constant smears of “the angry and arrogant left-wing” and paeans to the “instinctual conservatism of an American populace that is skeptical of complicated and expensive government interventions” and the constant attempts to mislead his audience about what Obama was saying, a small hint of anything other than political posturing enter into the piece. But that’ll be Part II.

Categories
Economics Health care The Opinionsphere

Our Health Care Systems Undermines Entrepreneurship

[digg-reddit-me]Ezra Klein brings together Andrew Sullivan and economist Jon Gruber to talk about entrepreneurship and health care. Quoting Gruber:

A system that provides universal access to health insurance coverage, then, is far more likely to promote entrepreneurship than one in which would-be innovators remain tied to corporate cubicles for fear of losing their family’s access to affordable health care. Indeed, even the Galtians among us should be celebrating the expanded potential for individual enterprise once the chains tying them to a job that provides insurance have been broken.

I think this argument should be more prominent in the debate – not because it’s the most important element – but because it demonstrates how integral to our economy health care is and undermines key right-wing critiques.

I wrote about this earlier in the summer:

If one wants to stimulate the economy by encouraging small businesses and entrepreneurship, there are few better ways to do it than to pass some sort of health care reform that makes it cheaper and more available outside of large employers. As Daniel Gross, financial columnist for Newsweek and Slate, explains:

An affordable national health care policy, which could allow people to quit their jobs and launch businesses without worrying about the crippling costs of premiums or medical costs, might be a better spur to risk-taking than targeted small-business loans.

I say this as a former small business owner and entrepreneur myself. One of my biggest concerns in working outside of an established business was that I was not able to get my health care through my job – which meant astronomical monthly premiums for a service I did not use – but which I could not be sure I would not badly need.

[Image by Matt McGee licensed under Creative Commons.]

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Health care Politics The Opinionsphere

Funding Health Care Through A Millionaires’ Tax or One on “Cadillac Plans” – Why Not Both?

The Politico has a piece about how the Democrats are “squabbling” over how to pay for health care reform. The article by Patrick O’Connor and Carrie Budoff Brown considers the two main revenue increases that have been proposed: the Baucus plan attempts to get funding from within the system by taxing “Cadillac” plans; and the House plans levy a “millionaire’s tax” on those making over a million dollars a year.

But given our fiscal situation – and the extent to which it is being driven by Medicare’s rising costs – and given the political landmine that is looming in our coming deficit crisis – why not include both? Take whichever measure is less popular, and use that to shore up the very popular Medicare program. And use the more popular measure to do the essential but less politically rewarding task of helping the uninsured.

What’s the downside of that? Let the Republicans oppose a revenue raising measure as busting the deficit!

The downside of course is that by increasing revenue and making our current level of government more sustainable, the Republicans and other right wingers will switch their criticism to focus on the fact that by running government well and responsibly, we are making more government possible. It’s rather incredible how the “starve the beast” strategy has become so essential to the Republican party’s political success since Ronald Reagan.

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Barack Obama Colombia Conservativism Criticism Foreign Policy Health care Iran Liberalism National Security Political Philosophy Politics The Clintons The Opinionsphere The War on Terrorism War on Drugs

Must Reads of the Past Two Weeks! (Extended Edition): J Street, NPH, Liberalism, Topless, Colombian Hippos, Grassroots, 1990s Reunion, Insuring Illegals, and the Iranian Time Bomb

J Street. James Traub of the New York Times profiles the new Jewish lobbying group J Street. For anyone who is interested in the Israeli-US relationship, a very interesting read that tries to profile one group trying to change the dynamic in Washington.

The Unique Figure of Neil Patrick Harris. Andrew Sullivan has an interesting take on Neil Patrick Harris, and speaking with Emily Nussbaum of New York magazine, Neil Patrick Harris also has an interesting take on Neil Patrick Harris. Takeaway line from Sullivan:

Everyone is a shade or two away from normal; and the pied beauty of humanity should not be carved into acceptable and unacceptable based on things that simply make us who we are.

Liberalism Defined and Defended. E. J. Dionne writing for Democracy magazine reviews Alan Wolfe’s book [registration required] (which was one of the inspiration for this post of mine on the 10 Principles of Liberalism). An excellent review of a book I now feel compelled to read:

Wolfe notes that “it is not sufficient for me merely to be left alone, I must also have the capacity to realize the goals that I choose for myself. If this requires an active role for government, then modern liberals are prepared to accept state intervention into the economy in order to give large numbers of people the sense of mastery that free market capitalism gives only to the few.” Exactly right.

Topless. Meghan Pleticha writes for Alternet about her experiment where she “legally exposed [her] breasts in public.”

There they were — in the sunlight, the eyes of God and New York Penal Law 245.01 — my boobs out, nipples blazing. The girls sitting on the blanket next to us giggled. Some passersby glanced over, smiles on a couple of the guys’ faces. My nipple ring glinted in the sun. Amazingly, I felt relatively calm. Warm. Neither lightning nor cops had struck me down. Furtively looking around, I noticed some guys attempting to be respectful. Maybe they were just thinking be cool or she’ll put her top back on, but gentlemen would glance over and grin, but rarely stare.

The Colombian Hippo Problem. Simon Romero of The New York Times describes how Colombia is dealing with yet another of the legacies of the larger than life Pablo Escobar, the drug kingpin who was gunned down sixteen years ago: an infestation of hippos who are thriving in Colombia’s ecosystem after escaping from Escobar’s private zoo.

The Right Wing Grassroots. Daniel Larison has a rather insightful piece on his blog regarding the relationship between the conservative elites and the right wing grassroots. I don’t endorse his entire analysis, but worth reading.

Like the Opening of a 1990s Political Joke. Dana Milbank of the Washington Post sketches a 1990s reunion of Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich, President Bill Clinton, and Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott. An interesting quote by Trent Lott:

I thought it might be a good time for us to show that a president, a speaker, the leaders, can find a way to come together. If three good ol’ boys from the South like the ones you’ve heard today can find a way to get it done. I know the outstanding leaders that we have in the Congress . . . can get it done.

Insuring Illegal Immigrants. Ezra Klein makes the case persuasively:

Illegal immigrants are clustered in service sector and food sector jobs. They clean buildings, prepare boneless chicken breasts, wash dishes, pick food, and generally do jobs that are much more conducive to spreading germs than, say, blogging is. I don’t know exactly why Rep. Joe Wilson and Lou Dobbs and all the others in their cohort want to make it more expensive to hire American workers and make it more likely that Americans get sick, but that’s why I’m not a political strategist, I guess.

The Iranian Time Bomb. George Friedman of Stratfor sees a world of trouble arising from the Iranians’ pursuit of nuclear weapons – as he analyzes how almost every interested party seems to misunderstand the interests and willingness to act of every other interesting part, which he believes could result in catastrophic consequences à la the opening of World War I.

[Image by Eamonn.McAleer licensed under Creative Commons.]

Categories
Health care Politics

The Senate Must Allow A Vote

[digg-reddit-me]Carl Hulse in the New York Times:

Given the steep climb toward 60, Senate Democratic leaders have begun to make another argument to lawmakers. They are pressing colleagues to vote with the party on procedural matters related to health care legislation and against any filibuster — a 60-vote issue — even if they intend to oppose the measure in the end when simple majority rules.

Senators are usually reluctant to clear the way for a bill they might vote against since they relinquish their most powerful leverage, but the message is evidently reaching some.

“It is difficult to ask someone to facilitate the enactment of legislation with which they disagree,” Mr. Bayh said. “But to move the process forward, to improve things, to get to the point where you can support it substantively, that of course I would be willing to do.” [my emphasis]

I understand the point Senator Bayh is making – which presumably is his politician’s way of saying what he is really thinking: If he votes for the process but against the bill, he’s hedged his bets.

Or perhaps, with some wishful thinking, another case can be made: Voters can understand that a Senator or Representative would oppose a bill and yet be willing to support a process that allows an up-or-down vote on the issue. I always found that argument – when made by Republicans about Bush’s judicial nominees, or when made by Democrats about Clinton’s judicial nominees – to be persuasive if not controlling.

And the same principles used then applies to health care reform legislation now: we’ve been publicly been debating this issue for months; citizens have expressed their opinions in town halls across the nations; protests have occurred against and rallies for; the President gave a prime time address to a joint session of Congress; various Senators and Representatives have worked for months on the proposals; the need for action is virtually undisputed; all the assorted interest groups have been brought into the process; the House of Representatives is sure to pass something; all of this proves that contrary to how it sometimes seems, democracy and even our public conversation is working, in however flawed of a manner.

At this point, the only thing standing in the way – not of passage, but simply the legislative process – is the possibility that 40 Senators may refuse to allow the Senate to vote one way or the other on this urgent matter of public concern. There may be 40 Senators who refuse to let the democratic process go forward which forces their colleagues to take an official position and instead allows them to finesse and weasel their way out of taking a definite stand.

Regardless of where you stand on the bill, it seems a strong case can be made that the Senate must – at some point soon – be allowed to actually vote on legislation, rather than sit impotent in the face of a nationally debated issue.

[Image by EVAN BAYH licensed under Creative Commons.]

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Barack Obama Health care Politics The Opinionsphere Videos

Senator Grassley Talks Out Of Both Sides of His Mouth On Health Care Reform

[digg-reddit-me]Watching the above clip on CNN earlier this week, I am amazed at Senator Chuck Grassley’s cojones!

This is the same Chuck Grassley who told MSNBC that he wouldn’t vote for a health care bill that only had items which he agreed with!

And this is the same Chuck Grassley who last week began fundraising against the health care reform he is allegedly negotiating over!

The same Chuck Grassley who fanned the rumors about death panels “pull[ing] the plug on Grandma!” And who then blamed Obama for making him endorse false rumors about health care.

This same guy is now blaming the President for making things “partisan” and for breaking his promise and undermining bipartisan compromise that he thinks is best on MSNBC while he spreads rumors about “death panels” to crowds opposed to the bipartisan reforms he is pushing and fundraises while demonizing the plans he supposedly is working towards.

It seems that this point from last night’s speech could be seen as directed primarily against Grassley – both carrot and stick:

It’s a plan that incorporates ideas from many of the people in this room tonight – Democrats and Republicans. And I will continue to seek common ground in the weeks ahead. If you come to me with a serious set of proposals, I will be there to listen. My door is always open.

But know this: I will not waste time with those who have made the calculation that it’s better politics to kill this plan than improve it. I will not stand by while the special interests use the same old tactics to keep things exactly the way they are. If you misrepresent what’s in the plan, we will call you out. And I will not accept the status quo as a solution. Not this time. Not now.

Obama’s message to Grassley is: You don’t get to help shape the legislation if you’re demonizing it every time you step away from the negotiating table.

Yet it’s also worth noting that many informed commenators have said that Obama’s proposal last night is closer to the Gang of 6 bill that Grassley has been helping create than the four already finished versions in the House and Senate.