Don’t kill me, Brad!
~

On a *slightly* more serious note, here’s an email I sent my dad:

http://www.dailyhowler.com/dh121509.shtml

“Never has it been so clear that we are now a fallen democracy—that we are too dumb, too corporate, too store-bought, too compromised to execute our system of government.”

http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/12/15/paying-the-liebergeld/

“But no more. On the next big challenge, financial reform, I say do it right or not at all. And we really need to talk about changing the way the Senate works; at this rate we’re well on our way to becoming a failed state.”

The words of Dwight Eisenhower come to mind, once again. But it’s more than a military-industrial complex, it’s a military-industrial-financial-media complex.

It’s that last part that seals the deal. Our politicians are bought and paid for, and their owners report this as a good thing in our newspapers and on our TV sets.

~

I guess I’m just shocked it’s all fallen apart over the span of a year. Not even in my worst nightmares did I imagine the Dems would suck this hard.

…it doesn’t make a difference which damn party you vote for.

I don’t mean to be rude, but this is fucking ridiculous.

Yes, the Democrats are generally inept and gutless. They have been for decades, so it should come as no surprise. But spare me this Naderistic ‘there’s no difference between the parties’ jive. The Democrats may be centrist weaklings, but the Republicans are obviously insane.

I say do it right or not at all.

Well, that’s one way of doing things!

“When the people find they can vote themselves money,
that will herald the end of the republic.”

When the corporate interests find they can vote themselves largess, we say: “Not without our cut, you don’t!”

When we do get out cut, we’ll be generous enough to throw in the extra “e” on “largesse”

Joan Walsh has an interesting (self-contradictory) take on things at Salon.

On the one hand: “Lefties who oppose a reform compromise remind me a little bit of Nader voters in 2000 who spurned Al Gore.”

Followed by “I admit: I’m afraid that building in an insurance mandate, but not any kind of public option that might bring down costs, could make this whole plan backfire.”

Gee, ya think?

So what do we do, then? I mean, besides join the Socialist Party of Los Angeles…

Or “our” cut. Hey, we’ve had a busy day screwing over the public. So back off on mentioning our typos.

I think the thing that kills me is that the centrists have worked meticulously to strip out portions of the bill — public option, Medicare buy-in, and today drug reimportation — that the public would actually support. They seem to have forgotten that public policy is supposed to be about helping people.

But spare me this Naderistic ‘there’s no difference between the parties’ jive. The Democrats may be centrist weaklings, but the Republicans are obviously insane.

Insane? Or crazy like a fox? Or — most likely — swaggering, bullying greedheads and thieves who suck up to the real crazies because that’s how they keep getting their hands on all the money? I’d like to think they’ll reap what they sow, except I’m afraid that we, the innocent bystanders, will do the reaping while they crawl back into the woodwork. In fact, maybe that’s why they don’t care about global warming: even if most of humanity perishes, they and their offspring will be right in there with the rest of the cockroaches.

Yes, the Democrats are generally inept and gutless. They have been for decades, so it should come as no surprise. But spare me this Naderistic ‘there’s no difference between the parties’ jive. The Democrats may be centrist weaklings, but the Republicans are obviously insane.

The problem is that these are the only 2 choices we are allowed to have. And yes, getting disgusted and idealistic about this fact every 4 years and deciding to vote for Nader, or Perot, or Anderson or whoever is complete stoopidfuckery. This country absolutely needs a third party that is answerable to the people, rather than the corporations, in fact, we should have 4, 5 or more. But you don’t accomplish this by deciding some savior is going to swoop in on a jungle vine at the last minute and make everything all right. We need to work at the real grass roots: work for third-party candidates for county commission, city council, state legislature, and finally (and most importantly) the House and Senate at the national level. Then, before you mount a serious run for the Big Chair, make sure we’ve amended the Constitution to eliminate the Electoral College, so that a close 3 or 4 way race isn’t decided by Congress.

Until all of that happens, we are stuck with the lesser of 2 evils. Period. Yes, “at least he’s better than McCain/Palin” is a damn disappointingly low bar, but in the end, it’s the only one that matters.

@Steerpike — I’ve been saying that all along. But the fact that the Senate voted to kill drug reimportation today just made my blood boil. They can’t whip votes for the public option but they can do it to benefit the drug industry. I feel sick.

Brad, yes, we’ve hashed this out many times. The problem is we are currently stuck with a choice between “corrupt and evil” and “corrupt and stupid”. Hopefully someday–maybe in my children’s lifetime–we might actually see a political system with more and better choices. In the meantime, we are stuck with government of the corporations, by the corporations, and for the corporations. Sucks, I know.

And this is probably why the Teabaggers enjoy such “high” approval ratings. They may be stupid, goddammit, and they may be obnoxious, but at least they’re trying to buck the status quo. Low-information citizens see that and approve.

If anything, the recent HCR meltdown further proves that the Republicans are superfluous because the Democrats can provide their own damn opposition.

Other than that, nope, no other silver lining.

We suck.

Actually, Ike’s original thinking was the “military-industrial-congressional complex” but he took the latter out to not inflame congresscritters.

Or, if you muƒt, “congreƒƒcritterƒ.”

Tommmcatt said,

And this is probably why the Teabaggers enjoy such “high” approval ratings. They may be stupid, goddammit, and they may be obnoxious, but at least they’re trying to buck the status quo. Low-information citizens see that and approve.

But this is the most depressing thing.

Who is organizing the teabaggers? Why FAUX Nooze, and a couple astroturfers funded by the insurance companies.

Up the man! Support your insurance companies!

Sigh.
~

They may be stupid, goddammit, and they may be obnoxious, but at least they’re trying to buck the status quo.

Until the Repubs win again and the Teabaggers fall back in line once more.

You now are free to choose between Republican Lite (formerly known as the Democratic Party) and the Republican Crazy Party (TM).

I’ll take the centrist weaklings over the batshit crazy psychopaths any day.

As they say in medicine – “First do no harm”.

I didn’t say I liked it, I just pointed out that that is probably what is happening.

Look, people, join something outside the paradigm, even if Democratic Socialism isn’t your flavor. Get your guy on the school board or city council. This is where change starts to happen.

Until we pick up the pitchforks, that is….

Actually, Ike’s original thinking was the “military-industrial-congressional complex” but he took the latter out to not inflame congresscritters.

An appropriate edit since Congress is decidedly a junior partner in that grouping. Capitol Hill doesn’t deserve equal billing.

Major Kong said:

I’ll take the centrist weaklings over the batshit crazy psychopaths any day.

As they say in medicine – “First do no harm

Well said my friend, well said.

Or as I put it, Republican Lite is better than Republican Crazy.

There are two choices, one decidedly less shitty (or insane) than the other. I’ll take the less shitty choice but retain my right to complain and agitate about how shitty that choice is.

And, for some reason, I think that is a vast improvement over the choices that others made for me during most of the last 30 years.

Baby steps. Baby ƒtepƒ.

“Until the Repubs win again and the Teabaggers fall back in line once more.”

This.

Because, let’s be honest, the Teabagger movement is more about the guy who’s Presidenting While Black than “fiscal responsibility.” They sure didn’t give a fuck about fiscal responsibility when Dubya was spending like a drunken sailor.

This is honestly one of the most disappointing days I’ve had politically in a long, long time.

But it’s Shitty Insurance that People Can’t Afford! Who cares if point of the bill is to make the insurance not-shitty as well as affordable, because that can’t happen ever.

In summary, everybody should say “Shitty Insurance that People Can’t Afford” over and over again because that’s slightly more convincing than saying “It Sucks So There”.

Pst. Hey guys, check my update. Would love to see where people are at in the “to kill or not to kill” question. I’m leaning toward “pass it” but I totally sympathize with the other side of the argument.

Kill the parts that mandate people buying private insurance, then pass what’s left. Meaningless as that might be.

Then resolve to build on that.

They seem to have forgotten that public policy is supposed to be about helping people.

What is this “public” policy of which you speak?

My lone hope is “reconciliation.”

I’d love to see ’em use the Nuclear Option, pass a public option and all the other stuff that Shitheads Lieberman, Nelson, et. al. got pulled, and then thumb their noses at the Republicans and dare them to try to pull it out.

Honestly? I think it’d usher in years of a Democratic majority.

Also honestly? Na ga happen.

And that’s a fucking shame.

Also.

In other words, do no harm.

Frankly, possibly because I’ve been living in poverty for so many years, I think we’re seeing the beginning of the end of anyone in Congress even pretending to give a damn about the public.

Call me crazy, but I think we’re heading right into bloody revolution. Thirty years maybe. I may not live to see it, but my children and their children will. I’ve told my kids to learn French and Spanish and one daughter is teaching her son as well.

Without the ability to move across borders, when the shit hits the fan, Americans who are not on the side of the corporatocracy will be fucked or dead.

Kill the mandate, then pass what’s left. The mandate is likely a dem killer in 2010 and 2012.

I say likely, because nobody knows how it will be received by the voting populace in areas that are up for grabs.

@AWS prob is if you kill the mandate you kill the bill. Kill the mandate and force companies to accept all sick people w/o bringing young and healthy into the system, then premiums skyrocket and Dems get tossed anyway. I’d rather get the mandate and work on subsidies and public option through reconciliation.

We should have known this administration was gonna suck the first time we heard the words “Rahm Emanuel.” At this point the naysayers who said that Obama was little more than his cult of personality are looking depressingly prescient.

This bill is the greatest gift the Republican party could have ever hoped for. The young people who voted en masse to get Obama elected are going to get a giant shaft in their asses. Millions upon millions of people are, like Atrios said, are going to be forced to buy expensive, shitty insurance from some of the most bloodsucking corporations on the planet. It’s a joke and the Democrats are going to be laughingstocks by the time all is said and done.

I expect severe losses in the 2010 and 2012 cycles. If the Republicans are smart enough to keep Moose Eater off the ticket and go with a generic Republican suit in 2012, they will probably make Obama a one-termer. He’s gift-wrapping all the ammunition they need to boot him out off office. And make no mistake, he will have fully earned his defeat. It’s astounding to me how tin-eared Obama has turned out to be politically. Passing a crap bill just so you can say you accomplished “change” isn’t what we had in mind, dude.

I hate this bill. But you’re right, Brad. Once the “principle of universality” is made law, Republicans will be unable to reverse it. They’ve already been forced to pose as the defenders of Medicare.

And one genuinely good thing this bill does is do away with the semi-privatization of Medicare enacted during the Bush era. Don’t forget that.

Call me crazy, but I think we’re heading right into bloody revolution.

We’ll see counterrevolution before we see revolution. The Teabaggers are that fucking nuts.

And yes, I know I used “Teabaggers” and “nuts” in the same sentence. So build on that, why doncha.

So I’m leaning right now toward, “pass the piece of shit and add to the subsidies through reconciliation with the goal of adding a public option through reconciliation further down the road.”

What say you all?

I don’t trust them to fix it. So . . . I’m sorry, but kill it.

Earlier this afternoon, on Twitter:

BarackObama:
The stakes are too high to allow our differences to prevent us from passing reform. Call Congress: 202-559-1161

Me:
@BarackObama Then let’s pass real healthcare reform instead of this pig’s breakfast of a bill!

Me:
@BarackObama I take that back. A pig’s breakfast offers more value for citizens than the Senate’s picked-over, compromised healthcare bill.

Yeah but…what if?

Let’s face it, when they pass this abortion and the teabaggers find out that they’re going to be taxed on their employer provided plans, and those who don’t have insurance are going to be mandated to buy it, they’re going to go even crazier.

It’s at this point we should go undercover and convince them that they should, out of loyalty to their Boston Tea Party forbears, revolt against the system and refuse to abide by the mandates, and starve the beast of the taxes on their coverage that will only go to provide care to the lazy and shiftless – in short, convince them to turn down their employer-provided coverage so they don’t get hit with the taxes, and refuse to buy a policy if they don’t have employer-provided coverage. Such a mandate is, after all, an unconscienable violation of their FREEDOM.

In the end, instead of having 15% of the population uninsured due to pre-existing conditions or the inability to afford insurance, we’ll have the 30% of the population that makes up the loony teabaggers brigade uninsured…which will force the government to step in and make some changes. Either that, or watch as insurance premiums finally bring the economy down around their feet.

Best of all, it will be the teabaggers themselves destorying the private insurance industry and unwittingly ushering in single-payer, while at the same time being the ones to take on the risk of going without insurance – which will allow many of them a new perspective on how health care “works” or doesn’t in this country.

I like this idea. A lot.

The trouble I have the third party idea, is that there’s no reason to believe that a third party won’t just get corrupted and bought out the same way the Democrats did.

If they succeed in taking over, they’ll just replace the Dems like Labour did to the UK Liberals.

Kill the mandate and force companies to accept all sick people w/o bringing young and healthy into the system, then premiums skyrocket and Dems get tossed anyway.

But would it skyrocket as much as it could if people were coerced into buying sucky insurance, which is what the mandates would do?

It bites, but if there’s no Medicare or public option, a “take-it-or-leave-it” option for the uninsured in the face of no alternatives is probably for the best at this juncture.

@Nymstradamus that’s where subsidies come in. You’ve gotta improve subsidies via reconciliation or you’re going to have 30 million new people wearing powdered wigs and tricorns.

The main thing structurally is to ensure the bill sets up incentives for future reform. It’s shitty but it needs to be such that the right people feel the pain.

My idea for doing that is to severely weaken the mandate – cut the fine down to something quite minimal like $100/year and let people freeload. As the insurers feel the pain, they’ll scream for reform, which keeps them at the table.

The main problem is that Obama is just a coward who was too scared of harry and louise ads to really take on the entrenched malefactors of great wealth who sorely need to be commupanced. So he left them intact, and frankly what options are left over end up being pretty shitty. They’re too comfortable and need to feel some angst over this.

@Brad,

Yes, subsidies would certainly alleviate the worst aspects of no public options. Then again, it might cause Lieberman to need smelling salts to ward off the vapors and we’ll find ourselves back to Square 1 again.

Because nothing thus far has convinced me that the Senate would actually consider, let alone use, reconcilliation.

@Nymstradamus — the prospect of creating 30 million new tea partiers will likely convince 50 Dems to use reconciliation. But maybe they ARE that clueless.

And of course, Loserman should just be booted out of the tree house after this is all over.

fucked if you do, fucked if you dont.

fuck it. im moving.

It moves the Overton window on corporate serfdom. And once it’s dead, Republicans will use the precedent to go full tilt toward a rentier state.

Kill it. The current costs are out of control. Health Care will be back with a vengeance.

As a rule, this country tends not to fix shit until it’s hideously broken.

Congress & the Administration has blatantly transferred a great deal of the USA’s wealth to Wall Street, and they are continuing to do so right now. They continue transferring Our Money to the Military Corporations.

Now another 10% of American’s wages is going to be transferred by mandate to the Health Insurance companies. Benefits under Medicare & Medicaid will be mangled and cut. SCHIP will be cancelled under this HORRIFIC bill.

Next on the chopping block: Social Security

My wife has a terminal illness and we can’t get insurance outside a pool from my employer, which is not the greatest.

I am very sorry for that poster and his wife. But what makes him think that he and his wife are going to be able to get better coverage under this bill?

But maybe they ARE that clueless.

@Brad

Trust me on this: The Senate Democrats are not that clueless. They just believe that they are in a 2 (or 4) year interregnum inside of a Permanent Republican Majority.

Problem is, that’s a self-fulfilling prophecy.

And of course, Loserman should just be booted out of the tree house after this is all over.

From your keyboard to the eyes of Whatever You Believe In.

“But then I think of it this way: once the principle of universality is established”

What good is the principle of universality if it comes in the form of a mandate to overpay private corporations for worthless “insurance?” We have lost the plot so badly by that point that it represents a massive net harm to the prospect of future democracy. The only meaningful precedent is sets is “we’re fucked.”

Would love to see where people are at in the “to kill or not to kill” question.

Pass it. Not passing it is giving up on the issue. This is going to be a long fight (if it is to be truly joined).

Damn, as far as three-dimensional chess goes, I thought my idea kicked ass. Not least because the teabaggers are dumb enough to go for it.

But maybe not.

I knew Ben Franklin, Ben Franklin was a friend of mine…

@watou — here’s my overall thinking:

-People are going to hate this bill.

-But even though people will hate this bill, it will still give 30 million people insurance, no one is going to work to take their insurance away from them. It’s just a non-starter.

-So once it comes time to fix things, things ain’t gonna be fixed by taking peoples’ health insurance away. Rather they’ll be fixed by either higher subsidies, a Medicare buy in, a public plan or some combination thereof

-Alternately, if you kill the bill, you’re stuck with tens of millions of people with no insurance whatsoever for the forseeable future and little hope of getting a better deal when President Palin takes over in 2012.

So, you pass it. I know it sucks and I’m not going to be one of these douches like Joe Klein who admonishes lefties for wanting this thing dead, but I’m just giving you how I’m thinking through it.

As a rule, this country tends not to fix shit until it’s hideously broken.

Isn’t it pathetic that where we are now isn’t broken enough?

And for things to get more broken, we’ll end up giving the government back to the Repugs.

If we’re not a failed state already, we’re certainly on a highway to hell.
~

It isn’t “giving” insurance, its forcing people to pay 8-10% of their salary to an insurance company for junk insurance.

Also, the bill defunds SCHIP

Gee. Gosh. The guy who actually needs insurance screaming “Gimme the damn insurance!” or someone who is objecting to the bill or the grounds that it could be better.

Golly. Just can’t decide whose opinion is more valid…

the “damm insurance” would not help this man or his poor wife. Or they might get minimal help. The insurance companies can CAP benefits in this bill, you know. It would be more useful if the S,N people all pitched in $100 to the man with the terminally ill wife.

Brad: The bill sucks. So let’s pass it already before Lieberman, Nelson, and the rest of the douchebags get to fuck it up to the point where killing it IS the better option.

I’ll take the centrist weaklings over the batshit crazy psychopaths any day.
Let’s hope enough people who feel that way get out and support the non-crazy candidate(s) in 2010 and beyond. Hold your nose or whatever body part/appendage is most in need of a hug but get out and work, then vote.
Don’t let worstpresidentGWBushever get away with wrecking the country and then sticking Obama (who could fill the part of Sir Robin in Monty Python and the Holy Grial ) with the bill.

When danger reared its ugly head, he bravely turned his tail and fled.
Yes, brave Sir Robin Obama turned about, and valiantly, he chickened out.
Bravely taking to his feet, he beat a very brave retreat. A brave retreat by brave Sir Robin Obama.

We need to liberals to play hardball Lieberman-style. Like total Douchebags, I mean. Threaten to kill the bill unless a Medicare buyin is included, at a minimum. Then let the party decide whether to appease Lieberman, or keep a half dozen real democrats happy. Then make the republicans fillibuster like real men, until a vote is finally allowed to happen.

This supermajority bullshit needs to be challenged at some point.

I wanted Obama to choke on the word “bipartisan”, but my curse didn’t work. This herding cats shit gets old.

Brad,

I’m thinking something along the lines of what you said.

Call me crazy, but I think we’re heading right into bloody revolution.

Thing is, there’s no nucleus around which a revolution for the better could form. Popular revolutions don’t happen without organizing frameworks–political parties, unions, student groups, media–to call the shots. There are no organizing frameworks left that have not been co-opted or weakened to the point of irrelevance.

Revolution is not on the cards. Instead, what’s happening is a step-by-step decline into despotism and state failure. The end stage could be anything from dissolution, similar to how the USSR broke apart, to something resembling Somalia. Improvement is not possible because the seeds for reform or positive revolution do not exist.

Sadly, this is exactly the “change” I voted for. It’s marginally less bad than we would have gotten from the GOP, which is why I’m still glad I voted for Obama. I said all last year that the Democrats would never give us real HCR. And they haven’t. Wish I hadn’t been right.

Mari: there is the internet.

Nice wonky discussion on this topic over at DKos.

The money quote, I think: What have opponents of health care reform given up? Name a single concession the other side has given.

It pisses me off that Reid and friends came into the negotiations “pre-compromised” (by taking single payer off the table) yet again, and they once again act surprised that the Republicans still won’t sign on. Really? Who would have guessed?

Harry Reid needs to have Joe Lieberman hung around his neck like a millstone and be flung into the sea.

Then we need to get a bunch of the Hollywood agents who negotiate the “only green M&Ms in my dressing room” to start working on real health care reform.

The 1957 Civil Rights Act was complete crap as well. The key is to keep up the pressure and make sure that over time improvements are made to the base bill.

The Internet is a medium, not an organization.

We’ll see counterrevolution before we see revolution. The Teabaggers are that fucking nuts.

Exactly, the corporate machine has been learning how to manipulate the stupid and willfully lazy to work for them. But at some point, I would think, these people will have to feel the pain as well. Manipulating them will prove a greater challenge as time goes on I think and they suffer more, which they will. I hope.

Every corrupt regime runs its course eventually. Just, I think things are going to really, really suck before they get any better.

Discussing the finer points of possibly high flown political motivations seems an intellectual exercise of great futility at this point. Money has managed taken over and is slowly closing any democratic action against its aims.

There are quite a few organizations that use the internet. Unions, political groups (act blue) woman’s groups, student unions and so on.

wait, how is this bill not to the advantage of the insurance industry? i mean, why would the republicans want to ever repeal anything that is going to hype revenues for the industry while simultaneously bleeding the poor bastards who are forced to take out insurance they can’t afford dry? in fact, they get to have their cake and eat it too when these people get angry about the fact that they’ve been fucked, yet again, by Somebody and the republicans say “hey we fought against this bill but obama pushed it through and now our hands are tied.” plus since health care costs are never ever addressed, the health care industry is going to be tickled pink.. it’s win/win for all the wrong people.

Well shit, one thing is for sure, the desurance industry strategists have crafted a bill that really split liberals right down the centre as far as “yes, eat the shit sandwich and die of dysentery” and “no, throw it out and starve to death”

The obvious disunity means we won’t see any concerted action by the netroots, and any chance we have of meaningfully affecting events from here on are basically nil.

We’re weak enough as a cohesive force that we can at best shift the overton window a few inches, when we’re unsure what to do, I see no route to effective action.

I’m sorry, this is an intellectual exercise right now. We’re just watching TV yelling at the hero to check the back seat, but he’s not going to, and the psycho is going to wrap the wire around his neck.

What happens next though, maybe we have some ability to influence.

My, you people are cheerful tonight.

We can work for change. It will happen, just not overnight.

The alternative is unthinkable. I have young children n my family.

Well shit, one thing is for sure, the desurance industry strategists have crafted a bill that really split liberals right down the centre as far as “yes, eat the shit sandwich and die of dysentery” and “no, throw it out and starve to death”

well, strategically it’s brilliant. the democrats are forced to fight, and i mean fight, tooth and nail, for a bad bill everyone is going to hate. plus all the existing problems with health care that aren’t going to be fixed can now be blamed, retroactively, on this “terrible toxic bill” that the republicans fought so hard against but that obama shoved down everybody’s throat because he’s an evil socialist muslim.

remember how obama was “playing 11 dimensional chess against morons” so we shouldn’t worry because it would turn out alright in the end? awesome.

Meanwhile, freakin Wonkette has MeghanMc and Drano!! Priorities people!!

http://wonkette.com/412774/safety-alert-meghan-mccain-interacts-with-chemical-product#comment-479961

Ok, has anyone made a goddamn argument for the fact that the “mandates” are necessary? Other than the industries who obviously have a vested interest in it. Let’s face it, subsidies aren’t going to roll back the idea that people who are not now paying will have *their money taken away by the federal governmnet*.

But even though people will hate this bill, it will still give 30 million people insurance

No, it will give them the obligation (better word than “mandate,” btw) to buy into shitty insurance with no cost controls.

That say I’m exactly with you. It’s a turd, but it is the best turd we could get in this environment, quibbles like the Dems are total pussies/bad politicians aside.

LOL, I just heard Bernie sanders may have heard me!!!!!

If Obama really is a chess player, now is the moment to strike. He better pull every political and parliamentary trick at his disposal to get back to something acceptable, or he really is going to be a one-term President.

It’s a turd, but it is the best turd we could get in this environment, quibbles like the Dems are total pussies/bad politicians aside.

no, it really isn’t though. it’s political suicide and the democrats are fighting like hell to get through all the obstacles so they can get to the cliff and jump off. the best thing is, at this point, obama has so much invested in “passing something” that there is no other alternative for the party. they’re totally fucked. it’s like that old zen koan, about the guy who was totally fucked.

The case for mandates is to ensure everyone is in the insurance pools, so that costs for the sick people are best distributed.

Since there are no price controls, without the mandates, and with restrictions on recission and denial for pre-existing care, if they don’t get the young’uns who pay for coverage they won’t need yet, to cover the old people who eat up more care than they pay, they’ll jack rates up enormously.

Of course, I think they’re going to jack the rates up anyway, mandates or no, but that’s the rough argument for them.

I don’t think mandates are necessarily evil, but in this bill, as construed, they’re probably very bad.

I don’t think mandates are necessarily evil, but in this bill, as construed, they’re probably very bad.

yeah, exactly.

There are quite a few organizations that use the internet. Unions, political groups (act blue) woman’s groups, student unions and so on.

As I said, potential organizational seeds for reform have either been co-opted or are too weak to be relevant. The fact that they’re Internet based isn’t relevant.

No, it will give them the obligation (better word than “mandate,” btw) to buy into shitty insurance with no cost controls.

Essentially, mandates mean granting the insurance industry the right to tax. Mandates without cost controls mean granting the insurance industry the right to set tax rates.

Giving a bunch of unaccountable bloodsuckers the right to set taxes is going to make the Dems real popular in 2010 and 2012. Say hello to President Palin….

NRO is quoting Bolton!!! Re:Iran

Shorter: Obama should bomb ’em. If we let Israel bomb’ em, Obama would frown on it.

http://corner.nationalreview.com/post/?q=YjZkMGYwNDBmZjQ0OGM0OGJkOTg1YTdkNjhkYzlmNDA=

My, you people are cheerful tonight.

The alternative is unthinkable. I have young children n my family.

Aside from trolls chiming in later, no one here is saying; “Abandon all efforts.”

By all means, continue to urge the passage of whatever is good in the bill if that is possible.

The problem is the very structure of the U.S. Senate.

Let’s not forget that the whole each-state-gets-two-votes deal got put in place partly to placate slave states that feared eventually being outvoted. When your legacy is steeped in evil, evil tends to persist. This is why fucktards who “represent” endless stretches of prairie and sagebrush get put in a position to obstruct whatever they want to obstruct. And what they want to obstruct is whatever their corporate contributors want them to.

The big argument against democracy in the 18th century was that “the mob” would simply use their votes to appropriate rich men’s money. Ain’t that a hoot.

it’s like that old zen koan, about the guy who was totally fucked.

Awesome. Is it okay with you if I borrow that turn of phrase?

Too bad.

A writer at KOS (maybe Markos himself?) pointed out the the liberal split-opinion on the current HC bill has the same people lined up on each side who ‘split’ over invading Iraq.

With the anti-invasion folk saying Kill the Bill.

Let me see, 40k people per year have died due to lack of health insurance every year for numerous years, but we should eat shit and accept a mandate for shitty expensive insurance so that some but not all poor people can be treated as shitty as me? These clowns claim this is the only deal? That’s a lie. They can cut a new deal, if they want to, and the prospect of repubs preening in victory might provide the dems enough motivation to try again immediately.

I still can’t understand why Obama didn’t pick and run with one of the European models, and ignore the morons who stood in red coats with posters portraying him as a gorilla at town halls.

If George Bush can finger the camera, invade and destroy a country, and basically spend 8 years saying “fuck y’all” with his majority, why can’t the Democrats ram public health care through, and pass bandages and a morphine drip to insurance companies whining it causes them pain. And some extra support for conservatards who obviously need their heads examined.

Instead his party marketed the idea very poorly to the public, didn’t defend it, and caved to piggy stupid republicans and big insurance. Where’s the courage he talked about during the campaign?

I did not vote for Ralph “It’s All About Me” Nader. However, kill the bill. No more band aids for cuts that need 60 stitches. If some people suffer, too bad. President Obama does seem to give a shit, either. Howard Dean has been consistently right since he came into national prominence. Kill the bill.

If George Bush can finger the camera, invade and destroy a country, and basically spend 8 years saying “fuck y’all” with his majority, why can’t the Democrats ram public health care

The insurance industry has way more money than the anti-war lobby.

How about this? Every senator and congressperson who opposed the single payer plan and has ground the initial idea into the ground to create the current piece of shit bill LOSES MEDICARE.

None of these bozos deserve the public health care they are receiving.

“You are making the perfect the enemy of the good.”

Actually, I think you were making ‘the adequate’ the enemy of ‘the allowed’.
The Democrats can’t govern and the Republicans won’t govern – they simply rule. With no press, no political power and no interest in policy, the “citizens” of this country have largely thrown it away. I suppose it’s possible that there could be some revolutionary upheaval, but it seems far more likely to come from some modern Black Shorts like the teabaggers. What or who would stop them?

bob cesca is in the same conundrum – http://www.huffingtonpost.com/bob-cesca/im-really-pissed-off-abou_b_394943.html

but it seems far more likely to come from some modern Black Shorts like the teabaggers.

Could we at least talk the Teabaggers into being Black Shirts? Because the mental images I’m getting from your words ain’t pretty.

If your shorts ain’t black and your boots ain’t brown…
~

First, do no harm.

But which will do more harm, passing a bad bill or letting it die? I think passing it will actually hurt people more than not passing it.

but it seems far more likely to come from some modern BlackBrown Shorts like the teabaggers.

Fixed for accuracy.

i think the analogy between watching this unfold and watching a horror movie is salient. from the beginning, i think, a lot of us were afraid this was how things were going to turn out, but the protagonist seems so sympathetic (and smart!) this time that we kept watching anyway. it’s like built to spill said, you watch old footage and keep thinking maybe this time kennedy will duck.

i don’t know how i feel about killing the bill. i think the bill is bad. i suspect it may, in fact, be worse than nothing. but at this point, how do you kill it?

I had some black shorts once, but it was too hard to tell when they needed washing.

What say I? Well first, I say doing something for the sake of doing something isn’t a strategy. If this picture is accurate and there’s no public option, at all, however anemic, AND not even price controls… then that’s bad. It’s the worst of both worlds, government ordering us to buy into a system that they’ve done nothing to improve.

What SHOULD happen is for a liberal caucus in the Senate to get together and stonewall, telling the moderates and the Democratic leadership that unless a full public option is reinstated, they’ll join the Repubs in voting against the bill, sinking it and any chances of victory in 2012. Then the Dems can ram it through by nuclear option.

Who do I blame? Lieberman obviously, the Dems’ leadership for an unprecedented lack of guts, the Senate for being America’s fucking House of Lords (16% of the people = 50% of the vote) yet again. But frankly the American people haven’t impressed me either, whether here or in the general reaction to the financial crisis. People who expect a revolution are dreaming; the only revolutionary instinct right now is from the teabaggers, who are being led around by the nose by the same funders who backed the GOP establishment for the last thirty years.

What I fear is going to be the future isn’t Somalia-style anarchy or Soviet-style decomposition; it’s more like Spain between 1700 and 1900; a slow decline by a country too insular, conservative and self-congratulating to evolve with the rest of the world, which through stagnation went from being the most powerful empire in the world to the most backwards country in the West in just two centuries.

Nowhere is this more obvious than in the reaction to the financial crisis, which the rest of the world is seeing for what it is – the failure of Anglo-American economics, specifically the aggressively anti-government, deregulatory Reagan-Thatcher ideology – while the American people, still living in nineteenth century hallucinations, appear to be bleating the right’s tune about big government and the left yet again.

Does this mean I won’t vote Democrat in 2010 or 2012? No, of course not, because the other side’s worse. Let’s just look at foreign policy; a Republican election would mean open season on left-wing democracies in the third world, a reinstatement and expansion of Guantanamo, more Watergate powers going to the NSA or whoever they throw their shady dealings into this time, the shadow of a leash that’s currently on Israel’s neck removed, and the prospect of more unnecessary and massively destructive wars once the public’s forgotten Iraq.

I won’t go into all the equivalents in domestic policy, but as someone else pointed out, it’s idiotic to think there’s no difference between the two. The Weimar Republic may have been a mess, but I’ll take it any day over… certain elements farther to the right.

Like a Bridge Over Troubled Waters…

(not really, but worth the click!)
~

The Republicans can ram shit through because there’s a fair percentage of Democrats that vote with them all the frickin time. I don’t see a way out of this, honestly; the Republicans can prevent the Dems from governing; the reverse is not true however. I think perhaps we’ve finally hit that slippery slope…

The Death Spiral has begun.

Yours, Sweetness & Light

And oh yes, I’d rather have a stalled government than a Republican one. We can always hope that shit gets egregious enough to clue more folks in. The Republicans shed a lot of people, and they won’t get all of them back. Now that they’re awake…a fair number of them might as well start doing housework, cause they ain’t gettin no more sleep.

“The Republicans can ram shit through because there’s a fair percentage of Democrats that vote with them all the frickin time. I don’t see a way out of this, honestly; the Republicans can prevent the Dems from governing; the reverse is not true however. I think perhaps we’ve finally hit that slippery slope…”

Oh, I don’t know. We did stop Social Security privatization even when they had control of both houses. The basics of programs like Medicare or Social Security will probably remain safe for the foreseeable future, because the overwhelming majority of Americans likes them. But as for implementing things like them in the future, things we still need, like a hypothetical Mediceveryone, that’s out. We’re stuck in cement and we probably won’t be moving backwards or forwards any time soon.

“And oh yes, I’d rather have a stalled government than a Republican one. We can always hope that shit gets egregious enough to clue more folks in. The Republicans shed a lot of people, and they won’t get all of them back. Now that they’re awake…a fair number of them might as well start doing housework, cause they ain’t gettin no more sleep.”

Most of the people they’re shedding seem to be going to the far right, not towards the left. That’ll end when the party’s caved to enough demands from the lunatics, thus shifting even further to the right than it was before.

The Republicans shed a lot of people *before* the last election.

But yes, at this point they’re losing people to the crazed side; we’ll see how that works out for them – and for us, of course.

Jonah Fucking Goldberg complains about what 15 minutes of fame can bring.

Jonah Fucking Goldberg, as you so aptly baptized him, is a fucking tool. Now that I’ve got that off my chest;

“It’s not all bad news, to be sure. The elite minority’s general acceptance of racial and sexual equality as important values has been a moral triumph. But not without costs. As part of this transformation, society has embraced what social scientist Charles Murray calls “ecumenical niceness.” A core tenet of ecumenical niceness is that harsh judgments of the underclass — or people with underclass values — are forbidden. A corollary: People with old-fashioned notions of decency are fair game.

Long before the rise of reality shows, ecumenical niceness created a moral vacuum. Out-of-wedlock birth was once a great shame; now it’s something of a happy lifestyle choice. The cavalier use of profanity was once crude; now it’s increasingly conversational. Self-discipline was once a virtue; now self-expression is king.”

So, racial and sexual equality is the reason more babies are being born out of wedlock and kids these days are swearing more. ??????????????????????????

Anyone else want to take this?

Oh. Like the courts, the press, and television aren’t factories for harsh judgments of the underclass.

A fabulous Jonanism in the subheadline:

Sure, it’s great television. But gladiatorial games would be great TV, too.

WHY WON’T PEOPLE STOP MAKING THIS GREAT TV?

This “Senate Healthcare Bill” everyone’s so emo over … I wonder how many have actually seen it yet.

Personally, if I was a Yankee I’d want to take a long cold hard look at the beast before I arbitrarily sentence it to a trip down the Memory Hole – but then I’m funny that way.

Kill the bill?

Depends – do you want 5-1 oods of a GOP administration in the White House after 2012? Then go ahead & kill it (along with x-thousand more uninsured Americans per annum, indefinitely) & give them a Xmas present they don’t deserve. I bet Santa’s just fine with that: after all, it doesn’t make his sack any heavier.

Please note that you also thus kill any chance of seeing ANY reform, strong OR weak, for decades afterward, if ever. Neither party is going to touch it with a bargepole after seeing two popular – & very smart – presidents get stonewalled trying to fix the mess, for a very long time.

Otherwise, it’s short-term-pain-for-long-term-gain time. That means you pass the dog’s breakfast you have & work on improving it. Gets you a lot fewer Drama Llama Points, but more concrete results for all the millions of hard-up po-buckers out there who so depserately need them right about now. I doubt many of them are debating whether or not to kill the bill – not that anyone in either party seems to give much of a shit what they think, or ever much has.

The Goopers don’t want a weak bill – they want a dead one, because they know that weak bills can often get stronger over time. Just watch their greasy mugs on TeeVee when this baby passes – those aren’t going to be happy campers, to put it mildly.

This liberal angst schtick seems to me to be both self-destructive & a product of our high-tech times … it might be worth keeping in mind that back in the Goode Olde Dayse, nobody got to watch the political sausage being made (not exactly appetizing, huh?) so they weren’t nearly as apt to get all het up over what came out the nozzle.

Call me crazy, but I think we’re heading right into bloody revolution.

A revolution has already taken place.

Remember? The Reagan Revolution? What – do you still think that was just a figure of speech?

Perhaps not so bloody in terms of domestic chaos, but a revolution nonetheless … & somewhere between Iran-Contra & the Patriot Act, the revolutionaries consolidated their power & their ability to operate completely outside normal legal channels, transforming their Secret Team monkeyshines from sub-rosa illicit action to just plain Business As Usual … while America slept.

The trope of revolution-as-angry-mob-with-torches-&-pitchforks is better suited to cartoons than the real world – it didn’t apply last time (nor is it likely to next time).

As for that “next time” – given the density of small arms in the US, I’d cordially suggest much less emulation of Jefferson or Robespierre & more attention to how they did it in the USSR & East Germany.

But keep that “Liberty Equality Fraternity” thing: it’s got a catchy tune & a beat you can dance to.

The only thing remaining about this whole health care “reform” debacle that gives me hope, is that “The Truth” (or whatever-the-fuck his nym is these days) says it’s dead.

That guy is wrong about everything.

Here is the answer to all your petty problems:

NI. HIL. ISM.

Now!

NI. HIL. ISM.

But they were the silly guys in The Big Lebowski.

Ve vill cut off your Johnson, Lebovski.

Well, they say great minds think ali– HEY FUCK YOU LIEBERMAN!

Sorry, don’t get film references from any flicks made after I was born.

Not that silliness isn’t another answer.

“When you’re smashing the state, keep a smile on your face.’

What say you all?

Where’s the rum and egg nog…

Sorry, don’t get film references from any flicks made after I was born.

Dead End Kids. Nihilists?

Steve Lonegan from Americans for Prosperity stood at the Teabugger Party on Capital Hill shouting “We cannot allow the pen to be mightier than the sword!”

Laura Ingraham, talk show host on Fox, stood at the podium of the same Teabugger Party protest and said the following, “with great respect,” said she:

“First they came for the rich and I did not speak out because I was not rich. Then they confiscated the property owners, then they took away our right to bear arms and I did not speak out because I was not armed…”

Then they came for the hyperbolic and paranoid, and, well, I had no choice but to get on the bus because I’m psycho, Jon Stewart finishes for her.

For all the shitty “compromises” this bill has been put through, for all the weaknesses it has, for all of the gutless, shameless corporate ownership that has reared its ugly head…I just can’t do it. I can’t say kill the bill, even while running away screaming from it, and indeed the Democratic party, is looking more and more appealing every day. There still are some decent parts to it, but what worries me most is what will happen if it doesn’t pass. Frankly, I think Obama gets declared a lame duck and spends three years doing nothing (If you think this is a good thing, hoo boy, just you wait), and, as Jim said, the issue becomes so politically toxic that its avoided until we absolutely have to fix it, if we’re even smart enough to tell when that moment arrives. I do believe that the “build up to something” principle applies here. As for the Democrats, they deserve all the shit being thrown on them right now-weak, stupid, ineffectual, elitist, corporate, you name it. But the Republicans are all that and worse. I cannot, in good conscience, support anything that might give them a chance to win, and I personally think that not getting a bill passed-failing at the stated top domestic priority-will do that more.

The one thing that’s keeping me cheerful is that, no matter how many times the pundits have pronounced any health care reform dead, its always risen from the ashes, like an ugly, misshapen phoenix. Maybe it will happen again. Maybe Sanders will actually act like a socialist, and not just call himself one. Maybe Brown will grow a spine.

Fuck, this is so depressing.

Also, fuck the teabaggers and fuck everything they stand for. They may be “the only ones trying to break up the status quo”, but I will not have my country being run by those screaming apes. Goddamnit to hell, why can’t liberals show that same amount of fight?

“So I’ve been thinking about this, and I’ve come to the conclusion that America just ain’t governable anymore. Corporate interests continuously override the public good and it doesn’t make a difference which damn party you vote for.”

Red pill doesn’t taste very good.

Although I’ve not been following it as closely as I should, a lot of this goes down to the fucked up politics you have over there. As a political body, your Senate must be about the most self-serving, incompetent legislative body in the world. But its the system that’s ultimately fucked. At least our crappy little devolved Scottish parliament gets stuff done, because the system still works, to a degree. What whats the solution? I dont know, but I think you Americans wont put up with it forever, but the decline of the Spanish Empire described above seems most likely at this point.

This sums up my point more eloquently:

Let’s not forget that the whole each-state-gets-two-votes deal got put in place partly to placate slave states that feared eventually being outvoted. When your legacy is steeped in evil, evil tends to persist. This is why fucktards who “represent” endless stretches of prairie and sagebrush get put in a position to obstruct whatever they want to obstruct. And what they want to obstruct is whatever their corporate contributors want them to.</i?

-But even though people will hate this bill, it will still give 30 million people insurance, no one is going to work to take their insurance away from them. It’s just a non-starter.

You’re “leaning towards” passing this “piece of shit” and giving Big Pharma, LIEberman and the Republicans a victory.

Great idea.

So I’m leaning right now toward, “pass the piece of shit and add to the subsidies through reconciliation with the goal of adding a public option through reconciliation further down the road.”

What say you all?

Yeah, this is where I am at. Yes, it sucks but that’s why it’s called the Desert of the Real.

“Our politicians are bought and paid for, and their owners report this as a good thing in our newspapers and on our TV sets.”

Yaknow, there’s a fix for that. But it means getting your hands dirty. “Let them eat cake” dirty.

“When you’re smashing the state, keep a smile on your face.’

Veiled Snappy Sammy Smoot reference.

Feck. Do not comment after beers. “When you’re smashing the state…” is of course FFF Bros, while Snappy Sammy Smoot’s advice was more “Don’t Wee-wee on your Teevee set”. I knew that.

In Snappy Sammy-related news, it turns out that Skip WIlliamson has a blog.

No, pretty sure it’s Snappy Sammy, possibly preceded by “Hey kids …” Although I didn’t remember when I typed it. So not veiled, just couldn’t remember. Go w/ your first instinct.

OK, now that I’ve done some research (clicked on a link) I’m sure it was Skip Williamson; not so sure it was Snappy Sammy Smoot.

Several links later: “..and don’t forget kids, while you’re smashing the state, to keep a smile on your lips and a song in your heart!”– Skip Williamson

Even MF has used it.

Where Smut’s link goes:

Database not found
Please check your local_config.php file and ensure that the $peepagg_dsn variable is set and points to a valid database.
Currently, either the database doesn’t exist, the user doesn’t exist, or the password in $peepagg_dsn is incorrect.

Gitcher se’f into the ’90s, there.

Closing time, here on the coast, at least.

Raus!

ensure that the $peepagg_dsn variable is set

My $peepagg_dsn variable is always set!

There are too many representatives who feel that it is their patriotic duty to stand up for corporate greed and prove that they are staunch capitalists. It is their patriotic duty to stand up for insurance industry and financial market deceit, because without it the country would not be as rich as it is. The problem with that argument is that it leaves out the fact that few are as rich as they are and there are many who are as strapped as they are. They forgot completely about giving the worker a fair shake with corporations around the world basing their reputations on having the least expensive most productive work force. Who cares how the other ninety percent live; it’s only the upper ten percent that matter. There is no objective argument worth a damn that rationalizes stealing from the middle class and poor and giving to the rich. Yes, I used the word stealing, because America’s wealth belongs to all Americans not just a self-appointed aristocracy. If it takes screwing over the majority of the population so that the country can be successful so be it. If you haven’t cheated you haven’t done all you could to win. It amazes me how similar the reasoning is between support for an un-free market and a criminal consciousness.

Don’t let the mediocre be the enemy of the bad? The bad, the enemy of the horrible?

“….add to the subsidies through reconciliation with the goal of adding a public option through reconciliation further down the road.”

That’ll work, for sure.

What you need is a counter-revolution. Just get rid of all that post-1776 nonsense and become loyal subjects of the Queen again. Joe Lieberman can replace John Bolton-wannabee Andrew Gurr as Governor of Saint Helena and Harry Reid can become a lavatory attendant

the fact is, 47 million people don’t have health insurance because they’re lazy slackers who don’t deserve handouts from the workers.

QED

The real Gary Ruppert would misspell QED.

Wouln’t it be more efficient if instead of election contributions people would just buy stocks to whatever large company they think is appropriate?

If you get large enough amount of stocks, and coordinate the votes, you could actually make some difference, right? And you would surely have the politicians ear.

Even if the politic fails, you still get to keep the stocks, and sell them.

When the corporate takeover is complete, remember to put your bets on the Energy Corporation team. I predict great things for one of their skaters – a kid named Jonathan E.

On the bill: This morning’s news reports indicate that Republicans are going full out to stop the passage of this bill (as shitty as it is). To me, that says, “By all means, pass it.”

I’ve been saying for years that America’s long overdue a revolution. I’m pretty sure US society had the wooden supports kicked away long ago. You’re just protected by the fact you haven’t looked down. You need a revolution. Only problem is that the most likely revolutionaries right now are those retards in tricorn hats.

To me, that says, “By all means, pass it.”

(1) If the Rs don’t want it, it can’t be all bad. (2) Deny them the victory dance. (3) Enrage the teabaggers. Distantly (4th): maybe even a piss-poor bill will help some people who need healthcare more than the current situation does.

You’re just protected by the fact you haven’t looked down.

Without cognitive gravity, I never would have learned physics from Warner Brothers cartoons.

Brad,

Rabble talk has always been popular and populists always attract a following.

Look at Nader or Perot, as examples.

That does not by any stretch of the imagination mean that the Tea Party is an actual movement. it symbolizes the frustration people have over the intransigence of government to ignore the governed.

If that message gets thru to Pelosi and Reid, then it will work nicely, and the Tea Party will be a blip on the radar.

If it does not, then Boehner and McConnell will become leaders.

And the Tea Party will be a blip on the radar.

The worst part of that is, the “movement” will have been perceived as a grass roots movement, when in point of fact, it’s merely an arm of the economic rolyalist Republicans.

When the corporate takeover is complete, remember to put your bets on the Energy Corporation team.

To-Kee-Yo! To-Kee-Yo! To-Kee-Yo! To-Kee-Yo!

So I’m leaning right now toward, “pass the piece of shit and add to the subsidies through reconciliation with the goal of adding a public option through reconciliation further down the road.”

Brad! And here I thought you were a radical! This is a sober and reasoned position to take.

A sidenote for people who think “even if this bill sucks, we can make it better later;”

It seems the first result of this bill is going to be to force people to buy insurance they can in many cases barely afford, without fixing any of the problems with the insurance companies they’re buying from.

What that means is that when the system does eventually get worse, the conservatives will simply say “See, we were right. Government shouldn’t be involved in health care! Look what they forced you into!”

The American people, having become the bleating sheep we know and love, will agree with them, giving the Republicans a mandate to repeal this bill and probably a lot of the medical safety net along with it. Democrats, tainted by their association with this bill, won’t be in any position to object.

In other words the GOP, its insurance backers and their couple of bought and paid for friends in the Senate have killed anything in this bill that might make it good, thus positioning themselves to get back into power when the bill they themselves gutted fails. Under those conditions, isn’t it better to deep-six the damn thing altogether?

The Franken Amendment is still in, right? The one saying that the companies must spend at least 90% of premiums on health benefits? If so, then the gouging is going to come from the health care industry, not the health insurance industry. Was the Franken Amendment removed and I missed it?

The Franken Amendment is still in, right? The one saying that the companies must spend at least 90% of premiums on health benefits? If so, then the gouging is going to come from the health care industry, not the health insurance industry. Was the Franken Amendment removed and I missed it?

Yeah, I wouldn’t put a whole lot of hope on that egg to remain in that basket:

WASHINGTON, D.C. — A provision of a key amendment offered to the health care bill by Sen. Al Franken is likely dead after a Congressional Budget Office report (PDF) released today said it would come close to federalizing the entire insurance industry.

However, the CBO analysis doesn’t eliminate medical loss ratio regulation entirely — in fact, it may have boosted the likelihood some form of regulation will advance by noting that medical loss ratio requirements “ can be a powerful regulatory tool.”

I think in the current policy, White House, and Senate environment, it would be truly, truly shocking if something even vaguely like this (not including the possibility of a ‘pretty please’ resolution which has no regulatory effect) made it through.

‘WHUT? THA GUBMIT TELLIN’ CORPO-RAYSHUNS HOW MUCH MONEYS THEY KIN MAKE? THASSS SOSHALIZM!!!’

‘WHUT? THA GUBMIT TELLIN’ CORPO-RAYSHUNS HOW MUCH MONEYS THEY KIN MAKE? THASSS SOSHALIZM!!!’

Oddly enough, this was precisely how utilities were run until deregulation.

You know, before we had brownouts and blackouts and little old ladies deciding whether to eat or heat their homes in the winter, when rates were regulated and limited by statute?

Funny thing about those utilities, too: they were the safest investment a stockholder could make…

Funny thing about those utilities, too: they were the safest investment a stockholder could make…

Yep. In California, PG&E was regulated but allowed to pass through to ratepayers the costs of fuck-ups (like Diablo Canyon). The stockholders were shielded from those costs. Not ideal, but better than the present state of affairs where PG&E has blackouts when it rains.

PG&E has blackouts when it rains.

It rains in California? I have been grievously misled.

“So I’m leaning right now toward, ‘pass the piece of shit and add to the subsidies through reconciliation with the goal of adding a public option through reconciliation further down the road.'”

This. Because of Presidents Lieberman and Nelson, it’s the only way it can work.

Until someone comes up with an actual plan as to how voting for Democrats will actually improve things, then not voting or voting for Nader is not any more or less stupid than voting for Democrats.

We voted for them in 2006, we voted for them in 2008, and nothing happened. They didn’t do anything. So obviously voting for them won’t work either.

It rains in California?

Girl, don’t they warn you? It pours, man it pours!

By the way, had to take a flyer on the Tuesday night Bad Science gig. Can I get a rain check? I had relatives from out of town in for dinner.

They tasted good, but I got gas.

I’m serious about what I said way upthread. If this bill passes, you don’t think Rush and Fox will be on it 24/7 preaching to their sheep about how they’re being raped by taxes on their health insurance and the mandates? It’s not much of a stretch to imagine them telling their minions to drop their coverage and starve the beast. In one fell swoop, the useful idiots of the insurance industry could be turned against the insurance industry through the mistaken belief that they’re actually hurting the government.

Any group that could be roused by frickin’ Rick Santelli to go out and dub themselves “teabaggers” doesn’t have the intellictual chops to see the logical endpoint of such an action, which would be skyrocketing insurance premiums and even more pressure from the non-insane 60 – 70% of the populace for a single-payer system.

If we don’t pass the watered-down piece of crap that is the health care “reform”, the teabaggers win. If we pass anything at all, they lose and will be outraged and quite likely to take actions that will make improvement of the bill with legislation a couple of years down the road more, not less, likely. So, pass the bill.

Oh, and another advantage of passing the bill: make the shitheels like Lincoln and Nelson take a stand. Whichever way they vote, it’s likely to cost them their seats, which would be a good thing.

Yeah, I don’t know. This thing is a motherfucking flaming bag of dogshit and everything in me screams “KILL IT!” but what will that do to the Dems’ already marginal ability to govern? And, as has been pointed out, at least there will be a foundation for reform later.

At the same time, if it passes, I think the Democrats can kiss their majority goodbye for at least 10 years, and there is no fricking way that the yoot are going to show up to support Obama in 2012 like they did in 2008. I don’t think this country can survive another decade of Republican governance.

So, I’m leaning toward letting it be filibustered into oblivion and starting over in a couple of years.

A writer at KOS (maybe Markos himself?) pointed out the the liberal split-opinion on the current HC bill has the same people lined up on each side who ’split’ over invading Iraq.

I was saying this yesterday…maybe it’s fucking time to start listening to the DFHs, huh? I know it’s easier just to compare us to the teabaggers and dismiss us as unpragmatic children, but it seems to me that we’ve generally been *right*.

At the same time, if it passes, I think the Democrats can kiss their majority goodbye for at least 10 years, and there is no fricking way that the yoot are going to show up to support Obama in 2012 like they did in 2008.

Three years is a long time, T&U, and yoot have notoriously short attention spans.

In fact, so do most Americans.

T&U – the only problem with letting it die is that it means 3 years of a lame duck presidency, followed by another Republican in the white house.

This thing is a motherfucking flaming bag of dogshit

That’s actually the perfect metaphor. As unpleasant as it may be, I’d rather have shit on my shoes than have my porch burn down.

If, you know, I had a porch. They’re kind of difficult to maintain when you live on the 13th floor.

At this point, pass it or not, Obama is a one-termer. Probably less, once the new GOP majorities impeach him for Unregulated Blackness in January 2011.

And honestly, good riddance to him, and good riddance to the Dem Congress. We gave them everything they asked for, and they wimped it all away.

Three years is a long time, T&U, and yoot have notoriously short attention spans.

T&U – the only problem with letting it die is that it means 3 years of a lame duck presidency, followed by another Republican in the white house.

*sigh* Yeah, I don’t know. I’m not sure which is worse political suicide.

What’s amazing is that if Obama had actually pushed for health care and green initiatives and reducing overseas military commitments – some of the left-center things he mentioned while running – he might have ended up an accomplished one-termer. Instead, by repeatedly backing down for no fucking reason, he may end up being GHWB 2: a one-termer with nothing to show for it.

The problem is that both parties are completely dominated by the base. Unfortunately, it’s the same Republican base.

Italics FAIL.

As unpleasant as it may be, I’d rather have shit on my shoes than have my porch burn down.

The funniest thing about it is that we lit the damn thing and put it on our own porch.

Ugh, you guys, I’ve been trying really hard not to be defeatist lately about everything. This is probably not helping.

Can we get some toilet photoshops?And maybe some PENIƒ up in here? (That’s what she said).

Don’t think of it as defeatist. Think of it as relentlessly realistic.

I know, it doesn’t help a bit. :/

The funniest thing about it is that we lit the damn thing and put it on our own porch.

LIGHTING FARTS FAIL.

On another topic, today is (according to Uncyclopedia) Talk Like jar-Jar Binks Days.

Me-sa so sorry you-sa fucked on health care.

So, those of us who still believe in the public good take it in the shorts again. Why? Ultimately, I think its because we have very little economic, social, and communications infrastructure. Thanks to these various and sundry Intarwebs, we’re vastly better off today than we were a few years ago but we’re still playing the short game with short money– thinking this or that election or this or that Federal bill is going to substantially change things. They won’t.

We make fun of the Wingnut Welfare crowd, but, really, where is our equivalent patronage system? Where are the organizations who will pay Liberal/Progressive thinkers to think, write, and speak (and then game the Best Seller system to make sure they wind up on all the talk shows)? There are a few that try (and generally do good work) but they all rely mostly on sweat equity and small-dollar individual donations. It ain’t a fair fight and expecting that the truth will win against a river of well-funded bullshit just because its the truth is a fairy tale.

As much as I want to smash Lieberman and Reid’s faces in with a brick, I say pass this piece of shit and turn our anger and frustration to the task of building a truly Liberal/Progressive infrastructure.

You are making the perfect the enemy of the good.

Actually the people making “the perfect the enemy of the good” (well, besides my wife who is such a perfectionist about certain things … but that’s another story) are not us moonbats but many elected Dem politicians.

In a sense Dem politicians are being quite “radical” about health care reform. Dem politicians want to “reform” health care so they every so often construct a complete overhaul of the health care system. As a “radical” myself, I agree that it is best to get at the root of the problem.

The issue is that “radical health care reform” is not something that can pass politically (especially given the monied interests in opposition to it as well as the American populace’s general distaste of radical, foundational changes). However, Dem. politicians still insist on passing not incremental, progressive improvements to health care that will move us further toward true health care reform but rather insist that we have “reform” that is so perfected everyone will agree to it.

Unfortunately the result is a 1000 ton steaming pile of shit of a bill that will make things worse, rather than better, for everyone.

Still, the perception exists that it is we moonbats who would just assume kill a bad bill than allow it to pass who are making the perfect the enemy of the good, and thus people like the person quoted will continue to vote for exactly the “moderate” wankers who are standing between him and the health insurance reform he needs because said wankers are all about “compromise”.

Of course, if a bad health care bill does become law, all of the bad effects will be blamed on us moonbats for insisting on a health care overhaul in the first place. And yet again the 11-dimensional chess players of the Dem party will be defeated because the other side ain’t playing chess but playing football.

How we Dems can avoid getting into these sort of traps? I don’t know. I’m sure not allowing wankers to dictate terms of compromises would help though.

Say … Obama is good at making speeches. Perhaps instead of giving Lieberman what he wanted, Obama should have said

Well, it looks like health care reform is not going to pass because Sen. Lieberman will join the GOP in blocking much needed health care reform unless we strip the bill of anything that will provide much needed alternatives to our flawed insurance system. I gotta say, I can’t blame Joe for doing this — he’s just doing his job representing his constituents who include a lot of insurance companies. I’m not saying Sen. Reid and Rep. Pelosi should stop work on health care reform. They should try to pass a good, clean bill … and if it doesn’t pass, well, the fault is with those who tried to compromise a good bill to the point where it was so unclean that I myself couldn’t, in good conscience, sign it. But if they cannot pass such a bill, my administration is preparing a proposal that, while it stops short of the comprehensive health care reform we need, will act as a stop gap measure expanding health care services to people who desperately need improved access to health care. While people may have legitimate differences in how best to give our health care system a much needed overhaul — and perhaps I was too optimistic to dare to hope we could have such an overhaul in what is only the first year of my presidency, at least we can — yes we can — expand health coverage to ensure anyone in need of health care can get it without it breaking the bank in these tough economic times.

Actually, whenever it looked like GW Bush wasn’t going to get his way, he gave such a speech. He was a bit more petulant about it and additionally called those who opposed him unpatriotic, etc. … but the germ of the idea was the same. And you know what? It worked politically — because instead of caving to those who opposed his agenda, GW Bush called them out (perhaps unfairly so) and the media then went along and blamed the opposition for “not giving the Commander in Chief a clean bill”, etc.

Why are Dems so insistent on passing “overhauls” that they end up producing shitty compromises so that the “reform” can pass rather than focusing on progressive change? This really is making the perfect the enemy of the good, and this emphasis on “comprehensive change” (which produces bloated bills and bloated bureaucracies) furthermore just re-enforces every bad stereotype people have of Democrats and causes problems that increase resistance to future progressive changes.

Don’t Democrats understand how to play the game and get things done … right?

Kingubu; we used to have infrastructure. They were called unions, and they were the glue holding American society together until the eighties. It’s not just ensuring that the money actually trickled down. They made their members more politically aware and active, they provided support for politicians who had their back, and they (along with progressive taxation systems) ensured that the rich were no longer rich enough to control the country as you describe.

The moment Reagan came into office, it was open season on the unions; illegal firing of employees who joined them became a common practice, as well as dissuasive practices against potential new labor agitators. The guy knew exactly what he was doing when he dismantled the unions, and that’s the reason we haven’t had an infrastructure since the seventies.

Fuck the bill. Fuck the democrats. Coming from a lifelong dem. What’s the point?

The Shrill One weighs in on the bill. He says pass the stinker, it does some good.

http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/12/16/illusions-and-bitterness/

If forced to pick a single source of political analysis and commentary, I would pick PK. YMMV, of course. Other guiding lights?

Looch,

“If forced to pick a single source of political analysis and commentary, I would pick PK.”

I think I respect Paul Krugman more than any Democrat in the last thirty years. But I still don’t agree with him on everything – however, if anyone could convince me to give the bill a chance, it’s him. Thanks for the link.

“Other guiding lights?”

Try this blogger; http://www.empirenotes.org/. I warn you, he’s very, very far to the left (I’d say a socialist, not that that’s an insult), and he doesn’t pull any punches when criticizing America and the West. But his analysis is often interesting and I find myself agreeing with him more often than not. Sadly he doesn’t talk about health care much.

I think I respect Paul Krugman more than any Democrat i

I don’t think of him as a Democrat, but as a thinker and an observer (well armed with those pesky fact-thingies). There is probably an argument to be had that he would have been an Eisenhower Republican back in the day.

But today, in our present Marketplace of Ideas, **cough** Krugman stands pretty damn tall.

Also, on economics, J. Bradford DeLong: http://delong.typepad.com/sdj/

Why are Dems so insistent on passing “overhauls” that they end up producing shitty compromises so that the “reform” can pass rather than focusing on progressive change?

Because they actually don’t want those overhauls and are just using progressive rhetoric to get elected? Because they’re not trying to find the “moderate” ground–they’re trying to find the ground between satisfying their corporate overlords and still getting elected? Call me cynical, but I’ve been wondering lately if Lieberman and the other “moderates” are just a screen and their intention in the first place was to pass a bill that was basically a corporate giveaway.

“I don’t think of him as a Democrat, but as a thinker and an observer (well armed with those pesky fact-thingies). There is probably an argument to be had that he would have been an Eisenhower Republican back in the day.”

If you’ve ever read “Conscience of a Liberal,” he has nothing but praise for Eisenhower, and ends the book with a call for a return to that kind of politics – when “two reasonable parties” agree on basic values and compete over how best to deliver on them for Americans.

Sadly, today “Eisenhower Republican” = Democrat and “Democrat” (back then) = “communist” today.

Thanks for the link to Brad DeLong; I’ve heard of but never actually read him, and will be sure to do so.

Pass it and get the fucking thing over with, please.

Pass it and get the fucking thing over with, please.

Yeƒ, pleaƒe.

…a call for a return to that kind of politics – when “two reasonable parties” agree on basic values and compete over how best to deliver on them for Americans.

That’s going to be kind of hard, since one of the parties has spent the last 30 – 40 years focused on only one value – that of how best to facilitate the ability of those who own the most to own it all, including us. You aren’t going to have much to offer “Americans” (as in all of them) if your only concern is what you can offer to 5% of them.

That’s where the Democrats have failed most consistently – by not making it a mantra that the sole Republican value is antithetical to democracy and therefore, objectively unAmerican and unpatriotic.

On another topic, today is (according to Uncyclopedia) Talk Like jar-Jar Binks Days.

Me-ƒa ƒo ƒorry you-ƒa fucked on healthcare

ƒixed!

Pass it with as many regulations and as few insurance industry loopholes as Joe Lieberman will allow – just don’t say we like it when we close them. Then reconcile the shit out of everything else. And from here on out, change the strategy of the way bills are offered; do everything possible through budget reconcilliation. What can’t be gotten through on a 51 vote majority, let the GOP pitch a hissy over and let Dems ask why do Republicans think it’s ok to not prosecute rapists/deny kids healthcare/pollute/etc.

Thanks for the link to Brad DeLong; I’ve heard of but never actually read him, and will be sure to do so.

My pleaƒure. Tiƒ a trifle.

The one thing that does give me hope about the whole thing is that if it is passed, and taxpayer money is going directly to insurance companies, it might make it easier for politicians to start cutting into the insurance companies as they are “wasting taxpayer money” Not a lot of hope, because more people will be bitching about how poor people shouldn’t be entitled to health insurance in the first place, but more of the center might get behind reigning in the insurance industry. Maybe.

It is a tough call. I think we are likely to lose seats next year either way… the left senators need to grow a backbone and defeat Leiberman before this thing goes to a vote.

“The one thing that does give me hope about the whole thing is that if it is passed, and taxpayer money is going directly to insurance companies, it might make it easier for politicians to start cutting into the insurance companies as they are “wasting taxpayer money””

No, more likely they’ll cut into the government for giving taxpayer money to the insurance companies in the first place and blame it all on the left and “big government” – as if that was what we wanted passed.

The right wing are geniuses at making everything the government’s fault. Since they have an entire media machine at their disposal, we have nothing comparable and the mainstream media is bending over backwards trying to prove that it doesn’t work for us, we have no way of getting any other message out, other than a few isolated places like Krugman’s blog.

Right now we have no insurance. We’re all healthy. We have a low income, but assets. This bill will make us buy insurance, at probably usurious rates. This means that the government is raiding my bank accounts when I can’t find a job and will probably need that money in the future. Of course the help buying insurance will come after my assets are gone. But what will we have to live on then?

I think it’s gotta be done. I can’t see any chance that the congress, and particularly the spectacularly fucked up Senate, will get any better for us in any foreseeable future. Gotta have a mandate–even naked, costs will come down for all if healthy people are in the pool; then, chip away–regulate premium dollars to services, strip anti-trust exemptions, force market competition, gradually introduce non-profits/expanded medicare, whatever you can get. But I really think if nothing happens now, the process won’t start before the streets are littered with the sick and dying.

This bill will make us buy insurance, at probably usurious rates. This means that the government is raiding my bank accounts when I can’t find a job and will probably need that money in the future

I’m sorry….have specifics of the bill been released that you KNOW this to be true, or are you just trolling?

Is it time for that discussion about up and down the road or across the street again?

Pass the fucking thing, or this whole year has just been fucking theatre.

Pass the fucking thing, or this whole year has just been fucking theatre.

And not in the good, live-action porn, way.

Pass the fucking thing

I concur. No one buys the Christmas tree with all the ornaments to carry home.

Posting in an Epic Thread!

Kill the bill? Fuck yes. BURN THAT FUCKER DOWN!!11!1

Universality? Hardly. Killing pre-existing conditions shenanigans is popular enough that it could easily pass on it’s own, so that could be tagged onto any bill, any time. It’s a gimme that shouldn’t count as a plus for the current pile of POOP in teh Senate.

The only thing here that helps those in need are the subsidies. And nevermind that the subsidies are too stingy or whatnot, the problem is that they’re subsidies. Guess what’s next on the fucking chopping block the minute the “fiscal hawks” gets their grubby hands on policy-making. Remember how Reagan’s Cadillac-driving welfare mom played. And if progressives can’t defend the public option, or even fucking Medicare buy-in at a time when bajillions of Boomers are 55-65, they ain’t gonna do much for subsidies for teh poor to buy their individually mandated health insurance.

Ever since universal single-payer was taken off the table, the whole idea was trying to get some good fundamentals in place that would be easy to build on. Subsidies are teh exact opposite, easy to cut and hard to expand.

Also, do you know why the tea party has a higher opinion rating?

Because they don’t have to DO A FUCKING THING AT ALL.

Seriously, I have a higher opinion rating, because I’m not expected to accomplish a damn thing. The Senate though? They’re expected to do shit. If they don’t do shit, people’s opinion of them goes down.

To put it another way, the minute America became America, the American citizen already hated their senator and thought he wasn’t doing enough.

I don’t know what to think about the Democrats anymore. They’re slightly better than the republicans, but that’s not saying much.

As far as health care reform, if there’s no public option or Medicare for all, then there can not be any kind of mandate for people to buy private insurance. I have insurance through my employer, but I’d drop it immediately if I could get something through the government.

Red pill doesn’t taste very good.

They didn’t tell you it’s supposed to be a suppository?

Red pill doesn’t taste very good.

They didn’t tell you it’s supposed to be a suppository?

It’s only spelled analgesic…

Let me add, as a small business owner, that rules concerning opt-out for individuals and an individual-based public option need to be carefully written. The semi-decent coverage I have for my office right now has as a rule that all full-time permanent employees must be covered. In other words, one person opting out for a hypothetical public plan would kill everyone’s insurance unless I continued to pay for the person who opted out.

I am not presenting this as a reason to avoid a public option or real choice for people. It’s a reason to regulate the hell out of ALL insurance, so that clauses like that don’t fuck people.

So I’m leaning right now toward, “pass the piece of shit and add to the subsidies through reconciliation with the goal of adding a public option through reconciliation further down the road.”

Similarly, later today I’m going to take out my own eyes, with the goal of adding new eyes further down the road.

To Jennifer,

“That’s where the Democrats have failed most consistently – by not making it a mantra that the sole Republican value is antithetical to democracy and therefore, objectively unAmerican and unpatriotic.”

Actually, the problem – well, one of many – is that the American political system is in many ways quite undemocratic, in ways that go all the way back to the Founding Fathers.

Let’s just forget about the whole slavery thing and the whole “red Indians need not apply” thing, which opens up a whole other can of worms. And just consider institutions like the Senate (16% of the people = 50% of the vote); the fact that Senators didn’t even used to be elected by the people if I remember my history; the electoral college; the fact that even white men over 21 didn’t have full voting rights unless they were landed, until Andrew Jackson rammed that down the system’s throat. Consider the fact that there’s never been a major political change subject to referendum – unlike even France under DeGaulle and Venezuela under Chavez. Toss in the whole states’ rights thing for good measure.

I understand why they did it (fear of mob rule and fear of centralized power), but I also think there are a lot of places where they went too far (there’s simply no justification for the electoral college in this day and age). I think it’s contributed greatly to a paralyzed political system. And I think there’s nothing wrong with questioning the founding fathers’ wisdom and we could probably benefit from doing it a little more.

My hope is that Bernie Sanders burns this fucker down. Or any one of the so called progressive Democrats. Is HCR a hostage situation with tens of millions of Americans at stake? Yes. But there are 60 Senators that have loaded guns. Any one of them can pull the trigger, even for progressive reasons.

Although, knowing how fucking shitty this shitfuck Senate is fucking shitting all over the fuck, they’ll probably just throw in a ton of tax cuts to grab a couple GOPpers.

Fuck. Shit.

You really expect that it will be “improved” down the road. In what world. Pass this now and the republicans are in control of both houses (which they will probably be anyway at this point), it will be gutted and treated as a give away to the undeserving poor.

Add to that the requirement that everybody give large amounts of money (both directly and through our government) to corporations to deny coverage at a later date to be chosen, and you have a disaster of epic proportions.

Obama is gonna get us all screwed anyway, but without the bill at least I do not have to throw money at the insurance companies.

Oh an tell me just how McCain would have been worse again? Specifics please.

Specifics please.

Bomb Iran?

You really expect that it will be “improved” down the road. In what world.

As Krugman points out, the same world that saw Social Security and Medicare improved.

Sadly, D-KW, I think lawguy is another candidate for the B-Ark.

Palin as Vice President?

The past year having been about our impending invasion of Iran, not health care reform.

And how would you be able to say “How is this worse than McCain” if McCain was in office, I ask you? I’ll tell you how, lunacy.

Specifics please.

Vice-president Sarah Palin/President John McCain’s 73-year old heart.

Oh, and obviously there would’ve been the Great Liberal Freakout that the troll was so prescient in calling.

We were right about the communist system – unworkable because nobody owns/has responsibility for anything. But guess what? The Commies were right about us – corporations are now our government and suck all the money into their running dog capitalist maws.

And we lasted only 20 years longer. Makes ya think.

One word for all of you: Conference committee.

Oops, I mean two words: Conference committee resolution

Among the words…..

Specifics please

How about hope? Yes, everyone is pissed about HRC being a flaming brown bag of dogshit, but at least there was something to invest in emotionally. I’ll take the momentary despair of not getting a good bill over the day-in, day-out despair of watching a McCain administration double down on the stupidity of the George the Leƒƒer. I’m still calling that a vote well cast. YMMV.

Hear hear, Looch!

Oops, I mean two words: Conference committee resolution

Yeah, that’s one of the reasons why I’m waffling on killing it. It’s possible that we might get something a little better than the Senate bag o’dogƒhit. But they’re also discussing just ping-ponging it. Which would ƒuck.

And oopƒ. ƒhould have ƒainted up.

As Krugman points out, the same world that saw Social Security and Medicare improved.

You get change in two kinds – incremental and revolutionary.

Social Security and Medicare were revolutionary, although limited when first introduced. Incremental changes to those systems had the advantage that 1. they couldn’t make them smaller and 2. they were being made to increasingly popular and beneficial systems. No wonder these suckers got expanded.

This thing that is trolling through the Senate sausage-making factory is about as revolutionary as p00p. The only “new” idea in it is the Health Exchanges. Whoop-de-fucking-dooo. The biggest draw for the whole thing is that incremental changes would have more people in the Exchanges, where regulations are tighter.

I can not envisage a time when increasing subsidies to the poor is going to happen. Especially considering the sheer magnitude of the FAIL that Senate Dems have delivered so far – with sixty votes, a discredites and massively unpopular opposition and an attempt to help out those in the 55-65 age range AT A TIME WHEN THE FUCKING BOOMERS ARE 55-65.

The Senate bill is worse than a dog’s breakfast, and I’ve seen a dog eat cat puke, puke it up, and then eat the re-vomited vomit.

No difference between the parties? Really?

You think there is no difference between a conservative moderate party and a batshit crazy insane MOOSLIMSMUSTDIE party?

I’ll take the shittiest Democrat over the best Republican any day.

You think this health care bill is bad? Imagine what we would have right now if Palin/McCain was in office with a Republican majority.

The soul shivers.

America is broken. But until its fixed, we need to take it from behind from corporate-owned Democrats, because the alternative is much, much worse. Just ask Gore.

Hey, remember the YouTube video taken from the Palin rally? The one with the guy holding the monkey doll, who says its name is “little Hussein” and that he came to the rally to see the “Real Americans”?

Yeah, I’d like a public option. Yeah, I think private mandates are pretty shitty. But what I’d really like is for that guy not to believe that he was right. You deride Obama as a coward and a weakling, and that guy wins. It’s pretty simple.

…adding…

We’re talking about like one or two people here that are fucking the country up. Reimporting failed, sure. But the public option or medicare buy-in, even strong ones, would have passed if the threshold was 50 votes! A bad public option at about 57 votes. Fuck! We’re so close I can smell it, but due to the attitude of throwing the baby out with the bathwater, America is gonna get to a level of Cheney fucked up in 2010/2012. FUCK!

I just want to thank the troll for bringing us back together in this feƒtive ƒeaƒon. If there is one thing Sadlies agree on, it is that McCain ƒuckƒ.

actor212 – I must have missed the memo – do new commenters always get called trolls here? I’ve been reading SN for a couple of years.

Why am I sure that the rates I will be charged will be high? Because as far as I have seen, while there is much talk about increasing access (good) there is very little talk about keeping rates down in any of the fifty thousand versions of the bill I have gotten excited about, only to be disappointed. It really looks to me at this point as if Lieberman et al will suck all the good out of the bill and leave only the punishing parts for the people. That’s not reform.

McCain is a belligerent, senile old coot with no diplomatic skills and no ability to keep his damn mouth shut. We’d probably be at war with Norway.

smedley said,

December 17, 2009 at 19:34

Um, wouldn’t that be “ƒmedley?” Wondering, that’ƒ all.

Yeah, the problem ain’t so much when the tighty righties get in power and try to repeal HCR – that’s probably not in teh cards. The real problem is when they get into office and decide that a hundred billion a year for poor folks is too much, especially in these uncertain economic times. Think of the deficits and debts we are leaving to our children and our children’s children. Surely the subsidies would still be effective at helping the neediest at a hundred million, or maybe a hundred thousand, or maybe a hundred dollars. I mean, we gotta pay for these tax cuts some how.

But until its fixed, we need to take it from behind from corporate-owned Democrats, because the alternative is much, much worse.

Trust me, taking it from behind is much, much more enjoyable than this. But I can’t disagree, especially since every time the Republicans come into power, they seem to weaken our democracy more and create circumstances in which Democrats become even more beholden to corporate interests.

I would have elected a jar of moldy bile not to see this person as Vice-President. Nice gams, though.

And we lasted only 20 years longer. Makes ya think.

But we bankrupted both of us. So it’s 2-0, USA!

I’ve seen a dog eat cat puke, puke it up, and then eat the re-vomited vomit.
*ack!* Newthletter *ack* …..

We’re talking about like one or two people here that are fucking the country up. Reimporting failed, sure. But the public option or medicare buy-in, even strong ones, would have passed if the threshold was 50 votes! A bad public option at about 57 votes.

Harkin’s considering reintroducing his filibuster bill, which, oddly enough, was not passed by the Repubes in 1995 when they were in power. It’s completely reasonable, and it’s high fucking time we did it.

I’ve seen a dog eat cat puke, puke it up, and then eat the re-vomited vomit.

You’re stalking my dog?

We’d probably be at war with Norway. – tigrismus

Of course. Norway does have a lot of oil.

The concern I have about the “pass it and we’ll just fix it later” argument is that there’s an assumption, I think, that the political will and resources will be available to do so. It’s true that major social legislation like Social Security was (slowly) expanded over the years, but it’s also true that legislation like the Patriot Act, FISA, etc. have not been fixed even when there was opportunity to do so. NAFTA will probably never be touched in my lifetime.

The right-wing opposition to this bill will not stand pat. They’ll be poised to exploit any failures of this bill – and there will be failures – as evidence that the whole idea of health care reform is teh socializm and that’s bad because it’s un-American and shut up that’s why.

Couple that with the Very Serious People Who Are More Reasonable Than You Are who will claim that any improvement can’t be done because it’s too radical or not the right time or whatever, and the difficulties in improving this legislation get that much harder. Of course, the people who are advocating for “too much” now are the same people that will be needed to push the conversation forward. So the DFHs will be blamed for anything that goes wrong and the Very Serious People will get to claim credit for everything even if what the DFHs want gets enacted at some point.

None of this is to say that anyone should give up, just that we should not be too blasé about what will be necessary to make improvements and we should be prepared for the possibility that those efforts will fail.

As an aside, I’m a little disturbed by the emerging Dolchstosslegende that holds left-liberals responsible for people’s deaths should the Senate bill be killed. By that reasoning, do I get to blame the bill’s supporters if I get screwed over by jacked up insurance costs when my current COBRA eligibility runs out at the end of next March?

Do not fuck with Norway.

Oh PeeJ, that was truly wonderful.

The helicopter than displays it’s dominance of the Fjord by urinating all over the rock face.

By jove, you’re right! It is “ƒmedley.”

??Ä?’|ô

Or “iƒ”

What say you?

emptywheel speaks for me.

I believe that if the Senate health care bill passes as Joe Lieberman has demanded it–with no Medicare buy-in or public option–it will be a significant step further on our road to neo-feudalism. As such, I find it far too dangerous to our democracy to pass–even if it gives millions (perhaps unaffordable) subsidies for health care.

I say we’re irretrievably fucked.

“I must have missed the memo – do new commenters always get called trolls here? I’ve been reading SN for a couple of years. ”

No. Just those who act like trolls.

Linnaeus:

I don’t think it’s any emerging German word here, just that for fuck’s sake, if you can’t imagine the political will or resources for the incremental growth, where the fucking hell do you imagine the political will and resources for the radical approach is going to be from?

The American system is fucked beyond measure, but this is closer to the reform our country needs than right now, closer than Clinton managed in his two terms, closer to something changing in this country.

But sure, if you need someone to blame for paying through the nose for insurance, you can shake your fist to the sky and shout out “St. Trotsky”. Mind, if you’re getting screwed, I’ll be living under an overpass cooking a sparrow, so I probably won’t hear you.

McCain is a belligerent, senile old coot with no diplomatic skills and no ability to keep his damn mouth shut. We’d probably be at war with Norway unmatched socks and the dryer lint terrorist network.

“The American system is fucked beyond measure, but this is closer to the reform our country needs than right now, closer than Clinton managed in his two terms, closer to something changing in this country.”

Again though, doing something just for the sake of doing something isn’t a strategy. I’ll reserve my final judgment until the bill’s out in the open and been fact-checked and all, but if my impression is correct and the bill includes nothing but a mandate for all to get health insurance – no public option of any kind, no cost controls – then what’s left?

The only advantage I can see is that insurance companies will no longer be able to turn away patients. But without price controls or any kind of competition, they can easily pass on the cost to consumers without it affecting their obscene profits, so they’ll love the idea. And for a lot of families, being forced to buy health insurance at prices set by the insurance companies with no form of government help, means they’ll have to cut their spending on other, potentially just as vital parts of their lives.

I just don’t know – as bad as the current libertarian system is, I’m not convinced it’s worse than a corporate-feudalist system that puts our money at the direct disposal of the insurance companies. (Like I said, I’m not outright on the kill the bill bandwagon – yet – just very, very skeptical).

And another thought on the differences between an Obama adminsitration and a McCain version:

At least a fight was fought. The Republicans and corporations were forced to pull most — if not all — of the stops to jam HCR up. They had to show their true colors. Maybe this is excessively optimistic (“Guilty as charged, My Lordƒ!”) but I wonder if there is a longer wave resonance with the public about just how the Republicans handled this. Yes, yes, there is a very good chance that as a country (and a marketplace of ideas) we have gone so far out there that none of the Republican shit-tossing will have an impact on most Americans. But I hold out a little hope, just a little.

Would McCain have even tried this? Of course not.

We’d probably be at war with Norway unmatched socks and the dryer lint terrorist network.

He’d call a sock a cunt and talk about how the dryer lint has trowelled on the makeup like a trollop and the laundry would have no choice but to impose sanctions. Then he’d discover the towels are Turkish and he’d bomb the linen closet as well.

St. Trotsky, Antipope:

I don’t think it’s any emerging German word here, just that for fuck’s sake, if you can’t imagine the political will or resources for the incremental growth, where the fucking hell do you imagine the political will and resources for the radical approach is going to be from?

That’s a fair question. It’s not that I can’t imagine that there will be the means for incremental growth, as you put it, but that we shouldn’t be lulled into a false sense of security once this bill passes (and I think it will pass). The exhaustion period after this bill passes will be crucial, and we on the general left end of things in this country need to use that time to get ready for the next round and even create the next round. Furthermore, we need to prepared for the possible negative effects of this bill, which might obscure in the minds of the public any benefits that arise from it. And we’ll need the DFHs to do it.

Forgive the German word hyperbole. I thought it was good stylistic flair.

But sure, if you need someone to blame for paying through the nose for insurance, you can shake your fist to the sky and shout out “St. Trotsky”. Mind, if you’re getting screwed, I’ll be living under an overpass cooking a sparrow, so I probably won’t hear you.

I won’t need anyone to blame, except for the parties directly responsible for jacking up my rates, i.e., the insurance companies. My point is that I’ve seen – not here, mind you – an increasing tendency to respond to my concerns about this bill not with “Hey, Linnaeus, here’s why you shouldn’t be as worried as you are…” but with “OH NOES YOU FUCKING HIPPY YOU WANT PEOPLE TO DIE YOU LEFTIST TEABAGGER!” And that’s simply not true.

You would hear me anyway, because I’ll likely be right next to you cooking a sparrow, if we’re not fighting over the same sparrow.

Then he’d discover the towels are Turkish and he’d bomb the linen closet as well.

And napalm the dust bunnies for good measure (or at least the ones that the VP couldn’t shoot from a helicopter).

Interesting, Looch.

You think there’s any chance of Obama going down as the next Barry Goldwater, Woodrow Wilson or W. J. Bryan? A politician whose ideas were soundly defeated in his lifetime, but a generation later had become conventional wisdom?

From your lips to God’s ears.

Ooops. Nym change phail.

Too busy loading up ƒpitballs.

I read more of these comments, and find that I agree with this guy: (Parmly)

“It seems the first result of this bill is going to be to force people to buy insurance they can in many cases barely afford, without fixing any of the problems with the insurance companies they’re buying from.

What that means is that when the system does eventually get worse, the conservatives will simply say ‘See, we were right. Government shouldn’t be involved in health care! Look what they forced you into!'” END QUOTE

So now can I please not be called a troll? My life sucks enough as it is. I’m disappointed in Obama because I (like everyone else) worked hard and gave money to get him elected and things aren’t turning out as well as I had hoped. It doesn’t mean I’m going to have a hissy fit and not vote for him again in 3 years. I’m just a little disappointed, OK?

You think there’s any chance of Obama going down as the next Barry Goldwater, Woodrow Wilson or W. J. Bryan? A politician whose ideas were soundly defeated in his lifetime, but a generation later had become conventional wisdom?

I was hoping (yes, a little, but still hoping) on a shorter turnaround than one that would take generations. Something a little beyond next week’s or next month’s CNN/Wapo polling results but something within my lifetime.

And while we’re cutting these immoral subsidies for those lag-abouts and na’er-do-wells, I say we also add an excise tax on ƒparrowƒ.

I say we also add an excise tax on ƒparrowƒ.

[wingnut] Taxation destroys! If you tax sparrows, there won’t be any sparrows! [/wingnut]

[N__B] Tax pigeons! [N__B]

And while we’re cutting these immoral subsidies for those lag-abouts and na’er-do-wells, I say we also add an excise tax on ƒparrowƒ.

And the ƒtickƒ one roaƒtƒ them upon!

Check out the Daily Kos posting on Massachusett’s system where cost controls haven’t been implemented. Not shockingly, costs have gone up.

You think there’s any chance of Obama going down as the next Barry Goldwater, Woodrow Wilson or W. J. Bryan? A politician whose ideas were soundly defeated in his lifetime, but a generation later had become conventional wisdom?

And I don’t think B.O. is ahead of his time. The times demand health care reform (just as they do financial institutional reform). My point was that perhaps, just perhaps, the American public (or a meaningful subset therein) will begin to comprehend some of the more tawdry details of Republican/corporate opposition to affordable health care and respond accordingly (with a new-found sense of the screwage they are unwilling participants in).

I’m an optimist, ƒo ƒue me.

Fe Fi ƒo ƒue m

actor212 – I must have missed the memo – do new commenters always get called trolls here?

Only when they are.

Because as far as I have seen, while there is much talk about increasing access (good) there is very little talk about keeping rates down in any of the fifty thousand versions of the bill I have gotten excited about, only to be disappointed.

But you have no definitive way of knowing if, for example, MY insurance premiums will be jacked up twice as high to help cover YOUR shortfall?

My point being, there’s nothing to be gained by panicking over stuff we have no clue about. I understand your fears. I’m saying you don’t need to awfulize things.

I’m getting to the point of saying, Fuck it. Torch this steaming pile, and leave the stinking remains smeared on the Republican’s doorstep.

We’re not going to pass decent reform right now. Nah. Ganh. Ha-nnn.

Options are,
A) Let this complete capitulation to the wingtards go through, fuck things up worse, and have them use all the crap they stuck in there to fuck it up as electoral fodder against us.
B) Let them kill it and crow about it as a victory, watch as things go horribly downhill, as insurance companies fuck everyone over even worse when they feel unstoppable, and use that as electoral fodder against them.

I’m leaning heavily towards B at this point. The fuckwits from both parties have screwed this round so hard it’s irredeemable. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I know. It’s what the Republicans wanted all along, to kill the bill. Great. As the Special Man used to say, “Let em haaaaaave it.” And let em own it. A couple of more years at this rate, and not only won’t real reform be electoral poison for blue dipshits dogs, but the groundswell for it is going to turn it into a necessity.

And while we’re cutting these immoral subsidies for those lag-abouts and na’er-do-wells, I say we also add an excise tax on ƒparrowƒ.

There are no fucking ƒparrowƒ.

Moderate reforms are hurt, not helped, by support from the left. If real liberals had stood up at the beginning and declared loudly that the (actually fairly good) proposals that existed before the bill was gutted weren’t good _enough_, the administration could have claimed to be steering a middle road. Instead, lefties dutifully lined up behind a centrist position, which meant that “compromise” could only be achieved by triangulating between the centre and the far right. And, of course, as usual the right gave up nothing.

All this incompetence makes me LONG for LBJ. He may have been 15 shades of corrupt and tawdry. But we have a Civil Rights Bill that probably would have happened a decade later, if at all, if Johnson hadn’t known How To Govern. We have Medicare and we have a number of other programs that are helping American citizens forty plus years later.

I still admire and am in a certain amount of awe at President Obama and his family and their accomplishments.

But I am rapidly losing the confidence I had on November 4, 2008 that he would outplay the rabidly insane GOP.

There are no fucking ƒparrowƒ.

But there are ƒucking ƒparrowƒ

B) Let them kill it and crow about it as a victory, watch as things go horribly downhill, as insurance companies fuck everyone over even worse when they feel unstoppable, and use that as electoral fodder against them.

I’m leaning heavily towards B at this point.

No.

As Kevin Drum points out, each time universal health coverage is brought back to the table, it’s even more watered down than the version that got shot down last time.

Pass it. Now. End of discussion.

So, speaking of ƒparrowƒ, does anyone here have a good recipe? I hear they’re delicious cooked over a barrel of garbage, but I’m looking for that little extra oomph.

Also, if anyone has any tasty recipes for ratƒ, I could use those. I’m writing cookbook–Recipeƒ of the Apocalypƒe.

How did we miss this: ƒap-ƒuscking ƒparrowƒ or, as they are known in inert-toob tradition, ƒappers.

I’m writing cookbook–Recipeƒ of the Apocalypƒe.

Unfortunately, all the recipes are the same: Grab [animal]. Beat its head against a hard surface. Eat it raw.

Let them kill it and crow about it as a victory, watch as things go horribly downhill, as insurance companies fuck everyone over even worse when they feel unstoppable, and use that as electoral fodder against them.

This sounds a little like the debates around the Bush versus Gore race. “Vote third party and let the Republicans win and then fuck up so badly that….um..um…um… revolution!”

No. Let the Republicans pick at this thing (dog shit as it may be). Let them try and move it and not have a clear, unbroken field in which to do more damage. I mean, fuck, if the country really is completely doomed (and it may be) at least throw a few roadblocks in the way before crashing into failed state status. It may be a retreat, but at least it’s a fighting retreat.

/Bluto Blutarksi

T&U

Recipeƒ pour le raton

Et pour pour le ƒparrow

I lean on the “kill the bill” side because Howard Dean sez so. And there’s my argument from authority for the day.

It can pretty easily be hung on The Party of No, I’d think.

I’m leaning heavily towards B at this point.

No.

Thee! Out of my head! Forƒooth!

Just put an FAQ on the comments section that only regulars are allowed to comment without being called trolls, right?

Recipeƒ pour le raton

Ooh! Some of those actually look pretty good.

It can pretty easily be hung on The Party of No, I’d think.

Logic says you’re right. But the Dems have been unable to counter p.r. bullshit as obvious as “death panels” and “there will be rationing for the first time in the history of American bleeding with leeches” so I have my doubts about any result of killing the bill other than a narrative that “We manly Repubs taught the cowardly egghead Demonrats that they can’t pass a bill opposed by 127 percent of the American public.”

It can pretty easily be hung on The Party of No, I’d think.

A week ago, I might have agreed with you.

Just put an FAQ on the comments section

Nearly nobody in these comments has any influence over the site. You do, however, have influence over what you see and pay attention to.

Logic says you’re right. But the Dems have been unable to counter p.r. bullshit …

Agreed. Whatever the Dems do, they’re going to be blamed for it.

But I’m still not sure which option is better politically.

Sue, you say you’ve read the comments for how long now?

If you can’t work it out for yourself why you might have been mistaken for a troll….

A week ago, I might have agreed with you.

I think we pay way more attention than the general public to the wrangling, so I think there’s still an opportunity.

suecris, I think it’s more that if people aren’t familiar with you it’s tough for them to know if you’re sincere(on the internets, no less, notorious for stripping easily discernible humor and nuance from comments as soon as one hits SUBMIT), and it’s been lousy with trolls here for so long we’ve started keeping them as pets. Don’t give up. Unless you want to, of course; NO PRESSURE.

Just put an FAQ on the comments section that only regulars are allowed to comment without being called trolls, right?

“Oh an tell me just how McCain would have been worse again? Specifics please.”

Folks ’round these parts have some triggers thet y’all should know about. “Specifics please” is one of them phrases that gits folks all excited-like. Especially when y’all ask folks to explain why Mr. McCain wouldn’t have been better than that there Mr. Obama.

Jest sayin’.

Now ya know, pard.

I think we pay way more attention than the general public to the wrangling, so I think

Also I think I think I think therefore I am I am I am.

I think we pay way more attention than the general public to the wrangling

True.

so I think there’s still an opportunity

You wacky optimist you.

Y’know, maybe it’s me, but the plans of burning this bill and playing what is effectively political chicken with the aftermath isn’t really that appealing to me from an intuitive basis. Because in my admittedly short experience with the political system at play, both of justme’s options end in “use that as electoral fodder against us“.

I suppose you could take the position that since we’ll get fucked by the ramifications either way, we should retain our dignity or some shit, refuse to accept the current deal and let the whole thing burn around us, but… meh.

I think the American public would respond better to our side actually accomplishing something this year for all our efforts, even a shitty something, than show up in January with naught but our dicks in hand.

on the internets, no less, notorious for stripping

Interest, website, newsletter?

It’s sounds better in the original pig: Cogito cogito ergo cogito sum.

actor, you’re fighting pretty hard to make sure I don’t come back. I said I had been reading Sadly, No for a couple of years. Not the comments. I can’t see what I said that is so different than Brad’s original article. Is it just that real people, who really don’t have jobs or insurance, shouldn’t come on here and mess up the theoretical discussion?

Jerks and a-holes.

suecris – and if you’re lucky, the Dragon King will ride in on your mother. Or upon your mother. Or something like that.

Looch, I’m not the one who said that about McCain. It’s really just that if you all don’t recognize someone, they should leave.

Sue, that’s just not true. ALL of us started out as newbies.

Look, you spoke your peace, and that’s fine.

I asked you a question and you immediately took it as an attack (which, by the way, lends credence to the possibilty that you are trolling).

Also, I understand that sparrow cooked over tire rubber is delish. Like cokking over wood chips, but for the vagrant set.

ALL of us started out as newbies.

Not true. Substance McG sprang full-grown from the forehead of Hera some dude named Bubba.

Looch, I’m not the one who said that about McCain. It’s really just that if you all don’t recognize someone, they should leave.

My bad. My apologies for the mis-attribution.

Y’know, maybe it’s me, but the plans of burning this bill and playing what is effectively political chicken with the aftermath isn’t really that appealing to me from an intuitive basis.

There’s already a large game of political chicken being played. If you pass a bill with a marginal outcome, people still have the chance to look around at the economic wasteland around them and say “What the fuck was all that shit about again?”

A bunch of hue and cry over nothing and claimed as a triumph is gonna go down poorly.

Substance McG sprang full-grown from the forehead of Hera some dude named Bubba.

Freaks of nature don’t count.

Looch, I’m not the one who said that about McCain. It’s really just that if you all don’t recognize someone, they should leave.

Cheeeeell, Winstahn. Maybe you should take some time to get to know the culture of a place, is all. Surely being accused of trolling isn’t the worst thing EVAR, especially if you’re not actually a troll?

Also, there’s a lot of of us that think Brad’s articles this past… oh, two years, are overwrought concern troll crap itself, so comparing yourself to them is… not very good if you want to distinguish yourself.

Surely being accused of trolling isn’t the worst thing EVAR, especially if you’re not actually a troll?

As long as you’re not accused of trolling a playground. Like happened to the mother of someone I could name.

So now it looks like Ben Nelson is about to kill the bill all by himself.

Let’s hear it for representative democracy, where one asshole can hold an entire nation hostage. And people wonder where I got my nom de blog.

As Kevin Drum points out, each time universal health coverage is brought back to the table, it’s even more watered down than the version that got shot down last time.

Then Kevin Drum is wrong. Either this steaming pile of crap is worth passing because it’s way more progressive than the ’94 proposals OR each time HCR is proposed it gets worse. Can’t be both.

“I’m sorry….have specifics of the bill been released that you KNOW this to be true, or are you just trolling?”

To support his rhetoric for a minute, isn’t the “mandate” basically forcing everyone to pay into the health insurance companies for “coverage”? And who exactly will decide what a “reasonable” rate is? It may be reasonable for an upper middle, it may be hard for a middle class, it may even be possible for a time for lower middles, but everyone else is fucked.

Unless of course there is some kind of subsidy for providing financing for those determined unable to pay. How, may I ask, is that “subsidy” different from today’s Medicaid?

Which brings me back again to the question, Who decides what a reasonable rate is? Who gets to decide what “affordable” means?

Its the same Republican trap again — dice and slice the poor into little pieces of deserving and undeserving. Have them fight amongst eachother for the crumbs — report their neighbors for non-compliance to arbitrary standards, tune into wingnut teevee to see how “you don’t get none ’cause that welfare whore down the street done got it all” and the game is set for another thirty years, only this time, clearly over healthcare.

And its all the Democrat’s fault anyway so goes the script.

The Democrat Congresscritters aren’t stupid, c’mon people! They are motivated — motivated by extortion from the corporate lobbyists who I’m sure say regularly, “You wanna get elected next term? You wanna keep yourself out of the National Enquirer?”

I mean really, do you think Obama cannot help but hate himself when he is forced to have these silly “meetings” with leading bankers wherein he “asks” them to play nice and reciprocate to the taxpayers who saved their lives last year?

Really? The man has to hate his own image or he’s as callow as the rest of them.

Good God, Ben Nelson is an asshole.

And Sue, everyone has days when they draw fire (or feel like they are). Some of us (like morons who mis-attribute quotes) have to regroup for the next day after being particularly inane hereabouts. For the most part, people aren’t all that bitey unless you bring it on yourself.

As Tig said: NO PRESSURE.

So now it looks like Ben Nelson is about to kill the bill all by himself.

And Senator Droopy Dog is piƒƒed.

That zombie guy is pretty bitey no matter what.

Good God, Ben Nelson is an asshole.

Joe Lieberman with worse hair and a different portion of the bible clutched to his chest.

DAMN YOU LOOCH! DAMN YOU TO HEƒƒ!

Unless of course there is some kind of subsidy for providing financing for those determined unable to pay. How, may I ask, is that “subsidy” different from today’s Medicaid?

Medicaid is extended to anyone who is below 133% of the poverty line. They subsidize based on a sliding scale up to, I think, 400% of the poverty line. Everyone has to have a plan that is at least 2-8% of his/her yearly income. I think there’s some sort of mechanism for forgiveness if the only plans available exceed 8% of your yearly income, but I’m unclear about that.

That’s really not so bad, except that the *quality* of insurance that people are going to have to buy sucks a big fucking fat one.

Good God, Ben Nelson is an aƒƒhole.

Fiƒƒed!

So now it looks like Ben Nelson is about to kill the bill all by himself.

Fucking awesome! So repro rights are going to be gutted or the bill is going to go down in flames and pro-choice activists are going to be blamed! It gets better and better all the time, bitcheƒ.

I think the American public would respond better to our side actually accomplishing something this year for all our efforts, even a shitty something

Not so much if the shitty something involves a mandate to buy private insurance from an industry that still has no regulation, and no price caps, and mere lip service to recission and pre-existing conditions and, and, and. That’s not letting the foxes guard the henhouse. That’s just shoveling the hens into the fox den.

If you don’t see that as a disaster, both politically and actually, look again.

As to my opinion being akin to Naderites ca. 2k, nope. The difference here is, there isn’t a “good” to support. It’s not letting the perfect be the enemy of the good. It’s saying keep the fucked up status quo, briefly, until something that isn’t a complete fucking disaster can be put through. It’s letting the bad be the enemy of the truly awful. They have succeeded in fucking this bill up to the point where this motherfucker, who has a seriously vested interest in healthcare reform, can’t support it.

Everyone has to have a plan that is at least 2-8% of his/her yearly income.

Interesting numbers. I pay ~$650/month for my single employees. If they paid that out of pocket it would be 7 to 14% of their incomes. Our plan is pretty good, not great, but apparently it’s considered to be a Cadillac plan or some such nonsense.

“That’s really not so bad, except that the *quality* of insurance that people are going to have to buy sucks a big fucking fat one.”

Indeed. I was on Medicaid for a short period when my kids were little. Thanks to medicaid, my daughter had her first eye test and herpoor performance in school was found to be caused by very poor eyesight and a need for glasses. Medicaid covers vision for children and dental as well. My kids had their first dental checkups that first year I got on. I could not afford that when I worked fulltime and paid into a corporate plan.

Also, my son had a hernia operation (at ten years old) that he desperately needed, but was denied by the corporate health insurance plan I paid into when I was working.

In fact, the deductibles for the “plan” that I was able to afford at that time were so high that I effectively never used the insurance anyway. I had to pay out of pocket for the yearly checkups for the kids and I just didn’t bother with myself because I needed the money for living expenses. I felt like I paid for nothing but emergency protection, which only paid 80% so I would have been screwed anyway.

I absolutely agree with you on that assertion, if health insurance that people will have to pay into is anything like the present private plans, we’re fucked all over and as usual, your fuckedness will largely depend on how much you lack in financial largesse.

Cheeeeell, Winstahn. Maybe you should take some time to get to know the culture of a place, is all. Surely being accused of trolling isn’t the worst thing EVAR, especially if you’re not actually a troll?

If you just say POOP a lot and toss in a few PENIS links, you’ll fit right in in no time.

$650/month… 7 to 14% of their incomes.

Are you hiring?

Are you hiring?

Just did. It’ll be a year before we do again.

I’m trying to help with the economy, but somehow my 6-person company doesn’t have as much effect as, say, BoA. But then again, I don’t get paid like the BoA CEO, so I guess it evens out.

ƒince I can’t find a place in my ƒig for ƒ…

“and it’s been lousy with trolls here for so long we’ve started keeping them as pets”

Yummy! ƒparrows + ratƒ + trollƒ = goulaƒh. Cook at whatever temperature those oil drumƒ can attain for fifteen minuteƒ. Win!

dOur plan is pretty good, not great, but apparently it’s considered to be a Cadillac plan or some such nonsense.

Oh, ooh! You’ll get to pay excise taxes!

I absolutely agree with you on that assertion, if health insurance that people will have to pay into is anything like the present private plans, we’re fucked all over and as usual, your fuckedness will largely depend on how much you lack in financial largesse.

The only requirement for the plans that people are asked to purchase in terms of quality is that it has to cover 60% of medical costs “on average” for a “representative number of enrollees.”

You’ll get to pay excise taxes!

I’m athrob with excitement.

60 fucking percent?

Kill that bitch.

There’s that one scene in the “Sin City” movie where the protagonist gets That Yellow Bastard down and starts hitting him in the face until “after a while all I’m doing is punching wet chips of bone into the floorboards.”

That’s pretty much what I want to do to a shitload of Senators.

I’m athrob with excitement.

I expect your highly interesting newsletter to be broadcast.

I expect your highly interesting newsletter to be broadcast.

The bible says I’m not supposed to spill my seed in the æther.

The bible says I’m not supposed to spill my seed in the æther.

If Onan had juƒt fucked his ƒister-in-law…

The only requirement for the plans that people are asked to purchase in terms of quality is that it has to cover 60% of medical costs “on average” for a “representative number of enrollees.”

Which is actually about ten percent lower than private insurance is supposed to pay, from what I recall. I haven’t worked insurance assessment for a long time.

“Are you hiring?”

I assume you mean, N__B that you pay $650/month for a certain number of employees’ coverage each month? Or are you saying that you are making your company co-pay of $650 per non married employee per month?

And that $650 averages to about 7 to 14% of each of the monthly incomes?

Because if you are, I want to know what the hell they are doing for you because I’ll do better for half that. I’m sure.

If Onan had juƒt fucked his ƒister-in-law

Variations on a theme:

If Onan had just fucked his sister-in-law (boringly literal)
If Onan had just fucked his fister-in-law (that is, presumably, someone who’s fisting the person fisting you)
If Onan had just sucked his sister-in-law (the TV-movie version)
If Onan had just sucked his fister-in-law (my personal favorite)

If Onan had juƒt fucked his ƒister-in-law…

He did, but apparently God really hates a mess.

are you saying that you are making your company co-pay of $650 per non married employee per month?

My company carries the cost of everyone’s insurance. Because (1) I wanted it for myself and because (2) I like to not feeling like I’m taking advantage of the people I see 40 hours per week and whom I would not have hired if I did not think they were decent people.

And that $650 averages to about 7 to 14% of each of the monthly incomes?

Because if you are, I want to know what the hell they are doing for you because I’ll do better for half that. I’m sure.

Structural engineers in varying degrees of licensure.

Tag fail. The third and fourth lines should be italicized and would be if I weren’t trying so hard at the moment to not write a report.

Structural engineers in varying degrees of licensure.

I hope that doesn’t include “apprentices”. If it does, can you let me know what buildings they’ve apprenticed on, so I can walk more carefully around them?

Which is actually about ten percent lower than private insurance is supposed to pay, from what I recall. I haven’t worked insurance assessment for a long time.

From what I understand, the “gold plans” cover about 70-100% of insurance costs. It’s definitely not ideal.

I would like to point out, btw, that the “Cadillac Plans” that are going to be taxed are mostly plans that government employees and people in unions have. Pretty sure this is a feature, not a bug.

“If Onan had just sucked his fister-in-law” is my favorite, too.

At least the teabaggers got out in the streets, and in the faces of elected officials, which is more than I can say for us progressives..

I was too busy making excuses for the piece of shit in the white house to realize just how horrible he was on every single issue.

The failure of health care reform is his and his alone. It’s not the Republicans’ fault, it’s not Lieberman’s fault. It’s all on B-Plus Barack. He’s so busy being the toast of the town in Copenhagen, polishing his Nobel, being a rock star, that he’s fucked the only hope of health care reform in the US that I’ll see in my lifetime.

So now I’ll have to spend the dozen years until I’m eligible for medicare paying private insurance companies for the right to beg them to let me and my family stay alive. And since Obama’s’ squandered the only chance to save Medicare, which is projected to go broke about the time I become eligible, I’ll be shit out of luck there, too.

We knew what George Bush was all along, but there’s a special place in hell for what Barack Obama has done.

I hope that doesn’t include “apprentices”. If it does, can you let me know what buildings they’ve apprenticed on, so I can walk more carefully around them?

You and my father. My advice to him when I was an “apprentice”: live dangerously.

My advice to him when I was an “apprentice”: live dangerously

I don’t wipe the tops of the soda cans I get from the hot dog vendor! How much more dangerously did you need me to live, you corporate plunderer????

Oh, I apologize. I am a liar! The CBO report says 70%.

I don’t wipe the tops of the soda cans I get from the hot dog vendor! How much more dangerously did you need me to live, you corporate plunderer????

Do you buy *hot dogs* from the hot dog vendor? ‘Cause that’s pretty damned dangerouƒ.

Oh, I apologize. I am a liar!

Preparing for your entry into national politics?

‘Cause that’s pretty damned dangerouƒ.

My middle name is Dænger

Oh, I apologize. I am a liar!
Preparing for your entry into national politics?

No no no!

“Mistakes were made”

“My staff dropped the ball”

“I deny the substance of the allegations”

“I deny the substance gravitas of the allegations”

Fiqqƒt.

No no no!

“I deny the substance of the allegations”

Exactly. I am far, far, FAAAAAAAR too willing to take blame. I take blame for shit that’s not even my fault.

I am, however, very good at kissing babies.

Let Ben Nelson kill it. Then blame him and Lieberman and the GOP for denying coverage to millions of Americans, blah blah blah.

Then start over and try to come up with a bill (or several smaller bills) that doesn’t allow the insurance companies to tax the living crap out of middle-and lower-class Americans.

BREAKING NOOZE! AROO! AROO!

At long last, the GOP returns to its roots!

“Coming Up on FOX NEWS: Obama said to be on the brink of declaring fluoride a vitamin, as America turns to a traditional patriotic coalition to counter this creeping crypto-Trotskyite menace … right after this very important message from McDonald’s!”

Aector, you left out “Known Unknowns,” “I Am NOT A Crook,” “I Did Not Have Sexual Relations With That Woman,” and of course, who can forget the former Vice-President’s immortal “Fuck You.”

Never start by shifting the blame. Always go for outright denial or, if that’s not appropriate, direct assault.

Chris,

As old as I am, I could have written a book. 🙂

“I am not a crook”

“We are winning in Viet Nam”

“When I returned, Mary Jo and the car were gone”

That’s right, I forgot. I’m only 22, too young to remember much before George W. Bush. I can only imagine what watching Iraq unfold must have been like after having already seen Vietnam – at least one older family member has said they were identical.

And if I have to watch this health care routine flash by four or five more times in my lifetime with the same results… bleargh!

PopeRatzo said,
“We knew what George Bush was all along, but there’s a special place in hell for what Barack Obama has done.”

I agree. I completely expect to get fucked by the republicans so I try to watch and protect my ass when they’re in power. I never expect to get fucked by the Democrats so they always catch me unprepared when they fuck me.

Having said that, I’m kind of sorry I wasn’t around when things like progressive taxation, a powerful union movement, the notion that government could be an agent of positive change, and the rest of the New Deal legacy were part of the normal political landscape. Rest in peace, America 1932-1980.

Rest in peace, America 1932-1980

*placing hat over heart*

I’m kind of sorry I wasn’t around when things like progressive taxation, a powerful union movement, the notion that government could be an agent of positive change, and the rest of the New Deal legacy were part of the normal political landscape. Rest in peace, America 1932-1980.

Me, too. But, hey, we have the awesome opportunity of dealing with climate change, record numbers of injured soldiers coming back from TWO wars, a crumbling entitlement system, and the decline of America as an economic superpower. At least we won’t ever be bored!

”’*placing hat over heart*”’

*Playing Amazing Grace on Scottish bagpipes, which not to go too far off point but that is the classiest possible way to go*

We’ll show Nelson. We’ll just boycott tourism to his state and … um, never mind.

We’ll show Nelson

The S/N Cow Tipping Strike Force!

Bookmark it, libs!

The S/N Cow Tipping Strike Force!

Why don’t we just leave the cows nothing and make ’em mad?

http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/12/17/health-care-and-iraq/

“The Shrill One” weighs in some more, eloquently so in my opinion.

Another perspective on how the WH got their negotiation strategery backwards.

http://nomoremister.blogspot.com/2009/12/negotiation-101.html

A lot of this.

Why don’t we just leave the cows nothing and make ‘em mad?

Can’t. I’m subject to the Former Service Industry Employee Kode of Karma.

“representative number of enrollees.”

Which, of course, has nothing to do with representing actual enrollees, just the number. Hmmmm. Are those cherries?

Okay, so after reading the “pass it or kill it” debate here and elsewhere, I’ve come to the conclusion that it doesn’t matter. If the bill dies, the Dems are obviously fucked. If the bill lives, the right-wing spin machine will ensure that the Dems are still fucked. And our health care system will continue to deteriorate either way. At this point, the only sane course is damage control. How do we prevent this debacle from putting the crazies back in power?

“Okay, so after reading the “pass it or kill it” debate here and elsewhere, I’ve come to the conclusion that it doesn’t matter. If the bill dies, the Dems are obviously fucked. If the bill lives, the right-wing spin machine will ensure that the Dems are still fucked. And our health care system will continue to deteriorate either way. At this point, the only sane course is damage control. How do we prevent this debacle from putting the crazies back in power?”

Man’s got himself a good point…

I don’t suppose my plan notion that liberals could simply write the public option back in, shove it through by nuclear option/reconciliation/what ever it’s called when you get around the filibuster, and tell Lieberman and his Republican friends to choke on it?

Why don’t we just leave the cows nothing and make ‘em mad?

I plan to explain to the cows that I’ve given their fifteen percent to a disadvantaged goat.

I don’t suppose my plan notion that liberals could simply write the public option back in, shove it through by nuclear option/reconciliation/what ever it’s called when you get around the filibuster, and tell Lieberman and his Republican friends to choke on it?

If only. That would be change I could believe in.

As far as

How do we prevent this debacle from putting the crazies back in power?

goes, all I can see is to let the thing fail, and hold the failure up against the ones what killt it. I mean, seriously, how many poison pills is it going to take before we refuse to swallow?

Are those cherries?

I don’t know, but they sure taste like ass.

At this point, the only sane course is damage control. How do we prevent this debacle from putting the crazies back in power?

That’s pretty much the reason why I keep going back and forth. Either way, we’re pretty much fucked.

If the bill dies, the Dems are obviously fucked. If the bill lives, the right-wing spin machine will ensure that the Dems are still fucked.

The thing is, if the bill lives (and is not dramatically improved), the Dems actually will be fucked. So will most everyone else.

The right-wing spin machine won’t have to do much of anything. As the realization sinks in among millions of Americans that the government is going to MAKE them give a large percentage of their income to BCBS, and there is no alternative, there are going to be howls of rage, and not just from crazy teabaggers.

I’d like to be wrong about this . . .

Chris Parmly said,
“I don’t suppose my plan notion that liberals could simply write the public option back in, shove it through by nuclear option/reconciliation/what ever it’s called when you get around the filibuster, and tell Lieberman and his Republican friends to choke on it?”

That’s what they should have done from the beginning. The republicans were gonna bitch and whine about anything that Obama did, so he should have realized this and ignored what they wanted. Not a single republican senator will vote for this bill, so why cater to them?

Mr. Krugman says: “some of the arguments here annoy me — in particular the line I’ve been hearing from some quarters that progressives who say we should hold our noses and pass the flawed Senate bill are just like the “liberal hawks” who supported the Iraq war.”,/i>

(And I LIKE Paul Krugman)

Chris:

AHEM!

I say my arse is bleeding again.

Some people will benefit from the bill, and that’s not a trivial matter. We’re not sociopaths (that’s what sets us apart from the opposition), and if we can save lives here, then that’s something we should try to do. On the other hand, though, “will this save someone’s life?” isn’t a good enough criterion to make decisions off of. We can all think of lots of policies which would save some lives with horrendous costs to others that we would never dream of accepting. We’d never accept bombing a nation to the ground to promote women’s rights, or killing a million people to remove one dictator. There must be a calculus here. Some people would benefit from the Senate bill. Some people would be worse off. It’s by no means an open-and-shut case that the bill in its current form is a net positive or net negative. Personally, given the way it entrenches private for-profit insurance companies and mandates that Americans buy from them with very inadequate regulation and cost controls, I think it does more harm overall to our society than good, and would vote to kill it. The best option I think would be to strip it down to the bare bones, give up on comprehensive health care reform (which we’ve basically already done), and just pass the insurance reforms like banning denial due to preexisting conditions and so forth, no mandate.

Basically, what Howard Dean said.

(And I LIKE Paul Krugman)

Most here do, myself included. Doesn’t innoculate him from being a target when he’s rwnog.

Maybe hopes of improving the new health care system over time, the way Social Security has been improved, will prove to have been fantasies

No maybe about it. There’s a helluva lot of room for improvement in the Senate bill, but every single thing you could do to make it better has already been shot down. The only thing that could be done to the Senate bill, without requiring a re-do of the past six months, is making the subsidies better. That’s it. And it’s much more likely that those subsidies will shrink instead of grow.

There’s no meaningful strong base from which to build upon. It’s a morass of hundred if not thousands of tiny regulatory things- small incremental changes that could just as well be phased in over time or enacted through reconcilliation. And the weak-ass subsidies with a giant bullseye painted right on them. Fucking great.

But you’re the Nobel laureate economist, why don’t you give me an example of how this bullshit fucking garbage can be improved down the road. Some aspect of this behemoth that could be expanded and would provide some sort of benefit to anyone other than insurance companies.

Please pretend that I closed the blockquote properly. It’s already awkward enough yelling at someone who understands the situation much better than I.

Yeah, I know what he means – that’s how I feel when I hear that line about how people who oppose the latest crappy version of the bill are just like the Naderites.

Since I have been one of those people that hinted at that “line” let me (please) step back from that a bit as the comparison does not do justice to reasonable objections to the bill and its contents. Hell, the reasons I think it should be passed are easily rebutted, I just believe that something, anything passed at this time is better than starting from scratch again, if for no other reason than the political optics (rather thin reasoning, yes, but it’s thin gruel to work with). Just maybe (with lots of pleasepleaseplease ƒpag grant us this wish kind of begging) improvements could be made down the road. I think nothing passing means the issue dies for years. Both options ƒuck, one, perhaps a little less than the other.

How’s that for tightly reasoned analysis?

Is the seventeenth-century long S now a requirement here?

Is the seventeenth-century long S now a requirement here?

Yef.

ƒure iƒ.

If you’re gonna make it mandatory, you could at leaƒt do it right. Here are the rules:

1) Lowercaƒe only. Capital s is ƒtill “S”.
2) You ƒtill need to uƒe a regular or “ƒhort” s at the end of a word (“ƒocks”), before an f (“ƒatisfaction”), or after another s (“paƒsing”).

You know who ELSE insisted people follow the rules?

You know who ELSE insisted people follow the rules?

Someone’s mother.

Thiƒ whole thing is pretty much juƒt piƒƒing me off oƒƒ.

It’s not about the “perfect” being the enemy of the “good”. It’s actually more like the “barely adequate and still mostly objectionable” being the enemy of the “Worse off than we already are”.

Why can’t the Democrats just open up Medicare to everybody? It would be easy to understand, easy to implement, and hard to attack. And with young, healthy people paying into Medicare its reimbursement level could go up to match what private insurance pays to doctors and hospitals. To me, it sounds like there’s no downside to doing that.

I’m a daily reader, but not a commenter.

But I have to say, my dad hasn’t had health insurance in over a decade. My brother hurt his ankle awhile back and borrowed crutches instead of going to a doctor. My unemployed friend was agonizing a month ago over whether to go to a doctor for a possible eye infection, or go to a doctor for a possible ear infection, because he couldn’t afford both.

Pass the bill. You have to start somewhere. Social security sucked too when it was first passed. Pass the bill and build on it, and give the people I just mentioned a fighting chance.

Any insurance is better than none at all. And right now, those people can afford none. If the subsidies are too low, they can be increased. Just pass a bill.

There is zero chance this gets defeated and comes back stronger. If it gets defeated, our cowardly Congress won’t touch it for another decade, and we frankly don’t have that long to wait.

Oh, and fuck Joe Lieberman. Because that can never be said enough. But don’t make my family and friends pay because he’s an asshole.

How is it that the discussion isn’t about the money the US pays for health care? The bills being discussed and graded by the CBO fail to change any significant costs. We’ll still be paying at least 40% more (Switzerland) and as much as 4 times more (Japan) than any other industrialized country for the benefit of being looted by insurance companies, pharmaceutical companies, hospital chains and doctors.
Pass the bill and get to work improving the people who can pass better bills down the road. If we don’t start on the road to single payer, we’ll never get there.