It’s August recess and the members are home in their districts "listening’to contituents. Check out our new calendar in the Campaign Silo sidebar to find events in your district and go talk to your members. 14 down…26 to go. Whip it! Took the Pledge Only With "Robust" PP Weasel Words "Open to Anything" Emanuel Cleaver [...]

Hoyer fought hard to make sure the Blue Dogs got everything they want in the situation. What happened to Tim Bishop (above) and Lloyd Doggett today, and to Frank Kratovil last week, is going to happen over and over again as the well paid thuggery of Dick Armey and David Koch gets visited on the Democratic caucus, courtesy of their Blue Dog bretheren. Made possible by Steny Hoyer.

Welcome to the Steny Shows.

It isn’t the only Blue Dog strategy by any means, but it is a strategy. Single Payer advocates would still have to whip for the rest of the votes. It wouldn’t be an easy job by any means. Ideally you come into Committee ready to deal, knowing what everyone else wants and what you want and where you can make alliances in order to get that. It wouldn’t be pretty and unholy hell would break lose, but if the 676 cosponsors like Jared Polis and Jan Schakowsky are really committed to the idea of passing Single Payer, they ought to be willing to take it on.

Trying to tell a story without a villain was a really stupid idea to begin with. Hard to believe the Democratic health care campaign has been running since last year and people just figured that out. The orders coming out of the White House to all the liberal groups were not to run ads against the insurance industry (they’re the new banks I guess), and also not to target Democrats. Ads were supposed to be focused on Republicans, because — and I shit you not — this was supposed to make Democrats feel better about voting for a public plan.

We’re going to be looking for how successfully HCAN achieves its objectives and running a tally of how many commitments they get this August in our sidebar, with millions of dollars at their disposal.

If people in their districts don’t start screaming and demanding that they stand up, we’re looking at a health care bill with “co-ops” that will be nothing but a bail out of the insurance industry.

In an interview with Time Magazine, Karen Tumulty pushes Obama to be specific about what his health care goals are.  Obama says that when he sketched out his health care principles to Congress, "we talked about the need for a public option as part of that health-care exchange." TUMULTY:  Although you didn’t define what a [...]

Mazie Hirono (D-HI) If you want to know why members of Congress don’t want to take the Pledge to vote down a bill that doesn’t have a strong public plan, Mazie Hirono finally says it out loud: Ultimately, Hirono said she was a progressive who firmly believes in the public option, but that she was [...]

It’s August, and that means members of Congress are back home in their districts. State bloggers, we need your help! State blogs have had a huge impact in our whip count efforts. Representatives really, really care what the people in their back yards are saying. I can tell you that state blogs like Left Wing [...]

Two GOP Congresscritters — one from Illinois and one from Utah — are conducting online polls on their House of Representatives websites right now, asking your views on health care reform. Why not vote right now?