Damn shazam. You folks are amazing. Rahm will have a direct link

This is phenomenal.

Truly amazing. You’re the best!

Rahm will have a direct link

I think Rahm’s a lost cause.

He failed President Obama. He failed the Democratic Party. He failed the American people.

Time for Rahm to update his resume.

What’s up there now is just the start; we’ll add more today and throughout the remainder of this fight.

does “this fight” refer solely to current legislative battle, or the long term fight for universal healthcare in general?

Failed Obama? I think he’s a great friend and ally to Obama. It’s Obama who’s failing us.

War room is a great idea. Got it bookmarked.

Thanks everyone. Glad you think it’s useful.

hi michael, any answer for my Q @6? the reason i asked is that there is no mention of any policy or politics re universal healthcare, and i guess i thought that there might be an argument for that if the war room was only for the current legislative battle but not if the war room fight was supposed to be the long term fight for universal healthcare.

FDL will stick on health care beyond this bill, because it is in no way real reform. We’re going to be active in the fight for true reform, no question.

And this War Room model will be adapted for health care’s continued fight, and for other battles FDL picks as well.

thanks. then i will wait and look forward to inclusion of single payer news, actions, etc after the current legislative fight.

Yep, Thanks.

I love it!

Absolutely fantastic!
Now bookmarked in my Top 10.

Kay Bailey Hutchinson, “Tenther” and Constitutional expert, now bloviating on the floor.

Especially like the Whip Count portion. I’d like to read updates and any information that you can get from the Progressive Caucus about its own whip counts…not that they’d tell you, I guess, but one could hope.

Except for the reconciliation part, its great. The Senate is constituted as a nondemocratic body. The filibuster allows for 41 senators representing the 21 most populous states, a majority of Americans, to stop initiatives put forth by the 29 least popular states, a minority of Americans. That is a democratic fix to a nondemocratic body. The key value is not in the number of Senators, rather the number of persons living in the states the Senators represent.

Reconciliation means that it is possible for Senators representing the 25 least populous states, again a minority of Americans, to overrule senators from 25 of the most populous states, a majority of Americans.

Do not make the mistake of analyzing a nondemocratic body with tools used to evaluate a democratic body, because they do not work accurately, and avoid trying to change the rules to get over a hump without honestly contemplating the side effects of such a choice.

tip of the spear.

beautiful! one-stop linking at the very best. way to roll the fight out!

and that Reconcilitation = Majority Rule bite is certainly an eye-opener! whether it is democratic or not. totally ignoring polls is also undemocratic.

You lost me. It’s also true 41 Senators representing the 21 least populous states could block an overwhelming popular majority in the 29 most populous states. How is that a “democratic fix to a nondemocratic body”?

THis is helpful, but you all also need to gather all the health care reform posts together in one tab, sorted by writer and/or particular aspects of the debate over these last several months. It’s all well and good to organize the action docs, but we also need to organize the analyses that stand behind them.

Blessings,

Fair enough. So either Obama wakes up, accepts Rahm’s resignation, and says some nice bullshit about him as he shows him the exit, or Obama’s a one-term president.

You lost me. It’s also true 41 Senators representing the 21 least populous states could block an overwhelming popular majority in the 29 most populous states. How is that a “democratic fix to a nondemocratic body”?

Because it also allows 41 Senators from the most populous states to block measures by the 59 Senators from the least populous states. The answer is to constitute a democratic body, any fixes are half measures, but half measures can tip the balance unless carefully thought through.

Situational approaches to structural reform are very bad ideas in general.

and that Reconcilitation = Majority Rule bite is certainly an eye-opener! whether it is democratic or not. totally ignoring polls is also undemocratic.

If Congress were democratic and accountable instead of Democrat and corporate owned, this would not be an issue. But it is a warped institution that does not lend itself to straightforward solutions.

We could just as soon see reconciliation empower small states to screw the majority of Americans, and we know that is not democratic.

just contributed some coin,

if you writing words of support make them real and send ‘em some $$$ NOW

Grrrrreat idea! May I also suggest a voters war room identifying the most progressive candidate for house or senate seats. This will help me vote correctly in primaries and general elections. I am done voting for just the democrat. Keep up the grrreat work FDL. Jane Hamsher for President!!!

Excellent news.

A number of items should a bill pass:

Updates on promulgation of regulations to implement the bill

Analysis of the impact of regulations and position statements about comments on the regulations

Link to HHS regulation comment site (if any)

—-

2010 election.

Candidate endorsement, ActBlue pages, and ways to hold incumbents accountable (especially those who received funds from ActBlue).

Election strategy for phone banks and other field work.

Doesn’t Walk the Talk hit list, ConservaDem hit list, and Republican hit list

We are going to be able to build a broad coalition that will bring substantial numbers together to oppose this turd.

There is little else we agree on broadly on health care at this time.

What we do agree on, however, is that Wall Street should not own and run the government and two party facades.

That should be the primary point of productive unity after we prove that we can kill this turd together.

If left and right can form a populist coalition to kill the corporate welfare health insurance turd, then that might form the basis to work together to extirpate Wall Street.

After working together on that, there might be common ground identified where we can have a conversation about health care that is not mediated by BillO or KeithO’s appeal to the caricatures of the most absurd extremists.

This is great,

Expose the the bill and turncoats who sign it!

David Dayen has a fresh cross-post already in progress: “Obama Campaigned On Lots Of Things Not Reflected In Health Care Bills”

It’s about time.

Listen, what Jane and the others have done to date has been nothing short of amazing. But it’s pretty clear that the race is nearly run. I just don’t see the conference going on for very long or over any differences of policy; maybe some tinkering with the revenue sources. The longer it’s out there, the greater the chance of it being picked apart. There’s also the Stupak problem, which the Senate bill sort-of sidesteps.

Given where we are, I’d like to see some short-term, obvious benefits that the idiot Dems can actually campaign on, to answer the question, “What have you done for me lately?” But beyond that, you can stick a fork in it.
Wrap it up in time for the SOTU, get it enacted, and let’s start primarying those Blue Dogs!

Meanwhile, Jane, and with total respect and admiration, I think you risk coming off as a little strident in print. You’re a knockout on TV–calm, charming, etc. But “kill the bill” I think is starting to push good people away. Even Grijalva’s on board.

I’ll be interested to see the storm of invective that this generates. It’s why I lurked for about 5 years.

PS–JOB ONE for next year HAS TO BE killing or crippling the filibuster. It is that “upon which all else chiefly depends,” to quote Abe.

One more thing–one benefit of Nelson’s having so publicly extracted a price for his vote is that if he reneges now, Nebraska loses its windfall, as to which his loyal Cornhusker constituents might be a tad pissed. Same goes for Landrieu.

Mike, there should be a button on the site that takes you to the war room. Either on the front page or on the FDl action page or both. So folks don’t have to bookmark to find it

This is fantastic!

Yes, Rham will read and then call Jane to the White House for a little one on one. Then……

One more thing–one benefit of Nelson’s having so publicly extracted a price for his vote is that if he reneges now, Nebraska loses its windfall, as to which his loyal Cornhusker constituents might be a tad pissed. Same goes for Landrieu.

Had there been honesty in the Medicare cuts and how the expansion of Medicaid will be financed in the states, there wouldn’t need to be these $1/3b goodie bags dropped all over the place.

“Don’t want to vote for this turd? Then your state will get fucked with Medicaid expansion and you’ll be on your own. But for $300m, perhaps we could work something out?”

“Letter to a Sincere Leftist”

http://www.jewishworldreview.com/1209/tracinski122309.php3

If this is a central point for action, I think it would behoove FDL to put a link in the right hand column or on the top of the page. Don’t make people who come to this site a few days from now go back through old articles just to find it and bookmark it.

Excellent initiative. It’s going to be interesting to see how this evolves.

It’s known as earning votes the old-fashioned way–BUYING them.

Dear Jane:
Now this is a start, getting the structure in place now may very well pay big dividends in the next six months. Most people are not going to feel this at first, it will seem like a lagging indicator but when it hits there is going to be a loud thud heard in D.C. That will be the American people waking up and realizing what has happened. If nothing else its going to be fun to watch.

I hail Jane going to FAUX news. I would NEVER watch Faux news, but that’s another story. We all know Rahm is fixeted on Faux views, so it was a good move. Also I like the idea of attacking him on all fronts as my understanding is that he is undermining all our prerogatives.

I dont know if it would resonate in the media, but I think an interesting way to brand the argument against taxing union healthcare plans is to acknowledge the power of the corporations (and if you really want to go for it the logical followup about the rich likely remaining rich). Something like this:

“Well you know Keith, its an interesting idea in the Senate bill to tax the union plans. My problem really has to do with being comfortable that the funding for healthcare will be there in the future. We have seen since the 70s that the corporations have been so strong, that the number of unions has been steadily declining. And we are going to have more people that need healthcare, not less, as time goes on Keith. So I just cant support getting the funding from a source that gets smaller, as the nations need gets bigger.”

This is Goddamn Outstanding, soldier!

Great! We’re going to need this war room…

Does “this fight” refer solely to current legislative battle, or the long term fight for universal healthcare in general? [edited by moderator to remove characters which could be misinterpreted as html]

One thing I would suggest as we "move forward" in the "fight" is to re-examine and perhaps find new ways to express and frame "universal healthcare." I say this because a few years ago I watched as this phrase was used successfully to market the Mass plan and was picked up in the 2008 Dem primaries. The media and politicos bought it to mean something loosely akin to non-commercial single payer (or allowed the public to get that impression by using the term "provide" rather than "required to buy" in a mini-coup of disingenuousness Obama still repeats), whereas in fact the phrase meant mandated for-profit commercial health insurance that all had to buy, with likely ever-increasing premiums, copays and deductibles without caps and without significant consumer protections which are hard to enforce anyway, exactly what we just passed in the Senate and exactly what is likely to give progressivism a bad name as Jon Walker reminded us so poignantly on another page here today. It's only language but it's potent since many people got a mistaken impression of what "universal healthcare" really meant and even to this day might not realize what's about to smack them in the face in 2014 after Obama's supposed re-election. Adding to confusion, GOPers kept calling it a "government takeover of healthcare" which didn't sound like the corporate product we have created. I wonder sometimes if the private health insurance insustry used the phrase "universal healthcare" intentionally to capture (in marketing terms) the emotional ("universal") core of the healthcare policy fight, steal its central premise of universal coverage (which used to signify single payer in places like CA where we passed an SP bill twice) but sneak in a new central idea of the public Treasury subsidizing private insurance premiums "to make them affordable" without letting much debate ensue as to mandate windfall profits going to Wall Street rather than help cover uninsured margins, instead sandbagging the Treasury for that entire bill (There was a deal in there somewhere that ObamaRahma could have made with insurers on behalf of the public interest and, of course, they never did, too busy making deals for the private interest and their own interests). Language and framing are something for the healthcare War Room to chew on, starting with "universal healthcare," a sloppy phrase that led us straight down the garden path.

Thanks, FDL, for delivering the best analysis of HCR all through the last year.

Oops, didn’t intend to reply to #5 but make a new comment @ 48.