It’s her right to vote any way she wants, she earned it by running for & winning office. Our right is to expose her to her constituents and supporters for what she’s doing that will directly & indirectly hurt them. Her district NEEDS her leadership and activism now more than ever. Relevant questions are, how much is she being paid for her vote, is it going to her or to benefit her district, and if it’s going to her district, will it be enough to offset the tremendously negative long-term impact of the Senate Bill on her constituents?

Interesting. Thanks for the update.

She needs to return my money.

It looks like Rahm found himself a Useful Idiot. Whenever you hear someone in power parroting Obama’s lines, they’ve either been bought, are useful idiots or been veal penned.

Having a bill pass is more important. Would you rather leave middle class and porr people to suffer. A public option can always be added later. If no health care reform happens then thi will not happen again for a while. There can even be reconicliation if the senate bill i passed at least as a posibility.

there are many people even with disabiltiies and mental illnes that need this reform.Especially prexiting conditions. There are also healthcare caps which are at least elimianted in the senate bill already.

re you nuts? I am a single payer supporter, but I would support passing the Senate bill now and try fixes later rather than risking total defeat and leaving millions without coverage. I have supported what FDL has been doing throughout this fight. But this is going too far. You are risking hundreds of thousands of lives by trying to block this bill. It’s wrong and people will suffer. Just read this…

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/2010/01/one_readers_sob-story.php#more?ref=fpblg

I am glad representative Watson is thinking about the lives of her constituents rather than risking being stuck with the current system because of ideological purity.

Please. DailyKos is where you need to be posting, though that’s coals to Newcastle.

Most here aren’t buying the mess you’re selling.

Troll much?

As I have asked others ad nauseum recently, please tell me ONE crappy bill that has been passed in the last 25 – 30 years that has been “fixed later?”

It. Does. Not. Happen.

To think it will happen in this instance is truly to live in a fantasy land.

The people with Disabiltiies and Mental Illnes have better Health Care now than it will be if we turn there health over to the insurance industry.I’m told there yearly caps in the Senates Bill?Prexiting conditions insurance industry will hold treatment till Disabiliies.Then Medicare or Medicade.

even if this senate bill is not fixed, it increases medicaid eligibility and gives subsidies to low income people. if the choice is nothing or that I can’t imagine leaving millions out in the cold while we play a game of brinksmanship. I think they should have passed a strong public option or single payer. But it hasn’t happened. I’m not willing to leave millions uncovered while we try and push them to pass something better. I think it’s a risk we will lament for decades if nothing is passed this year and people are left without health care.

Are you serious?

Suicide, it’s a suicide

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VY8w5mIjMDY

“I’m not willing to leave millions uncovered while we try and push them to pass something better.” ; then why aren’t you screaming about the date the Senate bill will take effect? You’ve bought into the arbitrariness and arrogance of the Senate and the corporate deals made by the Obama Admin.

And I read that story at TPM earlier and the thought occurred to me that it was so indicative of the ‘what’s in it for me’ mindset that has ruined this country. There are times -this being one- in ones life where one sacrifices their own well being for the common good. If that’s not part of your weltanschauung, well that says all i need to know about you.

And how do you plan to stop the insurance companies from raising rates beyond the subsidy levels? How do you explain to folks they have to purchase crappy insurance that they then can’t afford to use when they get sick?

At the expense of a tax on the middle class plus billions of profits for a broken system that can’t be fixed. If we stay on this path we’ll just delay in the inevitable. We should let wealthcare run it’s course and then get true reform. If it takes bankrupting the government for real change then I’m all for it.

Congress could pass an expansion of Medicaid tomorrow, and it could go into effect next week.

With 50 votes plus Biden.

I’m sure the Republicans will adopt what you are saying whenever they want to pass legislation to further entrench and enrich corporate lobbyists. Having our government becoming more and more corporate controlled is resulting in the collapse of our country and this bill is a clear and present danger to our country.

Works for me.

And we’ll be getting less insurance coverage, and paying more for it. A lot of us will end up paying excise taxes on what we do get. And businesses will probably drop most of the insurance they’re paying for now, because of the increased costs.

Go try Daily Kos; they like this bill, and the proposed maneuvers.

I’d like to see that.
Because it would be the first sign that anyone in Congress is not clueless or bought.

That was in the past. Now, with the latest Extreme Right Court treason there is far less chance of fixing it later. The insurance companies will flood congress with money to leave it as is. In fact, they may even push for a far worse bill than now exists, and have a good chance of getting it. After all, dangling money in front of congressmen and senators is like dangling a worm in front of a fish.

Anytime a ‘critter starts spouting that Feinsteinian ‘perfect/enemy/good’ I grab for my wallet before they do. It’s the symbol of a broken legislature that they try to sell corporate giveaways as good and try to make us think that what we want is perfect.

Even Medicare For All isn’t perfect, and we stopped fighting for that long ago. So don’t tell me that this latest awful compromised you might have to hold your nose and vote for is any ‘good’ at all, ‘Critter Watson.

It’s evil, and you’re doing the devil’s work.

You are confusing coverage with care, plus if you are so serious about coverage, you should be screaming your lungs out that the Senate bill doesn’t go into effect for years. The regulations are swiss cheese, the savings have been given away to the likes of PhRMA and others so all you’ve got is a bill that is a huge wealth transfer from the middle class to health care industry execs while they are able to still deny people care, bankrupt them and jack up the rates for insurance and drugs while making it even harder to attempt to stop them from this in the future as they are burrowed in more and have a much larger war chest to fight you (paid for by the taxpayer no less).

WHOA – can we STOP using the word “progressive” for caving, politically pathetic chicken shits?

I’m impressed with how blame the DFHs DLC-ism has been FABULOUSLY successful for the sell outs in charge of the democratic party for decades, AND, given how, once again, the corrupt DLC fuckers are selling out the bottom 80%+++ of us — THEY HAVE TO FIGHT AND THEY HAVE TO LIE!

so, just like the fascist party, what will happen when people stop listening to the lies ??

can we STOP calling chickenshits progressive? to hell with this woman.

rmm.

Nope, these corrupt dems are not going to let their small constituents get in the way of a big insurer’s bailout bill. No way, no how. This is the best democracy money can buy.

Don’t mourn, O R G A N I Z E

When someone takes your money and doesn’t supply the goods, it’s fraud – why shouldn’t these lying critters have to pay the money back?

Who makes her chief Whip of the Congressional Progressive Caucus? If she remains chief whip, then there will be more than Watson to condemn.

I’d say this is a near total collapse by the Democratic leadership, and a majority of the office holders.

I didn’t know Democrat was spelled w-h-i-g.

ugh. honestly we all want the same thing here. we all would prefer a single payer system. If they can get a fix of the senate bill through reconciliation then great, I’m all for that. If they can get their shit together and pass a medicaid and medicare expansion through reconciliation, even better. But I can’t see the later happening. My fear is we all keep fighting with each other, nothing gets done and the R’s take control in November. Then 48,000 people continue to die every year. I’m no Feinsteinian. I voted for Kucinich in the primary. Im as disgusted with the Senate dems and Obama’s lame “support” of the public option as anyone on this page, but I do not see how, at this point, this late in the game, this brinksmanship does anything except ensure total defeat.

“To thank her, 1,659 progressive activists donated $4,486 to Diane Watson. And yet Diane Watson is openly breaking this pledge, betraying progressive activists, and shirking her responsibilities to the progressive caucus.”

But then the corporate lobbyists handed her something in the mid-six-figures?

The problem is, I suspect, this Congresswoman can count on bigger cash from corporations, etc. She probably could care less about 5k or so. I was leery of sending money to the so called backers of the public option as listed by FDL. There are only a handful like Kucinich I can trust to support with $$$ if I had them.

Dream on with side car reconciliation. Did you see that latest nutty poll of USA today saying Americans want bipartisanship, etc. I hope it’s not so.

the only thing this reform you speak of guarantees is an enormous increase in profits for insurance and Phrma. It guarantees no health care to anyone.

Coulda,Woulda,Shoulda.

It putatively “guarantees” you “access” to “coverage.” Not “health care,” right.

Affording “coverage” is another matter.

Diane Watson has received $45,000 from 26 PAC donations.

“but I do not see how, at this point, this late in the game, this brinksmanship does anything except ensure total defeat.” ; ‘total defeat’ won’t happen, period. Quit worrying about that. Obama,et al, have too much at stake for ‘total defeat’ to occur.

What we can do is keep the pressure up so that the Senate bill is NOT the blueprint for HCR and to do that Obama has to be weaned from his Senatorial umbilical.

Well, then, Congresswoman, you can have your imperfection. We’ll keep our money and our votes, since your word means so little to you compared to the ecstasy of joining the herd. Good luck next November. You and your party will need it.

“we can’t let the perfect be the enemy of the good.”
___

My prediction is that whatever tangible scraps of “good” emerge out of any of this shit will be quietly eviscerated within a year or two.

Watson clearly is (or is no longer) a “progressive” – whatever that means anymore. But expect more of the same to happen all down the line with the Supreme Court decision. Someone has bought her vote, and it ain’t progressives.

No kidding. Those who believe that this can be “fixed later” are not just naive but extrodinarily foolish this stage.

Or, with people in the system, more will have skin the game to make our system better.

It’ll be “fixed” all right. In accord with the wishes of the Karen bin al Ignagni crowd.

In the wake of the current SCOTUS ruling, their voices will likely be down around zero dB relative to the numbing din of corporate noise.

she is a demo she will fold like all demos

they are on the same payroll as the repubs: ie corp fascism

the demos are the biggest liars they pretend to represent you all the while knowing who really owns them

demos give up your demo reg they no longer represent you.

become an independent and breath new clarity.

they pretend to represent you to get your votes

at least the repubs dont pretend who they represent they are bought and paid for my corp america

it will get worst much worst since the capitalists now own the supreme court. pure genius on the capitalists part to own the supreme court

they are ten times smarter than the have nots that is why they have most of the wealth.

the capitalists even have convinced americans that capitalism is in your benefit even to the point of making capitalism and patroitism synonyms. genius.

Can’t really argue with that.

believe me, i know how difficult a decision it is about this much flawed and oh so disappointing bill; however, it is the only game in town and to let it fall through now; regardless of how flawed it is, would have disastrous and far reaching consequences the least of which, would be a total denial of anything else we all hold dear.

if it can’t get done none, it never will. it has been said, one must know which battles to fight. if this goes down, their will be no more battles – set, match, game (pardon the conflicting metaphors.)

Sad, but my hope is that if she chooses to vote for the Senate bill, she faces the consequences of that vote from her district.

She deserves to be held accountable for her votes the same as any other elected official.

no, the opposite is true if history is any lesson. after the defeat of the clinton health care initiative, it was said they would do it in smaller increments, chunks if you will; and never was. if not now, it never will be done. pass this, hope for improvements, work like hell to end the 60 vote super-majority and public financing of all congressional campaigns.

When is she running for re election, I would like to contribute to her opponents.

Bullshit. That’s what they said when the Clinton effort was being pushed, that if it didn’t happen now it would never again.

Amazing, look at how the VERY NEXT DEMOCRATIC ADMINISTRATION health care is back on the table.

I’m sorry, but the ‘it can’t happen in the future if we don’t do it in the present’ argument is so flimsy and imaginary I can’t even begin to entertain it.

I really hope that your post is snark. Otherwise, I suggest that you give your thoughts some major reconsideration.

There is absolutely no way in hell that this POS bill will be “fixed later.” The individual mandate is an out-of-control freight train that will wreck everyone, including the Dems who have been foolish enough to vote for it.

The insurers will have absolutely no incentive to allow an amendment to “fix” this. It will never, ever happen.

Jane, and many others, have written about how the “we’ll fix it later” line (actually, “lie”) has been used many times before to seduce progressives into voting for outrageous legislation, trusting the liars to be true to their word. Examples of “we’ll fix it later” legislation that never got “fixed” (or at least seriously fixed) include NAFTA, the Telecommunications act of 1996, the “Patriot” Act.

I think that this is the wrong strategy, and that we can get the best bill by taking the Senate bill plus a second bill, passed via reconciliation, to fix the worst problems.

Just saying no, without a credible way forward, or saying that we must start from scratch, is basically the Republican position.

The Senate bill has to be part of the solution, because there’s no other way to get a ban on discrimination based on pre-existing conditions into law.

“it is the only game in town”
___

Your decision to permit them to frame is that way does nothing to help.

okay, let’s be honest. if i had to tell you everything that is in the senate bill, i could not. truth be told, if the senate bill passes, we will have to wait and see what the consequences really are and go from there and let the voters, hopefully who will have benefited, decide.

Don’t contribute to her opponents, there’s no good reason to do that unless you think her opponents are ACTUALLY going to do something for you. There’s no need to do something to spite her, just stop supporting her. Silence can be a pretty deafening weapon.

You realize that at any point in the future they can write a bill that does the exact same thing if the Senate bill doesn’t pass, right?

It’s true that we can’t count on having the bill “fixed later”. That means that we need to be working on the fix now, in parallel: a second, small bill. Experts on procedure can put together a plan assuring that we can get both.

Where does the progressive caucus meet?

In a cave.

Why?

It saves time.

And if the voters don’t benefit? And if the Senate bill makes things worse than before for everyday Americans?

I really wish people that say ‘pass the bill’ would stop and consider what that might actually DO and then decide if it’s a good idea.

It’s pointless to say ‘do it now’ and then HOPE that the future will all turn out all right.

Scarecrow is upstairs!
Why Bernanke’s Confirmation Is, and Should Be, in Trouble

“She needs to return my money.”

Mine too.

We need to be working on it? How about HR676, all 30-odd pages of it. Done.

How many members of the progressive caucus does it take to screw in a light bulb?

All of them because only one of them will actually stand up and do anything.

LOL!

Uh, oh, Hugh is on a roll.

I like it. Lie to me, I’ll work to replace you. Why keep this corporate punk in her seat?

323-965-1422 is a wrong number.

Shortly, everything will grind to a screeching halt: Midterms!
Nothing will get started afterwards because: Presidential Elections!

Tell the fuckers that they will be elected on the basis of a job well done and not like the Banksters, on short term bullshit, and empty promises, if not outright mendacity.

Stay and work!!!

When will a member of the progressive caucus listen to you?

When you send them money.

When will they not listen to you?

When they vote.

Her page says it is correct.

Yeah. We pay for four years (handsomely so), and we get one. I’d like to get paid for 40 hrs and work 10.

I’ll fix the ban on discrimination for you right quick.
Attach a rider to the Pentagon budget!

There, fixed.

Well, you’re not going to get a whole lot accomplished doing that, I can tell you. You giving money to her opponent does one thing and one thing only. It advances the goals of her opponent, regardless of how incompatible those goals are with yours.

If I’m angry with a Democrat, I’ll stop supporting them, but I WON’T give my money to a Republican. That’s like shooting yourself in the foot in terms of getting what you want.

I’m not getting anything accomplished as it is, are you? Time to clean house of these liars.

I wish you were right. But any such legislation would first have to get past the 60-vote filibuster hurdle in the Senate, even though it could certainly ultimately be passed by 51 votes.

Left a message at the DC number, I’m not happy with her intent to break pledge and I’ll be watching. I live in CA.

I’m not sure I get what you mean.

Voting is, and should be, a complex process. If an elected official does something that outrages your interests to the point you feel they no longer deserve your vote, you should either not vote for them again or vote for a person who you think will act and do better than they did. Under no circumstance should you ever vote for someone that INTENDS TO DO A WORSE JOB because you’re mad at the original person.

Sometimes not voting is an effective way of sending a message. If the choice was between a DLC-er or a progressive-in-name-only and a Republican, I wouldn’t vote for the Republican just to to prove a point that I’m mad at the other choice. Politicians don’t receive that notion mentally the way you think you’re sending it. If anything, growing support for a Republican or conservative among former voters tells them ‘I should be more like that person to get my voters back, because that must be what they want.’ Voting Republican if you believe in liberalism or progressivism is NEVER the right answer.

So, let the Republicans filibuster the expansion of Medicare, – a very popular program with voters of both parties.

The Repubs would have a hard time surviving that one.

I wonder what would be the aggregate electorate reaction were the filibuster bluff to be called? Let those Repu’ublicist fucks stand up there and read every phone book into the record for months and months. Go ahead, you pricks.

Just askin’?

Okay, so you’ve cleaned house. Who are you going to choose to replace the cleaned out people with, worse versions of themselves?

You’re defeating yourself and you don’t even see it.

Thank you for the link.
It is too bad that it is listed as a “sob-story” or maybe that just caught my eye and I got angry about it being said that way. Too many people are in the same boat about being denied insurance and my heart goes out to folks that wrote the post.
I noticed that it was that poster’s first time responding at TPM.
The other day I posted here after lurking for a long time. I joined the FDL group in 2005 and it is my favorite site, but the point I am making is that I too, found that I could not keep quiet any longer on this issue.

No, I see it. I’m done being lied to and manipulated by these cockroaches. At least teabaggers keep their party honest. You can tell me what you’d do, but please don’t tell me what I ‘should’ do.

Got a plan? I mean besides dreaming?
Begging?

Yes, instead of lifetime caps you get yearly caps which are likely to kill you a lot sooner if you have a chronic or catastrophic health event. It’s a little difficult to hold off necessary treatment until the next year when you’re dying now.

My post was less about voting and more about electioneering. In most countries of Europe elections last around 6 mo.

So, instead of governance we get capitalism expressing itself through the election process.

Have you noticed that the pundits always remind you that voters don’t pay attention until the final 2 months?

And teapartiers keep their party honest by… voting for Democrats?

I don’t think you really do see it. You’re angry at the Democrats, so you’re going to hand the bank over to Republicans to spite them. Republicans DON’T GIVE A SHIT ABOUT YOU. And they will gleefully pass legislation that will make you suffer. Why on earth would you vote for that?

If you’re pissed off at Dems for being corporatist and centrist, then support causes that are left of center or left wing. What’s difficult to understand about that?

No, they can’t do the same thing without the Senate bill. Reconciliation cannot be used to regulate the insurance industry. It can only be used for matters that affect the budget: tax policy, public programs, and so forth. So they can fix the excise tax with reconciliation. They can add a public option with reconciliation. But they cannot require the insurance industry to accept people with preexisting conditions with reconciliation.

And the Republicans will filibuster any new bill that tries to do this. They have 41 now. They will. After 2010 they’ll have even more.

That’s why the Senate bill (plus a fix) is the right way to go.

Many of those 48,000 are going to die anyway, because they aren’t going to be able to afford to use the insurance they’re going to be forced to buy. The cost of the premiums plus the copays and deductibles are going to be impossible for many to afford. They’ll have insurance they can’t afford to use!

I would vote for the republican if they weren’t in the majority party and they passed individual scrutiny, and especially if it was against an entrenched incumbent DLC or new dem.
DLC, New Dems, and even progressives work to kill off progressive primary competitors. Your method is the race to the bottom as far as I’m concerned. Screw these party politicians, they’ll have females seeking back alley abortions in a few years. Where is there commitment to their constituents?

This Watson lady is a major douche nozzle. Is there anything that can get you kicked out of the Progressive Caucus? or at least have her whip position taken away?

I understand how reconciliation works. It’s only to be used for items that affect the budget, yes, I get that.

However, a single vote on something like banning pre-existing conditions would do what? It would make the votes on that issue PUBLIC RECORD. Republicans would absolutely have to stand up and filibuster a single INCREDIBLY popular reform issue, or if they didn’t filibuster, vote directly against it. THIS would be populist harikiri.

You think too small, my friend. Come join my side, I try to use my immense powers of evil for good.

“They can add a public option with reconciliation. But they cannot require the insurance industry to accept people with preexisting conditions with reconciliation.”
___

So, then expand Medicare availability down to age 50 on a “buy-in” basis as the “public option.” Increased utilization of health care is highly correlated with age, and really starts to ramp up at around 50+.

No new P.O./”exchange” bureaucracies. We already have one that works tolerably.

Let the Repu’ublicists filibuster that idea.

Ok, up for reelection in Novermber, primaries held in june. I’ll be watching.

So your solution to the gridlock and ignorance of voter wishes in the two party system is to just switch to the other party?

You’ll get exactly what you’ve been getting with that one, and you will deserve it if you make that choice. Republicans are just as scared of genuine liberal or progressive policy as centrist Democrats are. They’re just as opposed to it. They’re JUST going to fuck you over and smile about it.

So, if you choose to make that decision instead of making a better one, that’s fine, it IS your decision, but you will have earned exactly you get in making it. And that’s gonna be a pretty miserable thing.

“Democrats DON’T GIVE A SHIT ABOUT YOU. And they will gleefully pass legislation that will make you suffer. Why on earth would you vote for that?”

Fixed it for you.

I say this repectfully because I would rather have discussion than a fistfight, but are you sure about the premium and huge costs and where did you find the cost factors?
I know what we have been TOLD by the Republicans and their clients the medical, Pharmaceutical industries, but are you really sure.
We need to get through the rhetoric and get something passed to start the process.

Marcy Wheeler’s already responded: http://emptywheel.firedoglake.com/2010/01/23/mds-sob-story/

Essentially, MD’s attacking the wrong people, because the House bill is infinitely better than the Senate bill that TPM backs. As Marcy says at the end:

Finally, one more thing. If Grijalva and Nadler have their way, then MD’s father’s drugs will be cheaper, both because they’re fighting to lower the exclusivity periods for the high tech gene therapy MD refers to from what is currently in the Senate bill. And because they’re fighting to prevent pharmaceutical companies from making deals with generic manufacturers to hold off on production of generics so as to postpone competition for a number of years. Again, for people facing years of medical care, such things will make a huge difference in quality of life.

So before MD starts beating up progressives, he ought first beat up the Catholic Bishops who are standing in the way of a bill. And because the House is at least one vote short of passage–even with the progressives who voted for it the last time–there will probably be an agreement to change the bill in reconciliation. And one of the first things that will happen–one of the things Grijalva and Nadler are fighting for–is to make sure that middle class union members like MD’s father don’t have their health care cut dramatically just to shield a bunch of millionaires from higher taxes.

So, I agree with MD–this isn’t about strategies to keep seats. It’s about making sure MD’s father gets to keep the health care he already has.

Sweetheart, neither party cares at this point, because neither party has to. Try and get past the high emotion you’re facing and think this thing through.

YOU VOTING FOR A REPUBLICAN DOESN’T CHANGE ANYTHING.

I’m not advocating you vote for Democrats, either. I would advise you only vote for genuine liberals or progressives.

I’m telling you as honestly as I can, that your ‘I’m gonna show them’ outrage is calculated for by campaign analysts, pollsters, and strategists in BOTH parties.

You’re free to play into their hands if you so choose, but in the end the only person you’ll end up hurting is yourself and your nation.

You need to finish the fixing:

“Democrats Politicians DON’T GIVE A SHIT ABOUT YOU. And they will gleefully pass legislation that will make you suffer. Why on earth would you vote for that?”

Sweetheart, thank you for the advise. I’m looking forward to the concession speeches of those dems who vote for the Senate bill, and I’ll put my money down to accomplish that.

http://fdlaction.firedoglake.com/2009/12/15/with-out-a-public-option-the-individual-mandate-is-unacceptable-for-moral-political-and-policy-reasons/

You can start here and then Google for some more detail. Sorry, link insert doesn’t seem to be working; you can cut and paste.

You’re absolutely right, politicians don’t, because they don’t have to. They have no reason to be, because no one can force their hands under the current political dynamic. They know how you think, how you react, and what you’ll do.

You’re a puppet to them.

But you don’t have to be. Learn to play the game better than they do. Learn to be smarter than they are.

Otherwise you’re just going to be sitting around bitching forever.

So you’re blinded by your own anger and that anger will force you to fixate on one issue to justify yourself. Alright, I gotcha.

Damn, you’re easily manipulated. I’ll have to keep that in mind if I ever decide to go into politics.

Thanks, I have been reading so much about this but another site might enlighten me even more.

Insurance for profit over your Health Care.Include Public Option or Medicare Buy-in and Drug Reimportation.Hell that all the Bill we need.Don’t and I will have to vote for anyone thats not an incumbent.

Not angry, not blind, this is entirely cold blooded. Don’t lie, have some honor for our party platform or I’ll work for your replacement as my first priority. I will not accept cowardice.

There isn’t a any difference between blue dogs, new dems and republicans. You should stop looking at the it through the framework of the party, and look at caucuses or the individuals.

You are stuck in a frame of thinking that only benefits Power brokers, or at least doesn’t work against them.
Why?
They work against you, in fact that where this wisdom emanates from. Why don’t they follow it? They are traitors within.

And causes aren’t the same as candidates as you suggested in @87

We’re in complete agreement about this. But don’t think that voting for Republicans, conservatives, or moderates is going to honor your party platform or do ANYTHING other than enable the exact kind of behavior you’re outraged about.

Most Democrats aren’t scared of Republicans. Most Republicans are not scared of Democrats. But BOTH parties are genuinely afraid of real liberals and progressives. You want to hurt the moderates and corporatists? Then work for THOSE people.

Pulled the same trick with the bailout bill.

“Why did House Rep Diane Watson flip on bailout bill?
October 7, 2008 · 1 Comment

When the first bailout bill was proposed, Congresswoman Diane E. Watson was in the minority of both California and fellow Democratic who cast opposing votes. Watson, who largely represents Central Los Angeles, issued a press release saying she was “not convinced that this unprecedented plan is credible, accountable, nor will it work in its current form.”

On October 3rd, when the House was presented with an amended version of the act, she voted yes, stating:

I cannot in good conscience stand by and watch the credit markets contract further. Rather than let the State of California fall to its knees and potentially collapse through inaction, I chose today to vote for legislation, although imperfect, that can potentially restore faith in the markets.”

http://californiafaultline.wordpress.com/2008/10/07/why-did-house-rep-diane-watson-flip-on-bailout-bill/

I’m aware that there isn’t any difference, I’m not saying that there is. But if you’re pissed at a Blue Dog or New Democrat, electing a Republican in their stead isn’t going to do much for you, now is it?

Voting for a Republican to spite a Democrat is futile. They’re in collusion and it ain’t gonna do shit for advancing your own agenda. Sure, if all you want is to feel self-righteous anger and a feeling that you DID something, anything, go ahead and vote Republican. But if you want to REALLY do something, vote for an ultra liberal. Campaign for one. Give money to one to get him or her elected. There’s nothing more terrifying to the status quo.

You should really, really read your post over and over again because it’s good and you should take your own advise. Ask yourself, how your strategy of passivity is going to lead to achievable goals when you are being triangulated against from within.

Depends on her primary opponent, if they’re progressive and have a shot, I’ll donate to them. If not, her opponent will get my support. I’m more tired of the lies than I am of republicans, really. Should be interesting.

Yeah, they bogarted her. They either used her conscience, her committees, or her re-election to secure her vote. She’s ultimately at fault for accepting it, but you need to realize that the situation is so much bigger than Diane Watson. She deserves to be held accountable for her votes, but focusing it all on Diane Watson is limp strategy.

Fight!! Fight!!!! Fight!!!!!!

IMHO public option is a must. Drug Reimportation would certainly go a long way to helping keep things relatively honest (I know, yeah right),
but voting against every incumbent is not really the answer either.
There are some good ones out there that is why we need to support them and get rid of the rest. I personally have a Rep who is a do-nothing Repub. that follows the party line to the max. In a strong Repub dist. there is no chance he will be gone anytime soon.

Let’s re-consider some E-Z Big Picture round numbers that are in fact credible enough for context:

- our 2009 NHE (National Health Expenditure) was estimated by the govt at ~$2,5 trillion.
- divide by 307 million U.S. population;

- you get ~ $8,143 per year per capita

Now, let’s say we can somehow “bend the cost curve” down a third (to closer in line with the NHEs of other comparable industrialized nations). You still, then would have a per capita annual cost burden of $5,249, or $21,716 for a family of four ($1,810 a month).

Now, obviously these expenses would never be billed “per capita” in any fashion. And HHS/AHRQ notes that roughly half the population spends little to nothing each year on health care, whereas 5% of the population account for nearly half the total spending (e.g., people like my aged and ailing mother), with the rest of us somewhere in between, amid a lumpy, highly age-skewed distribution).

There is simply no way out of this problem (which will only get more acute) via any for-profit actuarial based health insurance model. You simply get more whack-a-mole ever-more-artful cost shifting that take ever-more resources away from actual health care.

Health care should ethically be viewed more within the “social insurance” model if we are to have any hope of improving things before this bankrupts the nation. I won’t be holding my breath.

Einer Elhauge noted this conundrum long ago in his 1994 paper “Allocating Health Care Morally.”

I’m not talking about being passive. Please don’t misunderstand. I’m talking about directly undermining the power of both established parties via educating other voters.

You voting for a Republican under any circumstances other than a genuine faith that they’ll work on your behalf is stupid. Likewise, so is a vote for a Democrat.

You’re doing exactly what the triangulators want you to do if you decide that Democrats have failed you and all you do is hop lines to the Republicans. Trust me on that one.

Here, read about the money party.
http://firedoglake.com/2006/11/04/political-physics-2006-a-tale-of-three-parties/

Do you know what republicans I like or could live with? Chuck Hagel and Ron Paul. We should support some populist Republicans too.

I don’t think it’s all being focused on Watson. Just this post.

We had one hell of a fight here the other day and it was more name-calling,my view or the highway, and that is not the discussion I prefer to join in, but yes, I will fight for the right issues.

A memorable, brilliant post.

Christ, Watson herself is a limp strategy.

I understand that, my dear. I honestly do.

I’m trying to provide a more effective strategy than simply capitulating to the system and letting what has happened happen over and over again.

Please disregard #76 Bill Walker is right that this could pass by 51 votes through reconciliation. Sorry.

Thanks.
My family is in the upper end of those expenditures so that is why I am so angry/hopeful that something can be done.
The Repubs did not use an actuarial chart when it came to their wars in Afghanistan or Iraq.

Cynthia Kouril is upstairs!
USAG Holder’s “Never Mind” on KSM Trial: What Was Sen. Graham Thinking?

“I’m trying to provide a more effective strategy than simply capitulating to the system and letting what has happened happen over and over again.”

But that’s what you’re arguing for.

I hear ya.

I now cut about a $6,300 a month check for my mom’s nursing home care. Private pay. Ugh.

Too many people here using Mikesong’s new age online persuasion crib sheet:

1) Identify as a member of the group by paying homage to shared values (“I have supported FDL up until now”), completely unaware of the fact that we’ve been saying the same thing for 6 months contrary to what the borg told them when they launched them this morning.
2) Gentle and deeply emotional assertions of dissent with the group norms (“but what about all the poor little babies that will die if this bill doesn’t pass”)
3) When anyone calls them on their bs, reassert homage to shared values (“of course all we liberals think….”)
4) Lather, rinse, repeat.

No, it isn’t.

That is what YOU are advocating for by saying you’d vote Republican if that’s who Watson’s opponent was next election.

Then don’t vote for the do-nothings that go along with the heard for the lobbiest.Democrats and Republicans are loud with there talking heads MSNBC and Fox News that keeps the copperate center.

Subtle but effective emotional manipulation.

It’s a pretty effective strategy, actually.

And most people are not well equipped to recognize or defend against it.

But you’re absolutely right.

“we can’t let the perfect be the enemy of the good.”
The epitaph upon the Democratic party’s tombstone.

What an embarrassing defense for a lack of moral fortitude.

You’re doing exactly what the triangulators want you to do if you decide that Democrats have failed you and all you do is hop lines to the Republicans. Trust me on that one.

Okay. Now logicaly, are the New dems and blue dogs trying to get vote for republicans?
How does that benefit them?

A: they are spies, and are getting ready to jump to the other party.
or
B: They think my loyalty to the party will overcome my dislike for their DINO candidate and I’ll sit home.

Since they’ve used the Party apparatus against all progressive candidates in the primaries, the party is now unrecognizable.
What can I do, actively to take my party back?

Later I’m goin’ to Lindo, for some Camarones Barrachos and top-shelf maragritas. Later, ‘pups.

I’m pretty sure I donated to the fund. I now think they should pass the Senate bill. She’s off the hook with me. I’m not into playing Alamo.

I was idly thinking about that during my earlier chat with chrisunderscour. There is an uncanny similarity in the arguments presented. If indeed there are paid propagandists travelling internet forums, it would make sense that their organization would have done some ‘market research’ on the most effective ploys to use and has them tape it up next to their monitors. Who knows. Oddly similar messaging, and consistently repeated, seems to me.

EW did an analysis of the bill a few weeks back, about the time that the Senate version started to be pushed at us.

http://emptywheel.firedoglake.com/2009/12/29/why-cant-bill-supporters-say-affordable/
http://emptywheel.firedoglake.com/2009/12/31/bill-supporters-still-cant-say-affordable/

This sort of thing ruins FDL for me. For some on here, there’s a passion for seeing people fail. It’s this weird conservative impulse to tear down, rather than build up, but put to supposedly liberal policy positions. It’s poisonous … but it’s easier than standing up for compromised politics.

I mean, what could possibly be gained by sending someone out the door who believes in liberal policy w, x, and y while disagreeing with liberal policy z, for a GOPer who believes in none of that? That’s why this HCR debate is so frustrating: every liberal believes the Senate bill is flawed. Many liberals believe it’s the product of backroom deals and reflects these interests’ wishes. And, many liberals see that, despite these flaws, good can still be done with the bill.

HOWEVER, there is no possible reason any of that would be reason to vote GOP. Empowering the GOP is far, far worse than empowering someone you disagree with on your pet issue. I mean, c’mon.

Yup, I would sweetheart. Can’t vote there, so money will have to do. I gave her some, I wonder if I’ll get it back? Probably not, I think.

: )

Great way to dodge the substance: focus on the rhetoric.

If you FDL traveled back in time and refused to support SS because it excluded certain folks, and SS failed to pass, would that effort be worth it — knowing that SS has been expanded in the interim?

Start by jettisoning the party. There’s no difference anymore. You MIGHT NOT EVER get your party back. All you can do now is stand up for principles and policy.

You want to start to take back the electoral process, and your nation? Then go wildly left. It’s the only thing that will get their attention and undermine their dominance. Get your friends and neighbors involved. Actively march your community left while they try to legislate right. This is the ONLY thing that you can do to make them nervous and break their hold on the system.

Yeah, I think there are paid trolls commenters coming around here and elsewhere – there was someone at dKos who put up a diary that was right down the insurance/pharma lobby line. (In addition to the veal-pen effect that we’re also seeing.)

To think it will happen in this instance is truly to live in a fantasy land.

Is to have another agenda that that we don’t understand because they are unwilling to share.

These folks are not as stupid as we imagine. They have the goals we give them.

I don’t like being lied to, manipulated, and fucked over. I’m supplying consequences so that it will be less common in the future.

There is an army of former DLCers sitting in my apartment right now bwahaha….

Again, I don’t like the Senate bill. I just think that not passing something = big losses in ’10. And, subsidies help people. New customers for insurance companies doesn’t somehow make that false, though it does make people (like me) reluctant to go to the mat for such a crappy bill.

Yes, well we struggle along with some level of efficiency.

Then I’ll be sure to check back with you in the future when the Republican you helped support financially eliminates the minimum wage, the 40 hour workweek, eliminates Medicare and Social Security, the Department of Education, the Department of Labor, and OSHA.

I’m sure you’ll just be pleased as punch, sweetness.

You are comparing Social Security, a policy/program made new from whole cloth, to health care legislation?

You consistently misread and misunderstand what FDL says and does and what it has said and has done. (Note that complete agreement is not and never has been demanded.)

You contradict yourself in your own comments, and then you complain because we’re pointing out the problems.

Ooh stop, you’re scaring me. See you then.

: )

To address your conspiracy theories, I’ve been constantly opposed to moderate Dems up until conference committee became impossible.

Thankfully, yes.

I’m glad you do what you do, make no mistake, and I support FDL in most of what it does.

But I’m equating the two because this is a flawed bill, much as previous bills have been flawed. I think that getting people into the system makes that system much more able to improve. That, or Dems will continue to disappoint and be voted out for those who will…

Arrogance is self-destruction, dear.

You think you’re hurting somebody else with your actions, but the only person you’re hurting is yourself.

And that’s just sad.

Actively march your community left while they try to legislate right. This is the ONLY thing that you can do to make them nervous and break their hold on the system

March? While I have a vote I can use to make them nervous, a march is more effective? Please. I’ll ask nice and apply some pressure, then I’m using real ammo. A beggar and screamer – I’m not.

I agree that problems need to be pointed out; I’m only complaining about FDL strategy. Why not target Senate Dems to get them on record to support certain terms in a pre-House-vote-on-the-Senate-bill, reconciliation vote? Or, some other strategy that would be more productive than merely “kill the bill?” It’d save the Dems from being destroyed in 2010.

oops. responding to 151.

You’re not getting anybody into any ‘system’ other than the rolls of private insurance with the Senate bill, or even the House bill. You’re just forcing more people to buy private insurance with varying weak degrees of good incentives involved.
There’s no guarantee or expectation that these people will then be able to access health care affordably.

I wouldn’t vote for these bills if I were in Congress.

And how are you going to use your vote to make them nervous?

Not passing health care is not what is going to destroy Dems in 2010, DEMS are going to destroy Dems in 2010. They make bad policy decisions, they barely fight for anything they want, and they instantly cave to any pressure from their corporate donors.

The only people that are going to destroy the Dems are themselves.

You have to take into account the whole landscape, If you are going to give the republicans a 51 seat majority (this is equal to 60 spineless democrats) then you can’t do it. That’s why Scott Brown was actually a win.

So I was 6 months old at the doctor, the lady stuck a needle in my shoulder. I didn’t cry, I calmly reached over and pulled it out. She figured she had gotten enough of whatever it was into me, so she didn’t try to stick me again.

That’s unfair. We’ve had some successes this year: Ledbetter, hate crimes, EPA emissions, etc. That stuff matters, despite the Dems reliance on big donors. The alternative: the party of freaking Sarah Palin.

I mean, there was talk of conspiracy earlier, but this sorta thing is unbelievable. Depress the base enough, and GOP victories will be at hand.

No, no, I want you to tell me how your vote does anything but empower the exact same system that you referenced in the link to the Political Physics, 2006: A tale of Three Parties post.

I really would like you to highlight how your vote and asking nicely puts any pressure on this system in a manner that will force it to bend to your demands.

Because to me it seems like you’re just going to do the exact same thing over again and think that you voting for another Democrat and or Republican is going to change something.

That’s not even an equivalent analogy. You pulling out a needle is not the same thing as taking a needle and sticking it into the woman’s arm in retaliation, which is what you’re advocating with Diane Watson.

So in short you support the Democrats because you’re terrified of Republicans. And that’s the only thing you’re able to see. Got it.

Makes more sense that you think the way you do, then.

Republicans haven’t had 60 or more seats since 1911.

I was young then.

I grew up in the 90s and thought politics didn’t matter. Then I went to college and Bush proved me wrong. So, yes. I support the Dems because the policies advocated by the GOP are frightening. Some Democrats may be compromised by this or that interest of their state; the whole GOP is compromised as a whole.

The Senate bill is similarly compromised. It does some good, though. And it keeps this whole media narrative from being about Dem failure and GOP resurgence. I want the Dems to win. I want to help people. If that means a few more dollars in insurance companies pockets, than that is price I’m willing to pay for 30 million people covered.

… And somehow your strategy has matured?

Sorry, I’m not buying it. Again, if you want to hold Diane Watson accountable, then do so, but if you think supporting a Republican to replace her does that, then you’re naive and she isn’t going to learn a thing.

You want to do something that can get the message across, then support liberals that walk their talk.

“You want to do something that can get the message across, then support liberals that walk their talk.”

Where are they? Feingold. Sanders. Weiner. Franken. Yeah, I donated to Obama’s campaign too.

So you’re playing right into the hands of the people that want to defeat you.

I’m sorry, and I’m saying this as plainly and as rationally as I can present it to you, but you’re easily manipulated, and you’re BEING manipulated.

For example, I can glean three things from your post alone.

1. Republicans BAD.

2. I want to help people.

3. Giving private corporations that hurt people money if it means maybe helping people is okay.

And any pollster or analyst or strategist worth his salt will immediately zero in on those things and use them against you. Like with the Senate bill.

Senate bill:

Republicans are bad because they won’t participate, and if you don’t pass this bill you might put them in office. (Wrong, and wrong.)

This bill will help people. (This bill will insure some people in ways that they can’t afford to use their new insurance, and leave others to continue fending for themselves and dying for lack of coverage.)

We’re going to do this entire thing through private insurance and give the people that caused the problem to begin with money so that you’ll go along with it since we tell you that the bill will help somebody. So as long as we can distract you by making you think it’s okay that we give this money to the health insurers that donate money to our campaigns by dangling ‘we’re going to help people’ in front of your face, why SHOULDN’T we do that? It’s not like you’ve said you’re not okay with giving money to private insurance if it HELPS people…

Find one. Make one. Fight tooth and nail within your local Democrats to put one up for office. Defund the Democrats. Devote the Democrats.

The CEO of Cigna recently retired with a 73 million dollar golden parachute.

Sit back and watch them all fall into line and do what they’re told. Next fall, sit back and watch as they’re told they’ll have to leave office.

If we assume the big goal is to make the most money possible then Lebetter et all are minor concessions in comparison to the trillions of dollars spent to prop up the too big to fail. Freaking Sarah Palin becomes just a scary cartoon character put up to sway the decision. You don’t need some sort of big conspiracy when having a few rich guys pulling a con will suffice. If the GOP and the Dems both support the goals of the rich then there is no major difference between R and D and there is no vast conspiracy. It’s a club and we’re not members.

Amen to that.

Sounds like the fix is in. Diane Watson, I’ll see you on the unemployment line.

As I said, if she has a progressive primary opponent who has a shot, I’ll support them. If not I’ll support her removal. It’s my money, I’ll use it as I see fit, dear.

Scott brown. That scares them. They will go left or they will lose. By never using your vote against them you become a door mat, and they say things like “Don’t worry about the left“.

New dems are just as much my enemy as Republicans are. I don’t see any difference. If I have to, I’ll stand behind a Republican to get him to fire on the New Dem. Next election there isn’t a new dem filling the seat for the party to protect.

You have to look at the whole country though. This majority is being used against us to pass crap legislation. IN this case, can’t you see the value of forming a circular firing squad, R’s against DINO’s, with progressives in the bleachers where they’ve been sidelined to by the DINO’s in the primary?

Okay:
- GOP is bad, but not because they won’t participate. They’re just bad.
- Not passing this bill will put them into office.
- Like you said, the bill will help people, although flawed.

And again, I’m not enthused about the mechanism in which this gets done. It’s difficult to defend. I fought for the PO all freaking year to see it just tossed to the wind. But I will not be an accomplice in the last death blow to this bill; the next elections are riding on its success, as well as peoples’ lives. The fact that private insurers are enriched is frustrating, and certain Senators should pay a price, etc. But the bill shouldn’t be torpedoed.

If you’re supporting a progressive or liberal challenger to Watson, then good. You have a shot at success with that one. If you’re not, then you’re shooting yourself in the foot. Honey.

It absolutely should. Because it’s all smoke and mirrors. And people like you are held hostages of conscience to it.

I would be willing to bet that if we had a bill being passed with only a Public Option or Medicare buy in and Drug Reimportation no one at FDL would call out Kill The Bill.That would come from the Center Democrats and Center Republicans.You know the Copperate Whores.

We would do well without the condescension.
Being provocative does not advance an argument.

If thine eye offend thee, pluck it out. That’s from the Bible.

I cannot name more than a couple pieces of legislation that was ideal as enacted. Politicians blow.

I mean Shakespeare.

Oops I read that as CAP for some reason so my original comment made no sense. It’s the function of outside groups to exercise pressure on Dems and the GOP. I really, really, really liked FDL’s emergence this year as a positive influence for the PO, etc. … I got upset when I believed the mediocre bill would be killed by the very same people.

You still haven’t answered the question. HOW are you going to use your vote to scare them?

And Scott Brown doesn’t scare them. Ask Even Bayh. Ask the Democrats who are now trying to make the healthcare reform effort smaller. Take a look at all the ‘tack back to the center’ (as if they were ever left to begin with) comments they’re putting out.

Scott Brown only makes them go to the center, which for them is actually going past the center to the right. Voters voting for people like Scott Brown does not make Democrats go left.

And this bill blows, kill the fucker dead.

And they blow because you enable them to.

No, I elected Ellison so my conscience is clear :)

You’re really, really, really missing the point.

If you want to go after Watson, fine. But you do it by supporting a candidate that is BETTER than her so you show her what it is you really want. If you support a liberal that won’t cave and fights like a tiger in Congress, she and those like her then realize ‘hey, that’s what I should have done.’ and helps move THOSE PEOPLE to the left. If you vote for a Republican, she and those like her think that PEOPLE WANT MORE RIGHT WING POLICY.

You have a choice which one you want to go for. If you’re going to go after Watson, make sure you have somebody BETTER to replace her with or you’re defeating the whole point of what you’re trying to do.

New dems are just as much my enemy as Republicans are

The problem is that there are a boatload of new Dems. Not saying to avoid the issue or hope for change but they are as thick as fleas and after blood. All that they ask is for you to agree to help with this “one little problem”. Some of the Ds are acting new mafia, “we need your help on this one little matter and then you are free to do whatever you like.”. Think of it as a small favor to show that you are worthy of our trust.

emptywheel is upstairs!
A Barren Straight Wife Watches the Prop 8 Trial

All that’s just jibber jabber from the ones who got bought by the insurance companies. They were shocked and they had to say SOMETHING. The real deal is Obama’s little ‘time out’ routine, he goes off to distract us with the shiny object of the bankers while Emmanuel, Pelosi and Reid work on the house progressives and chrisunderscore works on us.

she seems more like the useless idiot type.

Scott Brown win does scare them, and evan bayh is spinning. Who cares if Watson loses? She’s already got the message, and brown was a warning shot. If she votes wrong, she deserves to lose. There must be consequences, to warn the others.
We need to form some strategic voting blocks.

And how does that clear your conscience?

good eye. we neeed to just concentrate all efforts on the house. get that mandate removed or get the bill dropped.

Uh huh. That’s why all of the Democrats are falling all over themselves to fight for leftist policy, aren’t they?

I’m not missing the point, I don’t agree with it. I want the worthless little sellout Watson kicked out of office, not having a progressive replacement is not going to keep me from trying to effect that.

yeah,a republican winning in liberal districts scares the poop outta them and whatever they say publicly, they have access to very good polling data. they know what happened in Mass. we need to stay focused on the house.

make sure you have somebody BETTER to replace her with

Given the rate of success for incumbents and how reticent people are to vote against incumbents in their preferred party it might be the case that a bad candidate in the House of Reps is a good thing. Easier to clean out than a D incumbent.

Did you ever fight for the Public Option.How did you punish anyone killing the Public Option.I’ll vote for anyone thats not an incumbent.

Not exactly. Putting somebody in who is a worse version of the person you kicked out just empowers the person who is slightly better than that worse version to come back after they’re gone.

I won’t.

“We pass this POS bill today and come around tomorrow with a reconciliation fix that’ll give us a bill we can actually support.”

Do I get a pony, too? Pass the best parts of the house bill through reconciliation, then we can talk about passing the senate bill!

Going to repost this, because my original post was deleted for some reason.

Not exactly. Allowing a worse version of the person you want to kick out to take the seat only allows a slightly better version or that WORSE version to retake the seat after the worse version is out.

So you’re kicking out the person, replacing them with somebody worse, and then replacing THAT person with someone just as bad as the original.

I suspect that the Repukes have hired a bunch of Derren Brown clones to be Democratic staffers. What part of 70% approval can’t our “representatives” understand?

Well, lucky you. Because we “emerged” because we got members like Watson to agree to vote against any bill that doesn’t have a public option, and she signed a pledge. And now we’re holding them to it — just like we said we would.

The memo that says “profess admiration for their past accomplishments but express your sentiment that they’ve gone too far” has a glitch. You might want to get the borg to correct that. It’s what’s known in poker as a “tell.”

Do I get a pony, too? Pass the best parts of the house bill through reconciliation, then we can talk about passing the senate bill!

Bingo! We have been down the empty promise road before, thank you very much Obama and Rahm and Reid.

Huh. Guess I’m not allowed to speak on this thread anymore.

Is he the one Congress Person thats planes to stand by his Signature on the July 30 letter that 57 Democrats signed saying that they simply cannot vote for a bill that at minimum does not have a public plan.Think he’ll stand by his Honor.Could not stand with dishonorable leaders.We have way to many of R and D.

“Obama road-tested his new message during a town hall Friday in Ohio, when he said 20 times that he will fight for average Americans. [...]

On Saturday, Obama made what a White House aide called “a few check-in calls to senators and members of leadership to make sure Bernanke was on track, and he was assured he was.”

Axelrod said Obama’s goal is to “make the agenda of Washington hew to [working Americans’] concerns and build an economy that works for everyone,” and that the State of the Union will include “initiatives that will build on the ones that we’ve already had to get there.”

“That was why we got elected – to push back on the special interests and make the agenda in Washington respond to the concerns of the American people and to build an economy that works for everyone and not just a fortunate few,” Axelrod said.

Read more: http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0110/31900_Page2.html#ixzz0dV95Tk22
”

Freakin hilarious if it wasn’t so pathetic.

Do you realize that preexisting condition ban does not come into play until 2014? Nor do subsidies or the exchanges. The President and Congressional Dems have been shedding crocodile tears for the 45000 a year dying for lack of insurance access. Why I call them crocodile tears? Because these same people are okay with watching 200,000+ die by 2014. Do you further realize that the coverage that will come in 2014 will still be at the rapacious premiums of uncontrolled Insurance Companies. Subsidies are going to be even higher proporationately. This is pure and simple filling the Insurance Pockets from our, the taxpayers money.

Ask Watson what is her explanation for the above points. These guys are either super dumb or super corrupt. They do not respect the intelligence of American People, thinking they can be fooled by these lame and disingenuous statements. It amazes me that Corporate Tools like Rahm Emanuel think that they can pull wool over our eyes.

As far as I see President and dolts like Watson feel they are not bound by any promises they made during the campaign. Promise things to excite and get votes from the public. Get elected forget public good and serve your Corporate Benefactors.

Now that President vows to fight for people again, he should begin by firing Rahm and similar Corporatists. If Obama wants to build some credibility for the Administration, he should not want to prevaricate again “like he did when he said I did not Campaign on Public option”. For a proof just watch the clip http://tinyurl.com/O-promised . He should say what he means and mean what he says.

Do you realize that preexisting condition ban does not come into play until 2014? Nor do subsidies or the exchanges. The President and Congressional Dems have been shedding crocodile tears for the 45000 a year dying for lack of insurance access. Why I call them crocodile tears? Because these same people are okay with watching 200,000+ die by 2014.

Do you further realize that the coverage that will come in 2014 will still be at the rapacious premiums of uncontrolled Insurance Companies. Subsidies are going to be even higher proporationately. This is pure and simple filling the Insurance Pockets from our, the taxpayers money. Ask Watson what is her explanation for the above points.

These guys are either super dumb or super corrupt. They do not respect the intelligence of American People, thinking they can be fooled by these lame and disingenuous statements. It amazes me that Corporate Tools like Rahm Emanuel think that they can pull wool over our eyes. As far as I see President and dolts like Watson feel they are not bound by any promises they made during the campaign. Promise things to excite and get votes from the public. Get elected forget public good and serve your Corporate Benefactors.

Do they know that the public will despise them for what they are pursuing, and yet they do not care, or are they not reading the public sentiment?

Bernanke means no accountability, an impervious Fed, and the death of a regulatory regime with teeth.

‘t would seem that they are planning to blow more economic bubbles, and to carry on blowing bubbles up our asses while all the while they are perpetrating the greatest legal heist in the history of Democracies.

If you let people buy into Medicare at cost, they won’t need to fix private insurance. People will buy into Medicare instead and private insurance will either get its act together or go the way of the dinosaurs.

It was reported that the estimated Medicare buy in cost would be over $7,000 per year. The NYT ran an editorial wondering whether that would be attractive, har har. But I think at that time the discussion was over 50 year olds buying in, so maybe there would be a variable cost.

Why the fuck can’t we just copy Canada’s system, lock, stock and temporary teeth for hockey players.

This bill will be an albatross around the necks of every Dem up for election in Nov who votes for it. Most non-political junkies don’t understand the details of bill, but they do understand 2 things: they would be forced to buy insurance (or be fined) and possibly be taxed for what they are forced to buy. And they are going to be reminded of that by Republicans in the fall quite repeatedly.

Pretty good article from our friends at the Nation, Watson would do well to read it.

“On healthcare, Obama played coy while his White House aides cut private deals with the drug industry and other sectors. The legislative process was drawn out month after month in an addled bargaining marathon with hostile Republicans (who stiffed him in return) and industry-leaning Democrats (who got whatever they demanded). The liberal base was conned, ignored and bullied, as its vital issues were one by one discarded. Labor unions were stroked and intimidated by the White House, then double-crossed as Obama’s reform extracted greater costs from union members than it demanded from the drug makers. People at large were confused, then frightened. They could not understand what reform would do for them, and some of their doubts were well-founded. The longer it went on, the more people wondered why Democrats weren’t talking about their problem–jobs and incomes.”

http://www.thenation.com/doc/20100201/greider

I looked at your links, chris. You do look human, so you’re alright by me. I do however disagree with you nearly completely. The senate bill should die, not be passed by democrats who hope to keep their seats in November. Ms Watson I’m talking to you.

“Of course the battle of Bernanke’s reconfirmation rages. This is nothing but a distraction from my perspective. The puppet gets played by the puppet masters and the media and people are all confused, worked up, and distracted from the bigger and more important reality. That being that it doesn’t matter who is running the Fed, they work for the central banks. Replacing Bernanke won’t fix anything, ending the Fed and our debt backed system will. Keep your eye on the debt and the purveyors thereof.

Here are the games being played:”

http://economicedge.blogspot.com/

for those of you who are supporting passing this atrocity, WHY? Have you looked at the enforcement mechanism for the *already* extremely unequal deal between real citizens and insurance companies? Not only are we getting a mandate with no public option… but the mandate will be enforced. Federally. By the IRS which is very good at such things.

All that “reform” stuff you like? Anything cutting into the insurance company’s “business as usual” routine? Yeah, that enforcement is up to the states. And however they wish to deal with it. Or not deal with it really. Or learn how to do it, maybe sort of effectively, if you’re in a state that actually cares. So yeah, like any of that is going to happen. The enforcement is where it’s at, the enforcement is aimed *straight* at the regular citizen, not anywhere near the people who actually made this problem.

What part of her post was ad hominem? … I don’t read her doing anything to characterize your argument as incorrect by attacking you personally…

Welcome to The Lake, jemand!
We are here to help.

I’m really glad that you enjoy being a member of the community. But I’m not sure what a couple of anti-Evan Bayh comments at Yglesias’s blog establishes, so if you’d like to link up an established facebook page to your username and prove you’re a real person, we’ll be happy to let you have commenting privileges at the Seminal until health care is over. It may just be your bad luck to show up when the borg is swarming the blog, but it is what it is.

Sound good?

you know what WOULD be good partial health care reform we could build on? Establishing a national method of policing insurance companies and keeping them honest.

Step one: Pass a couple really simple things like “you can’t drop people just because they get expensive” and “you can’t deny care to people who have been paying premiums and needed and had reason to expect it.” And set up real policy with teeth to punish misbehaving companies. Let the republicans filibuster if they want to, in the face of such overwhelmingly simple and hugely popular proposals! Have the federal board and these policies come into effect very soon, 6 months to a year. Many states already have this stuff on the books, this would simply be a question of real enforcement. We could have passed this already had the democrats decided to do something easy for a sure win to start with.

Step two: once that’s in place, add stuff like “no lifetime caps” and “no differential policy prices due to demographics: sex, age, race, sexual orientation, etc.” I suppose you could also pass that in step one if you could manage it. This should be done before two years.

Step three: once the companies have proved that they can play fair, and the government has proved it can ensure fair play, and that health insurance is a better deal in the event of sickness than a lottery ticket*, then you can impose a mandate and guarantee coverage for previously existing conditions. This would be finished before the shit bill in the Senate would ever be taking effect anyway.

We’d end up with something like Germany’s system, which seems to work alright, even though I’d rather have single payer. This, however, could easily be incrementally built, if our senators actually cared to reform health care. The current bill, though, has absolutely nothing good to build on. The restrictions on the companies are nebulous, and enforcement basically absent. The Medicaid expansion, well, maybe good, but why not just pass it alone? The mandate? Absolute poison pill. That’s what can be built upon, precedent for forcing citizens to buy a product they don’t want and can’t trust from private companies. And I shudder to see what kind of things can be built on that foundation.

*I actually would like to see the numbers crunched, in this environment of rescission, and reflexively denying claims, and unemployment, and employers cutting back on benefits, of the relative benefit of buying a lottery ticket to paying an insurance premium on reducing future risk of medical-related bankruptcy.

The current bill to ensure the health of insurance company profits is merely a single example of the complete control that large business corporations exert over our national government.

I’m pleased to find so many people in one cyberplace that realize this. FDL seems to be populated by people that have collectively been referred to as the “Democratic base.”

Times change and there is a new political alignment at the national level. This is a coalition of right wing Democrats and “moderate” Republicans. The ideological conservative Republican base and the populist, progressive Democratic base are both cut out of the action as bad for business. We are really looking at the new, as yet unnamed, centrist party. On some level, I think most of those reading this realize that the Democratic party has all but disappeared — swallowed up in a coalition government of big business and pro-big-business elements of both parties.

It is time to think outside the Democrat-Republican box. The basic unit of meaningful political analysis is no longer political party but rather economic class.

Good. The Senate health bill is better than our current system.

I grew up with a healthy disrespect for authority and I think it’s the best thing that ever happened to me. When I hear the “I’m one of you and I’m about to tell you what you should think” lines, I immediately think I’m in for a manipulation tactic. I don’t care if someone is one of my group in reality, never mind trusting they are because they said so, or that they think they can use that to tell me how to think, I have to think for myself. We all have to think for ourselves.

The progressives who are bailing reek of being told what to think and feel by leadership and lobbyists. If they are too stupid or authority-oriented to keep from falling for that, especially when poll after poll and fact after fact exists to disprove what they are being told, they don’t deserve to be leading us and we can’t afford to have them making decisions that will so dramatically affect us.

SS was a good system, just applied to too few people. That, you can expand on. The Senate bill is a horrible system of selling us off to the insurers who caused this mess without any real restrictions on what they do to us once we’re chained to them. You can’t expand that system to make it better. In fact, it is already an expansion of the worst of the system we have already got. You need an entirely different system. If you need a different system, it will be harder to get what you need once you have more firmly established the bad system and fed it with money and power. You will have to destroy an even bigger monster in order to get what you need. Better to have only a small monster blocking the path to what is needed.

If you thought the prisons were too full of people who should never have been arrested and my proposed solution was to build more prisons to solve the “prisons are too full” part of that sentence while leaving the second part for another day, would you be for that because you progressed halfway to having your concerns met?

You people are so cynical. Don’t you remember how this all went down before when Weiner delayed his vote on single payer on a promise he’d get a vote later? And then everyone kept their promises and he got his vote later just like he was told he would? Oh, wait…

Okay, so don’t you remember how the only reason that promise of later action was not kept was that it had to be sacrificed for the greater good because if amendments were allowed, we might end up with Stupak’s amendment which we couldn’t possibly tolerate? So it wasn’t bad faith, it was just to save us from a vote on Stupak. Oh, wait…

Anyway, you people are POOPYHEADS for not trusting the leadership to keep their word if they promise you a later vote on what you want if you just agree to delay and vote for what they want in the meantime. And nobody wants to be called a poopyhead, right? So you better straighten up or your leadership can’t be responsible for what nasty names you get called.

*Borg-Swarm*

Its a *keeper* Jane!