Jane, I would’ve preferred “all the above” but I see the point of your poll.

Is there some way to check all 6?

All of the above indeed.

Things don’t look good for our hero.

The fact that I blame groups like NARAL should in no way imply that I give Barack Obama a free pass for being a lying pol(and let’s be clear when you run by implying that you will be pro choice and then sign an anti choice order negating chioce you are a liar), or Degette for not standing for her convictions. Or even Pelosi who could have stopped this to begin with by not allowing Stupak to entertain his stupid amendment.

I just think that if there had been an effective lobbying effort from groups like NARAL that we wouldn’t be where we are today. They aren’t taken seriously. If I had to start with a fix…I’d start there.

They are all equally to blame.

My vote goes to Stephanie Herseth Sandlin.

Clearly, the House members. Of the range of parties, they are the ones elected to represent their constituents. They are the ones who had to match Stupak’s intensity. I think that the House was where this whole struggle had its hinge.

I do find it somewhat cognitively dissonant that people around here, who seem to pay attention to politics, still behave as if Americans have “rights.”

The experimental evidence is Americans have only one right: to shut up and pay their taxes.

I blame that divisive Lois Capps for her amendment. Like Bart said “I wouldn’t have brought mine up if she hadn’t brought it up first.”

How old is Stupak? Three? Geez, that’s what h sounds like with that statement.

I thought the same thing when I heard it. It is a paraphrase but it can be viewed on C-span from one of his townhalls.

Yeah, I’d call it a group effort too.

Without knowing why the poll was up my instinct was to blame the pro choice block who really failed to provide direction to the elected representation. However, there is a really valid point to the comment Casual Observer makes.

I am not voting this year. I have decided, after the passage of this bill, and the utterly child-centric rhetoric I’ve heard today, that I am living the end of the book Animal Farm, and I am one of the animals on the outside, looking from pig to man and man to pig, and not able to tell which is which.

I see no point in voting for pigs.

It was a hard choice. I make a habit of not saying who I voted for in comments so as not to bias the poll, but I sure have thoughts on the subject.

Yuppers, “all of the above.”

And typo: “Pro-Choice Caucus who broke their promised. .

Will you tell us after the polls are closed?

Please?

Breaking news from Planned Parenthood:

“We regret that a pro-choice president of a pro-choice nation was forced to sign an Executive Order…

Edit: or is Cecile Richards engaging in high-quality snark?

The president. The buck stops there.

This president is responsible.

He gave Senate writing of the bill to Baucus, who gave it to the former VP of Wellpoint (who had been his aide before taking the two year sabbatical to Wellpoint), etc. What Obama cared about was not rocking the Corporate boats and making sure his own ship would come in.

I don’t think he has a liberal thought in his head, unless scripted to bamboozle the rubes.

HCR means High Corporate Returns. (From Chris Floyd)

Always with the passive voice!

Obama “was forced”???

BS. It’s his bill and he managed it to get what he wanted. That he managed it poorly is his fault, not anyone else’s.

That was a tough one but I made my choice. But it was only the first among equals type of thing at best.

It’s Obama by far. Any time any group anywhere started sprouting independence from his slimy backroom corporate deal, his henchman came out of the darkest pit to buy her/him off. If that didn’t work – he demonized them with garbage worth of “Chauncey” & Cheney team.
I’m tired with people saying they LIKE “Clarence Thomas” Obama. What’s to like? Anyone disagree? Chime in here if I’m missing something. Are we to like or respect a family man with two daughters who’s doing this?
I can’t imagine any man who respects women doing what he’s doing. Anyone still think he believes in the ideals of the Democratic Party? Give me a break. A man who speaks “truth”? How dumb does he think we are.
It’s shameful how easily I fell for his “hope” & “change” rhetoric, just shameful.

Yes, all of the above. It took many players to orchestrate this by design. Planned Parenthood is wrong in saying that we have a pro-choice nation if we can’t elect a democratic majority in Congress and a democratic President and still get anti-choice legislation. Of course, I’m not going to fill their coffers because of it.

“We regret that a pro-choice president of a pro-choice nation was forced to sign an Executive Order…”

Uh, what evidence do you have, Cecile, that he’s pro-choice? The EO argues otherwise.

“We regret that a pro-vegetarian fox of a pro-vegetarian barnyard was forced to eat a chicken…”

How come Rahm wasn’t in the poll. He’s the dealer-in-chief after all.

I absolutely loved the applause from Democrats while Stupak was speaking before the vote on the motion to recommit…it kinda added to the surreal atmosphere of the whole thing, don’t you think?

…and now their insurance premiums!

I had to go with Obama. Even more people voted for him than for the individual house members.

And, he campaigned, supposedly, on not interfering with women’s reproductive health. I’ve posted the video of it.

So JANE what more proof do you need about OBAMA given the healthcare fiasco. Rahm is still in place despite the allegations of wrong doing. The healthcare reform you wanted was the public option,medicare for all or single payer you got neither. By the way the full effect of this bill does not go into effect until 2014. In addtion what happen to those progressives you were more than willing to support to kill the bill they supported it. However,what are you going to do about those DEMS who soldout us out the 38 who are own by the insurance companies. Those same DEMS will continue to sell us out period. What plan do you have for those sell outs.It seems to me you need a replacement plan for those DEMS and our President period. The question is what are you going to do? Let not forget your friend Blance Lincoln and the other senators who screwed this up in the first place. Again what are you going to do? So while you pause and think about what you are going to do have you learned any lessons. I hope so,but given what has happen about healthcare you need a different approach otherwise it going to continue to happen on other issues. You need a new plan and that a given.

The plan should be, dump the Democratic Party. They are an Epic FAIL.

We should dump those 34 DEMS that voted with the REP given they were bought and paid for by the insurance Co. Also those people in those districts have heavily uninsured people. At the same time we need replacements for those 34 House DEMS period. In addtion we need to replace those six DEM senators who screwed up the healthcare issue in the first place. Example Blance Lincoln she needs to be removed period.The question become what do we do now cause Obama is going to continue do what he is doing. By the way we must not forget our REP friends either given there obstuction ways. So there is a lot of dumping to be done including our present President. So the question become are we prepared and ready to do the work necessary to dump these fools. A new plan is in order period.

Very funny!

I guess the anti-choice and anti-woman provisions (the bill permits gender-rating, the practice of charging women higher premiums simply because they are women) are the price for the President’s signature on the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act – a purely strategic move on Obama’s part.

No kidding!

When will the subject Executive Order be revoked? It is not if but when

Ok I finally decided to vote for NARAL. Because other groups can claim they have multiple factors to consider in supporting the bill or not, but NARAL has to look only at abortion.

Epic fail.

My choice (None of the Above) wasn’t there. The status quo remains and the platform for true health care reform is in place. I’ll take that as a large step forward.

If the Progressive caucus toed the line, we would have a public option and women’s reproductive rights.

Talk about your devil’s choices. So much malfeasance, so few votes to cast.

How do you recommend a post please anyone?

Backward, actually.

Tough choice, I put it on the gutless ‘pro choice’ caucus, who signed the letter “Anonymous’. Truly lousy, whoever they are.

How many more ways can our elected officials screw us? The think tanks are busy working on that and have been. It is a conspiracy. RICO

Hi bigbrother. I think that’s only possible on Seminal.

good luck with getting rico prosecuted with the citzens united supreme court.

What Eureka said.

But you can always write a comment thanking the author of the post.

Toby Wollin is upstairs!
Late Night: Send A Dog to Congress

Cap and trade is next, imo, then Social Security and Medicare.

Haven’t read comments, but man I wish that poll had an “All The Above” Mz. Hamsher. I’m pretty furious with ALL those choices, how to single one out from the others? Impossible. So I didn’t vote, sorry.

Damn, I canvassed door to door for NARAL on the ERA in Western Mass in the raygun666 years, and now they sell out bigtime, so they got my vote but all the democrats are to blame. I also blame Barbara Boxer, my senator, for not destroying all this with her passionate laser beam legislative technique. I mean WTF?

I guess some things never change. Women are, now once gain, second class citizens, designed only to pump out babies and STFU.

Not even close to a backwards step, not with millions more people to have health care insurance, not with recision eliminated, not with children with pre-existing conditions no longer legally allowed to be denied insurance. A larger view shows a large step forward.

There’s enough blame to go around, enough for all these bad actors.
Obama fought hard for Nixon’s healthcare plan, and Tricky Dick must be cheering from the Great Beyond.
Women will not be able to pay for expensive procedures necessary to their health and well-being. And our “progressive” President, “progressive” congressional caucuses, and “progressive” voices in the media could care less.
Welcome to the US of A in the twenty-first century. Where being an anti-choice progressive is no longer an oxymoron.

Just yanking your chain so you can finish your little script. Be sure to wipe, now.

As Obama recently said, the buck stops with him, so I vote for Obama as the person most responsible for selling out abortion rights in the health care bill.

Jane Nice follow up post.

I am voting for each one one at a time.

So you’re okay with the following, then?

Fact: President Obama made an eleventh-hour agreement to issue an executive order lending the weight of his office to the anti-abortion measures included in the bill. This move was designed to appease a handful of anti-choice Democrats who have held up health care reform in an effort to restrict women’s access to abortion. This executive order helps to cement the misconception that the Hyde Amendment is settled law rather than what it really is — an illegitimate tack-on to an annual must-pass appropriations bill. It also sends the outrageous message that it is acceptable to negotiate health care reform on the backs of women.

Fact: The bill permits age-rating, the practice of imposing higher premiums on older people. This practice has a disproportionate impact on women, whose incomes and savings are lower due to a lifetime of systematic wage discrimination.

Fact: The bill also permits gender-rating, the practice of charging women higher premiums simply because they are women. Some are under the mistaken impression that gender-rating has been prohibited, but that is only true in the individual and small-group markets. Larger group plans (more than 100 employees) sold through the exchanges will be permitted to discriminate against women — having an especially harmful impact in workplaces where women predominate.

Still think this bill is such a great step forward? As a woman, I say it’s a step back for women’s rights, and when this happens, everybody loses.

I voted for Obama just because IMO he was ultimately the one that agreed and wrote and signed the actual assualt on women’s rights. I’m not sure the bill with Stupak would’ve passed this time (even though I know it did the first time) but I believe it wouldn’t have.

I don’t know if that would’ve been the end of health insurance reform, but I think it would’ve been the end of tying the Stupid language to it. But Obama made the hard choices unnecessary and enabled the abortion nuts have their cake and eat it too. They get all the perks of being “on board” with the Party, and get to brag about what they got done about abortion. Assholes shouldn’t have ever tied the abortion language to it in the first place since IMO The Hyde amendment would’ve covered the bill without it.

The whole fucking fiasco was just one lie and sellout after another. (Well, sellout to the democratic base, they didn’t sell out on their right wing donors and enablers).

Assholes.

You know, the best way to make this choice probably would have been with a random number generator. With the exception of Planned Parenthood, who may have gotten something of use to the general population out of the deal, there really isn’t much difference when it comes to culpability. Who is most to blame probably has the most to do with who had the most power to change things.

Elite propaganda and stagecraft, executed by Obama and enshrined by corporatist lapdogs in Congress.

Me too. They and NARAL exist to hold the line on choice.

Cap and Crap.

Oh, and can someone please explain to me how the powers that be get away with the explanation that abortion is so controversial that those that are dead against shouldnv’t have their tax payers going there.

Goddam it I’m dead set against the fucking Iraq war and Afghan surge, can I get my tax dollars exempt from those?

Assholes.

Pro-Choice Caucus.

If you’re going to make threats, you have to be ready to back them up. Stupak knew this, which is why he got what he wanted.

Honestly I think Obama probably ought to be the least culpable here…by the time this “11th hour agreement” was in place, what was he supposed to do? He’d spent plenty of time and energy to whip and cajole other members into voting for the bill…

Pelosi for ignoring the issue and the PCP for signing off on the Order. But really if anyone had taken the PCP seriously, the order might never have been signed.

I haven’t liked every single thing Obama’s done so far, so I am far from a strident Obama booster…but I really don’t think he deserves the blame so much as everyone who came before him.

Obama got my vote. For a Democratic President to sign such an executive order is utterly reprehensible.

Except for backing abolition of Hyde well before he was elected…
He cannot get a free pass for walking away from a core principle. He is THE top of the party. That has to mean something.

Obama got my vote. For a Democratic President to sign such a _____________________ is utterly reprehensible.

There, you should probably copy that and keep it handy because there’s going to be plenty more appropriate uses for that.

If we dump the Democratic Party, then we can’t defeat the “lapdogs” in the primaries. At least not in my state. Help.

I hope the bus the Dems threw us all under slams into reverse and runs them all down!!!!!

YOU KNOW, JANE, YOU JUST DON’T GET IT. THERE ARE RIGHTS MORE IMPORTANT THAN ABORTION RIGHTS. POOR WOMEN DON’T HAVE ACCESS TO MEDICAID FINANCED ABORTION ANYWAY. THE HEALTH CARE BILL VIS-A-VIA ABORTION RIGHTS ONLY APPLIES TO A TINY PORTION OF WOMEN OVER AGAINST THE HEALTH CARE PROVIDED TO WOMEN OVERALL.

You know, this is a democracy, and those fundamentally opposed to abortion do get to have their say. I don’t agree with them, but they do get to have their say.

DM

~~~ModNote: Repeating once again, please DO NOT use all-caps. It is very difficult to read, and is regarded as shouting.~~~

Or should we blame the ones that rejected a passionately pro-choice candidate with a long record of supporting both women’s rights and universal health care. A woman who’s policy knowledge and experience was strong and demonstrated her willingness to work hard and get the job done during her senate career. Who offered detailed plans of what she would do and how she would do it if elected. A woman who still stays true to the same principles she has always championed.

Those who decided to elect an unknown who gave pretty speeches someone else wrote and decided to run for president in his first year as a senator, who had little experience and no accomplishments in his extremely short senate career, who carried, at best, a questionable record on choice in his state legislative career, who had many troubling financial dealings, political tactics, and personal associations. Someone who offered few details on what he would do when elected.

Hopefully those people will think twice the next time a charlatan comes along to take their votes. God knows I didn’t suffer through 8 years of W hoping for what we have now.

Seems like there is plenty of blame to go around.

If a “wildly popular” Democratic president with big Democratic majorities in both houses has trouble passing the health care a majority of the country wants. If refuses to discuss single payer, concedes everything the Republicans ask before negotiations start in the name of bipartisanship and continues to make concessions without gaining a single vote, is he just a bad negotiator or is he stupid?

When the ultimate bill produced is just what the insurers wanted, don’t you think that his “11 dimensional chess strategy” achieved exactly what he (and his “true” base, the base that bankrolled him from the beginning) wanted? Doesn’t he think he achieved his objective?

Seems to me he is pretty happy with the deal and has no qualms about throwing women’s reproductive rights or any other Democratic value under the bus. Can’t wait to so see who he picks for the Supreme Court, or what his next legislative objective is… Social Security? Medicare? Both at once? More money for the banksters?

Do you think maybe it’s you that doesn’t get it?

I mean I’m not sure if you’re seeing the whole picture here.

Now that they’ve seen how far they can push the anti-choice agenda, do you think it’s going to stop with the health insurance giveaway bill? Because I don’t.

IMO the Hyde amendment itself shouldn’t even be agreed with by any Democrat. Abortion is a perfectly legal medical procedure.

Honestly, all six must be checked. This thing is beautiful.

This is unfair to Jane, #1.

#2, while I am not an abortion supporter, I can see their concern in that you give an inch and next they want two inches. It is slippery slope you begin down. (as someone who thinks the overall bill leads to a slippery slope of another kind, I get it)

#3, no matter the good of bad of the substance, Stupak, Pelosi and Obama handled this is a very poor manner to say the least. And Stupak, poor guy, just threw himself under the bus put himself in a worst of all worlds situation. And, I think the bus is going to back up, throw it in drive, then back up again, and maybe try to lay some rubber on him.

Katha Pollit’s take at Thenation.com:

In the end, forced to decide between sacrificing abortion coverage and voting down coverage of everything else for 30 million people, abortion-rights supporters took the hit. Prochoice representatives, who had vowed to vote against any bill that restricted access to abortion more than the infamous Hyde Amendment has already done, will have reversed themselves and voted for it. (Don’t kid yourselves, the Senate bill is a major blow to abortion rights. As antichoice evangelical David Gushee told followers stuck on Stupak: “Accept victory while you can get it.”) NARAL, Planned Parenthood and NOW stepped back.

Katha’s list is far from complete. She forgot to mention her own publication for endorsing this horrific bill, giving it the Good Housekeeping Seal of Approval from The Nation, Inc. Guess that must have just slipped her mind.
And Katha herself appears to agree that it is A-okay to bargain away women’s reproductive rights in order to get a bill that reeks with gender bias.
Way to go, Kat!

“built on a series of principles that Republicans espoused for years.”

“It doesn’t matter, though. Should I decide to change my politics and become a conservative now that I’m exactly the middle-aged bourgeois/suburban tool I used to rail against, I can always vote Republican by voting Democratic. The new Democratic Party is an excellent substitute for the old Nixon/Ford Republican Party. They even passed Nixon’s vision of a health care plan. That there’s no Democratic Party left is a shame, but I guess one choice is better than none.”

—Matt Taibbi

Didn’t you get the memo that you were supposed to hail the chief now? Fall in line, bask in the historic glory?

Obama is responsible not just for the anti-choice language in the healthcare bill but in signing the Executive order he effectively abandoned Roe. Think about that. If he was willing to swap Roe for a few votes on a catastrophically bad bill, what and who will he not sell out?

The Democrats have become Republicans, and the Republicans have become, well….. frothingly insane.

I blame Gods own little worker Blankenfein – because the bucks all wind up at his desk.

Your poll is idiotic. The answer is “none of the above”. The persons most responsible are the Republicans and the anti-choicers in both parties, and the morons who voted them into office.

Would that be the same woman who could never apologize for her vote for the Iraq war, the one whose main difference with George Bush was not the decision to go to war but how the war was fought, who threatened to nuke Iran out of existence, and who had no problem with her husband’s neoliberal policies which led to the financial disasters we are now experiencing? Is it that one?

The House, the Senate, and the Executive branch are dominated by Democrats. That they couldn’t or wouldn’t fight like Hell for an essential party plank is no one’s fault but their own.

The haters and Fundys can be crushed only if principle by Democrats is observed. The Dems failed miserably.

Plus, oh wait, those thirty million aren’t really covered. Medicaid will cover you as long as you’re poor and you don’t have any savings or other non-home tangible assets, but having to buy insurance does not equal coverage.

Maybe we should have made that phrase into a bumper sticker.

I swear, people hear that 30 million people insured and stop thinking at that point. That those people are being forced to buy a corporate product does not mean they have good, affordable healthcare. That is only a possible, and by no means likely, outcome.
And the women among those 30 million will pay more for less healthcare than everyone else.
If this bill had been put forward by Bush & Co., feminists would have been screaming to high heaven. But when dreamy Barack asks them to sacrifice women’s rights, by golly they will.

I think you have it there, but that means the electorate failed in electing insufficiently Democratic Democrats to the House, the Senate, and the Executive branch. I.e. all of us.

That same woman who’s major policy differences with the current president was she was in the Senate and had the responsibility for voting on the Iraq resolution along with the rest of the Dems, while he says he gave a pretty speech, that no one actually heard and he eventually had to re-stage to record. After he flip-flopped on his position. He hasn’t shown much ability to stand up for what he believes in when it is tough going. At best he votes present. His standard MO seems to be to cave. And really, you really can’t see the difference between her position, and almost all the Dems in voting in the senate, and the man who lied us into a war? Be honest with yourself if not with us.

And what is the difference that would have played out if she was elected? It isn’t like he got the troops out when he said he would. He made promises he didn’t have the experience to know how to execute or understand if they’d work. He said what people wanted to hear at the time and then did something different. Would you feel better if he apologizes for not ending the war as he promised you?

Would you feel better if he apologized for throwing women, single payer, and universal health care under the bus in favor of full funding for insurance companies?

Do you think all those people who lost their houses will feel better if he apologizes for not implementing a plan that would help him, one his rival crafted and promoted?

It isn’t like he has supported choice. It isn’t like he worked for universal health care. He only got off his rear for this misbegotten insurance give-away when it finally became clear to even him that his funders were not going to get their payback. Mandates, with no price controls.

Will you feel better if he apologizes for throwing away a Democratic supermajority in the Senate, and a large majority in the House come 2010? Should he do it now or wait until after it happens?

Should he apologize for demoralizing and ruining the Democratic party? Ruining the brand?

Does an apology really make it all better, and would you believe he was sorry if he did?

““ Good evening.

This afternoon in this room, from this chair, I testified before the Office of Independent Counsel and the grand jury.

I answered their questions truthfully, including questions about my private life, questions no American citizen would ever want to answer.

Still, I must take complete responsibility for all my actions, both public and private. And that is why I am speaking to you tonight.

As you know, in a deposition in January, I was asked questions about my relationship with Monica Lewinsky. While my answers were legally accurate, I did not volunteer information.

Indeed, I did have a relationship with Miss Lewinsky that was not appropriate. In fact, it was wrong. It constituted a critical lapse in judgment and a personal failure on my part for which I am solely and completely responsible….”

blah, blah, NAFTA
blah, blah, Glass Steagal
blah, blah, blah

Bargaining away women’s reproductive rights is hyperbole. Very good rhetoric for victim-role politics but not much reflective of the facts of the matter. In the status quo, poor women have no right to insurance coverage for abortion. Nothing has changed there. Doesn’t mean it is right, just means there has been no change, ergo, women’s reproductive rights have not been traded-away. At the same time, insurance benefits have been extended to thirty million. Suspect pretty close to half of those are women, the majority of which are of child-bearing age. Mandated coverage with the trade-off of no pre-existing conditions, etc. Given the facts of childhood obesity, you really think that is a good deal for health insurance companies in the long-run?

Scroll, peeps.
It isn’t worth it.

Well, Fuck NO, in contrast to you, I really did appear before the joint committee of the house and senate of the Kansas legislature on the issue of abortion. So, until you document for me you have actually done something, I will regard what you say as useless blather. I think T.S. Elliot had the final say on that.

you’ve been trumpeting that all over, over and over.
you also seem extremely preoccupied with all matters of sex.

I’m sincerely sorry for your loss though.

Uhm, **ll them all & let God sort them out?

I can’t choose just one, but Obama was clever here. He played good cop to Rahm’s and Congress’ bad cops, keeping his savior image and getting, after all, the bill he wanted. Obama is about appearances. Of the things he truly cares about, appearance is in the very small group at the top.

It isn’t hyperbole if you are the one on the receiving end.

And we haven’t even gone into the discriminatory higher prices women must pay for this insurance that isn’t about giving them good reproductive health options. Nothing was done to address this. Which leads to other problems in getting the job and who gets laid off in a bad economy.

And the practical reality of the EO will definitely make it harder to exercise that reproductive right. It makes it even harder for poor women, and it was already unimaginably hard.

I think that a popular Democratic president, with a supermajority in the Senate and a large majority in the House, with popular support for real health care could have achieved ALL of that and much more without codifying the Hyde amendment, without throwing women’s reproductive health and the Democratic Pro-Choice platform plank under the bus. Without a give away to the insurance companies(mandates with NO price controls and NO restrictions on increases) and backroom deals with Big Pharma.

Single payer was conceivable, a robust public option was definitely attainable, Medicare for all was in the realm of possibility. So many options for a good bill, so much hope, all dashed. All that work for naught.

The “Change” we needed was at the top, Obama.

Look what Bush did with so much less in congress. What is the difference here?

Is he really that incompetent or didn’t he care about Democratic principles? How does one start negotiations by giving away all the cards you care about without gaining anything? Who continues to “compromise” without gaining any votes? Why does someone do that?

Why did we really end up here with all the 11 dimensional chess being played? I don’t think he is stupid. I think we ended up where he wanted to end up.

I’ve never understood where all his initial funding came from. I think we know now. Not seeing the change. Sorry. The Republicans would love this plan if they weren’t fixated on making Obama fail. We’re still in Iraq. Not seeing much progress, let alone progressive principles.

Jane, a few weeks ago you were talking big about primarying any Democrat who restricted women’s abortion rights. Were you just blowing off steam? They crossed your line, are you going to make them pay?

Are you going to pay extra for the orphanages for all the unwanted kids?

Who did you have in mind?

I voted for NARAL. As far as accountability is concerned, I think they are the lowest hanging fruit. I think it would send a message to everyone else on the poll if we could persuade members and donors to ditch them for NOW or PP.

How long has it been since NARAL was worth a damn? Maybe I’m missing some inside game moves, but my impression is that NARAL has grown fat, dumb, and lazy inside the Beltway. They probably survive on the sentiment of distant memories. NOW likewise.

After we get mad—let’s get even. We represent no more than 10-12% of the electorate and mayber 20-25% of the Democrats. So let’s fous on primaries. I think we can make believers out of faux progressives and blue dogs by taking some key ones down. That will send a message we mean business. I think Lincoln and Reid are good for the Senate and of course Stupak and a few more of the more egregious ones in the house. Not voting is a mistake—just vote Green or write-in.

Obama is the one that cut secret (later revealed) backroom deals at the very start of the process that set the stage for what would follow.

I would have said “all of the above” if the choice had been there, but ultimately, the President is the most culpable.

That’s an insult to Nixon and Ford. Nixon’s CHIP plan was based on an employer mandate, not Obama’s individual mandate (it was only when Clinton adopted Nixon’s employer mandate idea in 1993, that the Republicans shifted right to the individual mandate position).

I disagree, the Republicans and anti-choicers don’t pretend to be anything they’re not and they don’t stab their allies in the back. Its politicians who are pro-choice when they need money or votes but who doublecross their allies when its convenient that are the real problem.

This whole issue was avoidable at any time if the President and the Congress had reframed HCR to provide coverage through existing federal programs (Medicaid, SCHIP, Medicare). Since federal plans are already covered by Hyde, the uninsured could get healthcare without, in the process, putting private insurer coverage of abortion at risk. And make no mistake, thanks to Ben Nelson’s state opt-out provision, you’re going to see the religious right go state to state to lobby legislatures to ban the provision of abortion coverage by private insurers.

But using public plans to provide healthcare would mean no corporate welfare for private insurers, and THAT was unthinkable.

What the crap does Bill Clinton have to do with “Who is the Most to Blame for Selling Out Abortion Rights in the Health Care Bill”? Are you wanting Jane to add him to the list? Unbelievable.

How much longer for the (later revealed)?

Poll should have had “all of the above” and “none of the above” choices. Given the factional nature of FDL these days I suspect “All of the Above” would win, with “none of the above” in second place.

I don’t see how this poll is anything besides a morale tool for keeping factions isolated. How does it advance anything besides anger and indignation towards the options given in the poll? Does castigating NARAL, Pelosi, Obama do anything to advance reproductive freedom? How does it help reproductive freedom to blame the pro-choice caucus – do you think expressing anger at them will make them listen to you?

None of the options seem correct to me. There is a much more complex explanation for re-affirming the Hyde Amendment.

In my opinion, 2010 electoral politics is mostly to blame. The Democratic Congresspeople that voted “no” weren’t whipped for this reason, and the Stupak block was needed for the damn bill to pass.

After Scott Brown’s election Congressional leadership and the White House determined this was the best way to insure 30,000,000 more Americans and to end some insurance abuses. They succeeded in doing this.

Go Carolyn!

Yeah, love Katha, but disappointed with her attempt to spin some sort of feminist rationale on it. I think the President signed the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act and considers it even, as evidence by the White House’s choice to codify Hyde and skip running the language of the executive order passed the pro-choice caucus. But then I guess they didn’t have to, they already had the caucus in hand. I also think Katha is erroneous in thinking that women ask for payback after the fact. If NARAL, PP, and NOW really stood up for women, they would have asked for something in return immediately like free birth control, free maternal health care – something even pro-lifers would have to agree with.

For the last time AArdvark, Jane and most of the thread are not saying that women’s rights are above health care rights. This is your umpteenth, lame attempt at forwarding this false premise that is based on the false dichotomy that one must either be for women’s rights or for health care, but not both. We are saying that a woman’s reproductive freedom IS integral to their health care and that the full depth and breadth of it should be available in their health care package. We are also saying that women should not have to pay more for health care just because they are women and the bill does nothing to change that. The bill permits gender rating to continue. Why should half of those 30 million pay more money than the other half?