Multi Medium

Why I’m Fed Up

As Gregg very effectively points out, it’s funny how Obama and the Democrats couldn’t be bothered to make an effort on behalf of the public option, much less single payer, dithering endlessly and fruitlessly with Republicans and immediately capitulating when conservative wankers like Joe Lieberman and Ben Nelson say they’ll vote no… yet now that the healthcare reform bill has transformed into a huge windfall for the insurance industry (and antichoice fanatics), they’ve pulled out all the stops to push for its passage and aggressively (and apparently effectively) attack any Democrats who hold out.  They’re even getting creative with arcane procedural workarounds.

So, to sum up: Public option/single payer?  Not worth the slightest effort to defend.  Gutting abortion rights and forcing people to buy insurance from the private companies who made healthcare suck in the first place?  The most important bill ever, and woe unto any Democrat who votes against it.

I guess it’s all just a matter of priorities, and Obama and the Democrats clearly have the wrong ones.

Add comment March 17th, 2010 at 07:25am Posted by Eli

Remarkable.

That Pat Caddell and Doug Schoen could write so many words about how healthcare reform is doomed and everybody hates it because they hate Big Government without ever once mentioning the public option and how overwhelmingly popular it is.

I’m sure it’s just an oversight; so many people seem to have forgotten all about the public option lately.

Add comment March 12th, 2010 at 11:32am Posted by Eli

Wankers Of The Day

Harry Reid and Dick Durbin.

After all their pro-public-option posturing, now they’re urging Senate Democrats to vote against any amendments to the woefully inadequate and public-optionless reconciliation bill, even if they’re popular and/or they personally support them.

Great plan, make Democrats vote against popular healthcare policies that they support… in an election year.  They must be worried that the base isn’t depressed enough.

(Gee, I guess Bernie didn’t get the memo…)

Add comment March 11th, 2010 at 08:41pm Posted by Eli

Gang Of 14: Yer Doin It Wrong

Lindsey seems a little unclear on the concept:

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) wants to revive the bipartisan Gang of 14 — this time for health care reform, not judicial nominees.

But most of his moderate Democratic colleagues aren’t rushing to R.S.V.P.

Graham said Tuesday that a coalition of Republican and Democratic senators could rescue the Senate from an institutional disaster brought on by the use of the parliamentary maneuver known as reconciliation to finish the health care bill.

“Many Republicans who were ready to pull the trigger on the nuclear option on judges are now glad they didn’t,” Graham said. “This place would have ceased to function as we know it. If they do health care through reconciliation, it will be the same consequence. So if you are a moderate Democrat out there looking for a way to deliver health care reforms and not pull the nuclear trigger, there is a model to look at.”

I wouldn’t mind seeing something like the original Gang Of 14 compromise, where the majority agreed not to eliminate the filibuster in exchange for the minority agreeing not to use it.  But this is more like the minority party agreeing not to use it in exchange for the majority party not making them want to.

What both “compromises” have in common, of course, is that the Democrats cede power to let the Republicans get their way.

Add comment March 11th, 2010 at 07:20am Posted by Eli

Massa:Beck::Al Capone’s Vault:Rivera?

Poor Glenn Beck.  Massa was serving up all kinds of juicy tidbits about groping and tickling and naked browbeating, but because he wouldn’t come out and say that Rahm or Obama did horrible corrupt illegal conspiracy things to force him out of office, the whole interview was a waste of time.

1 comment March 10th, 2010 at 11:36am Posted by Eli

That’s A Terrible Idea!

I am just not at all comfortable with the idea of making Medicare a government service…

Add comment March 10th, 2010 at 07:07am Posted by Eli

Trying To Pull The Woolsey Over Our Eyes

Lynn Woolsey’s attempt to convince us that she’s not a total spineless weakling on the public option is quite remarkable.  She starts out with an excellent defense of the public option, then pledges to… push for a separate public option bill right after the current monstrosity passes.  Right, because that would totally happen.  The only chance to pass the public option is now, when the White House is desperate for a win on healthcare.

This is strongly reminiscent of Candidate Obama’s promise to fight to strip telecom immunity from the FISA reform bill… immediately after he voted for it.  And look how well that worked out.

Reading Woolsey’s op-ed was like watching Ron Carey in High Anxiety: “I get it… I get it… I get it… I don’t get it.”

(Side question: Has anyone in the Senate leadership yet given any kind of coherent explanation for why the public option isn’t in the reconciliation sidecar?  I know Gibbs – who is not in the Senate – said it didn’t have the votes, but otherwise it seems more like the public option simply hasn’t occurred to Harry, and all the Senators who have signed the public option are just a vague buzzing noise in his ear.)

1 comment March 9th, 2010 at 07:22am Posted by Eli

Great Moments In Sales

In their latest e-mail blast, apparently the DNC actually thinks this is a good thing:

On Fox News Sunday this morning Mitt Romney defended the individual mandate, which was in the health care plan he championed as Governor, as the “ultimate conservative plan”

See it HERE:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GzdhJ3CsYLQ

DNC National Press Secretary Hari Sevugan offered the following response to Romney’s declaration:

“We know that ensuring everyone is covered and expanding the risk pool will lower costs, but it certainly speaks to the bipartisan nature of the President’s plan that Governor Romney calls the idea of an individual mandate the “ultimate conservative plan.”

Romney Defends Individual Mandate as “Conservative.” “What we did, I think, is the ultimate conservative plan. We said people have to take responsibility for getting insurance, if they can afford it, or paying their own way. No more free-riders.” [FOX News, 3/7/10, See it HERE:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GzdhJ3CsYLQ]

DNC National Press Secretary Hari Sevugan offered the following response to Romney’s declaration:

“We know that ensuring everyone is covered and expanding the risk pool will lower costs, but it certainly speaks to the bipartisan nature of the President’s plan that Governor Romney calls the idea of an individual mandate the “ultimate conservative plan.”

Oh yeah, I am soooo stoked to run out and support the Senate’s healthcare plan now that I know that Mitt Romney has endorsed the individual mandate as “the ultimate conservative plan” – I’m gonna get on the phone to my congressman right away!

2 comments March 7th, 2010 at 03:27pm Posted by Eli

So Now He’s In A Hurry?

Funny how Obama’s patience was nearly infinite when the public option was in the Senate healthcare bill with Republicans and conservadems trying to take it out, but now that the public option is out with liberals and moderates trying to put it back in, he can’t get it passed soon enough.

If it weren’t for his solemn promise to “revisit” the public option at some unspecified future time (just like his promise to “revisit” NAFTA!), I might think that he really really doesn’t want it.

Add comment March 5th, 2010 at 07:02am Posted by Eli

Wankers Of The Day

Shorter Tom Harkin and Debbie Wasserman Schultz: We really like the public option, but it is necessary to destroy healthcare reform in order to save it.  Or something.

Democratic support for the public option looks more and more phony and insincere every day.  Like Obama, they want it dead, but they know it’s popular and don’t want to take the blame for killing it, so they play Reluctant Pragmatist Acceding To Reality.  Pathetic.

Add comment March 2nd, 2010 at 11:32am Posted by Eli

Ignoring The Obvious

Al Gore and Michael Hiltzik speak the unspeakable truths about global warming and the healthcare industry industry.

But since they’re both advocating change that would not be profitable, Congress – especially the Senate – will continue to hide their heads in the sand until it’s too late.  Assuming it isn’t already.

Add comment March 1st, 2010 at 07:17am Posted by Eli

This Is What Happens

When you don’t deliver on your campaign promises.  Or actively work to sabotage them.

A year after supporting Barack Obama for president by an overwhelming 2-to-1 ratio, young adults are cooling quickly toward his Democrats amid dissatisfaction over the lack of change in Washington and an escalating war in Afghanistan.

A study by the Pew Research Center, being released Wednesday, highlights the eroding support from 18- to 29-year- olds whose strong turnout in November 2008 was read by some demographers as the start of a new Democratic movement.

The findings are significant because they offer further proof that the diverse coalition of voters Obama cobbled together in 2008 — including high numbers of first-timers, young minorities and youths — are not Democratic Party voters who can necessarily be counted on.

While young adults remain decidedly more liberal, the survey found the Democratic advantage among 18- to 29-year-olds has substantially narrowed, from a record 62 percent identifying as Democrat vs. 30 percent for the Republicans in 2008, down to 54 percent vs. 40 percent last December. It was the largest percentage point jump in those who identified or leaned Republican among all the voting age groups.

Young adults’ voting enthusiasm also crumbled.

During the presidential election, turnout among 18- to 29-year-olds was the highest in years, comprising roughly 20 percent of the voters in many states including Virginia and New Jersey, due in part to high participation from young blacks and Hispanics.

That percentage, however, dropped by half for the governors’ races in those states last November, where Republicans celebrated wins as black groups pushed Obama to do more to soften the economic blow from mortgage foreclosures and Latinos saw little progress on immigration reform. Young adults also were the least likely of any age group to identify themselves as regular voters.

They could have been “the start of a new Democratic movement”, but Obama chose to turn his back on them the second his election was secure.  Apparently he either thinks he can win without them, that he can turn on the charm and the uplifting hopey talk when he needs it, or that they’ll just have to vote for him because the alternative is so much worse.  Personally, I wouldn’t bet my presidency on any of those outcomes.  Maybe he thinks grateful PhRMA and Wall Street dollars will be enough to buy the 2012 election, but I kinda doubt that too.

And it won’t be just the youth vote Obama will be losing; he’s going to lose a big chunk of the Democratic base too.  Contempt and betrayal are not really great drivers for turnout.

Add comment February 26th, 2010 at 07:21am Posted by Eli

Obama Vs. Progressives

Despite Obama’s desperate desire to see the public option finally curl up and die, progressive congressmembers are still trying to keep the dream alive at today’s healthcare summit.  In addition to the use-reconciliation-to-pass-PO letter that’s circulating around the Senate, we also have:

• Bernie Sanders saying the Senate does have the 50 votes needed to pass the PO through reconciliation, and that he’s baffled why Obama keeps trying to bury it.

• Nancy Pelosi reminding Obama that he himself said that the PO would “keep the insurance companies honest and… increase competition” and challenging him to produce a better alternative.  She also pointed out that the public option saves money, which is a very important point that is too often forgotten.

• The Congressional Progressive Caucus objected to their exclusion from the summit, pointed out that the PO is mad popular, and suggested that perhaps the savings from the PO which everybody likes could be used to offset the excise tax which everybody hates.

At this point, I fear the fix is in, that Obama has made up his mind that he would rather piss off the voters than piss off the healthcare industry, but I’m glad to see that the progressives aren’t letting him off the hook.  This should also help them when they all have to run against Obama in the midterms.

Add comment February 25th, 2010 at 08:40pm Posted by Eli

Which Would You Rather Have?

A medal lasts four years, but universal healthcare is forever.

Add comment February 24th, 2010 at 11:17am Posted by Eli

It Certainly Does Explain A Lot…

No wonder Gibbs is trying to throw cold water on passing the public option through reconciliation.  Obama really is playing for the other team. Jebus, what a dishonest scumbag.

I’m still hopeful that Congress will pass the public option simply to save their own skins in November, but it’s going to be a lot harder with the president actively working against them.  I assume even Obama wouldn’t be stupid enough to actually veto the public option if it somehow passed, but if he did I’m sure his explanation would be fascinating.

1 comment February 24th, 2010 at 07:16am Posted by Eli

This Just In…

Earth to Obama and Democrats: How many times do we have to tell you that the reason everyone hates the Senate healthcare bill is because it doesn’t have a public option?

I know this is hard and painful for you to hear, but you would actually improve your re-election chances by moving left, not right.  But perhaps you’re less worried about staying in office than you are about your employment after office.

(h/t Phoenix Woman)

Add comment February 22nd, 2010 at 07:18pm Posted by Eli

Breakthrough, Or The Great Punkin’?

On the one hand, Harry Reid has announced his… non-opposition to passing the public option via reconciliation:

With more and more Senators signing on to the letter urging Reid to hold an up or down vote on the public option under reconciliation rules, Reid spokesman Rodell Mollineau sends over a statement signaling Reid’s qualified support for the move:

Senator Reid has always and continues to support the public option as a way to drive down costs and create competition. That is why he included the measure in his original health care proposal.

If a decision is made to use reconciliation to advance health care, Senator Reid will work with the White House, the House, and members of his caucus in an effort to craft a public option that can overcome procedural obstacles and secure enough votes.

Woohoo.  But here’s what scares me:

To be sure, public option supporters still face a steep climb. It’s far from decided whether reconciliation will ultimately be used to pass reform. What’s more, senior Senate aides still think there’s a procedural obstacle in their path: They insist that in order for them to pass a fix to their bill via reconciliation, the House must pass it first — something House leaders oppose.

While I do believe that most of the Senators who have signed the PO letter are sincere, I can’t help but think that Reid (and probably Obama) are trying to make the reconciliation sidecar’s chances look as strong as possible to con the House into voting on the current Senate bill without it.  I’m glad the House leadership still isn’t buying it, but the Senate’s continued insistence that the House must pass the crappy bill first looks like a big ol’ red flag to me.

Add comment February 20th, 2010 at 11:37am Posted by Eli

Obama Will Lead If Someone Else Leads First

I suppose it’s a good thing that Obama will push for the public option that he promised and repeatedly claimed he wanted… if Harry Reid will:

Maddow: “The private insurance company writ large hasn’t done a great job. That’s why we want a public option to compete with them. These 18 Democratic senators want to bring that back into the fold. If that happened, would the administration fight for it?”

Sebelius: “Well, I think if it’s…Certainly. If it’s part of the decision of the Senate leadership to move forward, absolutely.”

Especially since both Chuck Schumer and most of Nevada are in favor of it (and against healthcare reform without it), which puts extra pressure on Harry to support it.

But how pitiful is it that Obama is only willing to fight for the public option if one of the weakest Majority Leaders ever fights for it first?  Isn’t the President supposed to be a leader, not a follower?  He’s been in the White House for over a year now, and I’m having a hard time thinking of a time where he’s demonstrated anything remotely resembling leadership or courage.

Add comment February 19th, 2010 at 07:14am Posted by Eli

Fingers Crossed

Possible hopeful signs?  Is it possible that congressional Democrats are finally starting to look at self-preservation despite Obama’s insistence that they all commit electoral suicide by backing the Senate bill as is?  For one thing, it looks like they’ve finally realized that the excise tax is hideously unpopular, and for another, it looks like the House letter asking for the Senate to use reconciliation to restore the popular public option has finally crossed over to the Senate.  Only 8 Senate signatures so far, but hopefully more are coming.

Thanks for nothing, Barack.

Add comment February 17th, 2010 at 07:24am Posted by Eli

So Much For “Dreams Of My FDR”

I partially agree with this…

President Barack Obama’s dream of being a historically transformational figure like Franklin D. Roosevelt or Ronald Reagan may be slipping from his grasp.

(…)

Obama’s quest to usher in a new liberal era — one with major new policies and a growing Democratic voter majority punctuating a shift away from the conservative era that Reagan ushered in — is in trouble and may be disintegrating.

That is to say, I agree with the disintegrating/slipping from his grasp part, but not with the dream/quest part.  I just do not see any evidence that this kind of transformation was ever Obama’s goal.  Sure, during the campaign he said it was his goal because that was what everyone wanted to hear, but his lukewarm words and actions since then have been those of a man determined to work within the status quo.

If transformation really is Obama’s dream, then he’s been remarkably half-assed about fighting for it.

Add comment February 13th, 2010 at 04:56pm Posted by Eli

This?

Obama can’t be bothered to involve himself in the healthcare reform process, but he wants to be all hands-on with THIS???

Glad to see that he’s got his priorities and signature issues straight and everything…

Add comment February 13th, 2010 at 02:42pm Posted by Eli

Remind Me Who The Kill-Grandma Party Is Again?

I mean, after months and months of “death panels” and NOOOO THEY BE TAKIN YOUR MEDICARES, it’s pretty funny that the Republicans are already trying to kill Medicare again so soon.

Not that I’m surprised, of course.   The whole time they’re ranting about how those evil Democrats want to kill Granny, they’re easing her wheelchair over to the top of the stairs.

Add comment February 9th, 2010 at 11:40am Posted by Eli

Leadershippiness!

Obama Fail:

Sen. Al Franken ripped into White House senior adviser David Axelrod this week during a tense, closed-door session with Senate Democrats.

Five sources who were in the room tell POLITICO that Franken criticized Axelrod for the administration’s failure to provide clarity or direction on health care and the other big bills it wants Congress to enact.

(…)

“There was a lot of frustration in there,” said a Democratic senator who declined to be identified.

“People were hot,” another Democratic senator said.

Democratic senators are frustrated that the White House hasn’t done more to win over the public on health care reform and other aspects of its ambitious agenda — and angry that, in the wake of Scott Brown’s win in the Massachusetts Senate race, the White House hasn’t done more to chart a course for getting a health care bill to the president’s desk.

In his public session with the senators Wednesday, Obama urged them to “finish the job” on health care but did not lay out a path for doing so. That uncertainty appeared to trigger Franken’s anger, and the sources in the room said he laid out his concerns much more directly than any senator did in the earlier public session.

Maybe I’m just picky and demanding, but Obama’s “leadership” style sounds an awful lot like “make a vague hand gesture and then wander off.”

This doesn’t exactly put my mind at ease either.

6 comments February 5th, 2010 at 11:28am Posted by Eli

Harry Wants Nancy To Kick The Football

He has no idea how the Senate can pass a reconciliation sidecar fix before the House passes their first healthcare bill – no really – so the House will just have to pass it and hope for the best:

As for reconciliation, the Senate won’t go first.

“We can’t go first,” Reid said . “I don’t know how procedurally we can start reconciliation.”

But Reid acknowledged “that there is consideration of the House passing the reconciliation bill first, followed by the Senate.”  At that point, the House would pass the Senate health bill.

Sure, it’s not like there’s any kind of uncertainty about whether or not the Senate still has 51 votes for the public option, after all.

Fortunately, Nancy wasn’t born yesterday, and appears to be sick of being told what to vote for:

On the call, Pelosi was asked by a reporter whether the Senate would have to go first. “Yes,” she replied, twice, saying her members had repeatedly said they wouldn’t pass the Senate bill if it weren’t fixed before they were asked to vote on it.

Senate aides have privately expressed concern about this course of action being workable. “This is a whole bill that would amend another bill that hasn’t become law,” a senior Dem Senate aide told me yesterday. “How do we do reconciliation before the House passes the Senate bill?”

Some have dismissed the idea that this is a procedural obstacle, and on the call, Pelosi reiterated that she didn’t think it was a problem, saying it’s “not an obstacle,” though she didn’t elaborate. And she repeatedly stressed that the bill would get done.

I’m really really glad that Nancy is not falling for this, as I don’t think there’s anyone who believes that the reconciliation vote won’t encounter some kind of snag if the Senate bill gets passed without it.  I’d be even more glad if she were explicitly demanding that the reconciliation sidecar include the public option and remove the excise tax.

Add comment February 3rd, 2010 at 07:12am Posted by Eli

The Senate Healthcare Bill Is JUST LIKE Social Security!

Bruce Schulman explains that Social Security was actually deeply compromised from FDR’s original vision, just like healthcare reform today, and that’s why the House should pass the Senate bill and worry about fixing it later.  That seems reasonable – after all, the Democrats were able to improve Social Security despite losing big in the next election because everyone hated it.  Oh wait.

Oh, and let’s not forget how expanding Social Security to cover farmers, domestic workers and small companies didn’t threaten powerful corporate interests in any way, just like the public option in healthcare reform.  Yes, I’m sure fixing it later will be a piece of cake, especially with the strong, competent leadership of Barack Obama and Harry Reid.

Add comment February 1st, 2010 at 07:21am Posted by Eli

So Who’s Lying?

Is it Debbie Wasserman-Schultz when she said the Senate doesn’t have enough votes to pass the public option via budget reconciliation?  Or is it the 51 Democratic Senators who claimed to support – or at least not oppose – the public option?

We have 65 progressive Representatives who have signed a letter pledging to vote against any healthcare reform bill that doesn’t include a public option, and we have 51 Democratic Senators who are on record with some level of support for it.  Based on those two facts, what do you think looks like the most direct path to achieving Obama’s most cherished goal of passing something-called-healthcare-reform?

Any approach other than simply restoring the public option via reconciliation so that the House progressives can vote Yes without breaking their word just seems needlessly complicated and antagonistic, not to mention electorally suicidal.  It would remove all remaining doubt about whose side the Senate Democrats and the Obama White House are on if they try to force the House to either pass the Senate bill as is, or with an inadequate reconciliation sidecar that does not include the public option.

Oh, and I would also recommend that the sidecar also eliminate the unpopular excise tax completely rather than “fix” it by exempting union workers.  All that will do is make everyone else hate Democrats and unions.

2 comments January 30th, 2010 at 08:20pm Posted by Eli

Dare We Hope?

This is the most promising sign yet on healthcare reform:

House progressives organizing to rescue health care reform are pressuring their Senate counterparts to go back to the provision that has most energized the party and a majority of Americans throughout the debate: The public option.

(…)

They argued that the current bill before the House, which passed the Senate, lacks the votes needed to pass because pro-life Democrats don’t believe the abortion restrictions go far enough and progressive Democrats don’t like the lack of a public option, the weak affordability measures or the tax on private insurance. And nobody likes the Cornhusker Kickback, a provision won by Nebraska Sen. Ben Nelson that would cover the state’s Medicaid bills in perpetuity. Not even Nelson likes it anymore.

So, in order to move health care through the House, Democrats either need to pick up progressives or conservatives. And the budget reconciliation process does not lend itself to altering abortion language reform, because that wouldn’t have a direct, substantial impact on the budget.

That leaves progressives as the bloc available to pick up. Their demands — changes related to the tax on insurance, a Medicaid or Medicare expansion, and a public option — would likely be allowable using reconciliation. (The Senate parliamentarian would have the final say.)

Two House freshmen, Reps. Chellie Pingree (D-Maine) and Jared Polis (D-Colo.), circulated a letter, looking for signatures, that will be delivered to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) on Thursday on behalf of the plan, Polis told HuffPost.

(…)

If Reid and President Obama decide that the House Democrats have a workable plan — perhaps the only viable plan left, after the New York Times declared that the brakes had been slammed — they may be able to accomplish it.

(…)

Health care reform became less popular, Polis argued, when the public option was taken out but the requirement to buy private insurance or pay a fine remained.

“I think the fading of the public option from the Senate bill really hurt the Democrats’ prospects in the Senate [race], because they were seen as following the typical pattern of tax and spend and caving to insurance companies,” he said.

Pingree and Polis both noted that Obama’s focus on fiscal discipline and cutting spending makes the public option — which the Congressional Budget Office estimates could trim more than $100 billion from the deficit in ten years — that much more appealing.

It would also give Democrats something else to run on in 2010.

If House progressives stay strong and insist that the Senate use reconciliation to restore the public option (and hopefully remove the excise tax), then Obama’s desperation to claim victory on healthcare reform could put the Blue Dogs and Senate Democrats between Barack and a hard place.  This is really the only strategy that can make the public option happen, and they’re finally using their leverage to implement it.

If by some miracle the public option does return from the dead and gets passed by both houses as part of healthcare reform (and if the Democrats don’t get routed in November), the politician most responsible for that stunning victory would not be Obama, not Reid or Pelosi, and certainly not Rahm.  It would be Raul Grijalva, who has managed to stay strong and keep his caucus together on insisting on the public option (well, more or less).  Without him the House probably would have passed the Senate bill by now without a reconciliation sidecar to fix it, and their constituents would have absolutely hated them for it.

Add comment January 28th, 2010 at 07:20am Posted by Eli

David Michael Green Speaks For Me

I know, I’ve never heard of him either.  But he absolutely dismantles the corruption and self-destructive fecklessness of Obama and congressional (especially Senate) Democrats, who look more and more like Republican double agents every day.

It’s awfully shrill, and a little bit repetitive, and you should totally read it.

1 comment January 26th, 2010 at 11:34am Posted by Eli

Suicide Is Painless

Apparently Senate Democrats are determined to ensure an electoral bloodbath in November.  They’re finally talking about a budget reconciliation “sidecar” to fix the godawful bill the House is currently sitting on, but even though they only need 50 votes to pass it, they still don’t want to restore the public option or eliminate the excise tax – except for union workers, which will have the brilliant two-fer effect of making America hate Democrats and unions.

I seem to remember seeing some polling that Americans actually like the public option, and I also seem to remember a bunch of progressive Representatives promising not to vote for any bill that doesn’t have a public option.  Was I hallucinating all of that?  Was it all just some kind of fever dream?

Add comment January 26th, 2010 at 07:33am Posted by Eli

Can Someone Give The President A Nudge Or Something?

So let me get this straight – after his brilliant float-above-the-fray strategy resulted in a hideously compromised Senate healthcare reform bill which Americans hate so much that it cost the Democrats a Senate seat in Massachusetts, Obama’s Cunning Plan to fix the healthcare reform mess is… to float above the fray some more?

Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-OH) is engaged with House progressives, trying to tease out a solution to the health care reform impasse–but he says that at the highest levels of the Senate and the White House, there’s still no plan, and he doubts whether President Obama will insert himself forcefully into the process.

Brown, who traveled with Obama today in Ohio, tells me “I’ve talked to Reid, I’ve talked to Obama. Unclear yet what the strategy is, but clear interest, strong interest in getting as strong a bill as we can get.”

(…)

[H]e doesn’t imagine the President will lay out a way forward in his State of the Union address next week, and he won’t push any buttons in the Senate.

“I doubt if he does, I don’t think he’ll do a procedural thing. I don’t think he will engage in process,” Brown said of State of the Union.

Traveling with Obama today, he and House members from Ohio aired suggestions and opinions about how to get the Senate back into the game–but Obama’s not on the same page. “Everybody had opinions about what the President should do [vis-a-vis the Senate and particular senators],” Brown told me. “But he ain’t bitin’.”

I guess Obama will come out with a forceful statement about how he’s totally rooting for Congress to fix the healthcare bill somehow, and then just sit back and wait for the magic to happen.

Seriously, someone Obama actually listens to needs to get in his ear and tell him that he needs to do everything he can, both publicly and privately, to push the Senate Democrats to pass a strong “sidecar” fix (must restore public option and eliminate excise tax) through budget reconciliation, and push the House Blue Dogs to vote for both the current Senate bill and the sidecar bill.

True, it might still get done without Obama’s help, but does he really want to bet his presidency on it?

Add comment January 23rd, 2010 at 07:39pm Posted by Eli