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Today's Top News
The 'Bipartisan Compromise' Scam
So, some of the top corporatist Democrats and Republicans in the Senate sat around a table in the Finance Committee for awhile pretending to sweat out a compromise and then came out with exactly what we thought they would -- a health care proposal that benefits the health care companies above all. Shocking. What did we expect?
Max Baucus is the ring leader of this merry band of six senators. Seven out of his top ten donors are ... health care companies (he has received close to $4 million from the health care industry). You don't say? And then he crafts a proposal that screws the average citizen and helps those same companies. I never could have predicted.
Look at the two Democratic proposals they decided to jettison: The public option and employer mandates. The public option would clearly make health insurance cheaper for the average American and for the government overall. But it would also give the private insurance companies real competition -- so, we can't have that.
Employer mandates might bother some of the top corporations in the country, so we can't have that either. Better to let employees get siphoned off into government subsidies. But wait, wouldn't that make our budget problem worse and not better? Aren't all of these senators pretending to care about the budget and deficit? Oh I forgot, as long as the corporations get their way, none of the rest of this really matters.
In fact, if it turns out health care reform costs more in the long run, well, that's great because then you can kill real reform easier the next time around by pretending it costs too much. Everyone wins -- except you.
So, why are the Democratic senators going along with this scam? Because they get paid by the same guys as the Republicans. That's how life usually works -- you follow the orders of whoever paid you. In this case, the politicians get elected by raising more money than their competitors, and they get their money from corporate lobbyists. So, whose orders do you think they're going to follow?
Given this state of affairs, it's a minor miracle there are as many Democrats for the public option as there are now. But the ones who actually care to get this done are not the ones coming up with fake compromises with Republicans and the health care industry. They are the ones insisting on a public option. If you negotiate that away, you never had any real interest in reform.
Saying you're going to do health care reform without a public option is kind of like saying you're going to fight Al Qaeda in Afghanistan by invading Iraq. It misses the point -- on purpose. It promises to do more harm than good. And it's what was planned all along.
So, will this be our Waterloo if we allow the American people to be tricked into a "bipartisan compromise" that actually compromises real reform?
It will be so easy for the politicians to pretend to be brave and sign on to this as if they are doing something magnanimous by compromising and getting some sort of health care package through. And you can bet your bottom dollar the press will go along with the charade.
So, that only leaves us to object. And we can't do it meekly. We have to scream it from the rooftops. Otherwise, they will be perfectly happy to ignore us and sign on to this fraudulent proposal as if it's real health care reform. So, are you going to let them do it? Or are you going to insist on real reform and real change this time around?
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47 Comments so far
Show AllGotta give 'em credit for achieving "bipartisan compromise" just the same. That's quite a neat trick in a single party state.
Just a question or two. Shouldn't the insurers of ambulance and paramedic services also be entitled to a slice of the "premium options" pie? Shouldn't the wealthy also be permitted to purchase preferred emergency response handling? If not, why not? In what way are accident victims less entitled to the benefits of capitalist "free enterprise" than other surgical candidates? Surely we shouldn't allow egalitarian "socialism" to dominate that area of health care delivery either.
smipypr
Bipartisan doesn't equal nonpartisan. When corporatists/conservatives say bipartisan, they mean "our way or no way'. When the current crop of Democrats say bipartisan, they mean, "Oh. OK" Democrats are doing even more hand-wringing, wailing, and tooth-gnashing with a majority than they did when being sucker punched by the Blue Dogs and the Republicans. It's not just the economy anymore. It's the cash-driven ideology(and demagoguery). I know Obama is still presenting with the demeanor of a law professor, but come on. The pupils are shooting spitballs and rubber bands. Time to call in the Congressional (so called) leadership. And have them cut a collective switch on the way to the meeting.
A Waterloo for the Democratic party--not for the ideals of universal health care. We don't need them-- we can form our own party or go somewhere else. All the discussion about whether he Republican party will survive. If I were a Democrat I would worry about the Democratic partie's survival when it is so plain for all to see what a venial, sold out and souless party it really is. And remember that your President is selling you out too.
Doesn't this article basically speak to everything that is wrong in politics? It is not just health care, but the economy, foreign policy, kowtowing to the Military Industrial Complex, etc. The Congress bows to the money suppliers, and gives the finger to its middle and lower class constituents. It clearly is evident that the system no longer works. Instead of trying to change the Congress, why not try to change the system?
My sentiments exactly gracchus!
Our democratic process is broken, it is only a sham, a phony facade of democracy. The winner-takes-all electoral system is anti-choice from the get go. This factor alone makes it all too easy for the ruling classes to manipulate the system and offer only two pre-selected choices, as this system almost always produces only two parties. (Any basic course or textbook in comparative govt. and politics will cover this).
Then, add the corporate media monopoly propaganda and the largely un-regulated big money election campaign system produces the best oligarchic plutocracy money can buy.
Meaningful reform is virtually impossible without fixing the corrupt system.
A good place to start is: "10 Steps to Repair American Democracy" by Steven Hill.
matthew loughran
its more like bi partisan bullshit. democrats, republicans the party of no ideas and the party of bad ideas. Two bowls of crap only one smells a little better than the other.
I support the green party and will do what i can to help it grow in TX and elsewhere in the US. We need far better alternatives than these two asshole parties and their corrupt asshole candidates.
matt
galveston tx
Matt,
Exactly. I am happy to hear you are supporting the Green Party. After the 2000 election, I switched to Independent and have been happy ever since. You are absolutely right that both parties are bowls of crap, and they stink up the joint. I think it is time to pull the flush handle.
matthew loughran
i am the co chair of the harris county green party and more people have to do what you did. people in this country need and deserve better than these two asshole parties. the non reform healthcare reform is just one example of many screwings of the US public by dims and repugs
As we saw in the past elections, it will be almost impossible for any non-Duopoly party to win if the system is not reformed, see comment below.
Why is someone like Cenk STILL using the meaningless term Public Option?
If you support the a Public Option please stick an adjective in front of it.
I suggest the word PURE.
Some use the word ROBUST.
If you demand ONLY a Public Option...you will get one...
and it will be a SUCKY Public Option.
Yeah, you can scream from the rooftops.
You can call your Senators and Representatives.
Call them daily, e-mail em, send a fax. Let them know, in no uncertain terms how angy, incensed, disappointed and livid you are.
Get out and canvass your neighborhood. Gather up all your friends and co-workers and relatives and stage a protest.
Get out and vote and send a majority of Democrats to the House and Senate and elect a Democratic President.
Demand change!
No wait, we tried all that already.....
Now what?
Of course I share Uygur's indignation and non-surprise at the no-compromise "compromise" deal on health care engineered by Baucus and his fellow sleaze Senators. But I feel that it is naive in the extreme to argue that the "public option" (or almost any "options" that might be built into the "system") is to be mourned as an idea whose time had come, only to be knocked down by the nasty Repubs and Blue Dogs. This was Uygur's assessement to the only workable version of a health care "plan," on the Young Turks website which Uygur gives as "documentation" for the assertions in this article:
"There are legitimate concerns that progressives have with the public option. It is not single payer. The government does not pick up the tab. You still have to pay a premium and the current system is largely maintained. But I think this is better than single payer. It gives us a choice and allows the market to dictate which system works better in the healthcare industry - public or private. If in the end, more people choose the public option, then obviously it worked. If they don't, we've lost nothing because they can still get private insurance." http://www.theyoungturks.com/story/2009/6/11/142559/991/Diary/Four-Reasons-Why-the-Public-Health-Care-Option-is-Irrefutable
This is shallow thought indeed about the "public option," asserting that the "market will dictate" the better of private or public options. If we should have learned anything about the pricing and the distribution of medical care, it is that the market does not "dictate" these matters in terms of what "works better," but in terms of which people have the most clout in determining who gets what at what price in the realm of medical care. The "public option" is (as I'm afraid is also true of the "option" for individual states to institute single payer which will as well fall afoul of the tendency I can foresee of people in individual states "dictating" the terms of who gets medical care at what price) is a non-starter in terms of its likelihood of moving us toward universal health coverage. All that the advocacy for it accomplishes is that it gives Uygur and other Young Turk Democrats the political advantge of failure: the ability to say: "Look at the mess Congress made of health care, and how we tried to avert that mess by fighting for 'Obama's plan'." (Rumbles already of 2102 campaigning: time to tune up the choir, DNC!)
Shorter version: Cenk's for nothing! ;)
· Yr Obd't Servant
I have posted this before on this site, and it's appropriate again:
"The term 'bipartisan' simply means that some larger than usual deception is taking place."
- George Carlin
I remember seeing this author and his posts a lot of fluffpost. CU was nothing but a Democrat party apologist all along and he still says nothing about other parties. CU should take off his duopoly goggles and examine the issues more closely.
Whatever CU's character, he criticizes the Dems as his prime targets in this piece.
I am looking for a description and/or a couple of adjectives that would be an appropiate description of what that whore of a Senator, Max Baucus, has done to Health Care "Reform".
My apologies to all the good and decent people of the great state of Montana.
Call his office and ask his staff. They probably heard them all plus a few new ones today.
Cenk Uygar is parroting MSM disinformation about the true nature of the REAL public option being proposed in the House and Senate, as opposed to the vaguely imagined notions of public options that misguided "pwogs" carry around in their heads.
The two main goals of health reform are (1) containing runaway costs and (2) significantly expanding coverage. The enfeebled public options contained in these bills do neither.
On costs: In the words of PNHP's Kip Sullivan: "any insurance program, public or private, that has to compete with other insurers is going to have overhead costs substantially higher than Medicare"s. (It is precisely because Medicare is a single-payer program that its overhead costs are low.) Second, the multiple-payer system [that the public option] would leave in place would continue to impose unnecessarily large overhead costs on providers."
On coverage: The House bill would leave 17 million uninsured; the HELP bill would fail to cover 33 million. (http://www.pnhp.org/blog/2009/07/20/bait-and-switch-how-the-%E2%80%9Cpublic-option%E2%80%9D-was-sold/)
These farcical "public options" have been cynically crafted to present NO real competition to the HMOs and no real benefit to ordinary Americans: not surprising considering the millions of health-industry dollars lapped up by members of both parties, including Waxman, Rangel, and Kennedy, who share one key objective with the Blue Dogs and Republicans: retaining the HMOs' chokehold on our health-care system.
The only way to break that chokehold is nonprofit Medicare for all, as fifty years of experience in the rest of the industrialized world has proved.
Corporate America and its employees in Congress have no interest in the health of average Americans. The outscourcing of their industries no longer requires a healthy American workforce. We're on our own. Obama doesn't have what it takes to do what's necessary to break the corporate stranglehold.
Well, how are we going to make them do what we want? What rooftops are we going to scream from? We don't have ANY access to the media most people get their news from. When's the last time you ever tried to get people to a protest march? How many were you able to get? How many right wing saboteurs showed up from actors equity showed up dressed like drag queens on crack to get in front of the FOX News cameras?
I suppose they needed Cenk's revelations at Huffington Post, where it seems to be fashionable to be in the dark. But most Common Dreamers didn't need this information, because we already know what is up.
I'm just so elated to see our country heal itself from its bipartisan split that I really don't mind getting scr*wed by Congress on healthcare! Can't we all just be friends?
There is no bi-partisanship,no democratic republic,just a machine that needs lots of lubrication.Money protects the bearings from frictions. peace, be well!
Bipartisanship is two muggers deciding to shoot you or steal your money.
More like steal your money and shoot you or steal your money and just pistol whip you
Jim Shea
The Republicans will agree to a compromise, but I seriously doubt they will vote for it. Then, if it passes, they have the best of both worlds. They get a bill that contains key features they want, and then they can go to the voters and say they voted against it. When it fails to bring about the results the Democrats promised, they can say, "I told you so." to the voters.
The Democrats should not even sit down with the Republicans unless they promise to deliver the votes. In fact, they should refuse to compromise on essential provisions anyway.
Single payer is the only reasonable solution.
"It misses the point -- on purpose."
Mens Rea (bad faith) as in conspiracy to defraud the American people of still MORE money.
I have what is considered a great health care plan. $357 a month is taken out of my pension and $700 is chipped in by the federal government. We have an "open season" every year for about a month and I can change insurance if I want and cannot be denied for pre-existing conditions. So I sit here and think these people are ripping me off but they're ripping off my fellow taxpayers even more. My plan is to tell Blue Cross to put their plan where the sun doesn't shine when open season comes along. I will stop paying $357 amonth and all of YOU will stop having $700 a month stolen from your wallets to pay Blue Cross. It is my answer to the continuing senate and house collusion with the corporate crooks. I'll keep everyone posted. Let's get them! I am so pissed off that I'm willing to let the battery on my pace maker run down just so I won't have to give another nickel to those crooks. It's good for another 6 years or so.
Wow! Like minds think alike! I just posted almost the same thing.
My company switched us to a high deductible plan this year. I pay nearly $6K out of pocket between premiums and deductibles before they will pay a dime. I am getting close to the deductible annual amount now for me and my husband and suddenly they are questioning all our claims. I am SO SICK of insurance companies. It is expensive, confusing, frustrating and doesn't do a damn thing to improve my health. In fact, I'd venture to say that insurance companies are the biggest source of heart attacks and high blood pressure.
Let's please start a movement. Give up your health care INSURANCE now! Starve the bastards.
Agreed. The bottom line is that we all must "ensure ourselves" with discipline. We must put at least what we were paying to an insurance corporation in our own special credit union account. We must exercise and eat as if our life depended on it as well, because it does.
Thank you for the "like minds" compliment. Much obliged.
Wrong. Putting money into a credit union account and "ensuring" yourself is regressive from a social point of view and at best a protest gesture.
Health Insurance needs to be further collectivized thus increasing the risk pool. Individual policies or saver accounts are a step backwards. Without a public option, the entire thrust of the Obama plan is regressive. It may also contain an "individual mandate" that requires everyone not covered by employers to buy individual McInsurance. If ObamaCare devolves to that point then it will have become a criminal racket.
I think that's what we want to get to. By canceling our insurance policies we will effectively starve the powers that be that are spending millions of dollars LOBBYING OUR representatives to make decisions on voting that is counter to our well-being. I don't see any other option in achieving single payer.
I am also not surprised by any of this. Why do we keep electing all of these schisters? I'm assuming a number of people on this thread probably didn't vote for Obama, but there are so many people out there that continue the lesser of two evils crap.
I think we have to do the following, and it will be difficult and risky, but it has to be done:
1) Enact the national initiative: www.vote.org
2) If you have insurance, cancel it. Why do we bother having it anyway? Are they paying our claims? Do the claim payouts amount to more than our premium payments + copayments + deductibles? Are they denying claims? Are they charging out of network rates for in network providers?
If we all cancel our insurance, the insurance companies have no money to pay for their elected officials that are screwing us.
That being said, I am currently in the process of applying to a Masters of Public Policy. I'm SO sick of seeing all of this corruption that I feel the deep need to get involved. If I ever become an elected official, it will be as an independent. These parties are getting ridiculous and their allegiance is party over everything else. That's just wrong. Right now, I'm hanging with the Libertarians, but I'm a civil libertarian, not a free market capitalist. On other issues, I am more in line with the Greens. Voted Nader this time around. Maybe some of you will support me in the future. :-)
$$ talks in DC and BS ( the rest of us , including pundits like UYgur) run the marathon.
US progressive forces should take a cue from the people of France.
Tens of thousands of average French citizens have often enough and with minimal organizing flooded their national government buildings with their protesting bodys, when lawmakers there so much as even TRY to cut deals with oligarchs/corporations that blatantly screw the working-middle and lower economic classes.
We all know that Americans presently lack the political cojones of the French, but....
Why, I wonder, don't the US Greens and other US progressive parties at least try, beginning with their paid staffs in combination, to organize something like a Million Person March on the US Capitol Mall?
Even if the first effort got only 25,000 outraged people to show up, in favor of nothing more sepcific than a demand to End To Unaffordable Health Care Insurance, it would be nary impossible for the MSM or the greased pigs in congress to ignore such an outpouring.
While it's apparently true that most US citizens still don't understand what a gov run Single Payer system exactly is or could be, or that most other western capitalist nations have had such viable systems in place for decades, Yanks definitely do know they're being screwed in this connection by a corrupt economic and political system -- and millions of us are plenty pissed-off about it.
Shouldn't this domestic discontent over health care constitute enough freely angry, populist steam pressure to enable US progressive parties to be able to at least start to capture its energy toward a mass non-negotiable political demand for humane HC reform?
It's certainly resonable to expect so.
Still, I think the first cue we Americans need to take from political cultures like France isn't about the bravery of their progressive political parties, but about what's minimally required to be a sovereign citizen in a [capitalist] democracy:
Taking personal responsibility for maintaining your ethical consciousness and civic literacy.
Maintaining your citizen-assertive heft.
>>>jj apple wrote:... what's minimally required to be a sovereign citizen in a [capitalist] democracy: Taking personal responsibility for maintaining your ethical consciousness and civic literacy. Maintaining your citizen-assertive heft.
Well said.
Something just occurred to me: why is it so difficult to call the bluff of all those who oppose the public option? It's clear from their pathetic attempts to confound the public when they appear on TV - that the real reason they oppose the public option is because it would eat into their profits. There was this chap from National Review on PBS news who said this: "But my concern is that there's this issue of crowd out. When you have people looking at the system, and they're in the private insurance plans, and they start to bleed into the public plans, and the public plan gets larger and larger." See? They don't want people to "bleed into" a public plan. WTF? They don't want competition. Period! Why is it so hard to call their bluff?
What I don't understand is why the public option is viewed as anything but a compromise to begin with. Single payer was the only real sollution and alternative, the public option was a compromise with THAT. The fact that "competition" is now a given, whether it is with the government or not, in healthcare delivery shows how easily they brushed to the side the only real sollution. Yes, on the surface, if run correctly it would improve healthcare, but it is only a short term fix and doesn't solve the problems of the system, it would never be run as it should and you'd be one election cycle away from a bunch of right wingers gutting it and making it a paper tiger. Theoretically, it could work on a limited level under ideal conditions, but the right wing will never allow those conditions to be in place, so why are we going forward with an argument on their terms while so easily giving up so much right off? This country, because of how this government and the system here operates is not capable of solving big problems, it just isn't. The "founding fathers" hated democracy, made it so there was little to no direct input from the public and that change would always be incrimental and virtually impossible outside of emergencies, well, here we are on every issue and people assume taht we should reform the system from within a system that makes reform basically impossible. Either radicalize yourself and start giving new ideas a chance or accept your slave status.
I agree that the public "option" is a compromise. But you do see how alert "they" are even to the possibility of a competition, and the kind of support they have inside Congress. What do you think are the chances, under the current circumstances, for a single payer system?
There is no chance for universal health care in the short term. Fundamental change like that happens slowly, especially in this outdated representative democracy we have. A long term strategy, that expects and plans for short term losses, is needed, not one that says "let's get SOMETHING in place, it's better than nothing". If these people cared about the issue as much as they should (and who beside people like Bernie Sanders and Kucinich do?) they would make a moral case and make it an issue in the coming elections (if your strategy focuses entirely on electoral politics). "You want universal health care(which the majority of people do want)? Then get people into government who think as we do and make your voice heard", they'd say something along those lines and in the long run they'd win. Hell, they already have as far as the general public is concerned Issues like this and the now dead EFCA are much larger than the direct benefits or losses to competing parties. The right wing knows that those ideas, and the benefits of those policies to the majority of the country, would be an enlightening moment for many people. The left has won the argument on health care, it is just (especially the liberals) trying to reinvent the wheel and can't turn popular support into policy. Voting Democrats, or working entirely within electoral politics, obviously isn't getting it done, and neither are these compromises on compromised positions, neither is expecting some politician to make the situation better. They never have, 99.9999% of time in history they have been the breaks amongst power centers against popular movements.
It just sickens me to see the whores we elect listen to the Corporations and it sickens me even more that the American people are going to sit back and allow themselves to be screwed over again.
A third Party is a great concept, but its a concept that doesn't have the will of the majority of the people to back one and knock the other two Parties out of Office. Its really time for a radical approach to the power brokers of this country.....Revolt. But, what I suggest will also not happen for the same reason....the majority of the American People will not force change, they are too concerned with buying cheap plastic crap from Walmart, watching the Boob tube and trying to hold on their jobs and protect their families from falling into absymal poverty.
There are areas of this country that do not and will not trust any government because of their backward nature and politcal belief system. Perhaps its time to think about breaking up the United States....because we are anything but United...its time to jettison the notion that this country is working together and areas of like mindness need to break away from the Federal government that marches in lock-step with the Corporations.
"When any form government becomes destructive of events, it is the right of the people to alter or abolish it, and institute a new form of government." I think we have reached that point in time.
This could never have happened if any of our senators were still alive.
Compromise with Democrats is like compromise with Italian fascists; compromise with Republicans is like compromise with German fascists. Bottom line: we repudiated what we learned at Munich: you cannot negotiate with fascists.
sorry for the intrusion,
Good Morning Kindred Spirits, (for those of you that are not Kindred Spirits ((if any exist)) and would like to become one, the door is always open.
A Kindred Spirit is Love ,Compassion, Justice.
Those of you that posted a comment to this article should go to this previous article (many of you have been there).
article appears in commondreams.org
Title of article: “When Will The Recovery Begin ? Never.
Author: Robert Reich
dated : Friday July 10 2009
In my opinion Mr. Reich’s article describes the existing economic reality.
Sioux Rose, did you miss this article ?
Citizen Central is no longer inert, the momentum has begun.
Here are some answers to the comments directed to Citizen Central by posters (I am not aware of all of them sorry).
yours truly’s post July 11 2009 to Mr. Reich’s article is the approach Citizen Central is taking.
Is Citizen Central a forum? No Citizen Central is a direction action citizens lobby.
Will Citizen Central be a web creation? That would be great if C.C. manifests through the internet.
Why don’t you just create a web site or have someone do it ?. That’s a great idea , we need a web site, I don’t know how to do it, nor do I have the resources. That has to come from one of you .I can explain what the web site needs to do.
C.C. needs an administrator, who’s going to be the administrator, you? No the site will need an administrator, one of you.
Who will design the site, and choose the topics for consideration, you ? As of today I am the project manager, if someone wants to be project manager,
make your case. I am the current project manager someone had to do it, the way C.C. works, the members choose a project manager. When C.C. is created if a new project manager is desired we get one . There are no ego’s involved here.
What is the objective of c.c. ? Okay, within our current political system the only way to manifest our collective desires is to have the numbers.
Congress, the senate and the administration is elected by us the citizens. What we need is a majority of votes in each congresspersons, and senators district. That’s what c.c. does, bring together all the like-minded citizens ,but instead of electing a person to represent us, we elect a person to create laws and policy that we the citizens want . If they do not want to do the citizens business then we have an immediate recall and replace that person with a person that will.
If the elected official always did what the majority wanted then there would be no civil rights etc. I understand your point . However considering the situation at hand ,our elected officials are not representing our best interests, we have to change that , THE ONLY WAY TO CHANGE THAT WITHIN OUR POLITICAL SYSTEM IS TO HAVE A MAJORITY OF VOTERS IN EACH DISTRICT.
What we need right now is a way for the people interested in c.c.to be able to communicate with each other. I am going to post c.c. activity in the post section of the first article that appears on commondreams each day . Hopefully we can come up with an alternative soon.
Sioux Rose , you had mentioned that the administrator of commondreams might help us out, any way of checking on that.
Later on today :
We need to get a web site operational .Until that’s done we are limited.
We need to get every progressive site on board, as well as the general population.
If this statistic is correct , forty percent of American citizens are functionally illiterate, we need to energize that segment of society, by appealing to individuals that these people might trust for their endorsement i.e. actors, athletes, members of specific ethnic groups, religious leaders etc.
Once the opposition becomes aware of c.c. it will definitely turn into a numbers game. Mainstream media will not be very helpful to our cause, the internet and a field organization is probably the most effective way to go.
See you later today.
It isn't a minor miracle that there are many Democrats for the public option--THEIR main source of income, manufacturing, is under massive strain by providing inefficient, over-expensive private health-care for their workers. Make no mistake, the Democrats are no humanitarians, either--they're merely marching to the beat of different corporate drummers.
The LEWIN GROUP is owned by insurance companies.
Spokespersons for insurance companies routinely site them as honest and independent research sources to back up their lies.
United Health Care to be exact. Thanks Randi Rhodes. :-)