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White House as Helpless Victim on Health Care
Of all the posts I wrote this year, the one that produced the most vociferious email backlash -- easily -- was this one from August, which examined substantial evidence showing that, contrary to Obama's occasional public statements in support of a public option, the White House clearly intended from the start that the final health care reform bill would contain no such provision and was actively and privately participating in efforts to shape a final bill without it. From the start, assuaging the health insurance and pharmaceutical industries was a central preoccupation of the White House -- hence the deal negotiated in strict secrecy with Pharma to ban bulk price negotiations and drug reimportation, a blatant violation of both Obama's campaign positions on those issues and his promise to conduct all negotiations out in the open (on C-SPAN). Indeed, Democrats led the way yesterday in killing drug re-importation, which they endlessly claimed to support back when they couldn't pass it. The administration wants not only to prevent industry money from funding an anti-health-care-reform campaign, but also wants to ensure that the Democratic Party -- rather than the GOP -- will continue to be the prime recipient of industry largesse.
As was painfully predictable all along, the final bill will not have any form of public option, nor will it include the wildly popular expansion of Medicare coverage. Obama supporters are eager to depict the White House as nothing more than a helpless victim in all of this -- the President so deeply wanted a more progressive bill but was sadly thwarted in his noble efforts by those inhumane, corrupt Congressional "centrists." Right. The evidence was overwhelming from the start that the White House was not only indifferent, but opposed, to the provisions most important to progressives. The administration is getting the bill which they, more or less, wanted from the start -- the one that is a huge boon to the health insurance and pharmaceutical industry. And kudos to Russ Feingold for saying so:
Sen. Russ Feingold (D-Wis.), among the most vocal supporters of the public option, said it would be unfair to blame Lieberman for its apparent demise. Feingold said that responsibility ultimately rests with President Barack Obama and he could have insisted on a higher standard for the legislation.
"This bill appears to be legislation that the president wanted in the first place, so I don't think focusing it on Lieberman really hits the truth," said Feingold. "I think they could have been higher. I certainly think a stronger bill would have been better in every respect."
Let's repeat that: "This bill appears to be legislation that the president wanted in the first place." Indeed it does. There are rational, practical reasons why that might be so. If you're interested in preserving and expanding political power, then, all other things being equal, it's better to have the pharmaceutical and health insurance industry on your side than opposed to you. Or perhaps they calculated from the start that this was the best bill they could get. The wisdom of that rationale can be debated, but depicting Obama as the impotent progressive victim here of recalcitrant, corrupt centrists is really too much to bear.
Yet numerous Obama defenders -- such as Matt Yglesias, Ezra Klein and Steve Benen -- have been insisting that there is just nothing the White House could have done and all of this shows that our political system is tragically "ungovernable." After all, Congress is a separate branch of government, Obama doesn't have a vote, and 60 votes are needed to do anything. How is it his fault if centrist Senators won't support what he wants to do? Apparently, this is the type of conversation we're to believe takes place in the Oval Office:
The President: I really want a public option and Medicare buy-in. What can we do to get it?
Rahm Emanuel: Unfortunately, nothing. We can just sit by and hope, but you're not in Congress any more and you don't have a vote. They're a separate branch of government and we have to respect that.
The President: So we have no role to play in what the Democratic Congress does?
Emanuel: No. Members of Congress make up their own minds and there's just nothing we can do to influence or pressure them.
The President: Gosh, that's too bad. Let's just keep our fingers crossed and see what happens then.
In an ideal world, Congress would be -- and should be -- an autonomous branch of government, exercising judgment independent of the White House's influence, but that's not the world we live in. Does anyone actually believe that Rahm Emanuel (who built his career on industry support for the Party and jamming "centrist" bills through Congress with the support of Blue Dogs) and Barack Obama (who attached himself to Joe Lieberman when arriving in the Senate, repeatedly proved himself receptive to "centrist" compromises, had a campaign funded by corporate interests, and is now the leader of a vast funding and political infrastructure) were the helpless victims of those same forces? Engineering these sorts of "centrist," industry-serving compromises has been the modus operandi of both Obama and, especially, Emanuel.
Indeed, we've seen before what the White House can do -- and does do -- when they actually care about pressuring members of Congress to support something they genuinely want passed. When FDL and other liberal blogs led an effort to defeat Obama's war funding bill back in June, the White House became desperate for votes, and here is what they apparently did (though they deny it):
The White House is playing hardball with Democrats who intend to vote against the supplemental war spending bill, threatening freshmen who oppose it that they won't get help with reelection and will be cut off from the White House, Rep. Lynn Woolsey (D-Calif.) said Friday. "We're not going to help you. You'll never hear from us again," Woolsey said the White House is telling freshmen.
That's what the White House can do when they actually care about pressuring someone to vote the way they want. Why didn't they do any of that to the "centrists" who were supposedly obstructing what they wanted on health care? Why didn't they tell Blanche Lincoln -- in a desperate fight for her political life -- that she would "never hear from them again," and would lose DNC and other Democratic institutional support, if she filibustered the public option? Why haven't they threatened to remove Joe Lieberman's cherished Homeland Security Chairmanship if he's been sabotaging the President's agenda? Why hasn't the President been rhetorically pressuring Senators to support the public option and Medicare buy-in, or taking any of the other steps outlined here by Adam Green? There's no guarantee that it would have worked -- Obama is not omnipotent and he can't always control Congressional outcomes -- but the lack of any such efforts is extremely telling about what the White House really wanted here.
Independent of the reasonable debate over whether this bill is a marginal improvement over the status quo, there are truly horrible elements to it. Two of the most popular provisions (both of which, not coincidentally, were highly adverse to industry interests) -- the public option and Medicare expansion -- are stripped out (a new Washington Post/ABC poll out today shows that the public favors expansion of Medicare to age 55 by a 30-point margin). What remains is a politically distastrous and highly coercive "mandate" gift to the health insurance industry, described perfectly by Digby:
Obama can say that you're getting a lot, but also saying that it "covers everyone," as if there's a big new benefit is a big stretch. Nothing will have changed on that count except changing the law to force people to buy private insurance if they don't get it from their employer. I guess you can call that progressive, but that doesn't make it so. In fact, mandating that all people pay money to a private interest isn't even conservative, free market or otherwise. It's some kind of weird corporatism that's very hard to square with the common good philosophy that Democrats supposedly espouse.
Nobody's "getting covered" here. After all, people are already "free" to buy private insurance and one must assume they have reasons for not doing it already. Whether those reasons are good or bad won't make a difference when they are suddenly forced to write big checks to Aetna or Blue Cross that they previously had decided they couldn't or didn't want to write. Indeed, it actually looks like the worst caricature of liberals: taking people's money against their will, saying it's for their own good --- and doing it without even the cover that FDR wisely insisted upon with social security, by having it withdrawn from paychecks. People don't miss the money as much when they never see it.
In essence, this re-inforces all of the worst dynamics of Washington. The insurance industry gets the biggest bonanza imaginable in the form of tens of millions of coerced new customers without any competition or other price controls. Progressive opinion-makers, as always, signaled that they can and should be ignored (don't worry about us -- we're announcing in advance that we'll support whatever you feed us no matter how little it contains of what we want and will never exercise raw political power to get what we want; make sure those other people are happy but ignore us). Most of this was negotiated and effectuated in complete secrecy, in the sleazy sewers populated by lobbyists, industry insiders, and their wholly-owned pawns in the Congress. And highly unpopular, industry-serving legislation is passed off as "centrist," the noblest Beltway value.
Looked at from the narrow lens of health care policy, there is a reasonable debate to be had among reform advocates over whether this bill is a net benefit or a net harm. But the idea that the White House did what it could to ensure the inclusion of progressive provisions -- or that they were powerless to do anything about it -- is absurd on its face. Whatever else is true, the overwhelming evidence points to exactly what Sen. Feingold said yesterday: "This bill appears to be legislation that the president wanted in the first place."
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137 Comments so far
Show Alldemocrat believers take note
Obama threatened to withhold campaign funding from first term Congressmen who didn't vote for Ir-Af-Pak occupation (its not really a war)funding earlier this year, so the hands off argument is total BS.
The Obama Regime's theatrical production won't end with this massive corporate welfare program masquerading as health care reform.
While Obama is talking tough in front of the media to the Wall Street executives who own him, he told Congress not to include any meaningful regulation in bills being crafted to allegedly regulate Wall Street.
When the Democrats lose control of Congress in the 2010, Obama and his apologists will blame FOX, Republicans, Ralph Nader and Howard Dean, rather than the real cause...the voters failing to be hoodwinked by Obama's polished doublespeak.
As you say he has owners who he has every right to be afraid of.
I think maybe they picked him years ago, as another poster suggested.
If he costs them one percentage point of profit he could have an accident.
But if he agreed to such a bargain, whether tacit or explicit, that still makes him a traitor.
With a person who has as much public exposure as the POTUS, he could make some public announcemt that would put anybody who had even the slightest of notion of harming him on a very short leash. In fact, in order to keep themselves out of the spotlight, they would stumble all over themselves making damn sure nothing happened to him, lest they be blamed for his "accident." The most important thing to the string pullers is to stay out of public view and thus avoid scrutiny.
Face it, Obama is a man with no moral fiber. He's simply up for auction to the highest bidder, nothing more.
Pilger seems to think that Obama has connections to the cia through Business International Corps.
Could be he has been a "company man" all along.
Sadly, the Whitehouse sabotaged this bill from the very beginning. It appears that Obama only became active whenever it was necessary to rein in liberal policies. I wonder what will happen when people who can't afford health insurance now find out that under this misguided bill they will be forced to purchase it anyway under threat of being fined.
One of the reasons the bill won't take affect until 2013 or 2014 is to give Obama a shot at a second term. It will be hard enough for him to win in 2012 with so many of his young supporters unemployed. Criminalizing them because they can't afford medical insurance would cost him even more votes in 2012.
Nothing that happens from here on will matter concerning a second term. Obama has already lost too much support to be re-elected. I haven't spoken to a single person who voted for Obama last year who will vote for him again except for a few African-Americans.
q
Check out this recent Gallap Poll! (http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article24191.htm) This new poll has 44% of the respondants wishing BU$H was back in office. If the Backstabber in Chief has these kinds of poll standings less than one year after taking office, what will 2012 look like?
This YouTube video sort of says it all:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CRqXyaCATu4
Not a peep out of Obama when the public option was killed or when the Medicare buy-in was mentioned -- and I'm sure he and Rahm and Lieberman rubbed their hands in glee when the latter was killed off, too.
This paragraph is the whole mess in a nutshell, the why and wherefore. Bill Moyers brought this up in even more stark terms in a 30-minute interview with Bill Maher this summer:
"The administration wants not only to prevent industry money from funding an anti-health-care-reform campaign, but also wants to ensure that the Democratic Party -- rather than the GOP -- will continue to be the prime recipient of industry largesse."
God, I wish we had a population of critical thinkers -- or thinkers of any ilk -- in this country. Millions of sheeple, that's all we have. I feel severely in the minority this morning, and I had nightmares about this bill last night. Sometimes you wake up, shake off a bad nightmare and put it aside, saying it's just that, a nightmare. But this nightmare I couldn't shake off by taking a shower, going for a walk, and sitting down and focusing on my job. This is real, this is happening. As if he didn't sound like a raging fascist already on so many thing, his fascist BS was on full display yesterday. Obama is despicable.
God, I wish we had a population of critical thinkers -- or thinkers of any ilk -- in this country. Millions of sheeple, that's all we have.
---------------------------------
I have to disagree on 2 grounds:
1) People don't even *think* about things they believe they can't control. They intentionally avoid such topics because of the negative emotions and their effects on their body;
2) People prefer to avoid pain rather than seek pleasure, whence the well-documented tendency to bear miseries as long as possible rather than risking a jump from the frying pan that might land them in the fire.
Give people a genuine shot at changing things, where they have a good view of their chances rather than operating alone in the dark, and they'll go for it. Alinsky demonstrated that when he organised Back Of The Yards.
The use of the words "centrist" and/or "bipartisan" must be seen for what they are.
Deceit.
These words are used sentimentally. They are used to imply that numerous people in Washington have a wide range of perspectives. In fact, the vast majority of members of congress are required to prove that they not only "fit" within the ever shrinking "norm" of militarism and greed, but that anyone who steps beyond this "center" shall be punished as a fraud.
The "center" is now a place of brutality, desperation, and cynicism.
The word "bipartisan" is the more deceitful of the two words. It fraudulently implies a NEED to bring divergent thinking together.
In reality, it now demands that different opinions must be silenced.
It also fails to acknowledge that a bipartisan agreement is only as good as the thinking involved within it. If you have Neo-fascist thinking on one side and Proto-fascist thinking on the other side, then the "bipartisan" breakthrough is certainly NOT going to go beyond fascism. In the United States of Global Domination you have the "option" of supporting Parochial "Free" Market Capitalism or International "Free" Market Capitalism.
Even during the Primaries, the Limbaugh Clintonistas played "Spy vs Spy vs Spy." On this very site, those ideologues in career outrage, that have consigned themselves to perpetual marginalization, annoy the living f**k out of Grandma. If you can't form a coalition on shared issues with those you disagree with otherwise, you are working for "the Man." You are a useless ideologue, and part of the "divide and conquer," paradigm. Even Nader allowed Buchanan to stump the country with him against NAFTA.
But I am here because there is very little I disagree with, and it is impossible to find informed criticism in most of the media.
So, don't be rubbing this in my face ya pompous sod. But, "you're right." If you tell anyone I said that I'll hunt you down and shame you relentlessly.
This is the proof in the puddin. They voted AGAINST a good idea to preserve an unconstitutional, backroom deal the White House denied making, in LOCKSTEP behind Obama. No defectors... while the Republicans laughed their asses off and supported something they disagreed with, just to show the Dems up for what they are... sex slaves for the corporate elites. You can't make this stuff up.
Dean is right (finally), and I'm ready when you are, that is; IF YOU PLAN ON DOING SOMETHING about this. If you just want to circulate petitions and snivel about the "Obamabots" and "DLCers," then I'll check in and laugh at you while I'm writing my little letters and signing your crap. But IF, you want to SHUT IT DOWN... I'm ready to put my body on the machinery.
Let's go. I have a Gas Mask, a hard hat and a Bus.
The senate bill is a dog.
Obama is a dud as president.
Nearly all politicians in DC view party above all else. It's all about power, but to what end...certainly not to be put toward the public good.
Obamacare ... death by a thousand cuts ...
Caring about Big Pharma and Badhealthcare Inc,
and all those political donations ...
but of the people ... not so much ...
Single-payer TODAY! OR SINGLE TERMination tomorrow, Unka 'Bomb!!
Obama said he did not become president to serve "fat cat bankers," but it seems to have escaped everyone's attention that bankers have bought up the insurance industry. To have omitted single-payer health care from consideration was already a concession to the "fat cat bankers." Obama's rhetoric is in fact wildly at variance with his actions.
We finally get the truth.
Not spin.
About time.
So, some on the loony right were right -- Obama is a FASCIST. That's right. The bill which Obama and his administration wanted all along serves corporate interests and uses the power of the government, even coercion from the government, to serve corporate interests against the wishes of the great majority of the people. Mussolini said "Fascism should more properly be called corporatism because it is the merger of state and corporate power." And that is what we clearly have got here.
"So, some on the loony right were right -- Obama is a FASCIST. That's right."
That's right. And we have to get the REST of them on the right "corporatist" script.
Actually, someone on a financial blog pointed out that they have fused the TARP bank bailouts with the more main street friendly fiscal STIMULUS and they call ALL of it "stimulus" but what most (though not all) are really mad about is the bank bailouts--which they call "stimulus"-- spit spit, etc.
They also call the bailout "socialist," which actually isn't that different than the left formulation "socializing the losses and privatizing the gains."
"Liberals" are going to have to get used to a lot of "I told you so"--because this bill is really THAT bad--but it will be like being on some other planet where everything is still "socialist" and "government controlled healthcare."
"Get the government out of my wallet," OTOH, sounds about right.
They are going to go ape--and those swing state independents?--forgeddaboudit. Should be quite a show.
I hope that progressives finally get it. Obama's "centrist realism" is no more than cynical resignation used to cover his own ambitions, lack of guiding principles, and his absence of political courage. In spite of his flowery, "inspiring," but completely fatuous and hypocritical speeches on "hope," the man is a snake whose only agenda is to further his own ambitions and to put a smiley face on a disastrous status quo.
Wake up. The Democratic party is a bunch of unprincipled opportunists and sycophants to power and wealth. I have been a Democrat for over 30 years, and I am through with holding my nose and voting for Democrats simply because they creep me out a little less than their Republican opponents.
Maybe a third party may work. Probably not though.
We are sooo screwed.
"absence of political courage"?
No, the guy doesn't care. He displays no courage because he has no principles to defend, other than acquiring money and power, which means going with the most amount of money and players possible. He goes up against no monied interest so that he can instead extract the maximum from all of them.
km, I think you're right on target. I have been a Dem activist since the campaign of anti-war candidate Gene McCarthy in '68 when I was a high school student. I've been on the central committee, knocked on thousands of doors, made more phone calls. NEVER AGAIN. The lesser of 2 evils is still evil.
Barak Obama is enacting Cheney's 3rd term. He is a complete subterfuge. The only positive outcome from his election is the very palpable possibility to begin building alternative political structures that challenge the status quo. I honestly believe that the difference between the Obama that people thought they were electing and what he actually represents is so manifestly divergent that more and more politically conscious people will be ready to make the break for real change. When the party controls the entire spectrum of the pol structure as do now and the reults are what they are now, they have no legitimate excuse. These are the wars of the Democratic party. Health care legislation that solves nothing and gives even more profit to the insurance industry is theirs and it is their policy to hand precious public funds to the most egregious corporate criminals in history.
The monster behind the Democratic party curtain hs been made palpably manifest. If there is any hope for change we will have to create it ourselves. We need to be smart. And get to work.
Beware Obamas bringing gifts: a healthcare package that is a multibillion dollar reward to the drug and insurance criminals or a Nobel Peace Prize gift that is endless, extended wars, or soon a climate change package from Copenhagen that lets the hydrocarbon fuel and other industries continue their ruinous ways, or an ongoing gift program to rescue the economy that lets the Wall Street bankster criminals continue their thuggery while millions lose homes, jobs, healthcare, hope. Wrapped up in slick articulate, lie filled empty rhetoric, Obama's toxic packages should only be unwrapped and accepted by gulled liberals still under the spell of Obama adulation, who are ready to praise any token given by their still unquestioned hero.
Anyone wanna bet that Harry Reid uses reconciliation to make sure that the bill, without a public option or medicare option, won't be defeated?
At the same time they are in the process of slashing and will continue to slash Medicare before they turn their sights on Social Security.
The one feature Obama elevates as supposedly representitive of "reform" and promised change is the "no-pre-existing condition" clause, but Dean reported last night that it was BS and sabotaged in the fine print. Watch a smug Obama try to continue to advertise it as a great achievement.
The Right couldn't hope for such success--so who does Obama think will elect him in this suggested scenario that he is setting himself up for '12? The Corporations? Don't expect any help from the Right, even if he serves their agenda, they will still complain, and already his numbers are tanking.
Must be government of for and by the corporations...and the notion of the Democratic vote is a quaint sideshow.
Greenwald's article is exactly in spirit and perception, if in very different words, the same as I posted yesterday on the article reporting that Dean gave a declaration of death to the health care reform bill under Lieberman's influence. I repost it here because it seems equally relevant as a comment on this article about the Democrats and Obama as "helpless victims" of villains like Lieberman and the Republicans.
...........................................................
"gracchus: I couldn't be more in agreement. The cynicism of an Administration and a majority party in Congress demanding a bill that they know damn well will not pass, and which their fat-cat donors will not permit them to pass, almost surpasseth understanding. The pillorying of Lieberman and the elevation of Dean to heroic stature reflect "parts" being played in the theatrical script which demands the appearance of reform to satisfy the "liberals" (that boobocracy of the easily-fooled) by allowing the bill which nobody really wants to die, after which they will reap the rewards of their handlers (re-election funders), all the while blaming the whole failure of an enterprise designed to fail on Joe Lieberman or Ben Nelson or Bart Stupak. Is that too convoluted a plot? The sub-plot in this is that there has to be a much-delayed decision, including Dr.Dean's 'back to the drawing board' solution so that the contending parties can continue to draw their profits from those attempting to influence the outcome. And I don't mean just Big Pharma and the insurance and medical care lobbies. The "grassroots" will be mined as well for contributions to sustain their cash cows from the gullible liberals. Already today I've received a breathless exhortation from MoveOn to contribute still more money to them (as if I had ever contributed any money) to help buy campaign ads to convince the voters of CT to unseat Joe L. Edward Moneybags is the playwright who authored this script and there are juicy roles for monetary profit for all parties involved----except of course for the American people for don't get a part in this play, and who won't get a whit closer to affordable and quality health care as the theatre of the absurdly commercial politics grinds its way to a conclusion---or really to just another sequel in a never-ending dramatic series."
which elicited this gracious reply:
cassandra December 15th, 2009 8:41 pm
"Thank you. It's perfect. This assessment couldn't be more on the money, so to speak."
Lobbying is about the only reason people run for congress so as to cash in and become part of the 'elite' who are the only ones who will benefit from their narcissistic actions once they are elected to congress which is, also the massive ignorant idea of how easily the voters abdicate their 'for, of, and by the people', role in whatever is now left of this republic's democracy that has become the ostensible democracy of the people which in fact conceals the actual 'corpotocracy' that controls congress; maybe in shorter terms the greedy desire of those wanting a piece of the action by turning traitor to their own country which I can't see a better definition of Thomas Jefferson's reason to rise up and take these people out of office because they have become the BIG threat to our security.
The game has been set and carried out so adroitly that it is hard to even imagine the people doing any such thing and that deep down, they are so complacent in what some of the worst people they elect do, no matter how criminal and treasonous, they/we are willing to just let it happen.
All politicians, with rare exceptions, go into politics for one thing only - To Make Money. That's it. They play whatever role and do whatever the highest bidder wants them to do. The highest bidder gets served, everyone else gets curbside service. This is the way it's always been and its only real improvement over the past 200 years has been the introduction of "democracy" i.e. giving the public the illusion of participation in their own screwing.
No, not all politicians. I live in a democracy and it is very different. Yes there is corruption but it is not the primary motivator as it is with your Republicans and Democrats. There are good politicians in America too, Bernie Sanders is one I'm aware of, so you can't say you have nobody to vote for.
I said "all ..., with rare exceptions..." for example Bernie Sanders, who is 1 out of 100 senators. There are couple of others but very rare indeed.
Our government by Corporate Aristocracy is out of control. All it seems capable of doing is plundering our treasury, bombing our neighbors and enslaving our children. Regardless of past virtues and values it is a kindness to put down a rabid dog. Rather than sending our missile spitting drones into Pakistan I can think of a better target much closer to home.
I have a fantasy that once the US military arsenal becomes primarily robotic possibly some non-fascist programmers and technicians can reprogram the weapons to strike at the real enemies of the people.
"contrary to Obama's occasional public statements in support of a public option, the White House clearly intended from the start that the final health care reform bill would contain no such provision and was actively and privately participating in efforts to shape a final bill without it. From the start, assuaging the health insurance and pharmaceutical industries was a central preoccupation of the White House -- hence the deal negotiated in strict secrecy with Pharma to ban bulk price negotiations and drug reimportation, a blatant violation of both Obama's campaign positions on those issues and his promise to conduct all negotiations out in the open (on C-SPAN). "
THANK YOU Glenn ! This alone proves that no matter how much efforts we the people put into begging our Congress to listen to us, this administration and Congress were "bold" and shameless enough to outdo Dubya and TRASH our efforts but with pre-emptive planning. I'm glad that Glenn Greenwald isn't afraid to expose this administration for the worst kind of pre-emptive trashing of people's valiant efforts for worthwhile progressive causes that would make Dubya's pre-emptive attacks on Iraq look less pre-emptive in pale comparison. Some people may think that we are nuts to raising our concerns on getting our voting for the right leaderships straight but bad leadership can lead to wasted efforts. A Nader or Mckinney administration would never ever stoop this low or stoop low at all to such pre-emptive and stealthy maneuvers for the monied elites.
"A Nader or Mckinney administration would never ever stoop this low or stoop low at all to such pre-emptive and stealthy maneuvers for the monied elites." -- JenniferBedingfield
I completely agree! This was my exact argument to many of my friends prior to the election, and Obama's win -- using some pertinent examples, i.e., Obama's bailout vote, his FISA vote and his consistent rhetoric to escalate the war in Afghanistan -- pointing out that a peace candidate would NOT escalate a war. Few listened, though. At this time, some of my friends are crushed, and others are angry -- while some are simply silent.
Hmmm. I've heard comments here that the first time voters that chose Obama will stay home next time, that folks are angry. But I've seen no indication that USers have reached the point where they will vote in numbers for politicians that aren't invited onto "meet the press". For many Americans things that matter to them, the economy, must still be, at least on the surface, better than they appear from my vantage point. So give it a couple years, and you are back to choosing between the two long ruling parties. I wonder what it will take to break the log jam?
Ok, OK, I (and a whole lot of others) got this in February. So now, everybody's caught up, and "Hope" is once again a cheap flea-bag motel in AK. So, when do they start the human die-back? That's Summer's specialty and if you bring it up in conversation it quickens the sparkle in his eyes like he's looking at a naked helpless female, drugged and prepped for torture. That's how your Overseers see their task in life: Raping you to death.
I'm not talking about the 45k we murder every year by denial of health care. I'm talking the real numbers...Human Die-Back - intended and designed. We're here now...
Peace...as always.
We can always invite the "elite" join us in our plight. Gated communities are only as fortified as the nearest acetylene torch is distant. Somehow, I don't think it may be all that far away.
How disappointing.
Everyone thought they were voting for
Barak Obama, the First Black President,
when actually they were voting for
Barry the Corporate Shill from Hawaii
It's time to stop expecting Obama to be the answer. Time to stop wringing our hands because he has become what he clearly indicated he would in the campaign: a slight improvement over George Bush – I repeat, SLIGHT.
An article from Canada published in CD recently stated, "One might ask how many uninsured citizens exist in Canada? The answer is zero – all Canadians are insured. In this country, good-quality, universally accessible medical care is regarded as a basic element of citizenship, kind of like owning a gun is in the U.S."
The Second Amendment means more to U.S. conservatives than bringing the U.S. up to the health care standard of decency most of the industrialized world accepts. Conservatives are satisfied with 45,000 premature deaths annually. But there are many Americans who hear only the drumbeat, echoed incessantly by Fox News, that we have the best health care system in the world.
Many Americans would abandon this delusion if they became familiar with T.R. Reid's work on health care in seven other countries. See the article at http://bit.ly/Nv7ZA. Reid (who in his September interview pegged the annual premature death rate at ONLY 22,000) noted the following about the fight to obtain universal coverage in Switzerland:
"In Switzerland it was very tough, because Switzerland is home to huge drug companies and giant international insurance companies. Until the 1990s, they were making a profit on health insurance. They copied the pre-existing conditions rule of American insurers and tried not to sell policies to anyone who might make a claim. They hired lots of underwriters to deny claims, like our guys do. And by 1994, Switzerland got to point where 5 percent of people couldn't afford health insurance.
"For the Swiss, this was shocking. They had national referendum on universal coverage, and most of the business community opposed it. The giant insurance companies opposed it, and the drug companies opposed it. But the reform passed and took effect on Jan. 1, 1996. The result was that insurers had to cover everybody and they couldn't make a profit on basic health insurance."
Those of us who believe in our country -- if not Obama -- need to keep stressing this. I refuse to believe that an informed American people, conservatives aside, wouldn't be as smart as the Swiss.
No one on CD who's made the repeated claim that Obama is a slight improvement over Bush or over what McCain would have been has ever listed what those improvements are. What are they?
I actually prefer my enemies on any issue to appear to be bumblers and idiots, so on that count I'd prefer Bush or McCain or Palin expressing the same positions as Obama in public. In other words, I think we're in a far worse position than if a Republican won.
On the drug re-importation thing for example... well, with a Rep president the Dems might at least put up some minor fight to pretend to be doing something.
So someone please tell me why Obama is an improvement.
Mr. McCain singing "Bomb, bomb Iran".
Sarah Palin, a heartbeat away from being President.
Look up H Clinton's "obliterate Iran" comment, yes the secretary of state that works with Obama, the same Obama who surrounds himself with Zero (0) progressives. The Democrats are as much warmongers as their Republican partners. And as someone has already asked, as you know, the question is how could the boogeywoman Palin be any worse? If she were elected prez, wouldn't she be as "helpless" (LOL) as poor little Obama? Or would she do "bad" things like occupy other nations and pay off her banksters with your tax money?
Exactly.
In his most recent essay titled, The Devil and Mr. Obama, Joe Bageant, when discussing the massive redistribution of wealth from the public to the owning class through the financial sector, recounts:
"One liberal blogger wondered aloud, 'Imagine what the Republicans would have done had John McCain been elected?'" To which Bageant accurately responds: "The same thing, brother. The same thing. Only with a different cover story. Both parties exist at the pleasure of the same crime syndicates."
In essence, this sums up 'democracy' in the US.
With regard to Obama's healthcare 'reform', Bageant does not mince words:
"Insurance racketeers moved in with their own muscle to fill the void left by the Wall Street gang. The insurance syndicate dispatched its made men and soldiers throughout the halls of Congress, and, voila! They were able to pass the aforementioned $70 billion a year political blackmail job off as "reform legislation." Say what you want to about my country, but pillage and looting have never been so elegantly ritualized, institutionalized and executed" (www.joebageant.com).
Obama's healthcare 'reform' illustrates the dirty secret of reform legislation in America, which is that it is 'staged' by the two parties with only two underlying goals: 1) to maintain the status quo-- existing system; and 2) to keep power and wealth in the hands of the powerful and wealthy. The American corporation is always the primary beneficiary of the "welfare" state, regardless of which political party appears to be running the 'show'.
jlocke123 said: "Look up H Clinton's "obliterate Iran" comment ..."
OK, here is the entire comment. Why don't you try READING it?
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ABC News: Hillary Clinton interview with Chris Cuomo, April 22, 2008
Cuomo: "Iran. Some language recently. You said 'if Iran were to strike Israel there would be massive retaliation.' Scary words. Does massive retaliation mean you'd go into Iran, you would bomb Iran? Is that what that's supposed to suggest?"
Clinton: "Well, the question was 'if Iran were to launch a NUCLEAR attack on Israel, what would our response be?' And, I want the Iranians to know that if I'm the president, we will attack Iran. And, I want them to understand that, because it does mean that they have to look very carefully at their society, because whatever stage of development they might be in their nuclear weapons program in the next 10 years during which they might foolishly consider launching an attack on Israel, we would be able to totally obliterate them. That's a terrible thing to say but those people who run Iran need to understand that, because that perhaps will DETER them from doing something that would be reckless, foolish and tragic."
Cuomo: "Is it difficult to reconcile the logic of a statement like that with the realities of what it would be like to make that decision?"
Clinton: "It is. It's very hard, and that's why you hope you can DETER such behavior."
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jlocke123, Nuclear Deterrence has been U.S. policy, and has successfully prevented nuclear war, for 60 years now. Did you skip ALL of High School, or just History?
quizmasterchris... December 16th, 2009 12:38 pm -- Get real.
Wow, you know I've never seen it from that point of view!
You're right, that was a persuasive argument. The Dems are awesome & Obama is far better than McCain!
Now I know better than to attempt to match wits with a Democratic loyalist!
quizmasterchris... December 16th, 2009 2:57 pm -- For the record, I'm an independent.
Thanks for listening.
MoveOn.org still fooling its members -
Quick look at the MoveOn.org site today and it's political action arm is requesting members to urge Obama to reject Lieberman and support a public option. MoveOn is fooling its members by not disclosing that Obama told the Senate to back off and support Lieberman's threat and using Lieberman as a scapegoat as to why there isn't a public option.