David strikes again–right on the mark!

News Desk is a mighty valuable addition to FDL.

Abortion can’t be the roadblock to passing Liebercare. Like you said, Moran, Harkin and others have said all issues were resolved before Scott Brown. Brown changes the math in the Senate, not the House where abortion is a problem.

I think the roadblock is Senators who don’t want to use reconciliation for health reform, because of the political implications if nothing else. They are hoping to let memories of the Massachusetts election fade a bit and then take it up again.

But who cares really. With even House Progressives saying Liebercare is the best we can do–the implication being there aren’t 50 Democrats in the Senate who (really) support a public option or Medicare buy-in–this reform is 90% corporate giveaway and the 10% good it does is merely incidental.

For your tomorrow: Volcker on “How to Reform Our Financial System”.

Sure it does. If Coakley won, whatever abortion solution would have been baked into the cake of a 60-vote final bill. Now, the Senate bill has to be the base, and that includes the Nelson compromise. And it can’t be changed by reconciliation. So then it’s a roadblock to passing the Senate bill in the House, and if they try a standalone Stupak amendment, the Senate has to pass it even though such an amendment got less than 50 votes during the health care debate.

“Do you think anyone at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue wants those three months back when Max Baucus and the Gang of Six set out on a fools errand hunting for Republican support?”

It was Obama who sent Baucus on that fool’s errand, but it was actually part of a plan meant to do precisely what it did. I also think this was intentionally done as a war of attrition on Democrats to use Republicans for cover in order to water down the bill. Now Obama has been hoisted by his own petard where if he had fought for a better bill not only would we have gotten one written but it would have passed by now but instead Obama’s attrition tactics resulted in him losing the battle.

Fuck you, Rahm!

Hail Eris!

They only need 51 votes to pass anything if they want to.

I think a bill has to be passed first,so there is one to reconcile

Without Stupak’s dozen or so votes, we don’t get to 51. It’s tough for me to condemn them, there’s an awful lot of pro-life voters in those districts. Enough, maybe, to get them thrown out on a single issue.

There’s just no common ground for a compromise on that issue.

Boxturtle (My solution: If you don’t like abortions, don’t get one)

ummm… let me try some words smithing heresy for the upper middle class over credentialed over educated boobs –

all meeting are work, not all work is useful.
meetings are work, and so isn’t carrying rocks on your head.
meetings are work – so is carrying rocks on your head.
meetings are work – so is carrying rocks around a parking lot.

+++++
barack, like clinton, gore, kerry, dudkakis … – they’re all of a social class which does NOT have to produce x widgets in y minutes or z hours. they really do NOT know what useful work is cuz they don’t do oil changes or wash dishes or fix sick kids or teach struggling teens or plant crops or deliver food – they pontificate and ruminate and illuminate!

I’m sure in rahm’s & the big Zee-r0′s mind they’ve done a lot of work on health care … yawn… cuz they’ve had a shitload of meetings. what little the jerks offs have accomplished, when / if it will pass by another set of jerk offs, is a piece of shit for us working peeeee-ons. At best, they haven’t a clue what our lives are really like – and it probably cuz they basically don’t fucking care, they got theirs.

I was 18 in ’78 in Holyoke, MA., and I’ve ALWAYS known the string pullers of the republican party were fascists. um, Duh? Seriously, why do I vote for these fucking sell outs and political incompetents? the fascists get 75% of what they want when ‘our’ side wins … I am NOT voting for these fucking scum anymore.

rmm.

I believe Senator Harken. I also believe that Lucy won’t snatch the football away the next time.

I call bullshit on Stupak’s dozen until he names names.

Yes…it’s all so clear now

and I also think the tooth fairy..
the Easter Bunny and

“Change You Can Believe In”

are for real

I agree with you. But that said, I think he’s got the votes he needs to stop any bill he doesn’t like. He doesn’t need 12 votes, he needs maybe 5.

The GOPers will vote against in masse. If all the Dems hold together EXCEPT Stupaks block (which won’t happen, given Holy Joe) then he only needs 10 votes to kill. But Holy Joe and his ilk will try to kill any bill with a public option.

You can either surrender to the Pharma/Insurance lobby and get blue dog votes or you can surrender to Stupak and get the pro-life votes. I don’t see any whip count that would enable you to ignore both.

That said, which is worse? No abortion coverage or no public option? If I MUST choose, I’ll deal with Stupak’s folks and count on private industry to come up with a saleable policy for abortion.

Boxturtle (As long as people keep electing foks like that, we’ll have to learn to deal with them)

I call bullshit on the whole thing. Harkin’s blowing smoke up our asses. At best, playing within the system will get us a shiny brand new set of crooks. Time to change the game. A ten million person march might set the tone.

Note to Jane:

Why can’t THE MOST POWERFUL PERSON IN THE WORLD do these 7 simple things?

1) End the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

2) Create a monumental Infrastructure Bank to provide millions of jobs building a national high-speed rail system. The rail system would increase productivity dramatically in this country.

3) Expand health care coverage to 40 MILLION people using reconciliation.
Expanding Medicaid to everyone below 215% of the FPL, and expanding SCHIP coverage to all uninsured children, should give roughly 30 million more Americans insurance for a cost of just under $800 billion.
The Medicaid expansion could be structured to also work as a de facto extreme catastrophic insurance policy for people over 215% FPL. This would effectively put an end to medical bankruptcy in this country.
Early Medicare buy-in could be added for people without insurance who are between 47-65.
Expanding Medicaid, Medicare, and SCHIP are all doable under reconciliation.

4) Tax the rich to pay for Health Care Reform. $1.2 trillion over 10 years.
(The top 1% in this country take in 29% of ALL income! Taxing the rich on health care (and taxing them substantially to eliminate the deficit) will help bring about a more level playing field for the middle class).

5) Instruct the secretary of the Treasury and other financial regulators to draw up a plan to implement as many of the financial reforms that the president has proposed as possible, using the broad regulatory authority they have under existing law. The plan will take effect April 1 unless Congress acts on a broader regulatory reform bill.

6) Ask Congress, as an interim step, to impose a modest carbon tax beginning in 2011 equal to 25 cents on a gallon of gasoline, rising to 50 cents in five years, with the revenue to be used to reduce payroll taxes. That will result in no net increases in federal taxes.

7) Pledge to veto any bill that increases the national debt unless it authorizes a bipartisan commission to recommend a plan to bring down the deficit through spending cuts and tax increases. Do so even if it means shutting down the government until a commission is authorized.

I agree. If the immigration march was so successful, why in the world aren’t we marching over healthcare/bankers? We have so many great leaders, why aren’t we marching? Okay, maybe it’s a tad cold right now, but how about this spring???

And Boxturtle, I’ll agree with you on losing abortion over all of healthcare. Private industry would step up on abortion. Planned parenthood does some good work, and has since I was a kid.

our leaders have been bought and paid for– when ron paul would do more to forward our progressive causes than our leaders, houston we have a problem! he would bring back the troops from iraq and afgan, shred the patriot act,renditions and attacking iran. would use that money to fund social programs-called bush a war criminal, against bank bailouts. please explain how our leaders ACTIONS are more progressive. they are the other side of the corporatist coin that has brought this country to the brink of bankruptcy with a dim future. 60 years ago we dominated every category of production and researchand development . it is a herculean task to do that to a country– it takes two partys and paul understands that–iam likely to support his”ideas” not the partys of mass destruction

As of this year and our move, we have some wonderful and wise new friends from Nebraska. They appear quietly but thoroughly exasperated and embarrassed at the mere mention of Sen. Ben Nelson, so we hardly ever bring up his name, out of deference for their feelings. They may not physically be Nebraskans any more, but they surely are in heart and spirit, and they have many family and friends still able to vote in their beloved state.

My quiet but deeply felt message to those wonderful folks: Primary Ben Nelson ASAP. It may not help at the moment, but it seems a wise, bordering on mandatory, move for their state’s future.

Love your wry, wise comments, eCAHN. Did you intend to append an /s?

I like Harkin. I also like Sherrod Brown, as all can attest, through their groans at my seemingly blind tenacity. I will always wonder how close senators such as they came in their desperate attempts to steer that unruly pseudo-senatorial rabble of late.

What. A. Mess!

kill the damn bill.

OT, Judge Garzon is looking into Guantanamo torture again.

That’s easy–he can’t because he doesn’t want to. Simple answers to simple questions.

With all due respect to Sen. Harkin … I am not saying what he reveals is a falsehood … but I have become totally cynical of all politicians and political statements. From the blatant lies of Obama, down to the lie and unreality filled Republican plan for HCR, I have, through discovered long and multitudinous reinforcements, that the Ship of State, previously perceived as a Ship of Fools, has ALL ALONG been a Ship of Liars.

Untrustworthy in their statements to an extraordinary degree, the only remaining mystery is why reasonable people treat their statements with ANY credibility.

If the deal was in place that might have helped the Democratic turn out (might) before the special election how is that we learn this long after the results show that business as usual, even among the states with significant Democrat registration, is very unpopular. Did Harkin, as political patriarch, fail to explain a deal that had already been made which would bring the numbers back to the now magical 60 or is he playing defense by rewriting history in order to shore up support in the future. Given past performance the question pretty much answers itself.

As the guy said: “Fool me once shame on you. Fool me twice… won’t get fooled again.”

Already done. They can’t pass a bill with a public option. They can’t pass a bill without a public option. They can’t pass a bill with abortion coverage. They can’t pass a bill without abortion coverage. They can’t pass a bill that allows drug re-importation, but they can’t afford a bill without it.

And they WON’T debate the real issue: What’s more important, Pharma/Insurance profits or health care?

Boxturtle (At the end of the day, it’s all about who gets the money)

An activity very similar to banging one’s head against a wall, but not as enjoyable.

Boxturtle (Still, GO GARZON!!!!!)

Based on recent experience, either Tom Harkin is lying to us or somebody is lying to Tom Harkin. Harkin maintained in November that we had the votes to pass the public option in regular order. I’m not believing this story. If that is true, then there would be no problem doing what needs to be done through reconciliation.

And I am beginning to think that Elmendorf is not an honest broker when it comes to the behavior of the CBO.

Like Jon Walker proposed they can extend and expand Medicare & Medicaid with 51 votes but instead they play these games with everyone to divert attention from the obvious real solutions. They can then go back and do Ins. reform as if anyone will care after these pricks are withering on the vine as they deserve to. The whole dance now is to enrich these same bastards that have caused this mess to start with. The Dems. are full of shit.

Not disagreeing but “doesn’t want to” sounds almost ambivalent. His speeches and actions indicate that there is no way under the sun that he would even consider doing those things. He may want his rhetoric to be a blank slate but actions on nearly every important issue over the last year are far more significant than words.

Because he doesn’t want to is why. The Dinocratic party is a wholly owned subsidiary of BIG CORP INC. AKA USA INC. Obama is just a middle manager tasked to keep the public focused on small shiny objects while the plutocrats that really run the ship go about business as usual. We no longer live in a Republic of people but of Super people called Int’l Corps. It’s like the movie “the Matrix” and were all just batteries that keep these Super people alive. The machines have taken over.

We really have a very clever One party rule. The Corporatists own both parties and just keep all of us flopping back and further between its two wings. U get Corp. heavy ( Goperville) or Corp. lite ( Dinocrats). Thats it, thats our non-choices. Oh, but u get 56 different Ice cream flavors on any other given day.

They don’t care if you vote. All they care about is if you will donate to them so they can feel good about themsleves, I guess.
I like the passion you’ve got. I feel the same way..I just…wish it mattered anymore what we want/need/feel

You STILL believe the horsesh*t that Obama is “the most powerful” person in the world? It’s these kinds of generally accepted propaganda that are killing this country and the world.
Now, if you’d said Lloyd Blankfein, I might have agreed with you.

WRONG! They have a Public system already and its 45 yrs. in the making it’s called MEDICARE. They also have Medicad and other Gov’t single payer systems as well. All this could be extended to cover the 45 mil. and the funding is perfect for the reconciliation process . The Dems. just don’t want to do any of it because they’re owned by the “private for PROFIT” Health mafia. This is all a charade to increase the profits of the same bastards that are already raping and plundering the public. The Dems. aren’t about to do anything unless it fattens their masters bottom lines.

Obama is @ best a powerful middle manager in USA INC., but he’s not even on the real board of Directors (Plutocrats) that run this place is he? America INC. is run out of a series of private country clubs and hunting lodges.

The what might’ve happened scenarios is just more kabuki for play in the press.

I don’t believe one word out of ANY Senator’s mouth anymore – especially Harkin who’s been in on the back room deals all along.

Furthermore, if there were a bill approved of by the White House, Senate and both Stupak and Nelson it’s likely a bill most of the Progressives and pro-choice members would not support because they weren’t involved in the negotiations.

When Stupaks gang of 60 gets preferential treatment but the Progressives 60+ group gets called ‘retards’ by the White house Chief of Staff, we should all support Dean’s view by demanding this regressive and oppressive piece of garbage get scrapped.

the clearest depiction of what we are dealing with is the re-importation of drugs democrats voted almost unanimiously in 2006 crowing about it knowing bush would veto– present day 30voted against re import even the co-sponsor. this issue cannot be demigoged it simply saves everyone money except for big pharma– we should support ideas not partys-thanks for the response

And if you don’t mind my tagging along here, Medicare and Social Security are both targeted to be removed by the Powers That Be. Both Medicare and Social Security have worked very well and endured, despite all the efforts already made to destroy them (including using SS funds to balance the budget, etc.). They cannot stand it that the people’s money is used for the people. They want it all.

TARP O/T:

According to Yahoo News, “The 700-billion-dollar US government effort to rescue the financial system has failed to meet key goals such as sparking lending and curbing risky activities by banks, a special auditor [Inspector General] said Sunday.”

The report itself is here in pdf.

exactly!

As you are beating your breasts over this, I have a question…

When did passing the Senate version of Health Care suddenly become a good thing on FDL?

Weren’t they still going to force tens of millions into the arms of private insurers? Weren’t prescription drugs kept at artificial highs, because Dems defeated the drug re-importation bill? And weren’t there still going to be taxes on so-called ‘cadillac health care plans’ even if it was toned down some in the compromise?

And this was just the tip of the iceberg on the backtracking on true reform.

Bottom line…if the White House had Lieberman’s vote, then this bill would not have been to America’s benefit.

Yeah, let’s throw the women under the bus! Sure.

KILL, KILL, KILL THIS ABOMINATION OF A BILL!