DOA

Well, it's over: Max Baucus has announced that the health care bill will offer co-ops but no public option. Despite all of his capitulation to the Republicans, absolutely no Republicans will support his bill. And most liberals have come to hate the thing too.

I told you that Baucus would soon be one of the most detested politicians in America. In a recent post, I signaled that I might reconcile myself to this disappointing bill if the people in Congress I admire endorsed it. But they ain't buyin'.

Anthony Weiner has declared the Baucus plan dead on arrival. He also has sagely noted that "Bipartisanship in health care is the political equivalent of a child looking for a unicorn.”

Russ Feingold -- who just a couple of weeks ago sent messages telling everyone to support the reform effort -- is pissed off:

“My goals for health care reform include a strong public option, long-term care reform and reform of the Medicare reimbursement system that has disadvantaged Wisconsin for far too long. I am disappointed that the Finance Committee bill, as written, comes up short on all three fronts. I hope my colleagues on the Finance Committee will change the bill to ensure it is not just health care reform in name only.”

Senator Jay Rockefeller has written the following about co-ops:

First, there has been no significant research into consumer co-ops as a model for the broad expansion of health insurance. Waht we do know, however, is that this model was tried in the early part of the 20th century and largely failed. As the USDA states in its response letter, "Government support for the cooperative approach to delivering universal health care was reduced during [World War II] and terminated afterward." This is a dying business model for health insurance. Moving forward with health insurance cooperatives would expose Americans who are hoping for a better health care system, to a health care model that has already been tried and largely failed in the vast majority of the country.

...all of the consumer health insurance cooperatives identified by the USDA and NCBA operate and function just like private health insurance companies. Therefore, it is unclear how expanding consumer health insurance cooperatives would actually achieve greater affordability for consumers or bring about greater competition in the private market. This further substantiates my point that health insurance co-ops are not a real alternative to private health insurance they are not a substitute for a strong public plan option, and we should not suggest to the American people that they would be.

The Congressional Budget Office agrees:

The proposed co-ops had very little effect on the estimates of total enrollment in the exchanges or federal costs because, as they are described in the specifications, they seem unlikely to establish a significant market presence in many areas of the country or to noticeably affect federal subsidy payments.

I could go on, but the point is made: Co-ops are a farce, a gimmick. And every decent person on Capitol Hill seems to be infuriated by the way this legislation turned out. Max Baucus and Barack Obama pissed away a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity -- and as a result, quite a few lifetimes will be abbreviated.

Here's the best line of the day -- from Gene Lyons, who (unlike Joe Conason) kept his head during 2008:

Democrats who cry racism risk looking like whiners fearful they're losing the argument. Not to mention illogical. If Obama's approval rating among white voters has dropped from 63 to 43 percent, as the Los Angeles Times recently documented, it's not because they suddenly heard about his African father.

Obama's drop in popularity among white people is not, in my view, due to racism. The true racists were never among that 63%. No, those sagging polls can be attributed to Obama's stances on domestic spying, the increasingly unpopular war in Afghanistan, the failure to fix Wall Street and -- especially -- the health care sell-out.

In 2008, many progs allowed themselves to be "racist-baited" into supporting Obama. But that smarmy tactic will no longer work.

How are the progs reacting to the Baucus/Barack sell-out? Well, this interview with Jane Hamsher is very revealing:



On one level, I think that this exchange is hilarious. These gullible, self-deluded lefties try very hard to blame Rahm Emanuel and anyone else who served in the Clinton administration. (When all else fails, blame Bill!)

"I've been calling Rahm Emanuel 'President Emanuel' for the past few days..."

Oh, for crying out loud. Stop scapegoating, stop blame-shifting, stop trying to save face, and stop living in a dream. For the better part of two years, I've been snapping my fingers and shouting "Wake up!" -- yet these hypno-programmed O-zombies refuse to exit the trance state.

It's not Rahm who's at fault -- it's Barack. He's a fake. A liar. Always has been.

Obama's NAFTA lie should have told the progs everything they needed to know. That sorry incident set the template for all that has followed. Anyone who saw Obama's imitation of Janus on that occasion would have predicted how he would screw up health care reform.