Interesting wording, Jane: On Firedoglake, Jane Hamsher writes:
There really doesn't seem to be any limit to what the administration will do to pass Rahm Emanuel's neoliberal giveaway to the insurance industry.So. When it comes time to apportion blame in this administration, all roads lead to Rahm. Not to Obama.
Filibuster? Fill 'er up! Does the Senate have enough votes to pass a bill containing a public option? As of a month ago, Norman Ornstein of the American Enterprise Institute said:
The Senate simply doesn't have the votes, mostly because you have a bar of 60 there.Actually, although a filibuster-proof vote requires a three-fifths majority, a simple majority would suffice to pass the bill, and a senator who opposes the bill might still vote for cloture. That has happened before. It might be possible to muster up 50 votes in favor of a health reform bill containing a public option, despite the fact that some 13 blue dog Senators have voiced their discomfort.
So what would happen if the Republicans filibustered? As some of you will recall, senators from the South infamously tried to filibuster the Civil Rights Act, which nevertheless passed. A filibuster is an arduous challenge -- and the tactic does not always work.
Many people think that the great theatrical filibusters of the past will never be repeated. But the Senate Majority leader can rule that anyone wishing to mount a filibuster must do it the grueling, old-fashioned way -- by making an endless speech, standing, with no breaks. For the Democrats, the hard part would be maintaining a quorum. Harry Reid can actually task the Sergeant at Arms to compel Senators to return to the Senate floor. Despite what you may have read elsewhere, the Democrats can, under Senate Rule 6, compel the presence of Republicans. The senators on the floor can set up cots and tents and MP3 players and computers with internet connections. All the comforts of home.
The person conducting the filibuster will be much less comfortable.
One slang term for a filibuster is "taking to the diaper." That phrase arises from the fact that senators have often prepared for a filibuster by wearing diapers. I speak literally. A janitor with a bucket stands nearby, just in case. (And what a captivating spectacle that would be!)
I don't know about you, but if the Republicans are intent on battling any form of public option -- even one as compromised and limited as the one put forth in "Rahm Emanuel's" plan -- then I, for one, would enjoy seeing their jowled cheeks redden with shame as their speechifyin' gets smelly and moist. Ah yes. That would be the ultimate CSPAN moment. Most politicians are whores, but few whores will engage in water sports. And only the most degraded and destitute and pitiable sex workers would contemplate...
...well, I need not finish the sentence, need I?
I say: Let's force the Republicans to sink to that level of prostitution on behalf of their big business funders. Why should Obama back away from the public option at this point? The time to negotiate is after the Republicans have proven that they're full of crap.
I'm looking forward to this. Even if the White House loses, the super-duper-pooper spectacle of a filibuster would tickle my fancy in ways that it has seldom before been tickled. Hell, I'd like to see the Dems find ways to extend the Republican filibusters. They should bring in carts laden with beer and bean soup and hearty chili, all of which can be placed right in front of the orator: Get a whiff of that, Senator Sellout.
What preparations should the Republicans make before they do their duty? Depends...
Should we stand with Feingold? Senator Russ Feingold is not a whore. I want to be clear on that point.
He's one of the few politicians for whom I have wholehearted respect. And he remains supportive Obama's efforts -- although he insists on the need for a "strong public option."
Because of Feingold, I'm torn. Can we, should we, ought we write to our congresscritters in the House and tell them to vote against 3200? For a while now, I've leaned toward doing just that. But I'm loathe to say that Russ Feingold is wrong. Maybe we should bow to his judgment. Maybe we should support reform, as deeply flawed as these reform efforts may be.
Let's face it -- Jane Hamsher is right. The "mainstream" House and Senate plans can be considered neoliberal giveaways to the insurance industry. That industry which has no valid role to play in our health system. Why should we allow the insurance execs to gobble up some twenty percent of each health care dollar?
I despise the idea of mandated purchase of private insurance. The constitutional viability of such a mandate still strikes me as questionable. And those proposed fines are obscene.
And yet. And yet.
Senator Feingold can find it in his heart to support this immensely flawed scheme -- even though I suspect that he would prefer single payer, as would I.
In the House, Dennis Kucinich has introduced HR 676, the single payer plan. Yet he has not yet ruled out voting in favor of HR 3200, the neoliberal giveaway plan. For all its awfulness, that plan would disallow the insurance companies from denying insurance based on pre-existing conditions. Scoff at that if you will. People with pre-existing conditions will not scoff.
What if Kucinich decides to vote -- however reluctantly -- for HR 3200?
John Conyers, another backer of 676, has said that he will not vote for 3200 unless the public option is maintained and strengthened. The implication is that he could end up voting in favor of that bill.
Anthony Weiner is another force behind 676. He has not yet indicated whether he would vote for 3200. I've seen interviews in which he signaled that he might do so.
My point is this: The few decent people left in politics have indicated that they might support the Obama-favored plan, even though single-payer remains infinitely preferable. Should we tell them that they are wrong to do so? Or do they know something that we don't?
9 comments:
"[3200] would disallow the insurance companies from denying insurance based on pre-existing conditions".
So is the deal that in return for this, the insurers get assured by the state that they'll be able to pocket even more of the GDP than they do at the moment?
Got to say, if they were deprived of the "pre-existing conditions" excuse, these vampires would lose a tool they've used hugely successfully to keep people unwell and sick while keeping hold of their money. That would be a very welcome reform indeed.
But would these bastards' lawyers really not be able to do anything about this? Just wondering what extra power the extra money would bring.
I think Feingold is really great (incidentally, I'm one of his constituents).
However, he doesn't invariably display perfect judgment. For example, he voted to confirm John Ashcroft (after Ashcroft assured Feingold that he'd uphold the oath of office to be fair and impartial).
Likewise, I love Kucinich. But he endorsed Obama. Again, he's capable of getting played.
It seems that the version that Obama outlined would predominantly get paid for via cuts in Medicare (unfortunately, on my read, David Brooks' interpretation of the speech is largely correct). That seems to be the direction in which things are headed.
When the fines from mandates start to bite - along with Medicare cuts - Democrats will suffer at the polls.
It's true that banning denial of insurance based on pre-existing conditions would be a major gain. But, overall, it's not clear to me that the benefits of Obamacare outweigh the downside. And it might be possible to pass a measure banning denial for pre-existing conditions on its own.
Support for such a flawed bill despite a few potential gains is morally reprehensible. Plus I am not sure that by the end of the process those potential gains will still be in the bill. This is not a health care reform bill. It is a bailout of the insurance industry. I am not willing to see that accomplished no how, no way.
This bill will bankrupt many middle class families and single people what with the increases in premium costs and fines if you do not participate. I know it will bankrupt me.
This is not health care reform to Obama. He wants something passed so that his inflated ego for bragging rights only. He can say, “I did it. Clinton could not.” He just wants bragging rights.
It is a BAD plan(s) (there is no bill yet). KILL IT.
Bert in Ohio
Of course, the mandatory car insurance requirement in most states has helped maintain low cost and high quality auto insurance while ensuring the continuing safety of the motoring public. /snark
Just like Bush invading Iraq to out do daddy, Obama wants a health care "reform" bill to out shine Bill Clinton.
He is George W. but with a better vocabulary.
Thank you MrMike, since last May I had been searching for a more apt analogy than 'Bush from a different Ivy bush'.
I enjoyed the thought of discomfiting the GOP in the Senate with a true filibuster procedure, but I doubt that will happen.
As for the current bill(s) in question, remember the past.
Any number of worthwhile reform proposals have existed over decades, and until January of this year, once this current round of dispute on the issue began in Congress, NONE of them included a public option. (That is, none of the leading DEMOCRATS proposed that even during the most recent primary season last year.)
Nixon's proposal got reform done via a strong employer mandate, which Democrats at the time opposed as insufficient, thinking they could do better. That was roughly 38 years ago or so.
When Howard Dean was running for president, he had a good health care reform plan. It didn't include a public option. The Clintons' proposal did not include a public option.
I, for one, find the arguments for single payer entirely persuasive. So much so that I could imagine a principled position against the public option because single payer is far better than even that.
Most reasonable people might agree that opposing a real chance for a public option because of holding out for 'perfection' (single payer) would be foolish. (Oh, would that these were our choices!)
Perhaps by a parallel argument, reasonable people might agree that foregoing the chance for quite significant insurance regulation that addresses close to a majority of the problems because of holding out for the public option (which nobody advocated for until 6 months ago) is also foolish.
XI
The willful ignorance and self delusion on the part of this President and this Democratic Congress is a wonder to behold. Despite the nasty misinformation campaign of the Republicans and health industry lobbyists, the public option is still desired by a substantial majority of the public. Members of the Senate, media, and WH claiming that the public does not want it does make it so.
By talking to people in all walks of life in several regions of this country it became apparent to me that most of the anger directed at the health care debate was actually residual fury from the bank/auto bailouts crammed through Congress just in time to make sure multi million dollar bonuses were paid to criminals who just happened to be political supporters of the current Congress and administration. Since the media would not cover the bailouts and Congress did not take a townhall break immediately after the largest transfer of wealth in human history,the public stewed about it for months and then were told they had to talk about health insurance reform to their Congressperson. In their fury, they were told they were ignorant, as well as any other invective which could be invented to bully them to sit down and shut up.
If a bill is passed with mandatory coverage for shit insurance with noncompliance fines without a public option alternative, the fury over the bank bonus bailout will be squared. The electoral slaughter will be well deserved and President Obama will be lamest of ducks. Very few are listening to what the public is telling them and they are hearing only what is politically correct in their self imposed bubble.
And the "pre-existing conditions" concession (should that happen) is only somewhat beneficial: as defined, the term means "a condition which has not been diagnosed or treated in the past six months." Many people have conditions which they can cope with for six months without treatment (and of course the uninsured - i.e. those most frequently being used as a 'stick' to get "reform" passed - do this quite often).
Sergei Rostov
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