What Reid will do next

For Reid’s next trick…

Reid knows his future depends on this health bill; if he didn’t have the votes he would have gone for the trigger as Rahm pressed him to. Barring a major miscarriage, he has the votes. The Blue Dogs have been saying they can support the bill if it’s a level playing field – the Schumer version rather than the robust version – and are unlikely to block cloture. Significantly, Reid said he hasn’t asked the White House to urge Senators to get on board, because “it hasn’t been necessary”, which betokens confidence (or foolhardiness). He was also confident enough to ignore the worries of Obama and the pressure from Rahm, who knows how to bring pressure.

Tomorrow the Senate Democrats meet for lunch and Reid will work the Blue Dogs over again.

Reid will remind the Blue Dogs that this is a moderate bill, the compromise which they reached after the Democrats gave in on the single-payer, and on the robust public option, and on the unadulterated Schumer option. The public option will have to pay back its loans and play by the same rules as the private insurers; it not only allows people to opt out, but it allows states to PREVENT individuals from opting in, so nobody is being forced into anything – states can deprive people of the right to choose, which should warm any conservative’s heart.

Reid will remind the caucus that Lieberman, Lincoln, Carper and Landrieu supported cloture when Bush rammed Samuel Alito own our throats, and they should extend the same courtesy to a president from their own party.

He will remind them that a vote to block cloture is a vote to destroy both Reid and Obama, by rejecting a program that voters want; it’s a vote to create Speaker Boehner and Majority Leader McConnell, because in 2010 America will punish us for failing to pass a good bill, OR for succeeding with a bad bill that people hate.

He will remind them that if this bill is blocked, the Republicans will know they can block anything, at any time, just as they are blocking our nominees for the courts and for Surgeon General (right in the middle of a health crisis).

He will remind them that if they go with him on just one vote – cloture – they can go against him on the opt-in amendment, the trigger amendment, the strip-out-the-opt-out amendment, and the bill itself, four separate chances to prove their loyalty to their paymasters in the insurance industry (it isn’t loyalty to their constituents because the voters want the public option).

He will remind them that the liberals, for once, didn’t cave to the conservatives, and they will stand firm to the end because they’re tired of getting screwed over.

He will remind them that the options aren’t opt-out and trigger: they are opt-out now, or opt-out in conference, or opt-out in reconciliation.

He may also remind them that they need to sweeten the bill with some popular stuff for 2010, like drug discounts for seniors, tax credits for small businesses, money for folks with preexisting conditions.

And he will remind them that they claim to be Democrats, and it’s time to stop fucking with their president just to prove they can do it. Because Obama can fuck with them, and so can Rahm.

Watch Nelson, Lincoln and Bayh after the big lunch with Reid. Silence is golden. If they come out and say “hell no” now, then Reid miscalculated. If they play their cards close to their vest, then we have weeks to work them over. Baucus is now saying he was a public option fan from the beginning – he at least, believes the fix is in. Nelson says he wants the opt-in, not the opt-out, and hasn’t committed to cloture; nor have Lincoln or Bayh, so those three will get a lot of attention. Snowe criticized the bill but did not say she’d block cloture. Meanwhile liberal Senators are working it from the other side, showing that a bill WITHOUT the public option might not even get 50 votes (although threatening a filibuster could backfire by causing the Blue Dogs to use the same threat).

Then Reid will spend weeks working on the holdouts, if need be, aided by Obama.

The opt-out notion, apparently Schumer’s brain-child, was a huge creative leap, like the one LBJ exploited in the late 1950s to get our first civil rights bill passed (actually that bill required 3-4 political miracles from Johnson, not just one). Reid is actually sending two or three versions of the reform package to the CBO for scoring, which hopefully will come under Obama’s $900 billion threshold; apparently the alternatives to be scored do include some language regarding coops (I’m unclear what that is) but they do NOT include Snowe’s trigger plan, which is insulting to Snowe but necessary to prevent the Blue Dogs from selling out to her again. There are also elements of the old Baucus bill which the liberals may want removed.

Snowe’s trigger was doomed even before Reid stomped it flat today – Reid must have known that so many liberals would fight it that it might not even have gotten 50 votes, let alone 60. Note that neither Snowe nor the White House made a real effort to sell the trigger idea, whereas Schumer has been marketing the opt-out to death for weeks. Of course Snowe is still feebly touting the trigger now, claiming on very thin evidence that it would lead to a broad bipartisan compromise (no, seriously!).

And stop whining about Obama, folks. His strategy all along was to go with the trigger in the first bill, and keep out of the picture until everything is settled at the last minute in conference – it’s safer that way, it preserves momentum, and they only have to rely on balky Blue Dogs once instead of twice (although it was highly unlikely a Dog would vote yes the first time and then screw Obama on the conference report). Obama’s only sin here was being slow to shift strategy now that the public option is back from the dead, and some pardonable reservations about Reid’s ability to pull this off. Now that Reid has jumped in, the White House is backing him up: Obama always wanted the public option in the first place, and soon he will bring his considerable firepower to the cause.

The GOP thought they killed this dead, and now they are terrified. They are screeching that Reid, Mister Caspar Milquetoast himself, who looks like a retired mailman, is a PARTISAN BULLY!! Snowe, when she isn’t trying to resurrect the trigger plan, is bragging that she is trying to slow the process down, which is a dead giveaway that all those weeks of Baucus sucking up to her were wasted.


So watch to see what leaks out of Reid’s big lunch meeting tomorrow.

Can Pelosi lend Reid some, um, guts?

Reid and Obama both know that going for the opt-out is a gamble, and it gives conservative Democrats veto power over the measure – Bayh, Nelson, possibly Lincoln or Conrad. The White House has been planning for quite some time to give Snowe her trigger on the Senate floor and then fix everything in conference (which has risks of its own); they may be reluctant to rethink their strategy, although they should because the situation has improved relative to a month or two ago. Now, because of Obama’s waffling, Reid is waffling too, doing a nose count on the trigger option.

Reid is going to canvas the Blue Dogs this weekend and then make his final choice next week.

Enter Pelosi. She and her whip, Clyburn, are speaking out in favour of the opt-out. The message to Reid and Obama is that if the Senate passes the opt-out, the conference will be a breeze, whereas if they pass the trigger there will be a fight in conference. In other words, the Senate needs to pass opt-out, and it might as well be now, while the momentum is moving that way.

Pelosi needs to tell Reid what Maggie Thatcher told Bush 41 before the Gulf War: “This is no time to go wobbly”.

As I said days ago, if Pelosi and Reid had switched jobs, health reform would be on Obama’s des already.

Maybe she should have that conversation with Obama too.

Blue Dogs warming to the opt-out

Okay, okay, here's the short version.

The public option is getting more support from the polls and the media. The Congressional Blue Dogs, facing more pressure from their constituents, are starting to “frame” their position, saying they will not accept a public option linked to Medicare, but are warming up to the opt-out proposal, although Lieberman is still playing with fire by screwing with Obama both on health care and on czars. Other Democratic strategists are reminding the Republicans (and the Blue Dogs) that they have other tools they can win with – the conference report and reconciliation (although so far they are not talking up the notion of having people vote yes on cloture and then no on the bill itself); even the Republicans are starting to admit tacitly that the Democrats may very well stick together on the public option. Reid is talking tough about delivering the goods, presumably because he knows he can’t survive if they pass a crappy wimpy bill; Obama, who also realizes the need for a strong bill, is still hanging back, but will soon need to step in and lead, for a number of reasons – but when he does, a lot of people will fall in line.

Now, a whole lot of details about all this.

A new ABC poll shows, again, that the American people want the public option, not bipartisanship for its own sake, and the NY Times also endorsed the public option.

Reid is running ads all over Nevada, claiming he’s guy who can “deliver in a way that no one else can”. So with the problems he already has back home, he knows he can’t deliver a crappy bill, so perhaps his tough talk in the ad betokens his confidence that a good bill is coming. In Washington Reid is, annoyingly, still playing more of a birthing coach that a leader, still mooing about the 60-vote barrier, but still, there’s that ad. So perhaps for him it’s about the bill itself, rather than him doing a lap around the rotunda wearing a Superman cape. The ad is a good sign.

Obama does want the public option – he wouldn’t be pushing Pelosi to keep pushing the House bill to the left if he was just going to cave. He has been noncommittal all summer in order to make talks with the Republicans possible and keep the Finance committee from collapsing, but a lot of people – includingCongressional Democrats – want to see Obama honest-to-God lead, and not just because of the health care issue. The good news is that when he does step in, some wobbly Blue Dogs will finally fall in line. Hopefully, enough of them.

As we learned from the Medicare Catastrophic Coverage Act of 1988, the American people will indeed rebel against a bad health care plan. The MCCA was so bad it was repealed after a year. By the same token, if we do have an individual mandate, but do NOT have the public option, then millions of people will be forced to buy from the private insurers, who have just PROMISED us all gigantic rate increases. Under those circumstances, a rebellion – right during the 2010 midterms -- is certain. Add to that the fact that Obama has made clear that he doesn’t want to sign a bad bill, i.e. one that would start a REAL national teabagger riot. All this leads inescapably to the conclusion that Obama is unlikely to sign anything that looks even remotely like the Baucus fiasco, or triggers.
Axelrod is still talking about solving all this in the House-Senate conference, which could be risky. Hopefully the White House is just reminding the Republicans of how many paths to victory there are for Obama – just like Harkin is ostentatiously wheeling out the reconciliation weapon. Read on:

Democrats are test-driving the reconciliation process, which they can use to pass health reform with 50 votes if getting 60 for cloture proves problematic. They are testing out the reconciliation process by using it on a different issue, shifting student loan money away from subsidizing private lending and toward Pell Grants, which would move about $9 billion a year from bankers to students. This will be a great test of the reconciliation prospects for health care, because a lot of the same people are involved: Harkin is pushing for the student loan bill, the Republicans and a couple of Blue Dogs oppose it, and the Senate parliamentarian will have to rule on what passes and what doesn’t – this would be a good time to gauge his mood on the whole reconciliation concept. And publicly flirting with the reconciliation mechanism sends a message to the Blue Dogs: “If you screw Obama over in the first floor vote, not only are you going to bring the wrath of the whole party down no your heads, but you’re going to lose anyway because we have this second mechanism we can use to go around you.”

Baucus, the most conservative of the big three Senators currently hashing out the language for the Senate health reform bill, seems to be warming to the opt-out option. He reeled off the list of options, the “most pure” plan involving a public option linked to Medicare, and the many “less pure” plans such as Schumer’s public option plan, the opt-out, the opt-in, the coops, the triggers. He implied that the “most pure” version – the one linked to Medicare – was the nonstarter, echoing the sentiment of fellow Blue Dog Kent Conrad; in fact, other conservative Democrats are beginning to subtly draw that line – it’s the Medicare-linked public option they won’t go for, which is a very good sign. Baucus expressed particular interest in the opt-out. So it sounds as though the conservative Democrats are warming up to the notion that giving Obama the opt-out package would be a good compromise between the more robust public option, and openly defying the President. They seem to be realizing that defying a popular president in order to block a popular legislative effort is suicidal. Senate liberals are leaning on the Blue Dogs, to the tune of “you don’t want to be the one person who kills reform and cripples the party and the president, do you?”

Interestingly, it still sounds as though the Democratic leaders are not making much of an effort to persuade Blue Dogs to have their cake and eat it too – vote yes on cloture and then no on the bill itself. It sounds as though they’re shooting for 60 on the actual bill. Not sure why – the split-the-difference notion allows you to get a better bill and still get to 60. But as long as their talking opt-out rather than clinging to Baucus’ idiotic coops or Snowe’s fatally flawed trigger, we’re okay.

The various Blue Dogs are dragging this out as long as possible – as soon as they commit to a position, they no longer get all the attention, which is pretty childish; and as long as the three Senators are behind closed doors hashing out the bill, the Blue Dogs aren’t getting the ego massaging and schmoozing they need so desperately. Lincoln may have been speaking kindly of the trigger option in an effort to block the more liberal opt-out, but in the meantime her Arkansans back home, who have said in the polls that they want the public option, slapped her silly on the issue in a recent forum. Lincoln isn’t the only Blue Dog facing liberal pressure back home: Carper, Nelson and Conrad are also facing potential revolts from home-state Democrats, Mainers are putting pressure on Snowe and Collins. Specter, interestingly, is touting the public option, perhaps feeling the pressure from Sestak back in Pennsylvania. Conrad may be leaving himself room to back Obama after all, by specifying, as I noted, that it’s the Medicare-based public option he can’t vote for although he stills prefers coops and triggers; Obama worked him over in the Oval today.

Pretty soon Democratic Senators are going to be asking Lieberman – “Why are you insisting on an investigation of Obama’s “czars”, when you didn’t investigate Bush’s czars when you had the same oversight job? If you’re going to give preferential treatment to the Republicans, why don’t you just take off the mask and join the GOP?” This actually gives me hope here – Lieberman can’t be stupid enough to defy Obama on czars and then defy him again on health care, because he knows he’d be thrown out of the Democratic caucus. Hopefully he’s tacking to the right on czars so he can then tack to the left on cloture for health reform.

I think the Republicans know how much trouble they’re in. It is now emerging that Senate Republicans don’t expect any Blue Dog Democrats to block passage of the health reform bill, even if there is a public option included. The Republicans might even lose Snowe and Collins, who could conceivably support cloture. So now the only remaining strategies for the GOP are delay (they demand several weeks of debate, which the Democrats rejected) and more lies about tax increases, seniors getting denied care, some new variation on the death-panel bullcrap, etc etc.

Senate narrows it down to public option, opt-out, and trigger

Apparently the Senate leadership has narrowed it down to a public option, an opt-out, and a trigger; I think the opt-out is the most likely.

When the Senate leaders emerged from the Democratic caucus meeting, they were boasting that the caucus was united, but today it emerges that there was more squabbling about the public option than we were originally told. Rockefeller joined Schumer in publicly pressuring Reid to include the public option in the original merged bill, but it sounds as though Reid wanted to leave it out, and then try to add it as an amendment later, which is stupid because it could be filibustered.

Here’s the key: as it stands now, Tom Harkin says that the Senators have narrowed it all down to three options: a full public option, a public-option with an opt-out feature, and Snowe’s trigger. The trick is that if you present people with three options, they are more likely to choose the middle one, in this case the opt-out, which would be an acceptable outcome.

A problem with the deliberations in the Senate is that the 10-15 Blue Dog Democrats, along with a few centrist Republicans like Snowe, ALL want to be the star of the show, the deciding vote. We rewarded Snowe for playing hard to get, with months of adoring attention, and now a dozen other Senators want to be schmoozed and courted in the same way. To my way of thinking, liberals like Rockefeller held their noses and voted for the execrable Baucus bill; now the Blue Dogs need to hold their noses and vote for cloture, at least, even if they don’t vote for the bill itself. Mark Pryor says he can’t see any Democrat joining a filibuster, and he damn well better be right.

One bit of good news: Lieberman says he’s inclined to support cloture but he hasn’t decided yet. I guess he hasn’t decided whether he wants to be thrown out of the Democratic caucus, either.

House Democrats are talking about a negotiated public option, with a trigger that would potentially launch a Medicare-linked public option later on; that plan is actually to the left of all three Senate options, so it’s a longshot.

The insurers aren’t even trying to act in a reasonable way, to sway the debate. Guardian, an insurance firm, has cancelled all coverage in New York state rather than cover ONE muscular dystrophy patient. A Guardian executive referred to such patients as “dogs” which the firm could simply “get rid of”.

Standing up to the insurance bullies

The AHIP insurance people who just claimed that passage of the Baucus bill would “force” insurers to raise rates sky high, have been exposed as pathetic liars. Even the accountants who wrote their report for them, admitted that if other the health reform provisions succeed, that will offset the costs they forecast – they admittedly cherry-picked which provisions to score out. Undeterred, the AHIP people are still screeching that health reform will cause seniors to lose benefits – I guess they think old people are stupid – and Blue Cross is coming out with AHIP II, another pack of lies from the industry, warning that reform will cause them to jack up rates 50 percent.

Even more appalling that the lies in the AHIP report is the overt threat. If any other industry dared to tell the country – “don’t try to regulate us or we will use our monopoly power and our bribes in the Senate to rob you even more than we are already” – they would be shut down by the Justice Department instantly. The insurance extortion was so obvious that even CNN, in the form of Wolf Blitzer, slapped around insurance spokeswoman Karen Ignani. Perhaps he did that because CNN just got caught using another insurance shill, Alex Castellanos, as an allegedly “unbiased” reporter.

And all of this has backfired. Democrats, who had to wash the bad taste out of their mouths after they were forced to defend the Baucus bill they hate against the AHIP attack, now say that the AHIP blackmail makes the public option more likely –the insurers themselves proved the need for an alternative to their services (Pelosi said as much). The AHIP threat makes the Baucus plan less likely since it will put us all at the mercy of the insurers, and it makes the trigger option look pretty silly – if they’re already promising to jack up rates, which would set off the trigger, why give them a test which we know they will fail? And the past behavior of the insurers undermined their threat anyway -- since we know that they will raise our rates whether we pass reform or not, there’s no reason not to pass it.

Now that the insurers have taken the gloves off, the Democrats have done the same. Leahy, Schumer, Conyers and even Reid are working on revoking the anti-trust exemption which the insurers have had for half a century. The entire Senate leadership is sponsoring the idea. Schumer thinks that such an amendment can pass (it wasn’t clear whether they would put it in the merged bill, which would be good, or add it afterward, which would be bad because it could be filibustered on its own). Some say it’s just a threat, but I see no reason not to follow through and pass it; a bargaining chip perhaps.

This just in – the anti-trust effort has now been joined by….Pelosi. Ouch! If Obama jumps in as well, look for some serious crap to ensue.

And the Democrats are taking other measures that will make the Republicans and the insurers shake in their boots.

First, the Democratic Senate caucus met today – a meeting in which NO ONE spoke out against the public option --and the Senators came out saying it was likely that whatever bill they wrote would get all 60 Democrats and possibly even some Republicans.

Second, Sherrod Brown came out of the meeting and pointed out that no Democrat wanted to be the guy who would go down in history as the guy who destroyed health reform for another decade or two. He essentially dared any Blue Dog to contradict him on the issue of breaking ranks. To date, no Democrat has said he will vote against the final bill or against cloture.

Third, Pelosi is offering House Blue Dogs some money for rural hospitals, to help make the House bill as strong as possible, for when the House-Senate conference meets.

Fourth, Pelosi implied that if the Blue Dogs force the public option out of the bill, the Democrats will be forced to remove the individual mandate too – which would cost the insurers billions.

Fifth, House Ways and Means just approved the measure allowing the Senate to use reconciliation (it works that way because all budget bills must start in the House). Rangel said they’re just keeping the door open for reconciliation, but a GOP Congressman said that the Democrats have pulled the trigger and it is more likely that they will use reconciliation.

Sixth, Obama is mobilizing his zillion-man army to campaign for health reform.

Seventh – and Obama is also rounding up national Republicans who support reform. Bob Dole is a biggie.

And the people in the know, know that the insurers are going to lose all this. Since the death-panel wingnut lunacy peaked out around Labor Day, the stocks of the top six insurance companies have dropped a whopping 11 percent of their value. The investors know that the insurers are going to get whacked and they can’t stop it.

And how did we get here? Simple facts:

Almost everybody will have at least one major illness in their lives.

Once you are seriously ill, you’re at the mercy of the insurers, who can cut you off at whim.

They don’t even have to give a good reason: their justifications include preexisting conditions and disqualifiers such as teenage acne, pregnancy, and being a victim of domestic violence.

They profit when they cut you off – they have an incentive to deny you the coverage you paid for already.

Almost half of personal bankruptcies in America happen to people who got sick and HAVE insurance, but they get screwed over anyway.

In many cases, if you get screwed over, you can’t even sue the insurers.

And that means that ANY of us can have our lives ruined by the insurers.

They have effective monopolies in 38 states, so many Americans have little choice but to bend over and get screwed.

Trying to fix these problems at the state level is impossible, because the insurers have already bought and paid for all the state legislators they need; the whole country is littered with all the sweetheart deals which the state capitols have given the insurers.

Without a strong NATIONAL plan which is OUTSIDE the control or interference of the insurers, we have no recourse. They will rob us blind and drive us to the poorhouse.

And as long as they have that anti-trust exemption, and no federal controls, their capacity for defrauding and screwing us over, for blackmailing us, for controlling our own Congress, will remain unchecked.

Is Reid going wobbly on using the cloture option?

Washington insiders expect a health bill by Thanksgiving or New Year’s, depending on Obama’s travel.

The polls continue to show support for health reform. Only 18 percent of Americans believe the line that America has the best health care in the world; even among Republicans the number is only 28 percent. Olympia Snowe’s home state wants the public option by a margin of 58-29. And support will increase even more since Obama is turning out his grassroots troops to mobilize for health reform.

But we’re still overcoming the media’s laziness in reporting the issue accurately: in addition to the media’s parrotting dishonest wingnut talking points about death panels and benefit cuts for seniors, there is a strong likelihood that one reason the White House wanted Rockefeller and the liberals to vote for the Baucus bill, was that the media was likely to portray a defeat of the Baucus bill as a defeat for Obama and reform, instead of a rejection of a crappy bill.

One thing that could help goose the public option forward, is the fact that a lot of people are leery of having an individual mandate WITHOUT also having the public option: that really puts us all at the mercy of the insurers who just boasted that they are going to jack up our rates. Now: according to Senate rules, if they hold a House-Senate conference to reconcile the two versions of the bill, and both versions have the individual mandate in it, then it will be extremely difficult to take it out – you’d need 60 votes, and you know the Republicans would all fight to keep it in. So then the negotiators in the conference would be put on the spot: since we can’t take out the individual mandate, don’t we need the public option even more?

Other options include allowing states to opt in or out of the public option, or allowing states to choose from a list of options including local coops. The liberals at least want something that isn’t too weak. Some have suggested a combination, such as an opt-in with a trigger. Obama and Reid apparently have been talking about the trigger option with Snowe, but hopefully they were just buttering her up. Baucus’ plan is coming under more fire – with costs for a family of four at around $700 a month, around 17 million could be priced out of the market. Things we want to look for include: strong subsidies, protection against high out-of-pocket costs, controlling providers (drugs, hospitals, manufacturers), making the system strong and national with power to control insurers, opening the plan to those already employed, taxing the Cadillac plans, strong mandates for both individuals and employers, capping rate hikes.

The problem here appears to be Reid.

Reid says he prefers the public option but he keeps going wobbly on us; first he said he needed 50 votes to act, then when we got 50 he needed 60, and now that he gets 60 he says he won’t enforce discipline and will just seek a reform bill that can get 60 votes on its own, rather than demanding that Democrats support cloture. He doesn’t even want to ASK the Democrats to stick to the team on cloture. Alan Grayson is among the Democrats screaming at him to man up (I think that Lieberman, at least, should be brought to heel). Even if Reid wins reelection next year, how about making Schumer majority leader?

Reports say that in the last few weeks Reid has, in fact, started intensive talks with liberals, trying to figure out how to pass the public option, but hasn’t closed in on a strategy yet. He seems to be focusing on doing it in conference, which is risky.

So he wants it, to he's too polite to ask.

Lyndon Johnson wept.

Lacking such adult supervision, Landrieu is spewing nonsense about people believing the public option is free health care – I’m more interested in her stance on cloture. Conrad is stressing his opposition to a public option linked to Medicare – he’s setting himself up to vote for some OTHER kind of public option, which is a pleasant surprise. Ben Nelson says he will be a team player as long as his party doesn’t go too far to the left…which is where, exactly? Lieberman is a probable “no” on the public option, but again, what about cloture? He must know that even a very lenient Reid would have Lieberman at the top of the “punish me” list.

(On a happier note, Blue Dog Mark Pryor says he’s on board for cloture, and Specter urged the other Democrats to do likewise, although they were reluctant)

It was reported that Snowe will be invited to some of the sessions in which the bills will be merged; then Reid’s office firmly shot down the idea. Snowe is still selling the trigger idea; I don’t think she would be pushing this unless she was afraid that a real public option could pass. She dislikes the opt-out option. The GOP is not punishing her officially, although wingnut sites like Redstate are slamming her. But let’s all remember: if you pass a bill with a public option you might lose Snowe, but without the public option you lose the House of Representatives.

The rest of the GOP is doing the same old same old – lie, delay, lie, delay. McConnell says he wants a couple of MONTHS for debate, and the rest of Team Red is screeching lies about more gummint and more taxes – which they wouldn’t be doing if they had a valid argument to use.

Obama and SNL

Not long ago, the Saturday Night Live folks took a shot at Obama for not finishing a list of policy initiatives, as though he had to get his whole agenda done in one year. It is true that the Democrats have put some issues on hold until the health reform bill is passed but, to point out the obvious, that is only a temporary delay – the health care bill is coming soon. Once the bill is passed, action will move forward on all the other stuff.

Let’s look at SNL’s list of incomplete projects. They involve issues that will require some support in Congress – climate change, gays in the military, immigration (plus financial regulations, which I think they missed) – and a bunch that really don’t require Congress – limiting executive powers, torture, Guantanamo, Iraq withdrawal, gaining the upper hand in Afghanistan.

So here is what will happen.

When health reform passes, Obama’s numbers will skyrocket.

Obama will move forward on the issues that do not require legislation, such as torture and Iraq , and his numbers will go up some more.

Then he will move forward on the issues requiring legislation. Democratic legislators are already working on the issues noted above such as climate change, with vague promises of Republican support. Either the Republicans will renege on their promises and screech “FILIBUSTER” on all three, and America will react to this obstruction and Obama’s numbers will go up….

Or they will NOT obstruct, the bills will pass, and Obama’s numbers will also go up.

And so will the numbers for the Congressional Democrats.

Just in time for the midterms.

Four things for Obama to do

1. Herd the Blue Dogs.

The two guys supposed to herd the conservative Democrats are Reid and Durbin, but now Reid is whining that he doesn’t want a bill that will split the Democratic caucus. Emanuel needs to slap him around and remind him that a huge majority of the Democratic caucus wants the public option, and it’s time for the other side to start making concessions the way they have.

Likewise Durbin. Senate Democrats rank themselves by seniority, but Republicans do it by party loyalty: this gives the GOP a huge advantage, because they know their troops will always follow their leaders on procedural votes like cloture. In effect it gives them 10 extra votes, the difference between 50 and 60. The petition to have the Democrats do what the Republicans do – strip the committee chairs of Senators who don’t follow their leaders on cloture – has almost 80,000 signatures, but Reid’s deputy Durbin has already said they won’t strip committee chairs. So he needs slapping around too.

A key thing to watch for is whether the Blue Dogs are coordinating behind the scenes. Nobody wants to be the one guy who kills health reform, but if there is a little posse of three or four, obstruction becomes easier – treachery loves company. So far, no Democrat has publicly expressed willingness to support a filibuster, but we need to keep it that way.

Another thing to watch the Blue Dogs for, is hiding behind Snowe’s skirts. They could agree to vote for a bill she likes, which could be good, but they could also refuse to vote for a bill she does NOT like. This is pusillanimous and they should be crushed without mercy if they do so.

People to watch include the Democrats who opposed the public option in the Finance Committee, including Lincoln who said her vote on the Baucus bill doesn’t guarantee a “yes” vote on the floor bill, and Conrad, who interestingly has stopped bashing the public option and now is only bashing the ROBUST public option, the most liberal version of it. Carper, author of the opt-in plan, is also considering the opt-out plan, and if he likes it he could also sway guys like Ben Nelson and Bayh who also like it. Collins could conceivably back the Baucus bill – could she back a public option too?

Now the HELP bill and the Finance bill will be merged; once they merge the bills and send the new composite bill to the floor (they’re shooting for the last week of October), the decision on the public option won’t change on the floor: it would take 60 votes to take it out, or to put it in. The people who will decide this will be Baucus and Dodd, who will cancel each other out, Reid who will defer to the White House, and the real “decider”, the White House. Obama wants the public option – Rockefeller publicly reiterated that today -- but a great deal depends on (a) whether Obama has obtained commitments from the Blue Dogs to support cloture, and (b) whether he really wants to go the reconciliation route. If the answer to both questions is “no”, then something other than a full-bore public option may happen. Obama will not allow a bad bill even to be voted on, let alone reach his desk, so that rules out the Baucus bill, the trigger option (unless it is strengthened a great deal), and the coop. Two other options might be: reconciliation (messy), leaving the public option battle until the conference (risky), the opt-in plan (risky), and the opt-out plan. The opt-out is perhaps the best option; even with 22 Republican governors, 13 states with Republican legislatures not including nonpartisan Nebraska, and 9 states that are all GOP run, few states would really opt out.

House leaders are maneuvering for maximum advantage, trimming their plan down from $1.2 trillion down to $900 billion. They are talking about passage of a House bill by Thanksgiving, but they might do better to slow down, wait for Obama to get whatever he can from the Senate, and then vote for it in the House as is, so that no conference is needed.

Speaking of the conference: Obama has clearly read the Senate rules – that’s why he slid the reconciliation instruction into the April budget bill, to open the door for reconciliation later. One key provision: according to Senate rules, if both the House and Senate bills have the public option in it, the House-Senate conference can NOT remove it. But it can still be filibustered.

2. Spank Lieberman and Baucus

Lieberman was saying that the opt-out plan is worth looking at, but now he is actually to the right of the Republican, Snowe, on the Baucus bill, and parroting the discredited insurance-industry talking points from AHIP. Keep in mind that when Bush was pushing the Alito nomination, Lieberman voted for cloture and then against Alito – if he is unwilling to extend the same courtesy to Obama that he extended to Bush, Reid absolutely must throw him out of the Democratic caucus. Lieberman may try to take the lead on repealing Don’t Ask Don’t Tell, hoping to buy himself a reprieve by arguing that he supported his party on one out of two initiatives, but sorry, not good enough. You don’t get to be a Democrat only when it’s convenient. Thomas Paine called guys like that “sunshine patriots”, who flee for the hills when it starts raining.

Astoundingly, Baucus, after stage-managing the three-month disaster in the Finance Committee on health reform, wants to take charge of the legislation climate change and clean energy.

No. Way. In. Hell.

Not only do we need to keep him away from climate change, we still need to remind people why his health reform bill sucks. His formula for coops was slammed by the CBO, who said hardly anyone would use the coops, and it contains way too many provisions which leave us at the mercy of the insurers.

3. Watch for some fakery by the Republicans.

Don’t you think it’s a little odd that, right after sources leak the “fact” that the Republicans threatened to strip Snowe of a key committee seat if she votes for the Baucus bill, she votes for it anyway? Ya think maybe Snowe, who still disapproves of the public option, is setting Reid up for an impassioned speech – Oh, Harry, Harry, Harry, I have thrown aside my Republican friends for you! Keep the Baucus bill as is, lest my tragic sacrifice be in vain!” Then she clutches her pearls and flings herself on a divan or a settee with a case of the vapors. Reid is just the guy to fall for such nonsense.

Of course, having made this threat against Snowe, the GOP will now look foolish if they don’t follow through.

4. Keep stomping the AHIP report to death

The AHIP report, sponsored by the insurers, is backfiring badly; now that they have publicly threatened to raise all our rates, a public option is even more likely. They essentially made the case for the reform better than the reformers have, and gave top cover for some liberals who feared that the Baucus bill would be seen (understandably) as too far to the right. The accountants who prepared the AHIP report admitted that they cherry-picked the data, only looking at four provisions that are expensive. So it was all bullcrap anyway.

Obama greatness, in the palm of your hand

If you want to truly measure Obama’s greatness as a president, all you need is 36 cents.

Reach into your pocket and pull out a quarter, a dime and a penny.

Hold them in your hand while you read the following paragraphs.

Obama’s actual real-world accomplishments in his first year – his first nine months -- have been nothing short of extraordinary. All Obama did was, oh, let’s see, he improved America’s image internationally, repaired bilateral relations with dozens of countries, stopped the torture and other war crimes, persuaded Pakistan to go after the Taliban, freed two journalists from North Korea, resumed non-proliferation talks, got rid of the unnecessary fighter aircraft and choppers, proceeded with the Iraqi troop withdrawal, stopped the idiotic missile defense shield, repaired U.S. relations with the Muslim world, boosted our forces in Afghanistan and gave them a new commander, ordered the closure of Guantanamo, and shot a bunch of Somali pirates right in their fucking heads.

And signed equal pay for equal work, signed the children’s health package, helped kids to get college loans, raised the bar on emissions, protected the wilderness from the oilmen, nominated Sotomayor, led the fight against the swine flu, passed the health care bill, stopped pharmacists from cutting women off from birth control, reduced the secrecy in executive records, and opened the door to stem-cell research.

And saved hundreds of thousands of jobs (with the stimulus which even Republican governors begged for), gave food and support and health coverage to the unemployed, reformed the credit card industry, trimmed the budget by 200 billion a year, saved the automakers, created a bonanza with the wildly successful cash for clunkers, signed the anti-fraud bill, got the markets up 50 percent in a matter of months (in part by buying up depreciated real estate), turned the corner on unemployment, stopped the slide in GDP, established the homeowners credit, got banks to pay back big buckets of bailout money, and cut, I repeat CUT CUT CUT our taxes.

All with the Republicans fucking fucking fucking with him every step of the way. Fucking with him every day, on every issue, with near perfect unanimity.

All while fighting the titanic health care battle, a goal which has eluded a century of presidents and reformers.

In all of American history, I can only think of three presidents who measure up to Obama, for performance in their first year of office.

One’s on the dime.
One’s on the penny.
And one’s on the quarter.

Wingnuts demand impeachment!

The World Net Daily demands Obama’s impeachment – “high crimes and misdemeanors' does not refer to a criminal act…Our Founding Fathers fully intended to allow for the removal of the president for actions which include: gross incompetence, negligence and distasteful behavior….For those who mistakenly hold the illusion that impeaching Barack Hussein Obama would be a simple matter of 'playing politics,' the founders fully intended that the impeachment of a sitting president be a political act."

Okay, let me write up the Article of Impeachment against Obama: violating Congress’s prerogatives by lying to them to get us into a war, blackmailing them into funding unnecessary troop deployments, defying subpoenas, using illegal signing statements and administrative actions, perverting the executive branch into a partisan political weapon, illegally prosecuting opposition politicians and firing opposition attorneys, directing government offices to spread dishonest political propaganda, failing to uphold Article II responsibilities by keeping or financial system safe or enforcing product safety laws, sending thugs to disrupt officials from counting votes while screaming “don’t count the votes!”, trying to convert the Vice Presidency into a fourth branch of government with no oversight, violating the prerogatives of the courts by defying orders to preserve emails and concealing evidence, illegal spying and secret prisons and torture, and keeping innocent people behind bars indefinitely.

Oh, wait, sorry, that was the Article against Bush. I’m a big silly!

Going back to the original Wingnut Daily quote, the “does not refer to a criminal act” bit is an admission that Obama didn’t really commit a “high crime” or any other kind of crime; too bad they had no explanation for how they were going to persuade Pelosi and the House Democrats to impeach, and then the Senate Democrats to convict, for “crimes” as yet unspecified.

But they’re wussies anyway. Their partners at Newsmax are calling for Obama’s violent overthrow, to “resolve” the “Obama problem” (I think the term they were looking for was “final solution”). And of course others are calling for outright assassination. Amazing.

Elsewhere on Planet Wingnut -- while we were all paying attention to the 30 Republican Senators who wanted to deny rape victims the right to take their case to court, and the Republican politicians screeching that Pelosi is an enemy of the Constitution who needs to be put in her place, we all missed the new Oklahoma law which will now mandate publicizing personal details about abortion patients on a website. The website won’t have the name, but patients will be forced to reveal the date, county, age, marital status, race, years of education, previous pregnancies, previous abortions – all which, taken together, wouldn’t make it all that hard for women to be identified, particularly in small towns. Just another effort to terrorize women, using taxpayer money.

The White House is finally beginning to lose patience not only with the wingnuts but their cowardly enablers. After watching the mainstream media report the wingnut garbage as straight new – dead grandmothers, brainwashing schoolchildren, the evil czars – the White House is escalating. Instead of just shooting down the lies, the White House is now going to smack down media outlets that out-and-out lie, or don’t bother to check their facts. "The best analogy is probably baseball," Gibbs said. "The only way to get somebody to stop crowding the plate is to throw a fastball at them. They move." This may have been prompted in part by the NY Times effort to “tune in” more to wingnut “buzz” stories – sexy is better than accurate, right?

Who to watch in the next few days

OBAMA. The latest Gallup poll shows that support for health reform increased, and the latest AP poll shows Obama’s approvals are rising; likewise his approvals for handling the economy and health care. His approvals among the all-important independents is up too. Obama steps directly into the health care fray this week, Finance or no Finance: Senate Democrats do want Obama to steer on key issues such as the public option. But some of his key efforts are happening out of our view: in addition to lobbying Senate Blue Dogs to support cloture, Obama is also working behind the scenes to attract non-Washington Republicans to the cause. As a result, more Republicans are coming out for health reform: three former Senate GOP leaders, Mike Bloomberg, former HHS boss Tommy Thompson, and now Arnold Schwarzenegger. Buncha communists, right?

PETER ORSZAG. The White House team helping to shape the Senate bill will be Rahm Emanuel, health care adviser Nancy Ann DeParle, and OMB chief Peter Orszag. Having Emanuel in the room means we could get a trigger option; having Orszag in the room means a lean system which could win over deficit hawks like Bayh and Conrad. Orszag also said that the public option isn’t essential, and that he was okay with triggers and coops, so we’ll need to watch him to see how wobbly he really is. The GOP is watching him too: they demand that he be there for the Finance Committee vote on the Baucus bill, so they may be planning to ambush him.

HARRY REID. Reid is already beginning the effort to merge the two Senate bills; he’s not even waiting for Finance to vote anymore. Finance is delaying its vote, either due to Baucus’ glacial pace of operations as chairman, or because Baucus doesn’t have the votes to pass it. The Blue Dogs are demanding 72 hours to read floor bill before voting; I’m surprised they didn’t demand 72 years. Fine, gives Obama more time for arm-twisting. Meanwhile, Reid is moving forward.

CHUCK SCHUMER. Today we heard a cautionary tale about state-level health care plans, from the guy who ran the Texas plan. He said Texas tried to set up a state-run exchange, but it failed because because the plan was so small that the private insurers could undercut it and cherry-pick it to death, targeting companies with young, health employees and dumping the older folks out. The public exchange was swamped with old, sick people, prices rose, and it collapsed. Such cherry-picking by insurers also killed the systems in Florida, North Carolina and California . This is why we need a national plan, even if it’s just a coop, and we need provisions to prevent the insurers from gaming the system or exploiting adverse selection. If we reach a compromise on a plan that is a coop, but a national-level coop, watch for Schumer to be the architect of the deal, possibly working with Conrad.

KENT CONRAD The North Dakota Democratic party has passed a resolution demanding single payer, or at the very least the public option. It was unanimous. This is by way of putting more pressure on Conrad – vote with us or you’ll get a primary challenge! -- right after the Nebraska Democrats launched the same ambush against Ben Nelson.

RON WYDEN. Wyden wants to break the grip of the insurers. Wyden and other Democrats are furious at Baucus and Conrad for their obstructive behaviour in the Finance Committee. He and Rockefeller and Cantwell have been threatening to vote against the Baucus bill – perhaps they can force Obama to take a harder line on the public option on the Senate floor, in exchange for their acquiescence on the Baucus bill now. Wyden will vote for the public option if it comes to a vote.

BEN NELSON. A recent poll shows that if Ben Nelson supports a filibuster on health care, his support among Nebraska Democrats drops a staggering 17 points, thus paving the way for a long-overdue primary challenge. But Ben Nelson claims his leadership hasn’t even approached him on the cloture issue, which is bullcrap: he could still be planning to screw Obama over.

ALAN FRUMIN. He’s the Senate parliamentarian, and will rule on some critical issues once the health reform bill hits the Senate floor. He will uphold the rule that a conference report can be filibustered, which will put more pressure on Obama and Reid to hold the Senate Democrats together. He will probably support the notion that the Democrats, if need be, can overcome a filibuster not only by cloture or reconciliation, but also by leaving the bill on the agenda indefinitely, with nothing else on the agenda, so no other business can be conducted (the Republicans would try to play chicken and wait them out, but that’s a losing proposition). He may also have to rule on a tactic which the Republicans tried to use in 2005: the Democrats could threaten to use a chair ruling to kill a filibuster on the grounds that using the filibuster in such a case would be unconstitutional.



And of course THE REPUBLICANS; the air is slowing leaking out for them, and they know it:

Snowe is pushing to weaken insurance exchanges by forcing exchanges to allow any company into the exchange even if they have sky-high prices and lousy coverage like the existing firms. She is clearly not serious about either reform or bipartisanship. So she’s finally tipped her hand, and her influence will drop accordingly. Meanwhile GOP leaders are insisting that even if Snowe supports reform, it’s still not a bipartisan effort. As if anyone cares.

Earlier, the Republicans, on orders from their masters in the insurance industry, forced Democrats to amend the Baucus bill by adding an individual mandate forcing people to buy insurance. Now they are arguing exactly the opposite – now mandates allegedly are a bad idea -- in an effort to slow things down even further. Let’s just sit there and admire their chutzpah: slamming the Democrats for including something the Republicans demanded in the first place.

The conservatives are arguing, simultaneously, that “government can’t possibly compete with private enterprise”, and that “private enterprise can’t possibly compete with government.” Um, if government care is really that crappy, no will choose the public option, will they? You would think the Republicans would love to see the Democrats fall on their faces, right? But actually, the Republicans aren’t afraid that government health care will fail. They are afraid it will succeed. And if fact both of the arguments are wrong. As Bob Cesca pointed out, taking a private cab in New York costs four times as much as the public subway, but there are still more than 10,000 cabs on the streets – they didn’t disappear the minute the public trains began to run. .

Rasmussen, the Republican pollster, gets busted for lying again. At the same time, another right-leaning pollster, Strategic Vision, is also busted for cooking the books.

Fox anchor Shepherd Smith finally loses it and totally blows apart a Republican politician who was spewing lies about the “government takeover” of health care.

Republicans sucking up to the female voters again? The National Republican Congressional Committee just said "If Nancy Pelosi's failed economic policies are any indicator of the effect she may have on Afghanistan , taxpayers can only hope McChrystal is able to put her in her place." Another uppity liberal broad.

Limbaugh is trying to buy the St. Louis Rams. This guy is a drug addict who has failed in one field of endeavour after another, whose one brief flirtation with higher education was a laughable disaster, who only survives as a “pundit” because he never comes out of his sound booth where a real opponent could challenge his lies and his bullcrap, and who only has all those listeners because his company offers the show for free in many markets, in exchange for preferential advertising agreements. The man lacks the aptitude to lead flies to a pile of shit, and he’s going to turn around a team which is arguably the worst in football? And how could any black player possibly work for that guy? Or anybody who believes in labor unions? Or anybody with a brain?

Yet again, Republican governors who slammed the stimulus bill are now begging for stimulus money. As Kos implied today -- How about this? Any state whose Senators voted “no” on the stimulus gets no stimulus money. Call it The Hypocrisy Clause.

Pelosi is shooting for passage by Thanksgiving, so within milliseconds the Republican will make fools of themselves with a new wave of obstruction tactics, just so they can brag that they threw the timetable off track.

Obama writing his own health bill, just in case

Word has it that Obama has been drafting his own health care bill secretly, just in case the Senate bill turns into a Frankenstein monster. So he has yet another way to get in the win column. My guess is that his plan looks something like this:


The bill will establish a national coop which will be governed by members paid from coop’s own funds, and administered by private firms; getting its policy and financial safety net from HHS.

It will mandate irrevocable coverage, both public and private, with accountability to consumers and a “basic services” platform including prescriptions; it will prevent price spikes, adverse selection, lifetime caps, huge deductibles, and denial and termination of coverage.

The bill will control rising costs and encourage competition; buy-in will be significantly less than the 13 percent of annual income which Snowe prescribed.

The bill will supercede all preferential deals which insurers have with local governments and reaffirm the supremacy of Article 1 of the Constitution over Amendment 10.

We may never see this bill, but if we do, we can check to see how close my guess is. My proposed bill is not technically public option but it has just about all the features that people want from the public option.

Obama may be jumping into the fight earlier than expected

There are a number of places to pass the public option: in the Finance Committee, in the merged Finance-HELP bill, on the Senate floor, and/or in a House-Senate conference. Few people expect the Finance Committee to pass it: Baucus, Bill Nelson, Conrad, Lincoln and Carper are shaky, and even Schumer’s second proposed amendment, the least liberal of the three public option proposals, would have a tough climb. Firedoglake noted that the Chamber of Commerce is attacking the Schumer amendment but not attacking the more liberal Rockefeller amendment, possibly a sign that the fatcats are afraid that the Schumer proposal could actually pass. Even if the public option doesn’t pass in Finance, a close loss would provide some momentum for it.

Some staffers say that the merged Finance-HELP bill won’t have the public option either, due to Reid’s wobbliness; others said the White House would not weigh in on the process at that point, preferring to wait until the House-Senate conference. However, other sources say that Harkin will defer to Reid on the merged bill, while Reid reportedly will defer, in turn, to Obama – for the merged Senate bill, not for the conference later on. One source says that the merged bill will be hashed about by a White House official, Reid, Harkin and Dodd – not Baucus, interestingly. If a milquetoast like Reid goes into a room with Harkin, Dodd and, say, Emanuel, they’re coming out of the room with the public option in the language. We might have clues on the merged bill by the end of the week.

Another factor which will make it easier for the real Democratic leaders to toss out the Baucus bill in favor of the public option: the whole point of Baucus making all those concessions was to win Republican support, but now Republican governors are assembling a huge campaign to fight the Baucus bill. So what was the point again?

So after the merged bill is the Senate floor – another place to fight for the public option – and then the House-Senate conference. Some suggest that the conference was always the one and only path to passing the public option, but perhaps Obama could make it happen earlier, in the merged bill or on the floor. Adding some more pressure toward the left, 25 House Blue Dogs have said they will support the public option, making the conference a tougher environment for foes of the public option.

Whether the big fight is in the first Senate bill or the conference, the key, obviously, is that Obama doesn’t want to use the messy reconciliation tool unless he absolutely must, so he needs to get all the Democrats to commit to cloture even if they vote against the final bill (the have-your-cake-and-eat-it-too option), which means listening with saintlike patience to all their concerns – or he might pick off a few Republicans but it seems unlikely. Even if Obama is unsure of getting cloture, he might risk a filibuster rather than approve a crappy bill with no public option: even if he misses cloture by a few votes, the Republicans will get the blame for blocking something that everyone wants. Perhaps a filibuster and THEN reconciliation.

Behind the scenes the White House staff, the cabinet secretaries, Obama and Biden are lobbying Senators furiously, not so much lobbying them as carpetbombing them with attention. Susan Collins is a key target. Again and again they are asking the centrists: what could you vote for? They are acting as “vote whip” because Reid doesn’t have the balls or the brains.

There are those who suggest that by leaving his position ambiguous for so long, Obama showed America that he is being flexible and making concessions, and the Republicans are not, thus ensuring that the Republicans get the blame for any defeat. But leaving it up in the air so long has its risks. Perhaps Obama sees that, which would explain his jumping into the process during the Finance-HELP merge rather than in conference.

Obama told troops not to fight the Finance Committee

More details are emerging with respect to Obama’s health reform strategy.

We have learned that the White House pushed liberals to mute their objections to the Baucus bill in the Finance Committee (which Schumer correctly called the least friendly battlefield for Democrats), and save their ammunition until a bill gets to the Senate floor, and then the conference with the House. We have also learned that Obama himself will jump into the health reform fight with both feet when the conference process begins.

Somebody over at the White House has clearly been reading the history of Fabius Cunctator, the Roman general who came up with the plan to beat the great general of Carthage, Hannibal. The Romans allowed Hannibal to wear himself out in attack after attack, until finally, after some internal squabbling in Rome regarding the strategy, they defeated him. Sun Tzu had advocated such strategies long before. George Washington used the same playbook against the Brits, and then those Vietnamese fellers used it against us. And a big part of the strategy was to do exactly what Obama is doing: wait until the enemy can be tempted into doing something stupid, or tempted to wear themselves out in pointless attacks, or herded onto the right battlefield. Or, ideally, all three.

Obama spent the spring and summer quietly learning the Senate rules, setting up the reconciliation instruction in the budget bill, talking privately to Senators to get the 50 votes he needs, and covering his back by talking to the AMA and the drugmakers. Meanwhile he was playing rope-a-dope, letting the Republicans punch themselves out in the townhalls and the Finance Committee, showing the whole nation that they are lying wingnut teabaggers who want nothing but obstruction, despite all the Democratic concessions, all the wooing of Snowe, all the trial balloons regarding coops and triggers.

A lot of us wanted Obama to take the more straightforward route, crush the Republicans like Sherman going through Georgia this year and ram the Democratic platform down McConnell’s throat. He could have done that and I kind of wish he had – we do need to re-establish the tradition of Democrats who are willing to fight for their beliefs and punch the bullies until they bleed. But there are some advantages to the more Fabian approach which Obama has taken. A long, hard-fought, tactically brilliant victory will resonate with the people and history in a way that a quick smash-and-grab attack against the GOP would not have. And more importantly, letting the Republicans really show the country what a bunch of worthless scumbags they are is absolutely going to pay dividends for future campaigns.

So now the Democrats are situated perfectly. The American people still want the Democrats to pass the public option. And the Republicans, having worn themselves out pounding away at poor little Max Baucus, demanding concession after concession, suddenly will have to face the army of Boxer, Feinstein, Dodd, Harkin, Durbin, Mikulski, Levin, Webb, Leahy and Sanders…and then Pelosi and the House liberals in the conference.

And then Obama himself. The most effective American political leader in decades. As we have learned, once the House and Senate begin the conference process, Obama and Rahm Emanuel will overtly step into the fray, with all the talent and firepower they used to win the White House in the first place.

As Fabius would have said, the enemy has done stupid things, worn themselves out with their endless Pickett-like charges, and stumbled onto the perfect battlefield where they can be destroyed.

Should be an interesting two months.

Reasons to be cheerful

Here are about a dozen reasons why passage of the public option became more likely today.

The Massachusetts Senate passed the bill allowing the governor to replace Kennedy in the Senate. So we’re back to 60-40. All Reid needs to do now is lay down the law to the Blue Dogs: a “yes” vote on cloture is not voting to support the bill, you’re voting to support your party and stop the filibuster. And if you screw with me on this, the signature issue of your party leader in the White House, your days as a player in the Senate are over. Massachusetts Republicans are threatening legal challenges, to delay the process, but if Reid decides to seat the Senator, we could swap a court fight for a Senate fight. At best I think all they can do is slow things down a bit – and reinforce the overpowering impression among Americans that the Republicans are into obstruction for its own sake, regardless of the damage they’re doing.

More are speaking out for the public option: Stabenow endorsed it, Schumer called for it, Bingaman and Menendez want it, Cantwell said she won’t vote for a bill that doesn’t have it, even Bill O’Reilly endorsed the public option. And Eric Cantor told a sick townhall attendee to go get aid from the government, which was a rather astonishing left-handed endorsement of government-provided health care.

The main alternative to the public option, the Baucus bill, is being panned by labor, by House Democrats, Senators Burris, Feingold and Brown, and Howard Dean.

Today in committee, the Republicans were screeching all over again – “government takeover of healthcare, stunning assault on liberty, it’s all going too fast, we demand a promise in advance from the House and the President that they will back the bill with no alterations” etc, and they are still putting the screws to Snowe to reject any reform plan (pressure which may ease off once Kennedy’s replacement arrives). Nevertheless the Republicans are rather clumsily admitting that it’s the Democrats who have been trying to seek bipartisanship on this issue: Grassley finally admitted that the Finance bill did in fact have Republican input (a ton of it, in fact), and Cantor admitted that the Republicans agreed with 80 percent of the bill.

Insurance lobbyist Karen Ignani shows us all vividly why we need the public option. She actually sent a letter to Baucus, saying the insurers want to design “packages” that allow them to cherry-pick healthy applicants and deter those in poor health from applying. "For example, insurers could offer a benefits design that omits or severely limits services needed by people with serious medical conditions." Properly-defined standard benefits would stop them from doing that. Ignani’s idiotic move demonstrates to all that even government regulation won’t stop these crooks – we need the public option. (The insurers were also caught trying to use Medicare mailers to scare seniors into opposing government-run care – an astounding combination of hypocrisy, chutzpah and dishonesty)

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2009/9/22/785246/-This-Is-Why-We-Need-A-Public-Option

http://www.politico.com/static/PPM41_baucus.pdf_final_9-21-09.html

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/09/22/AR2009092201849.html?hpid=topnews

The public option won’t get out of the Finance Committee without Baucus and Conrad, but that is not an insurmountable obstacle – Reid will step in and merge the Finance bill with the HELP bill, which does have the public option. Wyden is complaining that the Baucus bill doesn’t have enough reform or enough bipartisanship – the obvious problem being that getting more reform means less bipartisanship and vice versa. Wyden cosponsored a coop plan with Bob Bennett of Utah, but interestingly, he hasn’t fought to put it on the table with the 6-7 other plans being discussed. Which makes the coop less likely, and the public option more likely. Wyden was also calling for more competition and accountability for the private insurers – perfect.

The Republican Lie Machine is running out of gas. The American people are tuning them out. Or, in today’s example, laughing them off the stage. Some GOP yokel tried to persuade his constituents that Obamacare will cap doctors’ wages, and his own voters openly laughed at him. And this was in ruby-red KANSAS . Meanwhile voters slapped around GOP Representative Eric Cantor, demanding that he explain what the GOP health care plan is.

http://www.everydaycitizen.com/2009/09/video_kansans_laugh_at_rep_tia.html

Mitch McConnell was screeching today that if the Democrats use the reconciliation process to pass health reform in the Senate, the American people will explode with rage and exact their revenge; his desperate, impotent bellowing neatly skips over the fact that not one American in a hundred even knows what reconciliation is (for once popular ignorance works in favour of the Democrats), and the few who do know, also know that the GOP used it to ram a bunch of stupid stuff down OUR throats. I raise the reconciliation issue to make a point: at many points in Obama’s career, he snatched victory from the jaws of defeat because he always knows the rules better than the other team. He got to the Illinois Senate by pointing out that his opponents were ineligible to run for the seat, because they had violated ballot qualification rules. He beat Hillary for the presidential nomination because he knew about the proportional distribution of delegates, about the hybrid primary/caucus system in Texas, about the rules for scooping up caucus delegates, about horse-trading with other candidates to win delegates in the all-important Iowa primary, and about working the superdelegates. And this spring, he managed to insert a thing called a reconciliation instruction into the budget package and hardly anybody noticed: that device gave him the option of passing health reform with only 50 Senate votes, provided he meets a list of rules – which Obama also knows full well. McConnell, a sharp parliamentarian himself, knows he’s been checkmated – and that’s why he’s whining today. If he had whined back in the spring, he might have had a chance to head Obama off at the pass on the reconciliation instruction. Obama never gets outsmarted on the rules, and he isn’t about to start when fighting potentially the greatest battle of his life. And he’s unlikely to set up the reconciliation thing in the spring, and then NOT use it to get the best bill he can, meaning the public option.

Robert Byrd’s fall wasn’t serious; he’s back home.

Key obstructionist Blue Dog Mike Ross has been caught selling a pharmacy business, for a ridiculously high price, to a drug firm that has a stake in the health care debate. He pocketed over $100,000 over market, I think. So one of the key obstructionists just pulled up lame.

The House Blue Dogs tried to pin Pelosi down to a deal Waxman made with the Dogs, to get Waxman’s bill out of committee. Pelosi said no dice: that deal was binding only on Waxman to get the bill out of committee, and I cannot be bound by anything that happened in committee because I have to also accommodate two other committees. Grassley tried the same stunt in the Senate, demanding that ALL Democrats, including Pelosi and the President, adhere to whatever deal was made in the Senate Finance Committee, which is simply not done. So Pelosi is still hanging tough for the House liberals.

A new NBC poll showed that the American people, who have said over and over that they want action on health care, will hold the Republicans responsible if health reform fails this year. Just in time for a midcycle election.

And on a side note…Scarborough just admitted the obvious – that Glenn Beck is bad for the GOP because he is the de facto leader of the party and he is clearly insane. Back in the spring I was tickled to death because the true GOP leader at that time, Limbaugh, was about as popular as hemorrhoids, but having Beck be the party poster boy is even better. A problem which the Republicans wouldn’t have if the had actual, ya know, leaders.

Time for Obama to shoot down the lies and the bad plans

After seeing how powerful and dangerous the insurers are when aroused, I am warming up to the notion of crushing them all with single-payer; at the very least we need the public option. But Obama is still hedging his bets: after Obama’s speech on Capitol Hill, both the liberal Democrats and the Blue Dogs believed that Obama backed their stance on health care, presumably by design. So the door is still open to a modified Baucus plan or the public option, so Obama can say he passed something, no matter what.

So which will it be? The Finance committee will probably start arguing all the amendments Tuesday and they plan three days of debate, although with 500 amendments that’s optimistic. Note that rather than pre-coordinating in advance, some Democratic Senators proposed the liberal House public option plan while others proposed the more modest HELP public option plan, possibly so the Democrats could propose the HELP plan as the compromise between the House plan and the Baucus coops (perhaps that was what they pre-coordinated). Meanwhile Snowe is resurrecting her disastrous trigger plan, possibly hoping that THAT can be the compromise option. Keep in mind that the public option itself is actually a compromise which writes off the most cost-effective alternative, the single-payer plan, and that the other side, the Republicans, offered nothing at all in return for that compromise. The Democrats have been negotiating with…themselves.

So first, Obama and the Democrats need to man up, and shoot down the Snowe plan. It sucks. Fix its problems, or kill it. Obama is, in fact, pushing both Baucus and Snowe on one of their greatest vulnerabilities, cost. Baucus’ plan would demand that families pay $700-800 a month for lousy care, and the Snowe plan would set “affordable” coverage at $13,000 a year. If Obama can crush single-payer without even a debate, he can crush the Snowe monstrosity (and the Baucus plan if he’s smart).

Second: we may have a replacement for Kennedy next week, which means the next step is for Obama and Reid to man up and demand that any Democrat who wants to sit in the Democratic caucus (or chair a committee) had better vote for cloture, in case they don’t go the reconciliation option.

Next, Obama and Schumer need to run the HELP bill by two people: Frumin and Pelosi. Ask Frumin about motions to recommit too, in case we do need the reconciliation option.

Next, Obama and the Democrats need to actually do what they said, call out the wingnuts. There are signs of wobbliness in the wingnut crusade: Glenn Beck didn’t even bother to show up at his 912 rally, support for the GOP outside the South is still at a toxic 11 percent, and Reid’s threat to cancel the October recess would prevent a repeat of the lunacy of the August recess. But the insanity isn’t over. For the third time in a month, atmed wingnuts showed up at an Obama rally. Republican leaders, instead of providing actually leadership, are sucking up to the lunatic fringe: Pawlenty was screeching about death panels (which is stupid) and nullifying federal law at the state level (which is illegal), and Kay Bailey Hutchison was screeching about Obama’s czars, none of whom are actual czars (“czar” is an appellation given by the media, and the officials in question all have normal jobs and normal job titles, having gotten their jobs in a perfectly normal way). So it is time for Obama to stop pretending he’s above the fray and call these guys out. They are calling him a liar to his face, accusing him of trying to kill people, accusing him of being a Communist etc etc. If he can call Kanye West a jackass but can’t do the same for Wilson and Grassley, he’s going to get whupped over and over. “Turn the other cheek” doesn’t work with bullies: going upside their head does work.

Next, Obama also needs to call out the media, for failing to shoot down the GOP lies, and for their chickenshit attacks against Obama. Just this weekend, MSNBC of all people is claiming that if the Baucus package were to be defeated in committee, it would be a stunning blow for Obama (actually it would be a major victory). And Bob Schieffer and George Stephanopoulos were both screeching at Obama that he’s going to raise taxes, which he isn’t. So much for the so-called liberal media. If Obama can call out dishonest politicians, he can call out dishonest reporters too.


So that’s what Obama needs to do: shoot down the less attractive alternatives to the plan he really wants, and be more aggressive in attacking dishonesty.

CBO exposes Baucus plan as worthless; Obama gains momentum

http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/59067-cbo-estimate-baucus-plan-reduces-deficit-covers-29-million-by-2019

The CBO said immediately that the Baucus bill would leave 25 million uninsured even in 2019, ten years on, and his coops probably won’t establish a significant market share and will have very little effect on total enrolment. His state-level coops don’t let big businesses enroll, so the coop can’t grow and keep costs down, nor can they have the same negotiating leverage as the federal government so they can’t cust costs that way either; so no one will join the coops. Some House Blue Dogs like the plan but House liberals are already condemning it; in the Senate Burris, Feingold, Klobuchar, Franken, Bayh and Brown expressed dismay at the Baucus bill, and Nelson may vote against it if the Medicare Advantage cut isn’t removed. Conrad is trying to game the CBO system to help Baucus, but liberals have already busted him publicly.

The coming carnage on the Baucus bill shows the wisdom of Obama’s decision not to put forward his own detailed plan – it would have been a target for months, ripped apart. Obama’s unstated message on the Baucus bill is “if I’m going to own the bill, I’m not going to own a piece of crap like that.”

Obama will be helped and encouraged by three things:

1. He has the votes for the public option.

http://washingtonindependent.com/59440/senate-public-option-scoreboard

As the link shows, Obama already has 47 votes in the Senate for the public option. He only needs 3 more out of the 14 fence-sitters, and he’s got the 50 he needs to get through the budget reconciliation process. And as you look at the statements of the fence-sitters, the votes are there. Begich, Bayh, Tester, Pryor and Carper will vote for it. Some folks are making bold statements about public-option packages that were never going to be proposed: Lincoln insists she won’t vote for a public option that is solely government-funded, and McCaskill said she won’t vote for a public option that becomes a mandate. They’re talking tough while setting themselves up to vote for the real public option bill. Baucus and Conrad, proponents of the doomed Gang Of Six package, have said the public option can’t pass the Senate, which isn’t the same as rejecting the idea.

So that’s 56. Unless we’re dead wrong on more than 6 of them, Obama has the 50. And it is just as clear that it would be hard to get to 60, which is why we need the 50-vote threshold in the reconciliation process.

2. His popularity is rising. Obama’s job approval ratings are bouncing back all over the place: On Message has the approval/disapproval at 55/43, Anzalone-Liszt 56/41, ABC/Washington Post 54/43, USA Today/Gallup 54/43, CNN/ORC 58/40, Bloomberg (9/11-9/14) 56/37.

3. The GOP scare tactics are backfiring.

http://theplumline.whorunsgov.com/health-care/poll-big-majorities-dismiss-leading-right-wing-health-care-attacks-as-scare-tactics/

According to a new Bloomberg poll, the American people finally woke up and realized that the GOP was using a strategy of dishonesty: that the crap they were spewing was not only dishonest, but a deliberate scare tactic. 63 percent said the claim that “death panels of government officials would decide how much medical care ailing individuals will receive” is a scare tactic. “Health care would be rationed” is a scare tactic: 53 percent. “Health care would become socialized medicine” is a scare tactic 52 percent. “Government money would be used to pay for abortions”: 61 percent. “Government money would pay for health care for illegal immigrants”: 58 percent.

4. And for dessert:

http://tpmlivewire.talkingpointsmemo.com/2009/09/judge-puts-birther-orly-on-notice.php?ref=fpb

U.S. District Court Judge Clay Land whomped the leader of the birther movement, Orly Taitz, throwing out her latest frivolous lawsuit claiming Obama isn’t really president, threatening her with sanctions if she tries this crap again, and comparing her to Alice in Wonderland. Taitz then screeched to the media that the judge was a puppet of the Obama regime and should be tried for treason, and compared herself to Nelson Mandela.

Baucus may unveil his bill tomorrow

We could still get the public option. Howard Dean correctly points out that we can get the public option through reconciliation – we have the votes. According to CNN, Obama’s approvals jumped 5 points after the big speech, and Obama still quite confident: he will appear on five different news shows Sunday…When was the last time any politician had the guts to face the whole gauntlet, the toughest interviewers in the business? (Obama meets the press more than just about any president in history -- brass balls, no fear) The Post poll shows that the wingnut-driven fear of health reform has peaked and that Obama is succeeding, somewhat, in shooting down the GOP lies (the Post poll suggests that support for the public option skyrockets if it is limited to those who can’t get private insurance, an option which Obama seems to be considering). So Obama could get the public option if he pushed hard for it.

Obama doesn’t want a weak, ineffective bill, and he does want the public option – that’s why he keeps harping on it, when it would be so much easier to give in and switch to the coop plan. But he is still keeping his options open – Axelrod at first stated that Obama isn’t willing to accept a plan that does not include a public option, but apparently he amended it to assert that it’s Axelrod, not Obama, who can’t accept it.

Obama may, in the end, accept the coops. Snowe, who originally advocated the trigger option, is now talking coop; likewise Collins rejects not only the public option but also any trigger that leads to a public option, which also suggests coops. Pelosi is bracing her troops for the possibility that the final plan won’t include a public option, to keep Obama’s options open, although progressives are still pushing to meet with Obama to push for the public option.

While all this is going on, Baucus may unveil his bill tomorrow. Unlike the other four bills which have passed through committee, Baucus’ plan involves coops, not the public option.

As I noted before, there are a number of things that need to be included in any coop plan:

http://hellodollyllama.blogspot.com/2009/09/coop-issues.html

And based on the rough draft of the Baucus plan which we’ve seen, there are a number of things that need to be fixed in it. Most of all, Baucus must ensure that the coop is always there and affordable for everybody: he needs national or regional coops, to ensure real competition and low cost, and stem the flow of windfall profits to the insurers; the federal safety net must be there permanently (Baucus says coops must be nonprofit AND self-sustaining after only a year); and Baucus can’t demand that people pay 13 percent of their income for health coverage. Also, Baucus needs more language on fixing Medicare fraud, and the state-level sweetheart deals for the private insurers must go.

Return of Obama the Fighter

Obama began and ended his appearance today with the mantra “FIRED UP”, and in the middle he shot down the GOP lies, and shot down the GOP liars. He reminded people of the real fear – that anyone can lose their insurance – and the real enemy -- the crooks who run the insurance industry, and their paid whores in the GOP.

Game on.

And once Obama gets into the ring to fight, no one can stop him.

Also, ever since he returned from vacation, his appearances begin with “Hail to the Chief”. Yes, I really am the President, you white trash wingnut fuckwits.

Is Obama faking us all out?

Firedoglake finally said aloud what I’ve been thinking for weeks, that Obama may be exhibiting a condition known as Munchausen by proxy, wherein an individual deliberately puts someone (or something) in jeopardy, and then jumps in at the last minute to “save” them heroically. Specifically, Obama has allowed his enemies (and the media) to create the notion that the public option is a death’s door, and in desperate need of last-minute rescue by Obama himself. Meanwhile, however, Obama has the 50 Senators he needs to pass the public option under budget reconciliation, and he’s had them all along, and public support for it has remained within the 60-80 percent range even during all the wingnut death-panel attacks.

Look at the facts:

--putting the budget reconciliation instruction into the budget bill verrrrry quietly in the spring with the October start date, so that even the Republicans didn’t notice;
--pretending that Obama really wanted the health bill in August so that the Republicans would have a fake target to shoot at, while simultaneously allowing Baucus to drag his feet for two months;
--allowing the Republicans to wear themselves out with their attacks during the vacation season when real non-Washington people weren’t paying attention;
--allowing the media to report that the public option was in dire peril even though Obama has the necessary support for passage;
--praising the public option without making a commitment to it, so as to avoid giving the GOP a clear target, while also praising the other options and the people advocating them;
--stepping in to make the big speech only when we were a month away from the reconciliation date, so as to begin building up momentum;
--Schumer quietly letting the media know how reconciliation would work;
--Obama’s secret meeting with the Senate Blue Dog Democrats, after which the Senators went to the media to claim that the meeting was really about program costs, rather than about the public option or reconciliation.

Also there seems to be a lot of what could call smokescreen activity – the kinds of things that could distract the screaming wingnuts for weeks while Obama works quietly behind the scenes to nail down the public option. Next week a House Democrat may introduce a bill to kill the Defense Of Marriage Act, which will drive the gay-hating wingnuts crazy. Meanwhile the global-warming-is-a-hoax wingnuts will be distracted by Tom Harkin’s hearings on cap-and-trade; Harkin, coincidentally, is a public-option fan. If they really wanted to distract and confuse the wingnuts, they would hold hearings on gun control, or on amnesty for illegals, or on banning NASCAR or chewing tobacky – or would that be too obvious?

I'm probably wrong about all this, but wouldn't it be cool if it were true?