Tweet
Hmmm, feels limiting (photo: TheTruthAbout)
There is tremendous fear rising on both the right and the left that the announced intention of Congress — to force every American to pay tribute to private corporations, with no government alternative — sets a dangerous and frightening precedent with implications far outside the scope of health care.
If the health care bill written by the Senate is passed, middle class Americans will be mandated to pay almost as much to private insurance companies as they do to the federal government in taxes, with the IRS acting as a collection agency for penalties of 2% of your annual income for refusing to comply.
This is just one of many recent measures that have brought liberal progressives and conservative libertarians together to join forces in opposition:
- Democrat Alan Grayson worked successfully this year with Republican Ron Paul to pass legislation to audit the Federal Reserve, with 317 cosponsors as diverse as Dennis Kucinich and Michelle Bachmann.
- On December 3, the liberal Campaign for America’s Future wrote a letter to the Senate opposing the reconfirmation of Federal Reserve chief Ben Bernanke until such an audit has been conducted. The letter was signed by James Galbraith, Robert Weisman, Chris Bowers and myself on the left, and Grover Norquist, Phillis Schlafly, and Larry Greenley on the right. Financial blogger Tyler Durden and young organizer Tiffiniy Cheng joined them.
- Also on December 3, conservative Jim Bunning joined liberal Bernie Sanders in placing a hold on the Bernanke nomination until the Fed had been audited.
- On December 15, CAF again sent a letter to the Senate Banking Committee, asking them to delay the vote on the Bernanke confirmation until Audit the Fed received a stand alone vote in the Senate. It was signed by Matt KIbbe of Freedomworks, John Tate of the Campaign for Liberty, and Grover Norquist on the right, and David Swanson of AfterDowiningStreet, Dean Baker and Robert Borosage on the left.
- On December 21, a letter was written opposing the mandate in the health care bill. It was signed by Bob Fertik of Democrats.com, Howie Klein of DownWithTyranny, Brad Friedman of Velvet Revolution, Tim Carpenter of Progressive Democrats of America on the left and Grover Norquist, Jim Martin of 60 Plus Association, Duane Parde of the National Taxpayers Union on the right.
- On December 23, Grover Norquist and I sent a letter to Attorney General Eric Holder calling for an investigation into Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel’s conflicts of interest before the White House could lift the cap on the commitment to them from $400 billion to $800 billion with no Inspector General in place.
The individuals on both sides of the political spectrum who signed these letters agree on very little, but they do share both a tremendous concern for the corporatist control of government that politicians in both parties seem hell-bent on achieving.
In 2003, the Democrats railed in opposition when the Republicans passed Medicare Part D prescription drug coverage that didn’t allow for negotiated drug prices. And in 2006 when Democrats took over Congress, one of the hallmarks of their first hundred days was passing legislation allowing Medicare to do so, supported by both Rahm Emanuel and Barack Obama. Of course, it had no chance of passing with George Bush in the White House.
Candidate Barack Obama said the ability to negotiate for drug prices would save $30 billion a year in medical costs. Yet when President Obama got to the White House, one of the first things he did was negotiate a secret deal with PhRMA that prevented drug price negotiations in exchange for $150 million in political advertising to help vulnerable Democrats in the House and in support of the health care bill.
In the Senate, Tom Carper said that because PhRMA had paid for the deal with political advertising, they were obligated to abide by it.
Jeff Sessions railed against the corrupt PhRMA deal that didn’t allow for prescription drug price negotiation. He didn’t mention that he voted for the 2000 bill without it, and when he had the chance to vote for it in the Senate in 2006, he voted “no” himself. Both parties are equally blameworthy — the only difference is who is in power and taking PhRMA’s money.
The PhRMA deal is one of many negotiated by the White House this last summer which formed the underpinnings of the health care bill. From then on, it just became a matter of which member was going to extract what deals for their votes, and who was going to take the blame for cutting popular elements from the legislation that the corporate “stakeholders” didn’t want.
As FDL’s Jon Walker wrote recently, if the ability to cut health care costs hadn’t been auctioned off to private corporations in exchange for political patronage, there would have been no government subsidy necessary to make insurance coverage affordable.
We are ceding control of the government to private corporations, not figuratively but literally. When the Senate Finance Committee bill was released earlier this year, the “author” was a former VP of Wellpoint. Liberals, conservatives and independents alike are all justifiably alarmed at what this represents.
It is tragic that health care for the poor is being held hostage to the corporatist agenda, a fig leaf to buy public support and disguise this bill for what it is. As blogger Marcy Wheeler noted in a piece called Health Care and the Road to Neo-Feudalism:
I understand the temptation to offer 30 million people health care. What I don’t understand is the nonchalance with which we’re about to fundamentally shift the relationships of governance in doing so.
Just as those on the libertarian right were demonized by the Republican establishment for opposing the Iraq war during the Bush years, so progressives on the left are being pilloried for “damaging the cause” by joining with Republicans to oppose these extreme measures. It’s ironic that the most virulent supporters of a President who ran on “bipartisanship” should reject it so vehemently when it becomes critical of the policies pursued by his White House.
This “right-left wraparound” is happening because politicians in both parties have become so unresponsive to popular sentiment: public support for stifling investigation of the bank bailouts just to protect the President are infinitesimally small, and fortunately Dennis Kucinich announced today that he would commence an investigation into the Fannie/Freddie bailout. But it’s a testament to the extreme nature of what is happening to our government that such traditional political foes could find common cause in opposing it.
It’s foolish to say that only those who agree with you on every issue are allowed to share your opinion when it comes to opposing something like the mandated bailout of Aetna — it isn’t necessary to achieve health care reform. As Jon Walker notes, removing the mandate would reduce the CBO score and its inclusion in the health care bill with no government alternative is unacceptable for moral, political and policy reasons.
Candidate Obama himself opposed the mandate. Keith Olberman and Howard Dean concur.
As Markos Moulitsas of Daily Kos said, “remove the mandate or kill this bill.” We’ve opened a “war room” at Firedoglake with information about calling your member of Congress to demand that this provision to bail out the insurance industry be removed from the health care bill before they agree to cast their vote in favor of it.
And nobody needs to pass an ideological purity test before they can use it.
Join us to oppose the mandate. Enter the war room.
Related posts:
Spotlight
Support this site!
Subscribe to the newsletter
Advertise on Firedoglake
Send
us your tips
Make us your homepage
About Firedoglake
Not a cent for tribute.
Whoever thought that indentured servitude would now be considered as upward mobility?
A complete meltdown of our economy was in the offing…so I think double guessing the early responses is bad form…but I wonder if this recent response is NOT unsettling to the president…but is, instead, welcomed. It is congress…not the administration (inclucing the justice dept.) that is tasked with this type of investigation. If crimes are discovered….THEN justice can step in.
So…where have they been?
Counting money, I guess. There’s just so damn much of it to go around.
As FDL’s Jon Walker wrote recently, if the ability to cut health care costs hadn’t been auctioned off to private corporations in exchange for political patronage, there would have been no government subsidy necessary to make insurance coverage affordable.
This really says it all. What more do you need to know?
Yep, the Gov has never imposed mandates on individuals (states are different story see “no child left behind”) without providing the means to comply with the mandate. this bill falls far far short of providing the means to comply with the mandate and so the mandate must be stripped from the law.
A lot more than that drivel.
Why didn’t Congress think up this Mandate Model before? It could solve a lot of problems it has struggled with for hundreds of years.
Poverty for example.
Just pass a law requiring everybody to open a checking account and deposit enough money in it every month to cover their living expenses for that month.
Problem Solved!
Put this in your pipe and smoke it.
http://emptywheel.firedoglake.com/2009/12/16/the-mybarackobamatax/
If you live in a condo on the 50th floor in Manhattan, you will be required to purchase flood plain insurance.
Huh, I must be losing it. Could’ve sworn I responded to this, and thought it was a Jane Hamshir post. Damn I hope I’m not getting what my father and grandfather had.
Anyway, a point. This is the second or third time I’ve seen the year 2000 being described as the year Medicare Part D passed. My memory insists George W. Bush was President when Medicare Part D passed, and George W. Bush didn’t even become President until Jan. 2001. I thought Medicare Part D passed in like 2003 or 2004.
Sorry if this shows up twice. I think I am losing it. Better STFU now. ‘day All.
And many other things he now has supported. He is a bought and paid for political hack, a hypocritical money grubbing sleazy bastard. And now we have a “terrorist” to take Oh Bummah’s venality off the front page, he is more and more like ReaganBushClintonBush every day.
We need to agree to disagree on lots of issues so that we can unite to put the “popular” back into “popular sovereignty” so that we can have the political discussions on those hot button issues without being manipulated by corporate interests which are raiding our government and destroying our democracy.
Is there anyone on the right side of this coalition who has said they would have been satisified if a government alternative – the Public Option – HAD been included in the bill?
Sorry if this is slightly O/T, but…
Criminals.
Keep after it. We need to make everyone aware that we are paying attention on both sides, of the growing partnership between political officials and private CEOs.
The government is of the people. No matter that the reminder is an inconvenience to the business as usual.
I told MW 2 or 3 months ago her tax calculations were off. I know a lot about taxes. Yet, she persisted.
I don’t know nearly as much about her other figures, but given that what I do know about is wrong, it makes me wonder.
Others have picked up on the error in her income tax calculation.
http://www.fivethirtyeight.com/2009/12/health-insurance-and-family-budget.html
And now let’s hear the whining about people calling Jane names.
Regulatory Capture.
With all the talk of the “Donut Hole” the proposed Health Care legislation will fill with regard to Medicare, it is interesting to watch the phenomenon Jane has elucidated here whereby the ordinary political process of “rushing to the center” is actually creating a donut hole when a majority of citizens have views which actually fall outside of a classic centrist perspective. And, of course, what is really, really interesting is that both fringe elements wrap around to meet each other–thereby completing the hole.
Has this happened in the past? Was the phenomenon of Trotskyism (like Bill Kristol’s dad) so left it became right, or visa versa?
Is there a single democrat left in Congress with enough spine to carry the anti-corporate welfare banner forward?
What do we need, one in the senate or a dozen or two in the house?
Reported today Hllary Clinton and Sarah Palin are the two most admired women in America. Keep on truckin Jane
I WILL NOT PAY TRIBUTE TO ANY CORPORATION THAT INCLUDES MANDATED INSURANCE. I would encourage everyone to do the same and refuse mandated private corporate insurance by the US Government.
Mirror, mirror, on the wall, who is the most corporate of all? Could it be Pres. Obama, could it be the blew-dog Democants, or could it be the Republicants?
Pres. Obama has become quite the little imperial war pig since he took office. Escalating the American imperial war for oil and gas pipelines in Afghanistan, keeping thousands of US troops in Iraq, with bases near the large oil fields, drone-murdering Pakistanis (trying to stop terrorism with more terrorism…) and bombing Yemenis. Heck of an Empire, Mr. President.
I cant speak for other free market advocates, but I would be willing to support a Public Option as long as it actually created competition for the companies responsible for creating this mess. After all, it is the lack of competition that continues to drive up costs and insurance rates.
Take a second to soak that up, because this whole scenario is tearing at my principles.
I believe unfettered free markets, and I would advocate a free market model if we were creating a system from scratch. Sadly, that is not the situation. We are dealing with entranched, corporate interests who receive government favor in exchange for full campaign coffers.
If the Government committed to a Public Option that would improve competition in the marketplace, then I would be totally behind it. This is the crux of the problem as I see it though, the government refuses to bite the hand that feeds and so they must grudgingly accept the mediocre.
Ms. Hamsher – a question – when you went on “Fox and Friends” recently, was there perhaps a large pod underneath your chair with a sillouetted form inside of it that remarkably resembled you? And did you at any time feel sleepy during the interview?
Few people outside the group covered by Medicare realize that Medicare Part D mandated that Medicare recipients purchase prescription insurance from private insurance companies OR face a penalty if they choose to enroll later.
That was just a warm-up for what Dems are trying to pass now and what have they learned from the experience with Medicare Part D? Mandate that Americans purchase insurance or be penalized immediately.
There has also been evidence that Reid and others would like to include some version of an “initial coverage limit” (or doughnut hole) in the HCR package, comparable to the feature of Medicare Part D which has caused so much hardship for people requiring expensive prescriptions.
..
Well, good to know. As you can probably guess from my question, I have some doubts about on what basis this coalition is being formed. But I appreciate and applaud your willingness to at least think about reevaluating your principles in light of actual experience, something I wish more free market advocates would do. I have called such people “free-market fundamentalists” in the past and it is good to see that there is at least one who isn’t completely blinded by his own blinders.
The problem with the whole free market theory is that it only achieves all of its magic in a truly free market with perfect information. We have never had nor ever will have such a truly free market with perfect information.
Odd how the “left of the left”, hippies, bloggers in the basement, et al can achieve bipartisanship and the centrist, Obama, etc cannot….ya know why..because the centrist and Obama like the status quo…they are not change its the rather odd bi partisans that seem to really be working for change. Jane, you go girl.
The hard right I would garner is against both a Forced Mandate and a Gov’t Option since they hate taxation as well. That is where we would part company with them. Nevertheless, it seems both factions agree a Gov’t Forced mandate to buy Private Products and Services is a radical change in the relationship between Gov’t, Individuals and Corps. that has to be stopped. The precedent this would set is frightening. What’s the next product or service some pol or group of pols decided should be a Forced Mandate?
I can’t help question & have problems with a partnership with Norquist. I think he’s a menace. But I have even more problems with the personal attacks on Jane.
Cenk Uygur posted a piece defending/explaining the necessity of the criticism from the left- and while I didn’t read through all the comments, it looks like he was attacked as well.
I’m glad the above have thick skin… I have no intention of being a cheerleader for any admin.
Look where the “free market” has gotten us to date in health care.
A for-profit actuarial business model is [1] antithetical to actual basic health care, and [2] contains the seeds of its own eventual destruction.
“improve competition in the marketplace”
Competition regarding what? Endlessly more spurious “choice” comprising beautifully worded large print 4-color “plan” brochure promises that will not be kept should they impinge on profit? People don’t need marketing “choice” as an end in itself, they need health care.
I don’t have the problem with mandates that others seem to have, and I need more information about how Jay Rockefeller’s limitations on the percentages of healthCo payouts for exec and business needs — as well as how anyone in government could actually detect, expose, and prosecute ‘workarounds’ or frauds that will inevitably be invented by the healthCos to skirt Rockefeller’s fine idea.
What I find beyond appalling is to see a nation of 308,000,000 literally held hostage by:
Ben Nelson’s fewer than 1,000,000 voters.
That’s an instance where 1 vote cancels out 308 others.
That’s tyranny by a tiny, teeny minority.
And it meant that all those Americans we saw covered at the public health clinics (covered so well by MSNBC), where we saw working Americans show up for free health care, were being held hostage so that Nelson could get another notch on his anti-abortion coup stick.
That’s telling millions of working Americans that their health is less important than a single fetus, which simply appears to me to be ideological Semtex.
The other thing that absolutely horrified me — and really exposed the Senate’s inability to function in any rational, meaningful, timely fashion was to watch HoJo Lieberman, who represents 3,500,000 citizens hold the rest of us 308,000,000 over who knows what? He was as changable as the wind!
One week he supported what he opposed the following week.
That’s like allowing less than 1% of your population to hold your policies and 1/7th of your economy hostage to the whims of a single petulant, vindictive Senator.
In Nelson’s case, one-half of 1% holds the entire nation hostage, along with 1/7th of the economy.
In HoJo’s case, 1% of the nation holds the other 99% hostage.
These ratios are also true for Blanche Lincoln, and close to the ratios for Landrieu.
A system where 99% of the nation is held hostage by one or two or three votes is not democracy. It’s tyranny by a very tiny, corporately funded, corporate-enabling minority.
This is sheer lunacy!
Thanks for letting me sound off.
Will put money in the FDL till in the New Year, as it’s some of the best money that I spent in 2009.
Ah, read it thrice and now see your point.
Well said.
That which does not kill you makes you stronger. The world does not neatly conform itself to theories.
One predicate of libertarianism is the just initial distribution of resources, and I don’t think that anyone believes that the economy in which we are living today is predicated on that.
I think that we realize on the left that complete democratic control over every aspect of the economy is probably not a good idea, but we need for our friends on the libertarian side to realize that completely unfettered free markets tend to spin wildly out of control and hurt others who were not participants in the bad acts that led to meltdown. I guess under a libertarian scenario, I could sue Wall Street to recover damages to my employment situation due to their recklessness.
But getting back to reality, our common task will be trying to figure out where to draw those lines in ways that maximize freedom to create without endangering people’s livelihoods, the environment and our democracy. But I think that we all need to leave our ideal politics aside in favor of more a more pragmatic, while using our ideal politics as compass points to guide our pragmatic actions.
I’m with you. I’m not fully on board with this coalition, yet I won’t trash Jane Hamsher for it because somebody’s got to do this experiment! And that’s how I view it at the present moment – as an experiment.
Us DFH’s of long ago were greatly concerned with the advent of corporate power.
You know, the 60’s and 70’s.
As time passed our concerns that corporate power and the MIC were all about making chems and weapons and that they needed wars to try them out (not to mention sell them, revise them, use them up to create a need for more) were pretty well evidenced.
And as time passed, and THIS DFH watched in sadness as deregulation, offshoring, consolidation and contracting laid waste to our standards of living, the DFH concerns of yore were proven again, and again, and again.
And here we are today, watching as all our worst fears come to full fruition and FINALLY, FINALLY at last, those fears have traction, and merit, and well, the proof is pretty evident everywhere if one’s eyes are open and yer not ONE of the problem makers.
So thank you Mz. Hamsher, Mz. Wheeler, Mr. Walker, Mr. Dayen and FDL and all the Pups who continue to collect, share and use all info available in a manner to try and affect some change upon it all.
As to a few of the comments in this thread already, my New Year’s Vow is to try and REALLY really commit to fully utilizing my scroll function . . . but it’s hard, it’s so hard, to accept that ya can’t fix stupid . . . . sigh.
Yes, Jane is a pod person.
(/s)
My point was simply that mandating that people purchase insurance from private corporations is not a concept which sprang into existence during the current HCR debate. The mandate represents a nefarious abuse of power that has been with us for some time.
I think it also represents an early step toward what so many corporatists wish for… complete privatization of so-called “entitlement programs.”
If you could carve out of your first principle an exemption for those who have not been blessed at birth with a winning lottery ticket, we could get far away from crony capitalism and back to (most) markets.
And a truly free market needs to be allowed to follow an unfettered, chaotic function over time, inclusive of radical highs and lows. The lesson learned from the Greenspan years is that human lives, dependent upon the finances related to those chaotic equations, cannot subsist in the absolute lows. Funny thing, but it turns out human beings need to eat every day even if the sine curve doesn’t dictate that it is possible. Now, if you are in a position to siphon off the top end highs, and sock them away for a rainy day, then you can let everyone else eat cake. I always wonder if Mr. Greenspan and Andrea Mitchel sit around in the evenings, sipping a glass of wine, and discuss this sad fact of reality.
*g*
rahmbama corruption is the issue. Public option, even health care, is just part of the fallout. Corporations own rahmbama and the Democratic whores. Until we unite and put an end to this ‘legal’ corruption results will never be ‘by the people and for the people’. Kill the bill, force rahmbama to do the peoples’ bidding. Make it clear rahmbama is a one term presidency unless it does and no corporatist payola will change that.
Yeah, I finally got it after reading it third time, and edited. Having a bad day. I thought I responded to this post once and it was a Jane Hamsher post and then looked again and it was a Gregg Levine post and then looked again and it was a Jane Hamsher post again.
I swear I’m not dreenking (burp) yet.
EDIT: Oh, and drug free too!! Very good day today pain wise!!
I think this experiment is probably scaring the bejabbers out of elected Dems and Repubs. It’s their worst nightmare because when both sides start to fight you, you really have no place to run. I believe they are beginning to realize that the country is enraged at many things they have tried to shove down our throats. All the pretty speeches can’t fix that.
Excellent, reasoned post Jane… I’m sure the people with no logic skills will figure out something that is “wrong” and run back to dk w/their bone… honestly, one individual in particular is so stupid that s/he posts these diatribes against you based on completely flawed logic… it is mind boggling.
Thanks for your work.
At least you realize the need to change strategy.
Doing the same thing over and over expecting different results in the end is insanity.
In the space of a year we have gone from hoping for a single payer health care system to hoping like hell that we do not a have a mandated insurance premium payable to Oh Bummah’s private financiers. How could we have lost so much so quickly?
Congrats on your pain free day! :-)
I’ve heard of those. I force myself to be content with keeping it down to a dull roar.
Jane. In my opinion, both the responsible Left and the responsible Right dislike Fraud; dislike being exploited to profit others because of our human needs; and dislike being ordered to pay for the pleasure of being exploited.
I think it was the Audacity of Trust.
“Look where the “free market” has gotten us to date in health care.”
Free market doesn’t exist at that scale; socialized corporatism is what got us here. The willingness, even the insistence of Government to be corrupted is at the core of our problems.
ps… here’s another scary fact about the mandates…
I am self-employed and pay a relatively low $250/mo to blue shit for junk insurance… cus I joined a new program a few years back with a new pool of people.
I went to the Kaiser Family Foundation website and plugged in my income and info and it shows that I would be paying more than double that amound in their “affordable” mandates.
So… what really disturbs me is that this new “affordable” level will undoubtedly be adopted by BC/BS since the govt has decided that’s what’s affordable.
Has anyone else thought of this?
RRRRRRaaahhhhrrr. Hey, you. Staying out of trouble?
How does that change her calculations overall pls?
This populist coalition should resist being characterizable as adding progressives and tea baggers and coming out with a dumbbell of extremist support without a broad middle.
We need the broad swath of Americans who are disgusted with corporate control of democracy if this is to be successful. Only something north of 2/3 is going to get us over this hump, and it is totally achievable.
Oh I didn’t say pain free, just a very good day.
Yeah, I have no idea anymore what a pain free day is. No fricking clue. Would love to take that day out for a spin. Just once. *g*
I tend to agree that this is the end, more than a beginning of a “slippery slope.” Article is spot on, as usual. I’m just a worker that’s watched rents, grocery bills, medical care costs, all escalate while my wages flatlined for 30 years. I think it’s broken and the right response is to build a system that works, which of course, can only happen locally, or at best, the State level.
Am I the guy that can make that happen? Not likely… I’m just another passenger on this juggernaut to the bottom. I have friends on the right that say, “by the time they are done squeezing us, we’ll be begging for communism.” They’re scared too. Still, I’m skeptical about coalition building on an issue by issue basis with these folks. Ideologues are dangerous. They can rationalize any amount of human suffering in the name of some greater virtue.
I have identified a whole host of issues where my friends on the far right and I can find common ground. Other than Jane here, I haven’t heard a rational voice for true “bipartisanship” in a long time. I heard echoes and hints of it, in the grand speeches of President Obama. Isn’t that the way of it? The more venal the agenda, the loftier the rhetoric.
Well I guess this ain’t “at you” Larue. It’s just smoke in the wind.
“Only something north of 2/3 is going to get us over this hump, and it is totally achievable.”
2/3 of what and what hump?
So far, so good.
My 86-year-old aunt lives in a subsidized senior housing complex. Wrapping up a conversation with her 95-year-old neighbor one day, my aunt told her to, “Be good!”
The woman replied, “I’ll try… and if I’m not I’ll name it after you.”
I thought that was funny. Hope you’re well, demi. Off to run errands. See ya later.
Yep. Prolly not today though, as I’m working this afternoon, 3 – 8. Maybe I’ll see you tonight. The flu is mostly gone, but we’ll see how I’m feeling after work. *g*
Welcome to the Govt of Special Interest.
The right hates the HCR bill
The left hates the HCR bill
the USA govt now serves a few special interest.
Congress people from both parties are now puppets of
Big Oil
Big Insurance
AIPAC
etc.
Jane and others are exposing this daily. Thank You! Jane
clearly no one in DC really believes in govt by the people for the people.
A govt that does not serve it’s people will die, because people want serve something that hates them.
In order to build a populist coalition that can challenge corporate dominance of the two parties, there will need to be a supermajority of Americans on board. The hump is the resistance of the kleptocracy. The 2/3 is popular support.
As the list of offenses by this government grows the greater should be our determination to push back.
Government mandates for any reason is by far the offense fraught with the greatest degree of danger. It is an abridgment of our rights and should be challenged in court right now. Petitioning the ACLU for a legal stay on this provision until the matter is settled in court seems a reasonable approach to take now.
It is a measure of the contempt the Obama Democrats show for the people that they would feel embldoned enough impose these mandates on the public. The people should return that contempt. I see no downside in joining forces with anyone who feels aggrieved by this government on this matter.
Obma and like minded Democrats really have no clue as to what they are doing. They are at odds with themselves regarding what they really want to achieve and the fact that those aims run counter to what the people want. They want to foster the perogatives of private firms to profit at the public’s expense and yet are unable to achieve that goal openly.
I incresingly feel more akin with people that favor a smaller role of government in our lives for the simple reason that government has been consumed by business interests. I equally am of the opinion that those business interests can not continue to stand. They both need to be severely reigned in.
Business is the easier of the two to control. We simply defund their operations, beginning with the big banks. We simply withdraw our funds from them. And thereby reduce them to a more directly manageable size and acoutability. These measures should also begin now.
Jon Walker is up with a fresh cross-post: “The Public Option Is Not Symbolic; It Is Foundational”
Jane
1) Reaching out to the Right on this issue is a stroke of genius. Keep it up. The Democratic Party establishment can go to hell.
2) Work as hard as we might against the individual mandate sans public option, it is likely the Senate version will still pass with the mandate intact and signed into law. It’s now time to start thinking about how to organize a legal challenge from the Left, as it appears so far that various Republican state attorneys general will be challenging it from the Right but on different grounds. I would be willing to support FDL or any other progressive organization in a class action lawsuit.
RH
but jane, we’re not supposed to work with people on the other side!!!
I wonder if they will ever realize how idiotic that position is
MEDICARE PART D is part of the Medicare Prescription Drug, Improvement, and Modernization Act of 2003 (MMA) and went into effect on January 1, 2006.
Jane, you should correct your statement about it being passed in 2000 — other than that error, your article is SPOT ON!
[mod note: fixed, thank you!]
Exactly.
The Article I and II branches are thoroughly compromised at this point. The only branch left us is the judiciary, and there has been a thirty year unreported war on an independent judiciary waged by the US Chamber of Commerce and other fellow travelors. This includes even (and especially) the various states’ judiciaries. I feel that political science will have to come up with new terminology to describe what we have here in America. Definitely not a pure democracy, nor a pure oligarchy, but something in-between. Social freedom, but economic serfdom….
I just told BarbinMD over at dkos where she can stick her bullshit, right here.
What the hell is wrong with those people?
Aren’t you worried that the special interests will bribe their thousands, perhaps millions, of employees and dare them to move against them in any way?
Thats the problem…people from the left just dont get it… there has been NO… ZERO… NONE… free market in this country for several decades… If there had been these insurance companies would not be doing what they do… a smaller company would have been started to deliver what the people want that do not like the current insurance companies… BUT because the FEDERAL GOVERNMENT protects these companies from FREE MARKET COMPETITION … we are stuck with their huge unreadable books, denials, endless gotchas… the government is protecting them FROM the free market… wake up.
I’ll tell you what is wrong with those people. It is in the FAQ of the DKOS site:
This is a Democratic blog, a partisan blog. One that recognizes that Democrats run from left to right on the ideological spectrum, and yet we’re all still in this fight together. We happily embrace centrists like NDN’s Simon Rosenberg and Howard Dean, conservatives like Martin Frost and Brad Carson, and liberals like John Kerry and Barack Obama. Liberal? Yeah, we’re around here and we’re proud. But it’s not a liberal blog. It’s a Democratic blog with one goal in mind: electoral victory. And since we haven’t gotten any of that from the current crew, we’re one more thing: a reform blog. The battle for the party is not an ideological battle. It’s one between establishment and anti-establishment factions. And as I’ve said a million times, the status quo is untenable
Waste of time and energy. They cannot admit they are wrong because of ego. Also they probably invested a lot of hope into Obama – as we did – and are terrified that their dreams are sinking.
Her bone of contention seems to have been based on the rather trivial aspect of Cenk’s post in “lumping Jane Hamsher and Howard Dean together.” BarbinMD ignored the primary message of the post which was about triangulation.
Selective observation, embrace or invent facts which appear to validate your prejudices, ignore or discredit any facts which might disprove them.
you just don’t get it, there is NO such thing as a free market, it was a propaganda scheme to get people advocating against themselves
there can never be, there never was, never will be a free market
in case you didn’t know it, the very concept of ownership IS a set of regulations, once you believe in ownership you are no longer a free marketeer, the same is true for the “sanctity of contracts” and even the concept of a monetary system is of course a set of regulations
that’s right, once you believe in money you are no longer a free marketeer
peddle your free market corporate myths to those people who fall for such juvenile propaganda
First privatization of health care. Next privatization of Social Security.
This turn toward liberal-brown alliances and hooking up with the far right is completely naive and just plays into the hands of people who would turn the world into a nightmarish dictatorship. It lends them credibility and advances exactly the agenda you think you’re opposing.
Actually, larryv, this looks like a likely option for quite a broad swath of the American public.
How do you see it playing out? Is Barack von Hindenburg going to appoint Grover Norquist-Hitler his new Chancellor?
Wrong.
It is simple math.
Company #1, #2, and #3 screw their customers. If no where else to go customers keep buying from Company #1 or #2 or #3.
If a new company arrive “Company #4″ and it does NOT screw over its customers … then those customers tell others about it and then they leave companies #1,#2,#3 and go to company #4…
It really isnt hard to understand.
INSTEAD what we have today company #4 is not ALLOWED to ever become a company by Republicans AND Democrats.
THANKS Democrats! Keep up the great work! We are all so proud of how you are soooo different from the Republicans…
In a free market regulation is DEMANDED by the free market people because a gamed system is not a free market. LAWS are required and demanded by the people so that the market stays FREE. What do you not like about Freedom? Freedom is NOT anarchy. Freedom only exists in the presence of regulations (laws and law enforcement)… maybe you should stop listening to people that know nothing of free markets to get your free market information.
We’re finally hitting them where it hurts! I’ve been so sick of the outraged tirades that end with something like we must tell them that we’re really mad, yeah, I really mean it this time, yeah, so there! This alliance isn’t just a rhetorical outburst, it’s a deed, a fact, it’s happening.
As the Incredible Hulk once said, “All I know is you try to kill me, and for that you must pay!” My plan to make them pay is to organize the Full Court Press:
http://www.antemedius.com/content/full-court-press-435-democratic-congressional-primaries
It entails filing in 435 congressional Democratic primaries in 2012, and as many as we can in 2010. Not necessarily running to win, but filing. Bottom line is:
o WPA-style jobs program
o Medicare for all the uninsured
o Repeal Hyde Amendment and its ilk
o U.S. out of Afghanistan
By my count, 71 of the Democratic incumbents faced no primary challenge last year. Even a filing will force them to spend money they’d rather save for the general election.
This is a response to the entire Democratic Party, rather than the usual targeting the worst. Targeting the worst makes our problem one of bad individuals, not the entire party. But in my opinion, when the Stupak amendment passed, and every other Democrat didn’t call for his defeat, they all bore responsibility for Stupak. When House members voted for a bill that included Stupak, they all became Stupak Democrats. If Pelosi wants to avoid that tag, then she has to go after him, not point to her own lily-clean hands.
Am I calling for purity? Well, when you’re swimming in a cesspool, a little purity isn’t the worst thing you could have.
word
Someone mentioned reading up on Polanyi(sp?). Any specific titles I should check out?
Well, as the old man said, history repeats itself first as tragedy then as farce, so maybe Sarah Palin will get the appointment with the enthusiastic backing of the liberal rejectionists.
Excellent work, Jane and all the contributors on FDL. I only started reading this blog a few days ago after watching Jane on MSNBC online. She is very articulate and well prepared to handle all that’s thrown at her and at the progressives. I had wondered how to support the site more meaningfully and today I saw the link to contribute to Dennis Kucinich and FDL and gladly gave since I could. We need to start mobilizing to defeat the powers that control congress and the American people, and this means contributing intellectually and materially to progressibes whenever possible. I am also heartened by the cooperation between the so called right and left on many good issues. The center seems quite hollow and the R&L are the only activists around. I disagree with a lot of so called Ron Paul supporters for example, but the man himself is an excellent example and activist who can be trusted. He has even said that if we didn’t spend the trillions overseas on wars, we could actually spend on national and local social services here, but in his opinion we don’t have more to spend. The point is that he and Kucinich may disagree on big issues, but they are not owned by anyone and can agree to solve the problems of this country, starting with wars, corporatism and other horrible issues we face today. Keep up the great work here and let’s keep it smart and clean!
“Won’t serve something that hates them?”
But they VILL obey…und they vill like it! /s
Those criticisms all seem based on an erroneous presumption that any left/right alliance can benefit ONLY those on the right. That strategists on the right are evidently superior and strategists on the left are doomed to serve as feckless dupes.
Knoxville, you’re going to have to learn to post stuff in the comments sections when the diaries first come up at Orange, otherwise nobody is going to see it.
Since the population has doubled over the past 30 years while the number of good middle class jobs has been cut in half, I don’t see how the numbers would pan out in their favor. They’ve winnowed themselves down to a very small direct constituency, and I think that their employees would find themselves in a very difficult situation were it to transpire that way.
Hell, even ole Free Marketeer himself, Alan Greenspan, was forced to admit before Congress last year that he had “found a flaw” in his Randian Free Market philosophy.
If we were Iranians, we would not pay this unjust tribute to the US Health Cartel.
If we were Pakistanis, we would not pay this unjust tribute to the US Health Cartel.
But we are Americans. We do as we are told.
Your screen name contains more than a hint of irony, since you appear to believe corporate servitude is the only effective remedy to Republican dominance.
Not likely. “History repeats itself first as tragedy then as farce” was not meant as the expression of some kind of law.
And, as I have said elsewhere before, “Fascism” referred to a dynamic system in an age of developing capitalism, in which the failure of the “free market” to achieve uninterrupted growth was resolved by brute government coercion. What was famous about Benito Mussolini was that he made the trains run on time.
We no longer live under a dynamic system of developing capitalism, but rather a declining system dominated by old, stale, and useless capital which attempts to preserve itself in perpetuity by its continual purchase of government services.
Since we’ve entered the world of neo-liberalism how long before people are told to visit their barbers for health care treatments? Just imagine the savings.
That is true, but the flaw in the “free market” that he discovered was the mistake of allowing the Federal Reserve to manipulate interest rates thus creating artificial asset bubbles. The flaw was in the regulation, not in the market itself.
This reasoning seems to be based, perhaps unconsciously, upon the covert right-left “alliance” that currently constitutes “Left” politics as it is practiced today in the US, i.e. the Veal Pen.
If this corporate give away passes it will be time for civil disobedience on a magnitude never seen in this country. General strike time to shut both government and corporations down.
See my post #83.
A general strike may be justified, but it’s not going to happen. How about working for something that CAN happen? And I don’t mean getting on the “improve the bill” treadmill.
You talk about this as if it’s just happened. The pivotal date is September 11, 1973, the original September 11th, the day Salvador Allende, then President of Chile, committed suicide and was usurped in his leadership by a junta headed by Augusto Pinochet, who brought in the Chicago School (incl. Milton Friedman himself) to lay out an economic plan for his dictatorship. This was the pilot project for the neoliberal plan for world dominance.
Another pivotal year to remember is 1988, the year in which the Democratic Party nominee for President was Michael Dukakis, thus making the nominees of both parties neoliberals.
wrong
completely, and if it’s “simple math” then you miss the obvious complexities, try to stay away from those
there is NO such thing as a free market, as far as your pedestrian examples, here’s what really happens
company “a” buys product at bulk, sells so low they put company “b” out of business, then company “a” raises prices higher then ever before
another example
company “1″ uses cancerous material to produce product at far lower prices costing everyone far more money then company “2″ but nobody knows it
company “1″ puts company “2″ out of business and everyone else funds those “low prices” by the loss of their parent and child
simple stuff
there is no such thing as a free market, it cannot exist, it’s a fantasy using propaganda that works on people like yourself
this country WAS FOUNDED on the principles of regulations, the boston tea party was initiated BECAUSE the king REMOVED regulations from the incoming product
to which the colonists said, “BULL CRAP” and they dumped that unregulated product into the sea
sorry but you are a victim of propaganda and now advocate against yourself, your wife and your children
you’re not doing a good job of it here though, so try it on the sites such pedestrian propaganda might work
Well, you can take your chances with “not likely.” I’d prefer not to, nor to nudge it along by getting into bed with the right. Re “we no longer live under a dynamic system of developing capitalism, but rather a declining system dominated by old, stale, and useless capital,” such mechanical nonsense was also heard in the 20’s and 30’s. Fascism, far from “referring” to a “dynamic system in an age of developing capitalism” was exactly the opposite–an open terrorist dictatorship of finance capital and the far right to deal with the deepest crisis of capitalism in its history up to that point. If you choose to ignore the parallels that’s up to you. How capital will attempt to preserve itself is far broader and more potentially dangerous than by the “continual purchase of government services,” which is a nonsensical statement.
Perhaps some day the neo-liberals and their corporatist allies of both parties will suffer the same fate as befell Salvador Allende. Since the U.S. orchestrated the coup it would seem to be poetic justice.
Global mass suicide is something that can happen, yet for obvious reasons we don’t work for it. An insane degree of global warming is something we’re working for right now, by adding 2 ppm/year of carbon dioxide to the Earth’s atmosphere.
Let me suggest, as politely as we can, that perhaps we’re better off working for a future we can’t see, because the futures we can see are all too bleak.
Try and tell that to the U.S. where the average American reads at a 7th-8th grade level. That means they are able to read medication labels, product labels (of course) and popular fiction.
No, this is crap. It took Nazi Germany half a dozen years to go from being the weakling of Europe to being its dominant power.
Jane, this is the second of two articles on the front page now that suggests that you and Howard Dean are on the same page on this. You aren’t. He’s reluctantly for passing the bill after working as much as possible for improving it, and then for not accepting it as final but pushing for more. You just want to blow everything up.
Yes, the loss of the public option is a bitter disappointment. Yes, it gives away too much to the insurance companies. But too much of the content on FDL compares the bill to the ideal bill, rather than the situation we’ll be in if there is no bill. Dean’s opposition is constructive, and yours has become destructive.
The bill eliminates pre-existing conditions, something that cannot be done via the reconciliation process. Reconciliation only addresses budget matters. Since the public option saves money, we could insist on a second bill, in addition to this bill, that would add the public option, and that this second bill be passed with the reconciliation procedure from Day One, eliminating the power of Nelson and Lieberman.
The combination of a second bill with this bill could be better than what could be achieved just with reconciliation.
I just got the news that our Jane and other progressives have teamed up with Grover Norquist and other paleoconservatives to go after Rahm Emanuel for his fishy activities at Freddie Mac.
Rahm Emanual is no doubt the Dr. Frankenstein behind the Blue Dogs’ rise to power. So it wouldn’t surprise me in the least to learn that he is also a financial crook with a shady past. Therefore, I see this alliance of the far Left and far Right as a welcoming sign. I think it’s our best hope of putting a stop to Washington’s mushy middle which has become a kleptocratic hotbed for aiders and abettors of our nation’s war criminals and financial terrorists.
Welcome!
Very well said.
Sad thing is, I sometimes I wish I were a pod person. It’s been a hell of a lot scarier world seeing clearly just how screwed up things are and having to deal with it on my own. A Rip van Winkle episode would be welcome about now.
I see — so you’re against the mandate in the health care bill too?
And a little over a year ago most people would have said mass protests on the streets of Iranian cities cannot happen.
.
So if the progressives don’t STFU there will be no bill? Obama will merely accept defeat when doing this was his idea in the first instance?
Certainly. But are you actually saying that we can pull off a general strike if the healthcare debacle passes? General strikes involve organizations. What organizations are backing the call for a general strike? What organizations are being newly created that could organize a general strike?
I’m not calling for narrow reformism. I’m not saying we should only choose among the options the Democratic Party offers us. I’m saying we have to have tactical/organizational means to actualize our demands. If we don’t have them, we have to build them.
The Full Court Press idea is to use the EXISTING Democratic congressional primaries to create a broad, relatively independent NEW infrastructure that can be built upon. See? Connection between existing and new. No heroic cries that go unanswered.
And, what’s more, you reject all of Obama’s alliances with the Right?
You need to go back and read the history of the Weimar republic and the economic crisis in Germany and its relation to the rise of Nazism. While you’re at it you might also read the history of how some liberals and parts of the left abetted it too.
I wouldn’t have said that. The conditions were there and observable. Their foundation was a broad-based opposition slate with militant support.
Of course not, not right away. But, remember, the mandates will only take effect in 2013 or 2014, so there’s time.
Yes of course. We should have a national health service a la Britain fully paid for through a progressive tax system, not just an anemic “public option.”
Interesting thing about your list. EVERY ISSUE on which you have united with Commandante Gee-Norq seems to involve an attack on an instrumentality of government. If you think the Fed is the handmaiden of Big Money, which it almost certainly is, then maybe that’s a good thing, and maybe not. It may depend who you think you can get instead of Bernanke. Krugman? Roubini? Stieglitz? Not holding my breath. Meanwhile, do you think Grover (“shrink the gov’t to where we can drown it in the bathtub”) would feel so positive about a direct restraint on corporate power–for example (again) permitting writedowns of underwater mortgages in bankruptcy? No? Do tell!
How are we to make this happen? Serious question.
Thanks for the lecture. Too bad you couldn’t contest my main point.
Yes of course.
How much of the “left-right” strife has actually been financed by the corporatists?
You know, divide and conquer?
We need to employ an electoral strategy: Progressives in Red Districts vote Libertarian, Libertarians in Blue Districts vote Progressive.
You mean too bad you couldn’t formulate a response.
At one point in the post you link to, the argument is made that since some of the income could come from self employment and frequently so for singles, the tax would be lower than emptywheel calculated due to extra deductions. No mention is made of the extra self employment tax of over 12% on these same earnings.
Using your inductive reasioning appoach to question emptywheel’s other calculations/assumptions, we must also wonder about the possibilities of other errors in your link.
Yeah, an “eternity”…
Of course that’s not what I’m saying; progressives should not shut up. We should push to get as much of the House language into the bill as possible, except for Stupak, and then we should demand that a second bill start immediately if we can’t get the public option through this time.
But our language should be that the Senate bill is not adequate; it should not be “kill the bill”.
Let me also mention that Barack Obama and Rahm Emanuel seem to be two of our many public servants who are using their political power only to enrich themselves and their already rich campaign donors. It seems pretty obvious to me that they have no interest in helping make America a richer and more rewarding place for ordinary Americans. I find this particularly disturbing given that the Democratic Party has traditionally been the party that stands up for ordinary Americans. Now it is playing second fiddle to the Republican Party as the party for our moneyed elites. In fact, both Obama and Emanuel come across to me as being so elitist in their thinking that I wouldn’t be too surprised to learn that they are looking forward to the day when America becomes a land of haves and have-nots with absolutely nothing in between!
So I’ve pretty much come to the conclusion that there’s only one of two things that we can do to keep our public servants, like Obama and Emanuel, from using Washington as a place for them to strike it rich: 1) get rid of all private campaign contributions or 2) elect only people to public office who are so damn rich that they don’t need to raise a dime to win elections. I’m sure that there are a few wealthy people out there who’d seek public office in order to represent the interest of ordinary Americans, even if it means having to lose a few of their multimillionaire friends. Rep. Alan Grayson comes to mind.
By engaging them we stop the metastasis of lunacy and turn the inertia of history away from fascism back to populism.
If we can’t threaten to kill the bill, we won’t have any power over its contents.
@97
In Congressional testimony on October 23, 2008, Greenspan acknowledged that he was “partially” wrong in opposing regulation and stated “Those of us who have looked to the self-interest of lending institutions to protect shareholder’s equity — myself especially — are in a state of shocked disbelief.”[23]
Referring to his free-market ideology, Greenspan said: “I have found a flaw. I don’t know how significant or permanent it is. But I have been very distressed by that fact.” Rep. Henry Waxman (D-CA) then pressed him to clarify his words. “In other words, you found that your view of the world, your ideology, was not right, it was not working,” Waxman said. “Absolutely, precisely,” Greenspan replied. “You know, that’s precisely the reason I was shocked, because I have been going for 40 years or more with very considerable evidence that it was working exceptionally well.”[64]
Greenspan admitted fault[65] in opposing regulation of derivatives and acknowledged that financial institutions didn’t protect shareholders and investments as well as he expected.
answers.com
But that’s the problem. Populism is a two-edged coin–and Pat Buchanan and Mussolini are examples of the other side of the coin. That’s why it’s important to make the distinction by explicitly opposing them, not getting into bed with them.
Alan Greenspan: Biography from Answers.com
Early in his life Greenspan was a friend and follower of writer Ayn Rand. ….. some Objectivists find his support for a gold standard somewhat incongruous … argued that doctrinaire application of theory was insufficiently flexible ….. Referring to his free-market ideology, Greenspan said: “I have found a flaw. …
http://www.answers.com/topic/alan-greenspan
In flyover country (i.e. 90% of the country by territory), they have far more than credibility, they are the most vital faction.
In the martial services, they are also a majority, but I cannot put a precise number on it.
Territory and fighting men: you see what the mullahs can do with only 25% of the country’s support, no?
Real world, man! Real world!
Wonder who made that up.
Please speak in plain english. We already know you are super super smart.
Obama is all about bipartisinship. We are following our leader here.
I think that the “teaparty” crowd and the progessives are about to figure out that they have both been screwed. While these groups were being played against eachother the “smart guys” have figured out away to raise everybody’s taxes and not deliver one dime of health care for three or four years.
Yes, of course we have to engage them in “flyover country,” and not just there, to pull average people away from the right and from such nonsensical rubbish like Ron Paul’s goldbuggery. But we’ve got to do that by explaining what’s wrong with the right, not by playing cute tactical games by issuing joint statements with them. The mandates are going to produce a lot of rage among working people who simply cannot afford them, and the right’s going to play this to the hilt by casting progressives as elites out to blood-suck them. Tom Frank laid out this narrative quite well in “What’s the Matter with Kansas.”
Before you go telling me who my “free market hero” is, read this commentary from Murray Rothbard (an actual proponent of free markets) about Alan Greenspan.
“Over the years, Greenspan has, for example, supported President Ford’s imbecilic Whip Inflation Now buttons when he was Chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers. Much worse is the fact that this “high philosophic” adherent of laissez-faire saved the racketeering Social Security program in 1982, just when the general public began to realize that the program was bankrupt and there was a good chance of finally slaughtering this great sacred cow of American politics. Greenspan stepped in as head of a “bipartisan” (i.e., conservative and liberal centrists) Social Security Commission, and “saved” the system from bankruptcy by slapping on higher Social Security taxes.
Alan is a long-time member of the famed Trilateral Commission, the Rockefeller-dominated pinnacle of the financial-political power elite in this country. And as he assumes his post as head of the Fed, he leaves his honored place on the board of directors of J.P. Morgan & Co. and Morgan Guaranty Trust. Yes, the Establishment has good reason to sleep soundly with Greenspan at our monetary helm. And as icing on the cake, they know that Greenspan’s “philosophical” Randianism will undoubtedly fool many free market advocates into thinking that a champion of their cause now perches high in the seats of power.”
Alan Greenspan is no champion of the free market, which any advocate of truly free markets will be able to confirm.
By the way Jane just my opinion but I’d stay away from Grover and his ilk because they’re lying sacks of shit and neo-Nazis to boot. If they have a compliant about a BIG Gov’t /BIG BIZ nexus happening you’d fool me considering the way these thugs acted the last 8 yrs.
Truer words were never typed.
I have a general question that may have already been addressed. Most programs that seek to redistribute wealth to private interests do so through taxation in the form of subsidies or contracts. Why the departure from that methodology? This mandate requiring individuals to pay insurance companies directly seems like a liability shield to me. The government enacts the law requiring us to pay insurance companies, but will we have any redress of grievances when the insurance companies inevitably pull the rug out from under us? Knowing that the insurance companies can “outlawyer” 99% of individuals may be the motive here.
ummm… not really given that they are reducing the insurance benefits of their own employees!
Yup.
A mandate, IF and ONLY IF there were a public option, makes a ton of sense — simply from the viewpoint of public health and epidemiology.
A mandate requiring people to pay private, for-profit corporations for insurance that is not fully regulated, and that leaves them destitute or unable to pay other things (like taxes for TARP bailouts) is so dumb that I have to rub my eyes in disbelief. Honestly, I have to blink to believe this is really happening.
If you think freedom = corporate servitude you’ve got a major problem.
The insurance mandates are not really “neo-feudalism.” Remember that the original feudal powers directly appropriated the surplus from a peasant working class — if I produced three pounds of grain, the nobility took two of those pounds and gave half a pound to the knightly class so that it could continue to wage warfare.
“Fascism” seems to me to miss the mark as well. Although I’ve seen it written that Mussolini imagined Fascism as the doctrine of a corporate state, Fascism still has too much of the definition given in Merriam-Webster.com in it:
A better name for the insurance mandates would be “neo-mercantilism.” The mercantilists, remember, ran national economies to strengthen the national warfare states, and this was done by identifying the national interest with a corporate interest.
There are a couple of places in the world with REAL free markets – Somalia comes to mind right away. I’m not expecting any health care reform in Somalia any time soon. In fact, I too think well regulated, fair, free markets work extremely well. So show me one for health care – anywhere in the world.
But I’ll save you the time – there isn’t one anywhere.
I asked the same questions on another thread a while back.
WHO you gonna call-Insurance Busters?
WHERE are the provisions for accountability from insurance companies-and WHO will enforce them ?
WHAT are the penalties for violations?
Funny how the pod people who can’t bring themselves to criticize the Obamessiah, even in the most tepid of terms, have to call Jane a pod person, when Jane is at least thinking on her own. Which is more than they are doing.
Thank you Jane Hamsher for your post and for all you do. You are a true patriot and lover of your country.
Indeed. I think there will be a real outpouring of rage in 2014 when people who were simply told that insurance would be available to them realize just how much it’s going to cost in premiums, deductibles, and copays. The subsidies they were promised are going to shrink like melting snow during every deficit reduction push, and they’re going to realize they still can’t afford health care, but they’re going to have to pay for it anyway. There are going to be a serious number of extremely angry people in this country.
Let’s assume for a moment that we are inhabitants of a country where the government has been granted a single role: to reflect and codify the wishes of its people above all else.
Imagine the reaction when the public learned that they were being required by their government in express opposition to their wishes to comply with the following:
-to forego their desire to have a single entity manage the cost of their health care bills and instead be made to pay twice the rate to private companies so they could profit, at their expense;
-be forced to pay these insurers for policies whether they wanted to or not for the sole purpose of enriching these companies;
-have the benefits of these same policies taxed in order that their access to health services be reduced;
-be disallowed to bargain for the cost of the medicines they are forced to buy from suppliers so that these may be enriched;
- and on and on.
Well since no reaction was forthcoming from the people then any neutral observer would remark, well what are they waiting for? Is it possible they could be so cowardly as to not react? Or so stupid as to not notice the extent to which they are being taken for fools? What is going on?
Well I think that we all know which country we are dealing with here. And after having left no stone unturned which all revealed one outrage after the next, it is time I think to answer this neutral observer’s very pointed questions.
What exactly are we prepared to do about all this?
I’ve read plenty of German history. Nobody on the “Left” formed an alliance with the Nazis in 1932, and there are no Nazis in American politics in 2009. What’s your point again?
TasteofFreedom didn’t say “the ‘Left’ formed an alliance with the Nazis.” TasteofFreedom said “abetted.” The communists and the social democrats thought each other the primary enemy. One communist slogan was “After Hitler, us.” Meaning that the rise of Hitler would pave the way for communism. Both communists and social dems focused on economic issues, and vastly underestimated the centrality of anti-Semitism to the Nazi message.
And who mentioned 1932?
What’s your point?
So let me get this straight. Your path to a progressive future is to vote for people who want to destroy the government, to eliminate the welfare state, to destroy the safety net for the poor and to eradicate society?
I expect to see you on the front page before you know it!
You are wasting your time arguing with people who are simply parroting slogans. He couldn’t even begin to substantiate what he posts here. He’s just repeating a meme.
But the government was for sale, so the government went to the highest bidders, best and highest use and all, and they rigged the game so that they always win.
Kleptocratic democratic capitalism.
The SPD felt that it could take a pass against Hitler because he would play by the rules, fail, and the SPD would be elected to succeed Hitler.
Hi! My name is Kelvin Phillips, and I hope to be posting here more often. Anyway, I would like to let you know one view from a someone who doesn’t veiw themselves as a political junkie. My mother.
One day, I took her to the local Walgreen’s to pick up her medicine. After she came back out of the store, we talked for a little bit. The talk turned to healthcare, and I was amazed to learn that the medicine she just bought cost her two hundred dollars! This is a woman who is covered by insurance. Now I hear that older people like my mother could pay as much as 3x the amount a younger person would pay.
How does that work? Where are senior citizens like my mother going to come up with that kind of cash? I also have a question about co-payments and deductables. In all the talk about killing or keeping bills, no one has answered (to my satisfaction at least), what’s to keep the insurance companies from raising the co-pays and deductables? I haven’t heard or seen anything in the bill that would prevent unfair raises. I have other questions, but answering these would be a start, thanks.
been on it for awhile. Just said if you think we are going to put up with this you are full to the brim with shit, well not exactly that, just implied. But calling them, forget about it. It is time to go to the mattresses. This is real simple, quit fucking participating in the madness. Everything is wrong, in every area and all you have to do collectively is say no. you/we have permitted them with, tacit approval, to destroy us by not storming the barricades, You/we put up with free speech zones, you/we permit them to make you the debtor for their folly. Take your money out of the bank, throw your credit card in the shredder, throw your fucking TV in the garbage where it belongs, stop buying their plastic shit, quit fearing them, you diminish your power.
Flame me all you want, but working in this system does nothing, accomplishes nothing. This health care bill is shit packed in a pink box. We really should just say no, they cannot come for all of us
Yes I am mad, mad at you, mad at me, that we permit this madness to continue. But my direct experience informs me that calling these lying sacks does not help. You are fighting money and the way you fight that is organized resistance from without. They own the system, now more than ever. Put it in the papers in a way that speaks to people. They don’t like liberal elitists, which is how you are perceived so the language must address that.
No I am no troll. El Duende. Although I do have the distinct possibility of living under a bridge in the near future. I refuse to identify with any party. Remember, you are a member of the greatest party on earth, the human race and we are all connected and very, very powerful. They truly fear us you know, they think we are sleeping and pray we continue. Wake up, it is a sunny day if you want it to be. Make them join us, don’t join them.
Burnie-semi retired asshole.
This is germane to my unpleasant words, and addresses what we are facing in health care and every other issue you care to name. It is not, mumbo jumbo, shoot from the hip nonsense. We would be well served if these issues were honestly talked about, but it seems like an impossible goal in a polarized world, so where best to discuss it than in the common purpose shown in regards to an insane mandate that rewards those that brung us here.
http://kunstler.com/blog/2009/12/forecast-2010.html
The only thing that will save us is common purpose for the good of all, executed with grace, humility and wisdom. If we fail to recognize our humanity we fail utterly.
Burnie-retired asshole.
Both feudal and fascist…. But why am I no-longer surprised by any of the actions now carried-out by my old nation?
I have to tell you that your use of term like “neo-feudalism” is not just intellectually vacuous in the sense you wish to use it but also historically inaccurate.
It is painfully obvious that neither you nor Marcy are historians or economists perhaps even lacking a basic literacy in either field. I don’t disagree with your thesis that corporate power is encroaching on our lives and frankly limiting our freedoms but to use a term like neo-feudalism only shows me that you are ignorant of medieval society (in feudalism rights and privileges were based on reciprocity extending up and down a hierarchical society) and that you are blissfully unaware of the origins of term neo-feudalism.
The term was first used by George Reisman, an economist of the Austrian school who taught at Pepperdine, writing in the conservative weekly Human Events (it was Reagan’s favorite magazine) in 1961 to attack John Kenneth Galbraith’s The Affluent Society. In Reisman’s essay neo-feudalism is the growth of a paternalistic liberal state that aimed to create a cradle to grave socialism. So you are actually pushing a term that was coined by a member of the Ludwig van Mises/Frederich von Hayek/Milton Friedman school of economic thought to disparage the left.
Its use as a pejorative term was silly then and it is silly now. Please stop bantering around terms that you don’t fully understand because frankly you are embarrassing not just yourselves but the progressive left as a whole. You think you are being clever but quite the opposite, you are demonstrating a profound ignorance. Have you even read Hayek’s Road to Serfdom? I might suggest reading the object of your disdain before you mimic it.
Well said.
The only political way out of this economic servitude is another demagogue on the level of Huey Long to arise.
The 1930s bred a few such: men who could appeal to both rural, socially conservative voters and urban liberals alike.
With FDR we had a charismatic leader who used the government’s power to partially curb the business sector. And then 30 years later we got LBJ who more or less allied with the business sector, but used the government’s power to aid minorities, increase education, enact medicare, and so forth (“the Great 89th’s” legislative history).
With Obama’s campaign rhetoric, we thought we were going to get a little of both men. Tragically, so far, we are getting neither. Which is too bad, since he has charisma in plenty and has the makings of a great popular leader…
Alas he lacks the ruthlessness and the basic simplistic reductionism that the great demagogues could use so effectively. And it is increasingly argued that he never did intend to shake things up too much. He maybe sees himself more as a healer of a badly divided polity. Such a role automatically limits his partisanship.
So we are kinda stuck. By the late twentieth century, a worker’s paradise of a sort here developed in the United States: an economic climate salubrious enough to dull political upheaval based on perceived class inequalities. People had enough material goods to have a stake in sustaining the economic system that had given them their big-screen tvs and suvs and no real incentive in overthrowing it. Further, 100 years of vicious business/govt-based repression had purged all effective revolutionary institutional counterweights, even to de-naturing the labor movement. The major parties give the public the illusion of freedom based on the so-called hot button social issues like gun control, gay marriage, abortion, etc. In this social arena alone, we still have the semblance of a democracy.
But in terms of fundamental modifications of the economic infrastructure, there is absolutely no democracy. We have no power, even with a mass popular outcry, to effect substantive change. This health care reform debate and progress should open everyone’s eyes to that sorry reality. Senators will simply ignore their constituencies on issues of major infrastructure change.
above post was in reply to gonalb@comment 155