Webb Urges a Halt to Senate Health Care Votes
By DAVID M. HERSZENHORN

NY Times.. Now one of the Dems is making sense.

Let’s hope there’s more of the same response from other SEN. Dems.

in the fullness of time, understanding will come to you.

Jane, you simply don’t realize how powerful you’ve become.
Everything’s on your head now: today’s loss in Massachusetts,
this fall’s losses nationwide, whatever happens to healthcare,
unemployment, commercial real estate…

It’s Nader’s fault. He split the vote. What year is it again?

NKOTB, Jane?

Webb is an asshole.

you forgot earthquakes and hurricanes.

Joe Friday?

NYT:

“It is important for us to pass legislation,” said Representative Baron Hill, a conservative Democrat from Indiana.

Yup, gotta give the store away to health insurers so they can pay to reelect us in November.

Is anyone else watching and listening to Brown’s acceptance speech? OMG Look what they elected. Geez.

Elections have consequences and running from your base once you get elected surely does. You can say what you want about the republicans but they dont alienate their base as soon as they get in office. The conventional wisdom of governing center right has kicked the dems in the arse once again.

To a demographer, the Brown electoral map looks like a census of SUV ownership. Vehicles which we have to start calling “trucks” from today henceforth!

At least the asshole is right in discouraging any vote right now.

Re-posting for better visibility:

I was talking to a friend the other night about politics, and honestly, more than at any other time in my life, I see politicians as a living analogue to the last chapter and last sentence of Orwell’s “Animal Farm.”

I cannot tell the difference any more. This goes for the media as well – Katrina Vanden Heuvel as a centrist? Only Olbermann really shines forth as a force for progressive principles.

Obama, indeed, has nine months. Nine months to get us out of Iraq AND Afghanistan, nine months to get real, progressive health care reform passed. Nine months to stand up to the centrists of both parties and shout with a voice like Moses himself, ENOUGH! Enough of the money changers, be they banks, insurance companies, oil companies, whatever.

AND ANOTHER THING…
Failing that, I have probably voted in my last election. If there’s no difference between the parties, what does it matter who’s elected? At my age, frankly, I’m starting to care a lot more about me and mine and a lot less about people who don’t have enough fight in them to take it to the streets, which, I believe, will be the ONLY way to stop the corporatism.

Bullseye.

If only she would have stayed in the veal pen, there never would have been an earth quake in Haiti.

Right is right

No, it’s Obama’s fault. Everything is Obama’s fault. Have not yet figured out how Haiti is Obama’s fault, but I just know that it is.

You get Brown, when at the top, you have betrayed your base. What else could Obama have expected. Let him keep blaming Coakley for her weak kneed, lifeless campaign. No one is going to buy into it.

Ok. Now what?

to auto-clarify the above: “it’s the middleclass economy stupid!” the spinners can talk tactics until red (or blue) in the face, but this is a marxist moment.

At least show up to register a protest vote. Don’t just give up.

That’s the right question.

……Obama, indeed, has nine months. Nine months to get us out of Iraq AND Afghanistan, nine months to get real, progressive health care reform passed. Nine months to stand up to the centrists of both parties and shout with a voice like Moses himself, ENOUGH! Enough of the money changers, be they banks, insurance companies, oil companies, whatever

If you want to substitute Rahm, Reid, Pelosi, Hoyer, or all of them, for the President of the United States, I do not have a problem with that.

Best thing Obama could do to begin turning things around is to announce that Rahm has resigned to “Spend more time with his lawyersfamily.”

I don’t think Massachusetts will be happy with Brown. But Coakley did a poor job as a campaigner.He has views and beliefs that run contrary to most of his constituents. He is also a bit rough around the edges. But they have to live with the vote. Perhaps it will work out. Or maybe it will be six long years.

Massachusetts voters said that provisions in the bill that would have cost them dearly and offered no additional coverage. They said that the bill was confusing and its benefits unclear. They said that unemployment was barely addressed. They said they did not want to be taken for granted.

I’m a progressive and I have not been happy for months now. The health care bill I want (and worked for) has little to do with what passed the Senate. It has more to do with the bill in the House. The wheeling and dealing has been distasteful but it’s the way Congress works. Neither the Democrats or GOP can function without tons of cash pouring into campaigns from lobbies, corporations, high roller personal donors, unions, professional associations etc. Campaigning never stops. And, most members of Congress want cushy jobs when they retire. So money drives the process and makes it corrupt.

I suspect that the Democrats will find a way to pass a bill. I suspect I will not be happy with it. By the way, I have no doubt I would be as unhappy with GOP leadership for the very same reasons.

x2

Stop the world, I wanna get off is never an option.

Well, I guess tonight that the Democrats in Massachusetts got an answer to the question,

“What Can Brown Do For You?”

Hmm. Didn’t I recall Obama saying that he staked his presidency over health care reform. So, Mr. President have you figured out that the MA election was actually a referendum on HCR and your presidency? (Imagine GOING to MA and standing beside Coakley, making it even more glaring that the election was indeed a referendum on Obama’s failed attempts at real health care reform.

I am so glad somebody else thinks that.

I don’t quite understand how it can all be the fault of the “left” who don’t support the President enough, and not a referendum of the President at the same time.

Don’t think about it too much. That seems to be the best way to resolve the contradictions.

I’ve been out of the political/current events loop for a few weeks due to family medical traumas.
First my younger brother in Finland receiving the most awesome care. Cerebral hemorrhage after beginning to recover from Swine Flu. He spent 3 weeks in ICU before being transferred to a care facility. He didn’t survive.
Then my 87 yr. old mother with a broken heart fell and broke 3 ribs.She’s on basic Group Health with Medicare backup.
If either of these events had happened to myself, my husband or our children, with insurance,….we’d be up the creek for the rest of our families financial future.
Why would Coakley concede so early? That’s seems weird. Don’t they have mail-in ballots?
But, I’m too tired to be baffled by their bullshit.

Ball’s in Obama’s court. House Progressives are terrified to move one way or the other. Winogrand is primarying Harman. Hoyer’s all a quiver, and the blue dogs want out of this party.

Depressing state of affairs for the Democrats and for Progressives in my view. The playground is now so chaotic, the pundits can and will spin this to fit their respective preferred narratives. The nation is left wondering why the Democrats can’t walk and chew gum at the same time. If ever there were a time for a leader with a gift of oratorical skills, it’d be about now. Can he lead? First year says he can only split the baby. We’ll soon see.

This is only a short term. Two years, IIRC.

Bullseye.

Bring on the Freddie Mac investigation.

No he actually didn’t campaign on it, it was just a ‘sliver’.

Wasted political capital is what it is. A failure to push for real change in a time when fatcats ride the taxpayer gravy train and taxpayers lose their jobs and homes.

It ain’t rocket science. It’s plain old, old-school, Democratic establishment hubris, and it’s failing.

Hell, yes!

Take Geithner and Summers ,too.

Is anyone else watching and listening to Brown’s acceptance speech? OMG Look what they elected.

Our next President?

Why? I mean, I’d have to vote for Delbert McClinton or Pat Paulson. There is not a politician in DC other than *maybe* Grayson who’s even worth a second glance.

I just don’t care any more. I figure when things get so horrible I can no longer live on my own terms, I’ll go to the Capitol steps, tie off, shoot up and head west. Big ol’ sign saying “Y’all suck ass” stapled to my clothes.

I’ve already been burned (third-degree) so I’m not doing the Vietnamese monk thing, and I’m not going to General Loan myself, but I’ll make a goddamed statement…Christ almighty, if only I had gone into diagnostic imaging, I could emigrate from this latter-day falling Roman Empire. The visigoths are here, Nero is fiddling, Caligula is fucking and everyone else seems to be jacking off.

I’ve had it.

Chalk another one up for the Money Party

Sitting on a sofa on a Sunday afternoon
Going to the candidates debate
Laugh about it, shout about it
When you’ve got to choose
Ev’ry way you look at it, you lose

With apologies to Mrs. Robinsons everywhere.

Massachusetts, the model for Obamacare…

… it was just a ’sliver’.

Slivers hurt.

He’s still talking.

AND THE KILLIN’ GOEZ ON AND ON AND…

Citizen hamsher and the Firepup Freedom Fighters:

Sister Jane, all this bullshit about the “lefties” and the “dirty fuckin’ hippies” is SOOOOO Rahmspeak and it’s as old as 1994. Now remember when an old lefty scandanavian-American was tryin ta tell ya that the antidote for virulent toxic Rahmism and healthcare reform rests in the House of Representatives? Well dear, it’s still there and if ObamaRhama doesn’t find some credibility with the House progressives AND the Speaker on reconcilliation and a public option, then the House of Representatives will kill Rahm’s gift to the insurance industry and Obama will be a ceremonial greeter in the Rose Garden for the next 2 years.

There is an opportunity here to kill Clintonism once and for all and to get Howard Dean back in charge of the DNC but it’s gunna take Obama seein’ the reality of the political tarpit Rahm has made for the Administration and the Democratic Party. Obama is nuthin if not ambitious and self-interested and he knows that the Democratic Party and it’s progressive base is gunna last a lot longer than his skinny little place in history.

So here’s to Citizen Hamsher and the progressive insurgents, just don’t get too close to the Ron Paulites, they can give ya a real bad case of political crabs!

KEEP THE FAITH AND PASS THE AMMUNITION, THIS IS JUST A BATTLE, WE WANT THE WAR!!!

Sorry to hear about your brother and your mom. That’s quite the double whammy. (((openhope)))

If the White House feels the voters don’t support it enough, maybe it should dissolve the voters and elect different ones.

You forgot to include the results of the Super Bowl and next year’s World Series.

That’s so sad and awful, I’m so sorry.

Just checked, and you’re right. It’s a Class I seat, which means he’ll be up for election again in 2012.

Ignore the whore media. I take heart from the commenters today who have described this as a win for the longer term.

Bernanke just said he’d acquiesce to an audit of AIG, and audit the Fed is the only victory we’ve had this year. That happened because we helped Alan Grayson and Ron Paul who were working together on it.

Should we call them up and tell them to stop?

Bullshit. Pull yourself together, we need all hands on deck.

I think the point is that they don’t think about it enough.

Then again, cognitive dissonance feels just fine for far too many and, for them, need not be resolved.

That’s already covered by electronic, paperless, untrackable voting machines with secret source code.

Politicians are the new boy bands. Corporate posers who sing other people’s lyrics, gyrating so predictably you could set a watch to it. We’re all supposed to be entertained. Who’s on top this week? New Kids? Maneudo? Boyz2men? Pure entertainment folks; sit back and enjoy. Clap when the light flashes. Put the posters on your walls. Take a stand for your favorite band. Hang tough. You’re rough.

No absentee’s no exit polls. It a special election.

(((openhope)))

Let’s get Socratic shall we? Since 60 votes in Dem caucus isn’t enough to get a Democratic agenda through, what number would be? 64? 65? Would it be possible to get that number? Highly unlikely. Will Democrat Party leadership ever listen to progressives? We all know the answer….it’s ‘no’. There is no point to continuing to support this absolutely useless party…I’m afraid Ralph Nader is owed a big apology from many. Can this country be saved from itself? You’ll find the answer in the history of ancient Rome. Our manufacturing base is gone, we owe the world more money than we’ll ever be able to repay and our polity is certifiably insane. I don’t think these are radical conclusions. For me, I’m done with the Democrat Party. I’ll only vote for Green candidates where available and abstain when not available. What’s coming will be terrible and I’d rather not live through it, but here we are on calamity’s doorstep and white Christians are about to realize their dream and create the dog-eat-dog world they’ve always wanted.

It was always in the cards that we will be blamed everytime the Democrats fail. But the responsibility is entirely on the Democrats. We started warning even before the Inauguration, even before the November 2008 election, that they had to get their act together and produce results. Their answer was to freeze progressives out of government and policymaking entirely and to go on a corporatist binge. Trillions for Wall Street and the healthcare industry. Continuation of Bush’s wars, his surveillance policies, and his legal arguments. Rather than punish Lieberman, he rewarded him, leaving him as chair of a powerful committee. Rather than stiff Republicans, he let them stiff him repeatedly. Rather than work with progressives whose positions were in line with those of voters, he left it to the Blue Dogs and conservative Senators to craft his legislation.

As Obama’s popularity began to fade, we warned him that it would take more than a little PR to bring it back. Indeed we said that when it was gone it wasn’t coming back. And it won’t.

The Democratic pols did this to themselves. They were told. We told them. They didn’t listen. They aren’t listening now. They can’t stop themselves or change direction. It just isn’t in them.

What we need to be telling voters, not just liberal Democrats and progressives is that the Democrats can’t govern and the Republicans are crazy. We, ordinary Americans across the political spectrum, need to look elsewhere for our leaders because the two parties are incapable of producing them.

My condolences for your brother and mother.

Brown is up by several percentage points, and most of the precincts have reported in. Just based on that, I think it’s unlikely Coakley would be able to come back.

Best wishes to you and your family, openhope

late nite is upstairs

I agree the House should be the focus. I think Dean would do better organizing the left outside of DNC. That place got filled with Clintonistas so fast after Dean left. He’d have to reorganize the whole bureaucracy. Why not do the same thing with the “Democratic wing of the Democratic Party” just to primary the neolibs? Then go from there.

The Art of War all war is base on deception

The elites tried to trick progressives into thinking Obama was a progressive.

Now Obama puppet masters know the deception did not work.

Obama job was to destroy the progrssive movement or control it.

the 60 vote scam to control the progressives is now over.

Obama, Robert Gibbs, and David Axelrod have a huge problem, they cannot hide behind this 60 vote scam, to promote conserverdem ideas.

Obama and the elites know that the progressives will dictate the agenda in DC, because every politician in Washington wants to get re-elected.

Robert Gibbs and David Axelrod know Obama cannot win in 2012 as a conserverDem.

Let the games begin.

Hi Norske. Paul, Norquist, and the rest came to us. Since day one, FDL has been about accountability.

Yeah, I’ll always remember this as the year that I finally realized how Jane Hamsher is 100% responsible for absolutely everything, and Obama is totally not responsible for anything. Except the meaningless crap he’s done in his first year.

And is it me, or does it seem that every time Obama flies off on a mission — to get the Olympics for Chicago, to do Climate Change, or to campaign for Coakley — he (and we) get absolutely nothing! He needs to stay home and do some work for a change!

Take care,dear caretaker.

Sorry for your loss, best wishes for your mother.

Right you are! I forgot that little fact. Ok, feeling better. Based on Brown’s campaign, his record, and even his victory speech, he seems an odd duck. Perhaps his honeymoon will be very, very short.

Citizen Hamsher:

You can give Grayson and Ron Paul all the credit in public but be very,very careful that you don’t sell your numbers out to their public posturing. The so-called “libertarian” movement that Ron Paul leads is nuthin’ but good old home grown American fascism and all he’s got is money, his numbers are pathetic. You could end up givin’ Ron Paul your muscle when all he’s got is noise and if you think Bush politics was evil, wait until Ron Pual has a real political base!

Condolences.

You don’t want me. Ask Jane whether SHE wants me…I am a “by ANY means necessary” kind of guy. I can’t even say what I think it will take on this board. But I know talking to pols, pundits and, in fact, talking period, won’t get it done. It never did.

Yes, that was the point. But it’s possible that cognitive dissonance is the new drug of choice in DC. Wouldn’t surprise me, everyone seems happy there.

Look at this from Kevin Drum:

I’ve got all sorts of complaints about Obama. He’s been weaker on civil liberties than I’d like. His approach to bank regulation has been far too friendly to financial interests. I’m not thrilled with his escalation in Afghanistan. He hasn’t moved as quickly on gay rights as I hoped. And he hasn’t used the bully pulpit nearly as effectively as I think he’s capable of. He could afford to attack obstructionism and conservative retrenchment far more directly than he has.

Still, none of that comes within light years of providing a reason to turn on him.

Oh? How about a good swift kick in the nuts, Drum? Or two or three or four swift kicks in the nuts? Because that is what you’ve described there. And that ain’t even been the half of it. But yet, you say it’s our fault that Obama’s phony disastrous Rahm agenda is flopping? Gebus!

The American people realize what the Villagers don’t. This country is in serious trouble and blowing another fraudulent Wall St. bubble won’t save us.

No one gives a damn about ideological orthodoxy. They want to pay their damn heating bill without worrying if they have to cut back on groceries.

John F. Kennedy famously observed that “victory has a thousand fathers and defeat is born an orphan.”

Well, today many things associated with the Kennedys have been turned on their head. This is one of them. This defeat had a thousand fathers.

To try to pin the paternity of this defeat and what it represents on an individual or wing of our coalition would be a mistake.

I think everyone left of center, including me, has to critically examine how they have conducted themselves over the past year, learn and improve.

It starts at the top with Obama. His team has failed him. Some, not all, need to be fired and replaced with people that understand the distinction between being the Mayor of Chicago and being the President of the United States.

Anyone care to speculate about how big labor will react?

nine months to get real, progressive health care reform passed

Actually, I don’t think he has to get the “real, progressive health care reform passed” in those nine months.

I do, however, think he needs to

** abandon the travesty of a bill he’s currently got;
** start speaking out forcefully for real reform;
** say “give me a Congress that will pass real reform.”

Folks are angry: angry at banks; angry at drug manufacturers; angry at insurance companies. Obama needs to figure out how to channel that anger and turn it on The Bad Guys, not invite the Bad Guys into a back room to write his health care bill or his economic policy.

The “pass it now [or by November]” just leads to the “give me a bill, any bill,” and we all know how well that worked out.

I think the public would cut him some slack if he could prove he wanted to do it right.

Citizen BooRadley:

They came to “us” huh? And what did they give us that we didn’t already have….come on wake up and smell the horse shit. The progressive left has real numbers and a political party base, the right-wing Paulite libertarians got nuthin’ under their shirts except white robes. Play with those folks and you’ll get ta see the real dark side of American fascism.

I don’t quite understand how it can all be the fault of the “left” who don’t support the President enough, and not a referendum of the President at the same time.

I hope they blame the left. Once they concede that the left has that power, they will realize it’s no longer safe to ignore them.

How badly did nine months of democratic majority governance have to fail for the sympathy and respect for Edward Kennedy’s life long commitment to average people to have meant nothing in this election?

November’s mid-terms will be Gingrich’s Nixon Resurrection campaign. Watch the teabaggers flock to his new 21st Century Contract on America — cut taxes, cut taxes, cut taxes.

Citizen BooRadley:

I can tell ya that organized labor, “big” or little, knows enough not to sell out to Ron Paul.

BooRadley and Githcheegumee, I agree…bring on the financial investigations. We Want Our Money Back. Then we get into the sticky part.
We’re in short supply of true Patriots with power and a dream for the greater good of their Nation/World.
We are the Great Experiment. We failed. Probably shouldn’t have built our future on the blood and land of the people who were here before us. Same as it ever was.
No matter what happens with federal healthcare we need to rethink community clinics,imho. They can work, it’s been proven.

“Fish Rots from the Head”~~~~~~Old Itaian proverb

Kevin Drum – gah! JESUS i hate this dem pansyasshood polite prose.

Some asked what we should do now. I am an ideas person, not an organizer, but I would say recruit populist/progressives to primary as many Democrats as we can. Run against do nothing, sell out Democrats in the primaries, and crazy, nutcase Republicans in the general. But if primarying is going to be done, we have to start on it now and move quickly. That’s where I would put our energies.

But that’s the point – he does not want to do it right. He never did, it was all empty rhetoric.

I don’t judge politicians by what they say any more. Only by what they do. Obama = Bush. One need only look at the past year to confirm that.

I didn’t vote for anyone named Bush in my life and I sure as shit am not voting for anyone who acts exactly like a Bush.

just more bipartisanship, all’s good.

Ending slavery in the U.S. took the lives of a lot of men who were white supremacists. One of them was Abraham Lincoln. He was for segregation at the same time that he was against slavery.

oldgold?

What progressive issue has Obama fought for?

Name One.

I will lose no sleep.

Progressive must elect and support real progressives.

Obama will learn the first rule of president in 2010, do what your base wants you to do. (wall street did not elect Obama, main street did, Obama is the one that kick main street in the stomach.)

Is it possible the Dems purposely threw the seat so they could really be in solid with the medical industrial complex?

My “rationale”: The insurance and PhRMA stocks shot up yesterday and today with the strong projection of a Coakly loss and Obama has been in bed with them from the get-go. According to beltway info, Obamarahma have been playing up to the medical industrial complex in order to keep the money in the Dem Coffers and away from the GOP. They have succeeded throughout the healthcare reform fiasco and now they have justification to push through the Senate version of the bill without ANY CHANGES AT ALL in the House. Doing that, the Dems don’t need the 60 vote filibuster majority, the bill passes AS IS which, of course, is horrible. Since we don’t really have two parties, just two halves of the same party but with different names, it is just a matter of who can win over the corporate biggies and their big bucks. Just a thought.

So, in the tyranny of alternating factions, establishment Democrats are fine giving up their turn to the establishment Republicans?

When Ghouliani came to a fundraiser in St Pete, St Pete for Peace was there. Directly across the street were the Ron Paul folks, racist signs and all. A couple of their organizers came over to stand with us and tried to tell us that wasn’t representative of the movement. At the debates televised from St Pete we weren’t across the street from each other, we were on the same side of the street, as close as the heat would let us. The Paul people were at the right end of the line with the same crap. Lots of anti-immigration signs. Creepy folks.

You are a great ideas person.

Your diligent work over the years documenting scandals is greatly appreciated and has always been a great benefit to FDL.

Still not sure how Congress and the Admin will try to spin this, but one way to drive home our point would be for a sudden and substantial influx of cash to appear on the balance sheets of the most Liberal people in Congress…soon…

just a thought…

Thank you all for your kind thoughts. I’ve been more energized in my belief in real healthcare through these experiences.
But it’s not available to all of us. Just some. And that’s starting to hit home at a gut blow level.
If we took our money back from the crackhead Banksters we could afford to provide this safety net for us all.

Since when did attacking progressives help the progressive movement?

It’s one thing to not like Obama and not want him to win in 2012, maybe Hillary will run again, but does it do the progressive agenda any good to weaken him, attack him, pronounce him a failure or whatever people are doing? I say no. Republicans are sitting back and laughing their asses off at the progressives fighting each other, they love it. If you all really believe in progressive ideas, stop it. We barely had 60 votes before tonight, and at the rate the uninformed middle is going, we ain’t gonna have these numbers in the house and senate for a long, long time. Let’s kick the republicans asses, together.

“Folks are angry: angry at banks; angry at drug manufacturers; angry at insurance companies.”

Sure, but in Mass. they voted in a guy who is an even bigger whore for banks, drugmakers and insurance companies than Joe Lieberman.

But I guess he knows who plays for the Sahx!

Well here’s hoping for an orderly breakup the Empire and the formation of an EU type government.

The car’s on fire and there’s no driver at the wheel
And the sewers are all muddied with a thousand lonely suicides
And a dark wind blows
The government is corrupt
And we’re on so many drugs
With the radio on and the curtains drawn

We’re trapped in the belly of this horrible machine
And the machine is bleeding to death

The sun has fallen down
And the billboards are all leering
And the flags are all dead at the top of their poles

It went like this

The buildings tumbled in on themselves
Mothers clutching babies picked through the rubble and pulled out their hair

The skyline was beautiful on fire
All twisted metal stretching upwards
Everything washed in a thin orange haze

I said, “Kiss me, you’re beautiful..
These are truly the last days”

You grabbed my hand and we fell into it
Like a daydream or a fever

We woke up one morning and fell a little further down
For sure it’s the valley of death

I open up my wallet
And it’s full of blood

-Godspeed You Black Emperor!, ‘Dead Flag Blues’

Anyone care to speculate about how big labor will react?

Big labor ought to take a breath and take some time to read the political tea leaves.

I was over reading Reuters this afternoon, and the comments were all, “My insurance plan is now going to get taxed, but not labor’s, ’cause they made this deal with the Democrats.”

I hope Big Labor used vanishing ink to sign that deal with Rahm; I think they might want to be out of it any day now.

PS – Big Labor also might consider that Rahm tends to use vanishing ink on the deals he signs, and take a look at what he seemed to promise about EFCA. Not worth the paper it’s printed on.

“The creatures outside looked from pig to man, and from man to pig, and from pig to man again; but already it was impossible to say which was which.”

There is no difference any more. You might as well call it the National Socialist Party (though it has no relation to socialism).

There is no difference. IOW, we’re fucked.

I have said for some time now, that Americans have been programmed to consider themselves as a nation of consumers,rather than a nation of citizens.

Most folks sense of community is no larger than the dimensions of their WalMart shopping carts.

But that is the legacy of me first, Free Market thinking.”I got mine. F–k you.”

There is very little concept of the common good-the greater good-the commonwealth that creates civilized society.

But that’s the point – he does not want to do it right. He never did, it was all empty rhetoric.

I fear that you are right. I was just trying to hold out one sliver of “hope.”

We’ll find out who the “liberals” are when this piece of shit bill comes to a vote. We already know who the ConservaDems are. Now we’ll see what the rest of that bunch is made of.

Wasted political capital is what it is. A failure to push for real change in a time when fatcats ride the taxpayer gravy train and taxpayers lose their jobs and homes.

It ain’t rocket science. It’s plain old, old-school, Democratic establishment hubris, and it’s failing

I stole the above from wanderinIndiana at comment 37.

It’s not progressive voters that they’re courting. It’s the Clintonian independent middle that could go either way. Today’s election result in MA won’t change those dynamics, unless:

1) Bernanke’s nomination for 12 more years as Fed Chairman is withdrawn, and Elizabeth Warren is confirmed to clean out the Augean Stables in one day.

2) Summers is fired, and replaced with Stiglitz.

2) Rahm is exiled to K Street, and replaced by Howard Dean.

3) And Reid pulls a Daschle in November, and Dick Durbin or Russ Feingold becomes senate majority leader.

Like I said, the Emperor’s New Clothes PR campaign to address structural defects under the entire system will continue unabated.

Much appreciated.

Tell your boss to tell Rahm that he is the Republican.

Ok, first Webb said that health care legislation must be halted rather than moved forward toward real reform. And now Barney Frank has said it.

So much for my earlier hopefulness that the Dems might have read the results in MA correctly and learned something from them.

Great moves on the white collar thugs on Wall Street, thank you.

National Socialist Party

Fascism!

Sure, but in Mass. they voted in a guy who is an even bigger whore for banks, drugmakers and insurance companies than Joe Lieberman.

Yes, but that’s partly because Coakley [and most Democrats] couldn’t rail against the banks, drug makers & insurance companies because they’ve been in bed with them.

If Coakley had had the guts to say, “I don’t care WHO Obama’s sleeping with, I’m not going to support that piece-of-crap health care bill,” she could have capitalized on some of the anger and run effectively. But of course she didn’t and couldn’t; she had to race off to that fund-raising dinner hosted by drug mfgs and insurance companies.

The Dems can’t get on the right side of this argument until they get out of bed with the criminals.

That’s what we have now – rule by corporations – IOW, fascism. And we voted it in.

I am betting health care stocks trade down tomorrow.

Clouds do have silver linings…perhaps if Obama is a one term Pres and the GOP takes over Congress and the WH again they can finish what they started and end this Empire once and for all. I think I’d rather live in a collapsed Empire as a relatively young man.

Unfortunately, Robert Rubin has been the crossdressing Ayn Rand, running the U.S. federal government from 1992 to the present day.

And let’s throw in one more change:

5) Holder is sent back to defending multi-national corporate executives from war crimes prosecutions, and replaced by Elliot Spitzer.

Both the House and Senate will bail on the bill. Both sides of the aisle in both houses of Congress will get together and re-regulate the banking industry, pass a single payer bill, pull the troops out of Irak and Afghanistan, close the majority of overseas military bases, pass the strongest labour-friendly legislation evah. For starters.

I gotta quit smokin’ this shit.

I just don’t understand why we think this isn’t a rigged election. There were bused in “protesters”, a national media blitz continuously on Coakley’s potential loss and what that would mean to Dems, polls that are pure bullshit without taking into count cellphone users, and a candidate that rolls over within hours to legally concede in Kennedy’s district. With Diebold machines.
Color me conspiracy oriented.

I agree

Atlas Shrug is not a winner, this Any Rand crap must end.

Don’t bogart that joint….. my frieeeend…. Ahh, Little Feat performing live in Chicago, circa 1976 — good times.

As I indicated above, after a sharp defeat, it would seem prudent to take some time to reflect on how it occurred, what lessons can be learned and then try to improve

So, perhaps, Webb and Frank, are correct. And, who knows, it might lead to better HCR.

Don’t know about going back to the DNC, but it looks to me like his stock is on the rise.

Reuters was reporting that today, because of the likelihood of Brown’s win, health care stocks were heading UP — on the idea that now Obamacare can’t pass.

These are some pretty stupid analysts if they think Obamacare would be BAD for health care stocks.

who would be interested in rigging an election and why? After all, this is Rubin’s second term and the Corporations made out like bandits in his first.

Next on the plate: deficit reductions.

I gotta quit smokin’ this shit.

Pass some of that over here.

Yes — There is boordom after death, Ayn Rand

openhope, the USA electoral system is a joke.

The lack of a clear paper trail for american elections is part of the elite way of controlling the masses.

the last thing the elites want is progressives in control.

The hoped for audacity has faded out of sight.

Hangin’ Tough – Jane Hamsher you are f*in’ killin me

has anyone checked what Survey USA’s latest numbers for this race were, hmmmmm ?

let’s have a google, shall we ?

I definitely need to take what you’re saying into account.

I don’t doubt that they’re going to adjust course as a result of what happened tonight. It’s just a question of whether they’re going to change direction for the better or worse…

They’ll blame us for it…why not blame the Hubris in the WH?. This says Rahm and President Lieberman cannot run the country any longer. The elected guy needs to wake up and needs to learn to govern. Read a MSM story today (which was meant to shine a positive light since it came from the WH) that Obama left an important meeting with Geithner and Summers to go eat and get a haircut and told them to reach a decision on bank toxic assets before he returned. How’s this for a haircut, Mr. President?

So, perhaps, Webb and Frank, are correct. And, who knows, it might lead to better HCR.

Talk about smoking some shit!

Yeah, well we’re combatting that notion this Thursday when we start our community meeting with a free dinner.
I’m mad as hell and I can cook in restaurant quantities.
We hope to slowly begin a dialogue by breaking bread together without religion. One has to be invited into the community to recognize there IS a community. Which boils down to someone has to cook because food is a universal language. It’s the backbone of humanity.
Actually, this is a rebellious, desperate act to find a way to build bridges. We’ll see.

Ian Welsh called this one on January 3, 2010.

Yes we can!*

*Lose Senator Kennedy’s seat.

Chuck Todd is sad.

Chuck Todd “aka” Robert Gibbs mouth piece thinks dems in congress are going to pass the Senate HCR bill. WOW!!! Chuck must be drinking more than kool aid these days.

Chuck no sane Dem is going to touch the HCR scam.

Dems will spend 99.99% of their time getting their base happy again, or they will be slaughtered in 2010.

.

Should say thanks first to Boo.

realliberaljim, what has Obama done that makes you think he is a progressive? Progressives and Democrats are not the same thing. Sure, Obama uses the rhetoric of progressivism from time to time but he has governed consistently as a conservative. He put virtually no progressives in his Administration. He has taken progressive ideas off the table so they are not debated, even when, as in healthcare, they accorded with those of a majority of Americans. His policies have been continuations and even extensions of those of Bush. So we are not attacking one of our own here. We are not being purists. We do not support Republicans because they do not support our views. Why should we act any differently when Obama and the Democrats not only don’t support us on the issues but seek to undermine us at every turn?

“Coakley Pollster: White House Hurt Us By Not Taking On Wall Street”

Sorry for your loss. Peace and blessings to you and your family.

The most basic way of organizing. Good on you.

I realize blaming the left would only be spin for the veal pen.
“Poor Obama, stabbed in the back by his own party.” =_(

But, if they acutely beveled it…
It would help.

Great Post!

Dems will spend 99.99% of their time getting their base happy again

Are they savvy enough?

I agree they don’t want progressives in control. Being a dark thinker- I think they want progressives in the streets to crack their heads and break their hopes. It’s part of my paranoia when people like Al Gore begin calling for civil disobedience but never do it themselves.I feel this ratcheting up of acceptance to violence against the masses.
It can’t end well.

Econnobuzz, You know cynicism is a lot like smoking shit. Short term it is satisfying, but eventually………….

“The Dems can’t get on the right side of this argument until they get out of bed with the criminals.”

True, then they have to craft a progressive narrative so pissed off voters will have a better sense of what to be FOR instead of just AGAINST. 30 years of right wing message dominance can’t be undone with half-assed liberalism.

When the election of 2008 was over, I wrote a column telling Republicans not to worry, that even though it was a sea change, that the sea is a cruel mistress. Carter came in more than 60 Senators, yet 4 years later, Reagan was elected and GOP took the Senate. The Clinton-Gingrich example, etc.

The same can be said for Democrats. Somewhere along the line, the sea will change again.

To me, the biggest problem with Health Care Reform and other items was they were too “back room.” No hearings on single payer. No hearings on tort reform. No public nothing. Just handing it over and then take it or leave it. Nobody from either side liked that.

Same with the stimulus. One day, there it is.

Democrats are lucky. Better to get this message now than 8 months from now. At least now you have a chance to save the majorities. Unfortunately, you have three people in charge; Pelosi (who is really in charge), Reid and Obama, who don’t listen too well. The ego’s of those three could fill a few stadiums. It has been, and will be, their further downfall.

Because of the sea changing back and forth, the “get rid of the filibuster,” etc. ideas are also pretty bad. If you did get rid of them, you would regret it when the GOP takes over the Senate again which will happen again for sure at some point. It protects you as well as hinders you.

The real message ought to be Rodney King’s, “Can’t we just all get along?” (and look in the mirror before you tell the other side THEY need to get along)

From the Department of No Lessons Learned

Take a minute to read the link in my #135. It’s a good thing PETA doesn’t advocate for the protection of blue dogs — they’re going down big time in November.

eventually…

how long is that going to take. I ask because cynicism is the zeitgeist of Washington.

Cregan, are you a complete MORON? Yes (MODNOTE: NO FLAMING! future comments like this will be moderated)

You must have miss the memo, real progressives did not support Obama HCR scam.

Cregan, I doubt that any Dems 8 months from now will be talking about how great Obama conserverdem ideas are.

Cregan the funniest thing you said was that Pelosi was in charge, if Pelosi was in charge, Scott Brown would have gotten slaughtered.

eventually it kills the soul.

They don’t want progressives in control because that would mean re-ordering the entire power structure of the country.

Use whatever derogatory epithet you like, those pulling the strings, running the show, and raking in the dough will, paraphrasing JFK’s inaugural:

that we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe, in order to assure the survival and the success of Wall Street, K Street & both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue.

And it’s clear now what they mean when they say “We”, Kemosabe.

I agree,

Progressive must understand, and understand this fast, the real danger to the elite is the progressive movement.

govt by corporations for corporations, or govt by banks for banks is thier mantra.

there’s much to be said about sound paraphrasing.

not an accident

thats probably just what gibbs told him. what the hell ELSE is gibbs going to say at this point. go todd heres some inside info, nancy told me its in the bag, report that!

*G*

the MSM garbage about an independent majority raging across the USA is a joke!

is rush limbaugh, glenn beck, the brain trust of independents?

Obama is the tool, that the elites wanted to use to stop and destroy the progressive movement.

the MSM never talks about the real majority of the USA, the progressives.

One more time …. perish the thought…

that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain, that this nation under God shall have a new birth of freedom, and that government of UBS, by AIG, for Goldman Sachs shall not perish from the earth.”

Thanks!! I’m not alone is this coup de’tat of our council meetings. There are several of us moving this forward. Especially, the council member who is using the weakness in our bylaws that allows a council member to spend up to $500 for repairs without a vote.
We decided the most broken thing was our council meetings, they no longer represented the citizens, they strove to alienate them. So, he’s sticking his neck out by approving the food costs and we’ve got his back. Luckily, it’s hard to depose an elected council member. And we can feed 70 people a good meal for $130. This allows families to participate instead of rushing home to cook and get the kids ready for bed. We’re also providing an area for the kids to play while the adults talk.
I might be the Socialist my father dreamed of. An accidental Socialist.

You aren’t serving “BROWNies”,now are you? *G*

Don’t bogart those brownieeeees, my frieeeeend ….

I don’t want to see the filibuster destroyed either. It is a strength in our democracy. I just want them to actually have to put sweat-equity into it when it’s invoked. Filibuster, cool. You get a coalition to stand at the podium for however long your passion can last. If they want to pull a filibuster, they have to work it.

This loss can be a huge whip to the Progressive Caucus. I know I am calling Gwen Moore and Tammy Baldwin here in Wisconsin to say I told you so in a very polite and respectful manner.

Hey, I wish I could!! Then we could have a giggling ” let’s get those fucking sticks out of your asses” moment and we could bond with these nasty Landed Gentry Folks. People who’ve invaded our community like the invasive Green Crab that threatens to wipe out our clam beds.

The Democrat Party is useless, vote Green….nothing will get done, but you’ll feel a lot better about yourself.

We have not come this far without a struggle and I assure you we cannot go further without a struggle.

Here is an amazing paradox! The very employers and politicians and publishers who talk most loudly of class antagonism and the destruction of the American system now undermine that system by this attempt to coerce the votes of the wage earners of this country.It is an old strategy of tyrants to delude their victims into fighting their battles for them.

FDR,Madison Square Garden speech 1936

Greens should have run a candidate in MA, at least then there would have been no illusions as to why Coakley lost.

Sic Semper Tyrannis!

FDR,Madison Square Garden speech 1936

What a fucking deja vu!

good luck with that — vote Green….nothing will get done

Well, maybe you SHOULD consider revising your menu, after all….

I just wouldn’t want those who were in favor of Coakley to be offended by you serving BROWN-ies. *G*

I hear you. Hopey changey isn’t working out too well.

Hey Michael Pollan — don’t let politics poison our food, too.

Especially if they blame the loss on the candidate’s campaign staff all being coakley’ed up.

Night, all. My spouse just walked in from a business trip to Paris. Did you know that all French customs requires of you is a passport to enter the country? Like way back in the old days of United States customs. Before bedwetting fear.
Fuck, we need to get back to being real !!

be well, openhope

Seriously, vote Green. The luster of BO’s election ended quickly for me because I knew this Empire can’t be fixed and that this moment would come too soon. The populace is insane, too insane to maintain a democracy and too many bad decisions have been made in the past 40 years that they could be fixed now. It’s just over.

Now what?

If you’ll notice @ 169, the FDR, Madison Square Garden speech 1936 does not list one currently fashionable social wedge issue, other than class antagonism which in today’s America must remain unspoken.

PLEASE read the ENTIRE speech-its magnificent!

Incidentally, shortly after making this speech, he was re-elected.

Doc of the Day: FDR’s 1936 campaign address at Madison Square …Oct 31, 2008 … President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s October 31, 1936, campaign speech to a cheering audience in New York City’s Madison Square Garden …
blog.milestonedocuments.com/…/doc-of-the-day-fdrs-1936-campaign-address-at-madison-square-garden/ – Cached – Similar

Bon soir!

Apparently some things (like BROWNies) don’t go better with COAKley….

thanks for the linky.

One thing we can take away from the MA election is that the MA electorate is as stupid as your average state in the union. It holds no particular exalted place, as neither does CT. My take home message of the result is twofold; one is that the typical range of choices among candidates is too narow and the other is that the electorate as whole is pathetic.

What you have basically is the worst of all worlds.

The notion that a Republican could be elected after the country has seen the devastation they wrought for 8 years is just incomprehensible unless the population is just absolutely torpid. And the fact that the opposing Democrat was a willing adherent of the monumentally lame Obama school of governance completes the horribly pathetic mess.

You really can no longer keep making excuses for the American population. You can not make a silk purse from a sow’s ear. In a sense as it stands now any progress that is to be made in this country will be attained in spite of the population at large.

Now that Coakley lost out of sheer rejection of Obama is understandable, but to have elected a Republican such as the imbecilic Brown is a reflection of the imbecilic nature of the electorate as well.

However, the outcome of the MA election does provide an opportunity for the left. The Obama WH and the Democratic Congress is reeling and now is the time to exert all possible pressure at our disposal, for our own sake. Now is the time to demand a single payer plan such as an expansion of Medicare and the reigning in and dissolution of big Banks. The pressure from the right is sure to mount and the response from the left must be greater.

As for the electorate at large, it has shown itself incapable of self governance and has become largely irrelevant.

Remember how enamored we were of the fighting spirit of Jim Webb?

“In many ways the campaign in Massachusetts became a referendum not only on health care reform but also on the openness and integrity of our government process. It is vital that we restore the respect of the American people in our system of government and in our leaders. To that end, I believe it would only be fair and prudent that we suspend further votes on health care legislation until Senator-elect Brown is seated,” – Jim Webb (D-VA).

In the end, they all become pod people.

Uh Norske, Audit the Fed happened because it had 313 cosponsors. There are only 258 Dems in the House, and they weren’t the majority of the cosponosrs.

Do the math.

I agree 100%. I breathed a sign of relief when BO won the election and by Feb I was disappointed, by spring I felt that BO was Bush3 and haven’t felt good about any thing since. I see no difference between the parties. BO changed between the 2nd and the 3rd Presidential debate. If I have to be filling out petitions and begging on the phone to get the Dems to do what they campaigned on then what’s it all for? No more door to door and phone banks, etc for elections, I am just too drained.

As we speak the war mongers are adding more troops to send to the never ending war.

Pentagon Decides To Increase Size Of Afghan Army
Posted by Steve Hynd on January 14th, 2010

http://rethinkafghanistan.com/blog/?p=1442

Liberals and progressives stayed home out of disappointment at the neoliberal corporatist Obama admin. that we had hoped would be progressive, and independents expressed their anger at their interests being ignored in favor of the corporate plutocracy by voting for CHANGE, even though the guy they voted for is more part of the elite than the Dems. I think it was a referendum about the strong disappointment in this administration (and most of the Dems. in Congress).

That and that Tiny Tim Geithner has been indicted for criminal malfeasance in the AIG affair…

Never happen because birds of a feather (criminals) stick together

59 is a mo better number:

“Such concessions to members of their caucus by the Democratic leaders are the price of aspiring to be a genuinely national party. The congressional Republicans are unified, all right. But they are reduced to an ideological and regional faction and seem intent on “purifying” the party even more—the forces that backed Conservative Party candidate Doug Hoffman against Democrat Bill Owens in upstate New York vow to run conservative challengers in GOP primaries against alleged moderate apostates. If the Democrats are eventually to increase their majority, the only place to increase it is in districts that are currently red, or at best “purple.” Thus the paradox that a larger Democratic majority, at least in the House, will likely make for a somewhat more conservative one. The Blue Dogs will long be with us.”

- Michael Tomasky

Who Are the Blue Dogs?

http://www.nybooks.com/articles/23432

Thats absurd… Ron Paul is the quiticential anti-fascist. You don’t even know what the word means? Libertarians and progressives have much in common, both believe in freedom and liberty. I suspect you’re in the wrong place NorskeFlametrhower… you want the communists

On the whole it seems like a repudiation of the ‘been there, done that, and don’t go there’, failed R. Rubin economic direction for the left, and the effects on the economy of it’s blatant application of cronyism on Wall Street, for the right along with Independents and Libertarians.

Research shows that chimpanzees, dogs and even cats have a sense of fair treatment. So it should not surprise that when humans sees the corrosive damage of one group or person getting better treatment than the rest, there is backlash. The vote for Brown was not for male-model skills or pickup-driving ability, but against perceived unfairness. And America has become quite uneven in its pie-division, now about on par with China (not exactly the shining star of clean government).

On the plus side, the situation gives a great opportunity for reframing the national debate. The ebbs and flows of American inequality span decades to wane and emerge. We saw slavery abolished, women declassified as chattel, and emergence of a robust middle class. Now we are headed in the direction of greater unfairness, but this is entirely reversible. Americans do not presently distinguish between interest groups, even if some groups work for the greater good (even if we might see them as misguided) and others work for narrow benefits and even self-dealing. The apolitical Nature Conservancy, for example, works rather successfully for a very wide benefit. Others groups work for specific benefits, e.g. PHRMA, sometimes in ways that damage entire legal structures. Eli Lilly’s last minute amendment to the Patriot Act to excuse it from possible thimerosal liability come to mind.

A humming green economy would be healthier and more prosperous than what we have now, but we are not going to get there if those pursuing narrow interests are not consistently called out. We could start by imaging virtual NASCAR jackets onto TV pundits.

While I have not read each and every comment here tonight, let me see if I understand this. Some believe the Brown victory was a repudiation of the current healthcare plan (and other actions/inactions of the Obama administration). If only the HC bill had been progressive Coakley would have won. Really? We live in a country where Fox news pulls more viewers than its next 3 competitors combined. A Nancy Pelosi-type will never win that seat in Arkansas. If you want to go with a take no prisoners approach, fine, as long it is understood that once this HC bill dies, there will be no reform…not this year, or next year or maybe ever, unless you believe that a wave of Dennis Kuciniches will be swept into office in 2010. I was willing to see if we could build on something with the healthcare legislation, as imperfect as it might be. But you cannot build on a dead bill, and that, by all accounts, is what we are left with. As someone who works with people with pre-existing conditions and chronic illnesses, this is truly a shame.

From my hero Bev Harris:

For 10 years, I’ve been watching a trend to manipulate elections through premature “call” of the race by a media outlet. See below for predictions on what may follow a media call for either candidate in Massachusetts.

The media “call” can be manipulated because the public doesn’t know that projected winners come from a system that is not even a governmental source!

…
In fact, the media “calls” elections based on data from just one media outlet — usually a quiet little division of the Associated Press that occupies a little corner somewhere and answers very few questions. Volunteers call in result reports to the corporation. The reports are often inaccurate (see below for examples). The names of these volunteers are not part of the public record. We will never get the list of names for those who will call in the 351 numbers which will result in “calling the election” for Tuesday’s Massachusetts election.
…
ISSUING FALSE NUMBERS TO THE MEDIA TO CREATE A FALSE “CALL”

In the recent controversial NY-23 race, volunteers in multiple wards called in zeroes instead of votes for Conservative candidate Doug Hoffman. There WERE votes, but they called in zero and later said oops. This was not a plausible oops, because the zeroes were not called in randomly for various races, nor did the zeroes spread themselves among different candidates. Doug Hoffman had false zeroes reported while votes were called in for the others.
…
JOURNALISTIC MALPRACTICE

When the media calls an election based on non-governmental verbal information from unnamed volunteers, it displaces legitimate election procedures. Media volunteers can — and HAVE — issued false numbers in order to get the media to call an election for a candidate. The US Congress can — and HAS — installed new voting members of congress before the votes are counted or the contest is determined.

If a media outlet calls the Massachusetts race based on verbal reports from names that are never disclosed, we need to call this what it is: Journalistic malpractice, and a danger to democracy.

If what you see Tuesday night ain’t right, be prepared to speak up. Or shout loudly. It’s our duty.

“It does not take a majority to prevail… but rather an irate, tireless minority, keen on setting brushfires of freedom in the minds of men.” – Samuel Adams (1722-1803)

http://www.gouverneurtimes.com/frontpage-news/10790-watch-for-pre-emptive-maneuver-thru-qcalling-the-raceq-in-ma.html

I have no way of proving it but: Obama lied and Coakley’s (political career) died. Mass was a referendum on Obama. Each broken campaign promise in isolation could be forgiven but the endless stream exposed him for the backstabbing SOB that he really is. People, whether republican or democrat don’t like being lied to. Only those “in love” cannot see it.

Yes this country desperately needs health care reform but Obamacare is not it. Obamacare is health insurance bailout. Its fascism with a mandate (they don’t even have the decency to enact a tax to pay for it instead they want to criminalize failure to purchase a defective product) plain and simple.

From Brad’s Blog

Several supporters of Democrat Martha Coakley were injured during her rush to get to the phone as quickly as possible in order to concede the race for the U.S. Senate in MA to Scott Brown even before AP called the race in favor of the Republican.

That, while some 25% of the precincts had yet to report even how Diebold’s easily-hacked, oft-failed optical-scan machines (which are in violation of federal voting system standards and programmed by a company with a disturbing and criminal background), had even reported their tabulation and, more disturbingly, while 0% of the voters’ cast ballots in Massachusetts had been counted or examined by any human being on the face of the earth.

http://www.bradblog.com/

Do we have any info on size of campaign crowds or which party had the most nw registered voters?

Yes every state needs a madatory paper trail audit. I wish this were and issue because with out the vote we have NOTHING. My state, the victim of diebold corruption finally passed a law requiring it (New Mexico). BTW what is the situation in MASS? I would not put it past the corporatists to rig it either way depending on their plans of course.

At the heart of this… is the fact that 59 senators are in the senate, opposed to 60. Suddenly democrats can’t get anything done. Are these guys pathetic or what? You have the white house, you have the house, you have the senate and you still can’t get the job done? You lost one senator and now Obama’s presidency is OVER?

Democrats are weak and pathetic. Grow some Alan Grayson balls already.

DO they know this? From your lips to their ears. We shall see.

The government is dysfunctional. Unless it calls for handing the treasury over to the banks or starting a war killing innocent civilians somewhere, they are impotent. There are plenty of examples around the world of how to “do” health care, and for a whole lot less money than we currently spend. All were rejected but the despotic amoral criminals in the DC debate clubs. This chart says it all: http://images2.dailykos.com/images/user/6685/healthscatter2.png

I’m not in love; just practical. We never really had a 60-seat majority; Democrats like Bayh, Landrieu, Lincoln et.al were not going to back progressive healthcare reform because they represent conservative states. This is the unintended consequence of the 50-state strategy. We might get Democrats elected, but we have to accept that they aren’t Democrats in the way we like to think of Democrats. After the elections of 2010 are over, do you see a tax being enacted to pay for healthcare? How about after the 2012 elections if say, Mitt Romney or Sarah Palin becomes our next President? This was our shot.

The US “might as well face it we’re addicted to war”.

sing it with the notes from “Addicted to love”. We could use one of those Weird Al variations…

Doing the right thing could be embrace by a majority … bi-partisan majority but it was never about that. It was about ensuring Insurance companies would contribute to Democratic coffers in upcoming elections not doing the right thing. It was about ensuring the trial lawyers would continue to fund the democrats in upcoming campaigns not doing the right thing. Dennis Kucinch said it: its about bailing out the insurance companies that are government owned see off-book investments (see Walter BUrien’s http://cafr1.com/ ) and are insolvent thank to the banking corruption caused but Geithner Sommers and Rubin.. (greenspan too).

I don’t see health care coming to the United State anytime soon. More will become uninsured, medical vacations will become commonplace and eventually even the emergency rooms will turn people away.

At the heart of the problem is neither Republican nor Democrat… its bad character. The people we elect to office are susceptible to bribery and threats of bodily harm. Few are held accountable. The house is Sodom and the Senate is Gomorrah; America has lost its way.

“WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The White House and congressional Democrats have reached a tentative deal to set up a task force that could make it easier for lawmakers to approve tax increases, spending cuts or other unpopular measures needed to reduce budget deficits, lawmakers and aides said on Tuesday.

The proposed commission would enable President Barack Obama to say he is taking steps to reduce record budget deficits over the long term during his State of the Union address next week without having to spell out how he would do so.”

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/01/19/AR2010011902175.html

“Charter Schools: Another Failed Bi-Partisan Policy Obama Is In Love With
by: Paul Rosenberg

A new report, “”Multiple Choice: Charter School Performance in 16 States.”"(pdf) (pdf executive summery / pdf press release), from Stanford University’s Center for Research on Education Outcomes, or CREDO, finds that charter schools significantly underperform overall compared to the traditional public schools they are supposed to improve on–a major embarrassment that will no doubt be ignored, just as all evidence of privatization and corporatization are ignored, especially since Obama’s basketball buddy and Secretary of Education Arne Duncan is a huge charter school booster.”

http://openleft.com/diary/13962/charter-schools-another-failed-bipartisan-policy-obama-is-in-love-with

We need to join with Independents, find common ground, because this government offends our sensibilities.

I know you think that is cute and snarky, but what it really is, is lame and selfish. That is what all of you are. Lame and selfish. Thanks for destroying any hope at all that people who are under and un-insured had. You all make me sick to my stomach. For you, this is some sort of political agenda. For people I know, it was the last best hope of getting anything at all. You sit here and you post about how the president is at fault. He’s not perfect and he had a lot to deal with. You won’t be happy until someone like Brown or Palin is in the White House. Go for it. I now realize that your version of “progressive” is to blow up the base in order to save it. There is nothing to save. You have alienated half of the so called “base” and radicalized the other. You have given Limbaugh and the racists talking points for years to come. It makes me sick to my stomach to think about it. Now, do you think Obama can get anything at all done now? What stupidity. One year. One freakin’ year. Bush took 8 to destroy it, and you gave Obama a few months and then you turned on him. Great. See how progressive the agenda gets now. Just plain stupidity…

you’re that ‘leave my Obama alooooonoooone’ ~~~EDITED IN MODERATION~~~ aren’t you?…..— are you?!

~~~ModNote: Enough with the name calling.~~~

Waterloo. Now what? I thought so. Lots of sound and fury. No answers.

What we’re doing over here has nothing to do with what happened in MA. Perhaps in 2010… but honestly, if the D’s are going to be this weak, this incompetent, this ineffectual, isn’t Obama’s presidency over? So we never really had a chance… we’ve been over here on the left trying to make HCR better.

And letting the corporate wing of the party fuck us in the ass repeatedly and begging for scraps, hardly inspires devotion. Sorry. Give us a reason to support you again Obama. There’s still time.

That is the next question. We from MA, Those who argued for and against voting for Coakley need to define our next steps and take them together?

There are two key fronts we need to define:

1) Messaging. It needs to be clear that this is the consequence of broken promises and denying your base.

2) We need to figure out who we can put up to replace Brown and who should be primaried.

I agree with both your points and I would suggest that the candidate to run vs Brown in 2 years should be a true leftist independent that would caucus witht the Democrats.

In that way he/she would be free to run against the likely continuing misguided Obama policies. Obama is a corporatist to the bone and a cowardly hypocritical one at that and no one should be under any illusions about that. He will hopefully last only one term.

We owe no allegiance to him or the Democrats since their agenda is to the right of the political spectrum. And our aim should be to advocate for the social policies that most of the country wants and elect into office like minded candidates.

My impression of the TV coverage of the race, which mostly I did not watch, was that it was an effort to throw the election to the Republicans. Looks like it worked. Again.

Maybe one of the media watchdog groups could do an analysis of the actual media ‘coverage’ and see if my impression is based on reality.

If so, it would be worth it to document it (for our big court case) since media is not interested in doing that. Sure we know they throw elections, why don’t we do more to prevent it or hold it against them?

It is also part of a criminal conspiracy to commit very serious crimes including treason, terrorism, fraud, murder and war crimes, and should be investigated as such. People who would block such investigations are obviously involved in a huge cover up.

I think it is a fantastic idea, good luck.

And it is not going to be either. You will be wasting your time. Better to start a new party.

They should have run a candidate talking about big picture fiscal conservatism and plans for the creation of new jobs and industries in the big ‘greening’ of our economy. People know we have to get off of coal, oil and nuclear – the politicians talking about how doing that will also create good jobs at home, should have an argument that is a winner.

The Republicans are running on polluting the earth as fast as possible, the Democrats only want to slow the process down, and they do that only as long as they can maintain it’s profitability.

The Greens have to provide a clear vision in the opposite direction, and that vision needs to include jobs and it needs to make sense. Can they do that?

I remember when the paranoids suggested we’d need passports to travel state to state.

Ah those Bush days … memories of home grown terrorism.

We could blame it on the parties and start a new one.

Webb is against the drug war.

The drug war seems to be heavily involved politically in the health care reform issue, but no one is covering that aspect of it that I know of. I wish they would, I suspect many questions would be answered.

Since I know Webb is publicly against the drug war (a rare quality in politicians), I suspect he would take that into consideration in his support (or not) of legislation on health care. I guess I would figure if he doesn’t support it, there is probably a really good reason.

Bush took far less that 8 years to do his damage. The repubs paid for it well before ’06, and wherever you draw the starting line, perhaps Iraq, the Bush years started in a tailspin and ended in a flaming parachute.

So, you want to give Obama more time to finish what he started a year ago? I think we all know pretty much where this is all headed.

I like your spirit!

The problem is more with the way our govt. operates than who gets elected.
Our election system and Judicial systems are broken.
Ray McGovern has asked if the president is afraid of the CIA. Why shouldn’t he be . .as well as the SS who are his guards.In our times, presidents who strayed from the course were killed. The military is notorious for racism.

Right now, many are complaining about the US militarizing Haiti’s relief.Foreign countries can’t get in to help because our troops are using the airports. Amy Goodman and Cynthia McKinny are both reporting on it.It is New Orleans all over again.

We have got to aim our efforts at a place that will do some good. When the economic tsunami hits and it is right around the corner. Progressives need to stand up and be counted. Namomi Klein’s Shock Doctrine can work both ways.

Webb also wants prison reform. He actually cares about the sorry state our prisons are in since privitazation. Prisoners aren’t even being fed properly in some cases.

I respect any rep. who seems to think outside the box. There are precious few.

There is no money for health care. We are too busy fighting wars for oil and power.

Someone has asked how the socialist countries manage to provide health care and WE don’t. They don’t put all their treasury into the military industrial complex.

May I add Health care system to the other two broken systems in the US. Judicial, Election and Health Care. It is not just being uninsured, health care in the US is rated at 37 compared to the world. Not very high up.

When I was young and impressionable, I had hope and was optimistic about the political future of the USA. Now, it is the same as then, only 40 years later. You have a choice in voting between an asshole and a bigger asshole.

Congratulations, Jane. You got just what you wanted: the Senate HCB is dead, dead, dead. Oh, and so is every other legislative agenda item on the Democrats’ list. Hurray for the coming gridlock. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t blame you personally for the Dems loss in Mass. I just think that you would have killed that bill no matter what the cost – it’s just now we know what the cost is. So, again, big congrats to you.