No 11-Dimensional Chess

For all you Obamafans out there who were holding out for the health care “reform” bill to be “fixed” in conference:

There will be no conference committee.

House and Senate Democrats intend to bypass traditional procedures when they negotiate a final compromise on health care legislation, officials said Monday, a move that will exclude Republican lawmakers and reduce their ability to delay or force politically troubling votes in both houses.

The unofficial timetable calls for final passage of the measure to remake the nation’s health care system by the time President Barack Obama delivers his State of the Union address, probably in early February.

It’s all stagecraft.

Democratic aides said the final compromise talks would essentially be a three-way negotiation involving top Democrats in the House and Senate and the White House, a structure that gives unusual latitude to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada and Speaker Nancy Pelosi of California.

Not that it matters…the conference committee is only for public consumption anyway.

These officials said there are no plans to appoint a formal House-Senate conference committee, the method Congress most often uses to reconcile differing bills. Under that customary format, a committee chairman is appointed to preside, and other senior lawmakers from both parties and houses participate in typically perfunctory public meetings while the meaningful negotiations occur behind closed doors.

So why not just cut to the chase?

In this case, the plan is to skip the formal meetings, reach an agreement, then have the two houses vote as quickly as possible. A 60-vote Senate majority would be required in advance of final passage.

Exactly how many campaign promises are being broken here? I count at least two, but it’s early and I haven’t had my second cup of coffee.

• Health care reform meetings conducted in front of C-SPAN cameras
• Allow at least three days for bill to be read

How’s that “transparent” government working out for you. Oh, yeah, I know, he’s opened up some records, but that’s shit that’s already happened and we or Congress wouldn’t have any say about it any way.

In the meantime, Democrats are bailing like rats deserting a sinking ship.

Pardon me while I go postal

My friend likes to send out emails to his distribution group regaling us with his take on the politics of the day, local and national. Today’s missive was about the Pelosi torture kerfuffle.

He writes, in part:

We’ve written in detail that the [Obama] campaign had known that they needed to corral the progressive extremists in the House, and many in the Obama orbit are very put off by the Speaker pushing hers, rather than the president’s agenda.  Their agendas are similar, but it is the White House who will drive the train, not the House of Representatives, or the Speaker.
 
What better way to distract than by dumping a load directly onto the Speaker’s lap by leaking memos?  Who better than to be the political assassin than former Congressman and now Chief of Staff, Rahm Emanuel?  The White House was diabolically silent after the Pelosi press conference fiasco, failing to come to her aid or to her defense.
 
The GOP must be looking skyward with all thanks for the Godsend of this Democratic circular firing squad. 
 
I wrote of Obama soon having to have his Gerald Ford moment and now he has no choice but to offer blanket immunity and pardons, and then seem Solomon-like by protecting the best interests of the country and its security.

[...]

It is within the realm of possibilities (certainties?) that Emanuel engineered the selective release of the memos to distract away from the president, and place it all on Pelosi and other Dem members of both houses for their complicity under Bush 43.  Call it a culling the heard (sic), something we also told you last year that Team Obama wanted very much to do.  Remember that Obama hates conflict which is why he changes his mind so often.
 
They all knew of the Pelosi/Harman blood feud and had the patience to wait until the moment was right to capitalize on it.
 
Trust me on this, Emanuel is that smart, that bright, and that devious, and so is the president. I’ve said it a thousand times and I’ll say it again here, both Rahm and Barack are first and foremost, brilliant and very astute politicians.

My answer:

Pardon me while I go postal.
 
If it is as you say about Obama, that this is all gamesmanship, I’m very, very, VERY glad I couldn’t pull the lever for him.
 
And lost, LOST, in all of this bullshit are the actual victims of the torture and the actual CRIMES that were committed. Worse than that, the torture appears to have had one VERY SPECIFIC purpose: to link Iraq to 9/11 and make a phony case for war. And Barack doesn’t want us to look at that? The fucking war he supposedy “opposed?”  I put that in quotes, because aside from an alleged anti-war speech he gave when running for state senate in a liberal anti-war district, of which there are no contemporary news accounts, press releases or actual footage, his record on the war has been dismal, and aside from one vote, identical to the “triangulating” Hillary Clinton. Fuck him and the magical pony he’s promised everyone.
 
We fucking tortured, and it’s all about Nancy now. Even the chair of the DNC is doing the old “look forward, we don’t need no steenkin’ investigations.” In the meantime, you’ve got the Rs cynically (and calculatingly) using this to double dare the Dems to hold an investigation, which will then give them the freedom to scream “PARTISANSHIP WITCH-HUNT!” which heaven forbid we should EVER bring our leaders to account, regardless of what title they held or hold, or what fucking political party they belong to.
 
Oh, and fuck the idea that Barack must some how go all “Solomon” and give blanket immunity and pardons to the whole sorry lot of them. All of this shit has its seeds in the Nixon pardon (just as all the bailouts began with Chrysler, lo these many years ago).
 
Someone stick an fork in America. She’s done.

Have you sent your fax?

From CorrenteWire:

My local single payer activist passes along the following:

It appears that Congressional leaders are being deliberately dismissive of single-payer to the point of ludicrous statements. It’s like they have put their fingers in their ears and are yelling “I can’t hear you, I can’t hear you.” Here they are in all their Congressional member glory:

Baucus a few days ago: “Everything BUT single payer is on the table. Single payer is off the table.”

Pelosi: “In our caucus, over and over again, we hear single payer, single payer, single payer. Well, it’s not going to be a single payer.”

Pelosi’s aide: “Where are the phone calls, e-mails and faxes in support of single-payer? Speaker Pelosi has been in favor of single-payer for a long time. Now make us do it.”

OK. We are up to the challenge. He wants to see the faxes. Let’s break their damn fax machines with the faxes.

You can send a fax right now to Pelosi, Baucus, the aide and the White House.

Send one now and send another in a few minutes. Give them enough faxes that they have to run get more paper (or electronic ink, as the case may be.) Then when they have received all of these, we will do it again. And again. And we will print them out and dump them on Pelosi’s office desk.

So let them see what happens when they ask for faxes. Then maybe they will have to take their fingers out of their ears.

Thank You

Clark Newhall MD JD
Physician & Attorney
Law Office at
57 W. 200 South, Suite 101
Salt Lake City, UT 84101
http://www.cnewhall.com

I sent my first fax just now.

I just did too. What are you waiting for?

By the end of the year…

I’ve got a bad feeling about this. I read this as a lose-lose for the middle class.

But fixing the budget would require a kind of joint political suicide, with Democrats agreeing to trim costly social programs and Republicans acquiescing to a major tax hike. That kind of bargain has eluded previous administrations and seems highly unlikely now, even for a hugely popular new president.

Joint political suicide? I doubt it. They’ll come through just fine. We’ll be the ones sucking it up.

At the moment, discussions are focused on whether to name a special panel to make the difficult decisions that would be required to right the nation’s finances. Key senators in both parties are backing a plan put forward by Conrad and the Budget Committee’s senior Republican, Sen. Judd Gregg (N.H.), that would create a task force of lawmakers and administration officials. The task force would wrestle with the details of Social Security, Medicaid, Medicare and the tax code, and deliver a reform plan to Congress for a vote later this year.

Under the proposal, the task force’s recommendations could not be amended; the House and Senate would be required to accept or reject them without changes or additions, similar to the process lawmakers use to close military bases.

Uh. NO. We’ve got 535 elected representatives. Let them do what we sent them to do, not some “panel” that no American has a say in who is selected. Looks like neither Obama or Pelosi are in favor of this commission, with Pelosi echoing my sentiments.

 In addition to Obama’s apparent reluctance, the idea faces opposition from House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), who has argued that no special group is needed to sort through problems that already are well understood. Instead, Pelosi and some House leaders say the existing congressional committees have the expertise to handle the delicate task of rewriting tax provisions and social programs with large and avid constituencies.

At least one would hope so. Sigh. Gotta get to work. I’ll be back.

Walking and Chewing Bubble Gum

This editorial’s conclusion in the WSJ made me sigh:

Mr. Obama will take office with an enormous amount of goodwill, but good feeling alone won’t bring lending and risk-taking back to the economy. Americans are waiting to see if their President-elect is going to be the class warrior he sometimes was in the campaign, or push a pro-growth agenda that can get cash off the sidelines and moderate the recession.

What the conservatives don’t seem to get, is that it is possible to be a “class warrior” and push a “pro-growth agenda.” The two are not mutually exclusive (see The New Deal). I am in “watch and wait” mode myself, but do not fear a populist agenda and would cheer it!  Much will be telegraphed to us by Obama’s cabinet selections. We’ve got serious problems in this country, and they won’t be solved by one side screaming “Class Warfare” every time the policy doesn’t match their deregulatory delusions.

My sincere “hope” is that Obama doesn’t listen to the Timid Triangulators (Anglachel).  I’m with Paul Krugman:

Right now, many commentators are urging Mr. Obama to think small. Some make the case on political grounds: America, they say, is still a conservative country, and voters will punish Democrats if they move to the left. Others say that the financial and economic crisis leaves no room for action on, say, health care reform.

Let’s hope that Mr. Obama has the good sense to ignore this advice.

I also hope he ignores Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid who are echoing the same sentiments. If change is indeed what this country voted for, and it’s my firm belief they did, then let’s roll our sleeves up and do it. Let’s start with Health Care and Infrastructure. Strike now, while the iron is hot, and let’s just get Single Payer done (Medicare for All). Fight for it Barack and I’ll have your back every inch of the way. It’s been my burning passion since I was twelve, and we’ve just got to get rid of employer provided health insurance. It’s a burden on the employer and an burden on the employee. And let’s put people back to work.

I think the National Service program is a nice idea, but our pressing needs are jobs, health care and Iraq. Let’s not skitter of in twelve different directions. Oh, and can we please bring back respect for science?

I’m in the same position as my friend who said to me the other night that she is hanging all her hopes on Obama doing the right thing. She, like me, opposed his election. But here we are. He is our next President. We’ve got a greater Democratic majority in the House than the Republicans ever did when they were shoving their ideology down our throats. It’s time to do some major housekeeping and get some good stuff done for the people of this country.

I don’t want Obama to fail.

Olbermann nails it again

I will be watching the vote in the Senate and the House. Who I will support in the caucus is in the balance. Time to put up or shut up. Digby says it well:

This one’s easy for the Presidential candidates, if not the pants-wetting Red State moderates. This occupation is the most important issue to Democratic voters and things aren’t going to suddenly “turn around” before the election. It’s a disaster that will only get worse. I don’t know what it’s going to take to get the Democratic leadership to internalize that basic fact. On both a moral and practical basis, voting to continue this war on Bush’s terms is just plain wrong.

Here’s Keith: