I love Mike Stark as a person even if I don’t always see eye-to-eye with him in the particulars of how goes about his business. Sometimes I cringe a little when he asks certain questions, but I admire his courage and his dedication. Watching him torment the chairman of the Blue Dog Caucus, Mike Ross of Arkansas, isn’t easy. I don’t know if in the end it is even helpful. But I feel some level of satisfaction in knowing that Mike Ross cannot oppose a public option for health care without paying a price for it. Watch.
Stark is correct that we’d all be a lot better off without people like Mike Ross taking up room on our committees. Where are the populist southern Democrats? How did they become a bunch of corporate shills? My guess is that the people of Arkansas stand to gain more from a public option than almost any other state in the union. Does Mike Ross care? No. And that’s the problem.
WalMart is the issue in Arkansas. I assume anything that might be good for regular people, WalMart opposes.
l’m not so certain that walmart is the driving force behind rep. ross nor his blue dog corporate whores…to wit:
Wal-Mart Backs Drive to Make Companies Pay for Health Coverage
granted, this statement doesn’t address the public option, which seems to be the bugaboo with them. especially since they’re still hanging onto the idea…doa…of a trigger mechanism …even rahm backed off that one, and rather quickly at that.
my suspicion is that ross, and his 6 co-conspirators, are in the pockets of the big insurance co.’s and the chamber of commerce.
not to mention that they’re all assholes of the first order.
l’m certainly not defending walmart here, as l have a long standing animosity towards them, and have, honestly, never been in one; and l’m sure they, more likely than not, have an ulterior motive behind this stance.
Why would they oppose a plan that lowers the cost of their insurance? They might be evil but they ain’t stupid.
though l suspect their comment re: “leveling the playing field” is obscuro-speak for driving smaller competitors out of business.
as for the stupid…l can’t imagine any other reason why the other major corporate and manufacturing players…who, btw, have moaned long and loud for years that they’re at a disadvantage to foreign enterprises, in large part because of exorbitant health care costs…and the chambers’ opposition is in direct conflict with what’s obviously an enormous benefit for them.
ah well, it’s all bs posturing on the blue dogs part, and this too shall pass.
Sitting alongside the Rockefeller Republicans – in the dustbin of history…
What happened to Arkansas?
Good question. For much of its history in the first half of the 20th century, Arkansas was a hotbed of populism–the home of widespread support for the New Deal and, also, the home of the Southern Farm Tenants Union.
Too much theory to go into on a saturday afternoon, just suffice it to say–if Michelle Bachman can be elected in “progressive” Minnesota, no reason a sellout like Mike Ross can’t be elected in “populist” Arkansas.
For me three things pop out in this video:
— The total helpless ineptitude of Ross when he’s out of the fawning Big Media environment. How is it that this supposed leader has no way of dealing with a loud guy with a camera and answering his questions? Nobody gave him a script? There’s something deeply wrong with a system that lets inferior beings like Ross come to power — especially when they’re pretending to be Democrats.
— Not being a follower of network news, I have no idea who the “interviewer” moron is. I honestly can’t tell if this was supposed to be a “news” interview or a Ross commercial. It’s startling how clear this clip makes it that there’s not the slightest difference. Either way, the “interviewer” sees it as part of her job description to shield her subject from hard and unscripted questions.
— The sense of entitlement from the “real” media is as amazing as it is disgusting. I’ve always been sympathetic to the problems the traditional media has adjusting to the new tech, but watching thie “reporter” at work makes a strong case that we’d be better off without them.