I like Chris Van Hollen. I like him a lot, actually. I’m glad he’s honest and that he can articulate a strategy. But his strategy is a strategy for scared little wimps. I don’t give a rat’s ass if the Ben Nelson medicaid deal makes the Senate bill’s ‘brand’ look tarnished with independents. That’s just transactional sausage-making. Own it and love it, and tell the critics to stuff it. And then take it away in reconciliation. It’s the opportunity to tell the voters “I voted for it because I knew I could vote against it later” in perfect Kerryspeak. Everyone in the caucus is afraid of that one little line, so health care reform is essentially dead?
It’s hard to muster a sufficient amount of contempt for the congressional Democrats.
is exactly the kind of thing you should give a rat’s ass about. Barack Obama was elected, largely by independents, to put an end to precisely that kind of bullshit, back room, business-as-usual “transactional sausage making”.
Whatever. He was elected to get big things done, not little micro-management. The Nebraska provision vs. heath care donut. hard choice?
The Nebraska Compromise he would have the entire nation behind him and be ABLE to “get big things done”.
Did Landreau get a treat too?
I love how Ben Nelson tried to deny even asking for his pork. But he asked for it, and he got it. He can live with the consequences of having it stripped out after it passes.
And exactly how would he have done that? What leverage does Obama, or the Dem party generally, have over a member of their caucus who hails from a deeply red state? Push to hard and Nelson becomes a republican, which provides a PR coup for the rethugs and eliminates any influence the Dem caucus ever had over his votes.
is not a red state – blue state issue. The support Obama would get for a government reform crusade would extend beyond party lines. He could shame the entire Congress with a pork-of-the-week award announced in White House press room – hold up Democratic and Republican deals to the light of day and condemn them. That’s the kind of bold move he was elected to make.
That’s “change”.
But Nelson was not going to sign on without it? No Nelson, no Senate bill.
Pork barrel spending is to reform as religion is to family values.
You seem to basically want Obama to become John McCain, and grandstand about bullshit that is microscopic in the grand scheme of things while we need grownups to deal with real issues.
Pork barrel spending is bad, but it’s a distraction meant to simply make the hamsters hit the pedal and see a politician as a “reformer” when he’s really an empty suit.
Don’t fall for the bullshit. I hate Nelson as much as anyone, but if Nelson hadn’t gotten that deal when he had the opportunity, he’d be an awful senator.
Who are the “grownups” to whom you refer? Do the “grownups” favor pork? Does that make Nelson a “grownup”? Does taking pork make him a not awful senator?
No it wouldn’t. The “pork” thing is annoying but trivial — the grist for gotcha politics and shallow journalism. Senators are supposed to get stuff for their state. It may not be in the Constitution, but it’s half their job, like it or not. Your belief that eliminating pork is the change Americans wanted is laughable. Do you really think some senator getting a pez museum for his failing industrial town is what was keeping Americans awake at night when we were in one criminal war and one stupid one, the economy was in freefall, we were on the razor edge of becoming a genuine and literal police state, and our planet was heading toward a state that will no longer support human life? Really?
Check out Sen Proxmire on the Net. Pork of the week was his game. He became a total bore and laughingstock, and wasn’t otherwise that good a senator.
So your idea of “change” is pretty much the same as Obama’s – no change, politics as usual.
My idea of change is change that makes a difference — not obsessing about the horror of some senator getting funding for a university hospital or new transit line in his state. If that’s all you can find to rant about in this failing country you must be a very happy person.
In the annals of sausage making, the Nebraska deal was small fries. (Sorry, mixed my metaphor there.)
They should have cut the Nebraska deal for every state. And what Landrieu got was hardly anything worth hanging up the bill over either.
of what constitutes “small fries” is not shared by the majority of tax-paying citizens.
what? a comment that doesn’t trash Obama? you’re slipping
is a substantive response to my concerns about the first year of the Obama presidency. I get a lot of “why are you criticizing Obama?” and zero “here’s where your concerns are not valid”.
I very much want the President to succeed. So far he hasn’t.
Waaay back, I ran a study on Leadership style, decision-making, policy effectiveness and popularity. Long story short, we compared styles across the Autocratic vs Democratic spectrum when dealing with a contentious, vital issue in hopes of determining the most effective and most popular leadership style.
Long story short, the most effective leadership style was also the most popular: The most effective, appreciated Leader stated his policy preference, then listened to all parties, exhaustively, then went ahead and came to a decision that was exactly the same as the original policy (no need to explain yourself!). This was the only style that actually increased popularity (aka political capital).
The least appreciated leadership style (uses up political capital fastest)? The Obama model. Let the sausage makers make the sausage. People simply come away with the impression that the Leadership was unnecessary, even when it was the Leader who designed and shepherded the entire process. The Leader was almost universally was challenged when the next decision needed to be made. That’s one reason I am afraid of Obama’s choice to go after banking regulation at this moment. He should have picked a gimme that didn’t have a realistic ‘it will cost jobs’ opposition, because opposition will come, just to test his ‘leaderhood’.
And I thought he was an intellectual (wink). I’m sure that dissertation is somewhere in the basements of Berkeley’s psych library..
I forget what your thesis was, but I read it and thought it totally brilliant. I don’t think that was a dissertation though.
The study was conducted ultimately for another fellow’s dissertation – I believe he was a gradu-slave to the great Danny Khaneman, who’s work pretty much explains why the Repugs go so strongly for using Fear to manipulate the people’s decision making: folks’ fear of losing $100 is stronger than their will to gain $100, an idea that extends well into most decisions. In other words, Fear rules Hope. K-Dog won the nobel for this idea, aka Prospect Theory.
If the Dems could use Fear the way they do, they would have the advantage of also providing good policy. I just wouldn’t want to be in the populace if BOTH parties completely disengaged from reality and went full on fear tactics… or do they already?
It’s kind of like the administration’s decision not to publicize the tax cut we all received as a part of the stimulus, because research indicated it would be more effective policy if people didn’t realize they were getting it.
Great policy, but terrible politics in an environment where the opposition party is conducting a scorched earth campaign against everything you do. I’ll bet you that not 1 in 10 Americans know about this.
I bet you they will by November!
Really? You must have health insurance for your loved ones.
I have no idea what that means.
But, yes, my loved ones have health insurance. I do not.
I think he is referring to limitless contempt.
I meant (in my sarcastic way) that the appropriate level of contempt (which I have not attained myself) might be reserved for those who witness their ill friends and family go without care because our gov’t will not protect them from the forces that control the distribution of health care in this country.
I did not mean to imply anything about you, BM. I think anyone that reads this site knows where you stand regarding such matters.
And I hope you, and your loved ones, are, and remain, in good health.
Someone smart agrees with me:
Seeing stuff like this just makes me more crazy pissed and nihilistic these days. All perfectly sane and savvy advice from someone with a resume for winning elections, but what happens to it? It all gets casually dismissed without serious consideration by the DC establishment including the “news” media. If we’re going to call ourselves the “left” or “activists” or anything like that, this is the problem we’ve got to solve instead of blathering on about the latest moronspeak from Palin or Beck or Brown, or the niggling details of some poll or some prediction.
It’s really all we should be talking and thinking about. How do we become the bulldozer that pushes simple commonsense ideas like past the gates of corruption and insanity that have turned our political system into a shrieking madhouse? And why isn’t it happening already?
Steve Benen has hopeful news.
This is going to be the name of my Rock Band
We went from needing 60 out of 60 votes in the Senate. Now we need 50 out of 59. What’s the big freaking problem?
I really can’t understand why someone like Sanders or Merkley isn’t collecting a petition from 50 Senators to get this thing done. Or holding an impassioned press conference to rally people to call and get active. Or doing SOMETHING to show that they are determined to see this pass. If I were a Senator, that’s what I’d be doing.
where are they going to get 50, assuming biden breaks a tie, votes in the senate?
going down the list it’s very likely that, bayh, conrad, dorgan, hagan, landreieu, lincoln, nelson, pryor are probable nos;
begich, mccaskill, and johnson are iffy;
and LIEberman can’t be counted on for anything regardless of what he, reid or anyone else says. so we’re at 47…who can they turn?
it seems to me that once again the house, and particularly the progressive caucus, is being asked to take a leap of faith in regard to the senate’ veracity and willingness to see this through. after all we’ve seen in the senate the past year, would you trust them? l don’t blame them for not wanting to jump off that cliff.
This entire ordeal reminds me of a great West Wing quote from Toby: “This administration doesn’t even need an opposition party, do you know that? We do fine by ourselves.”