It is much more than arrogance and greed. It is the holy grail for them, and Obama is their messiah. A health care failure would mean a failed presidency, so they are going to go down swinging rather than cut their losses.

The Democratic party going down in flames would be fun to watch if it were not so scary to think that they might actually still be able to pass something.

It’s just bad for the Insurance Companies who profit from our misery.

care about it enough to do something about it.

I think there are a handful, and, in addition, that it is in Lieberman’s political interest to be the man who kills the bill.

None of them — Obama, Reid, Pelosi, Durbin, the Dem back-benchers — are looking at this with an eye on the short-term political calculus. It’s entirely about the long-term ramifications in their eyes.

Forget the public option. It’s been dead for some time and they’ve known it. It’s a diversion….a red herring. It’s something that’s hung out there as face-saving cover for the Dems with their base (“we tried….we tried so hard”) and a device to simulate legislative moderation and compromise for moderates (“the bill isn’t too radical…we ditched the public option”).

Meanwhile, the rancid meat of the overhaul — the community rating, the pre-existing conditions stuff, the individual mandate, the taxes, the central Health Insurance Exchange, etc. — march on unimpeded and virtually undiscussed.

The end result is a powder-keg inside a Trojan Horse. The net effect of this legislation — whatever the near-term political fallout — will be pouring fuel on the fire that is our healthcare system.

It will not improve it. It will make it worse….and it’s being done intentionally. Because they’ve come to realize that they still have to stoke more pain and suffering before they can hope to sell the magic elixir of single-payer medicine as the cure.

I hate to be so pessimistic….but I’m starting to think that our only hope will be the courts tossing out some key provisions of this legislation.

Anybody who’s giddy about the Dems apparently committing political harikari with this legislation are badly missing the point. It is a kamikaze mission for many of them, yes. But let’s not forget that even kamikaze pilots did what they did for what they considered to be a greater good.

I mean, if Harry goes down to ignominious defeat, who’s Websters going to get to replace his picture next to the word(s): “incompetent doofus”?

Bush has nothing to do with it.

Obama loves bringing up the fact that job losses were occurring in Oct-Nov 08 – while Bush was president….

Hello – numbnuts – the losses were occuring because business people had a good idea that – you the Obama sham WOULD become president!

Job losses are easing now because business people usually do not fire employees right before Christmas. Just wait until January….
it will be bloody. And if this “HealthCare reform” passes – Holy *hit.
Look for One million jobs per month to be slashed.

Unemployment will be 15% and the real rate will be more like 25%
States like California & New York will be shutdown by the summer.
Just keep pushing it over a cliff and let’s see what happens.

call your Republican Senator and tell them to object to any unanimous consent request, unless that request is to allow the Senators to leave town!

and they cannot stop themselves.

They are irrational.

Stubbed my toe on this pile of stupidity.

when they’re not paying to be abused at S & M shops.
Other than that, there’s always government, where everybody gets to play, in a manner of speaking and whether they want to or not.

Scram.

So…

….do you feel lucky? Well…do ya..?

The point of this reform is to set the table for a broader clamoring for more government involvement….twisted as that may sound.

The public appetite for government asserting control over healthcare still isn’t there. But the Dems figure that it will be, if they can make the present system unpleasant enough that more and more people will cry Uncle.

Of course peoples’ costs are going to go up, SkinTight. You don’t cover millions of present uninsured people without somebody having to pay the bill. You don’t require companies to cover people regardless of pre-existing conditions (and at a community rating, no less) without it costing somebody else more.

The thing is: this isn’t an accident. It’s not an “unintended consequence.” It’s entirely intended.

The intent is to get people even more angry at their insurance provider for screwing them….even though the higher costs will be the result of legislation, not “corporate greed.”

You need to ask yourself why Anthony Weiner, one of the most outspoken (honest) proponents of single-payer healthcare, believes that the legislation in the Senate will move us down the path to that vision.

they are demoralizing their base and they still can’t stop hurting themselves over health care.

They are calling down political air strikes on their own folks — in their desperate attempt to get something done.

Which is especially relevant given that a majority of the American people does understand that under ObamaCare, premiums will skyrocket, the country will be bankrupted, and people will die!

Got any more brain-teasers for us, SkinTight? Are there secret codes in those little “o”s you used as bullet points? If I flip my monitor horizontally and peer up from the bottom will I see hilarious hidden messages in your post? If I fold it up like a MAD Fold-In will I see a clever composite picture of Harry Reid hacking away at a piece of legislation in a desperate attempt to get his own party to vote for it? I love puzzle pages!

fall

…is that they’ve put themselves in a no-win situation with healthcare — at least insofar as the next couple elections.

As Chuck Todd tweeted, during the House debate, “Want to stump a GOP strategist: Ask them their preference: health care passes or fails?”

His point was pretty simple. If the Dems fail to get a healthcare reform at all, they’re roasted similar to the way they were in 1994. Not only are independents turned away and Republicans charged up, but the Dem base is miffed by their inaction.

If they do get a bill passed, but not embraced by the left (which seems to be the case with the one the Senate’s going to consider), same situation.

If they get a bill passed that the left likes, then they kiss away the moderates that gave them the Congressional majority to begin with.

Politically, what I think they’re counting on is dividends paid down the road because of increased dependency on their programs.

That may or may not happen. But I think one could say that it was the “success” of LBJ’s Great Society which sowed the seeds of the Reagan Revolution. It never really became the political bonanza that the Democrats expected. We’ve spent a lot more years since 1965 with Republican presidents than Democratic ones.

The flip side of that, though, is that it also sowed the seeds for the situation we find ourselves in today (particularly in the realm of healthcare). Whatever it meant politically, it’s been a burgeoning economic nightmare.

Or are you simply trying to repeat the talking points so many times that you convince yourself?

What Bill Archer tried to get through back in the mid-90s was the single-best reform idea that’s been before Congress.

But it got nowhere. The Dems have long been singularly focused on single-payer healthcare…..they’ll support legislation they think moves us closer to that, and vigorously oppose legislation they think moves us in a different direction.

And they were able to bottle up Archer’s MSA-based reform in the Senate.

Another example of leftist projection. From the article:

A similar sentiment was the driving force for another Connecticut rabbi who has gone public with his opposition to Lieberman’s approach. Rabbi Ron Fish from Congregation Beth El, a Conservative synagogue in Norwalk, decided to write an open letter to the senator. “For him to say that the public option is weighing on his conscience is a misuse of the term ‘conscience,’” Fish said.

Seventy clergy from different faiths have signed Fish’s letter, which states that “anyone who argues that faith and religious tradition should direct our actions, such a person must stand for universal healthcare in America.”

Look particularly at that second sentence again. And remember that Jesse Jackson recently said that anyone black opposing ObamaCare couldn’t call themselves black.

So once again, all this language of liberal’s about pluralism and toleration and openness to new ideas ends at the liberal’s front yard.

Evidently, big tents are advocated only for conservatives.

For the left, it’s follow in lockstep the true doctrine or be excommunicated.

They should get Dodd’s seat in ’10 and splitting CT between an R & I would be a coup in and of itself.

If Harry can spend $300M for a vote, the GOP should be able to bargain for one.

with your assessment.

Hold past 12/31/09

… it really does appear that he has neither the votes nor the momentum. Kudos to the GOP on this one for holding Reid’s feet to his own fire.