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H R 3962 was a compromise of a compromise within a compromise, accepted on the premise that it was a step in the right direction.
What is it now? Is it a step in the right direction? No fucking way it is.
(Jane, if you have time to read this diary, please take it as it’s intended: as constructive criticism. I assure you that you have a whole lot of admirers around here.)
The Democratic leadership brought us to water, but we got there only to find that the water had been poisoned just before they let us drink from it.
Jane’s initial response Saturday night after H R 3962 passed was to organize some kind of single payer project:
Anyone wants to volunteer to work tomorrow on a single payer project, email me at firedoglake AT gmail DOT com.
I think – and others who responded to her on that thread thought – that she felt Saturday night the way I still felt Monday morning when I wrote this here:
The general consensus around here – though not unanimous consensus – was that H R 3962 would have been somewhat acceptable. Not great. Very flawed. But somewhat acceptable.
Then we got betrayed even on this compromise.
And here:
We were betrayed. The country lost. We have to shout as loudly as possible that the Democratic Party leadership betrayed us all.
Pelosi cannot be allowed to solidify her narrative of having achieved a victory.
Don’t take a sucker punch lying down. Fight back!
That’s what I was saying.
Based on a variety of arguments, that’s what so many of us were and still are saying.
But, on further reflection, Jane started saying things like this:
One of the reasons nobody wants to organize single payer supporters is because its strongest adherents attach themselves to extreme, impossible solutions and then attack anyone who doesn’t follow them. It makes it impossible to do anything constructive, and so nobody even tries.
We’re trying to change that, and channel all that energy into tactics that have a chance of succeeding.
She also got a bit defensive:
We never took on the choice issue. So unless I published a post I’ve completely blacked out on, you’ll have to provide a link.
And even more than a bit defensive:
What are you talking about “we failed?” We didn’t whip for that. I’m sure if you read the entire thousand plus pages of the bill you’d find many things you didn’t like, but forcing responsibility for that onto us is really a bit of a stretch.
Though I’m flattered at the idea that you think we’re that all-powerful. I’ll have to let the mods know, they’ll be delighted to know they’re “masters of the universe.”
First, I don’t recall ever placing responsibility for not whipping for that on Jane or FDL.
Second, Jane was arguing that what we got was good enough because we got what we whipped for, however badly H R 3962 overall might have been ruined by means of the Stupak Amendment.
No, I say. Because of the passage of the Stupak Amendment, what we got in H R 3962 might just be worse than what little good we might still get from it.
Look, I trust Jane. I want to follow her lead exactly because she is, frankly, amazing. Beyond her obvious intelligence, endless knowledge and general talent, she’s got tremendous experience of a kind that I most likely will never have.
So, I want to help as she works toward achieving great things.
But there’s one problem. Jane wants to point out that she did a lot and that she made a lot of good moves. She did. Many will disagree with me, but I believe she was right to stake out the position she did early on and to pursue it full strength.
And now she wants to defend what she thinks is still defendable in H R 3962.
But H R 3962, that compromise of a compromise within a compromise (accepted on the premise that it was a step in the right direction) is no longer defendable. Sometimes you can do everything right and still get sucker punched or knifed in the back or whatever and suffer a serious setback. I’ve never blamed Jane for that, but that’s what happened here.
Let me try to put the whole problem this way: Jane has said many times that an opt-out is immoral. How is what we now have – H R 3962 that requires millions of Americans to voluntarily surrender their rights in a matter of conscience or, well, opt-out – any different? How is it any less immoral?
Or, I can put this whole thing another way, as I have here:
Democratic leaders are now between a rock and a hard place. As of now, it looks like they can’t pass health care reform and get the stupak out of it. So, until they find a way out, they either lose votes because health care reform fails or they lose votes because they will have passes, as you [libbyliberal] put it (here), legislation that is “inhumane and unconstitutional” and that promotes “a double standard of freedom according to degree of wealth” in order to get health care reform.
The politics aside, it’s just plain immoral to accept something so rotten just to say you got something (that was spoiled before you got it).
Or I can put it a third way, which I think really brings this whole debate home and which I very much would like to call to Jane’s attention as she thinks this through going forward:
Far too many Americans will never accept the mess that the Democratic leadership in the House created in this fight for health care reform. Right now, everyone seems to be in shock or disbelief or denial about what happened, but this is an undeniable truth, so let me repeat myself:
Far too many Americans will never accept the mess that the Democratic leadership in the House created in this fight for health care reform.
Just for one example: Cbl2 sent me a link to a “thank you” rally that Organizing for America put together for Rep. Jim Cooper last night. Yup, they wanted to fucking thank the weasel who tried yet again to have it both ways, this time by giving a lemon to his constituents by voting Yea on H R 3962 just after he helped ruin it by voting Yea on the Stupak Amendment.
I couldn’t believe that OFA would call on anyone to go thank Rep. Jim Cooper at the airport in Nashville for his “hard work” on health care reform, but I can definitely believe how bad that idea turned out to be. Once they realized what Cooper would actually be facing because he is a shameless weasel, they canceled the event.
A storm is coming.
Even if you listen carefully, you can’t really hear it just yet among the leaders of netroots activists.
No one seems to know exactly which position to take, so they’re retreating to the safest positions they can find.
But trust your own inner voice. It’s yelling louder than a primal scream from the depths of your soul.
What you’re hearing is rage.
How long do you think it will be before that rage shoots out from the blogosphere – from good-old-fashioned grassroots activism – onto anyone in the Democratic Caucus in the House and Senate – onto any Democrat in the political arena anywhere – who is on the wrong side of women’s reproductive rights in a matter of conscience?
The Democratic leadership has stupidly put itself into a deep hole. And they know it. Now, either health care will get derailed if they can’t work out this mess or they will pass a shadow of real health care reform with all the shit stuck into it that millions of Americans will ever accept.
As it stands now, they’re going to lose one way or they’re going to lose the other.
So, now is not a time to take a defensive stand saying that something is better than nothing, no matter how much we have to give up to get those little crumbs.
It’s a time to find the right position based on where this fight will be going into 2010.
128 Comments
Why waste all this energy?
Why not direct all energy toward taking out bad Dems, like Harry Reid.
I’d give all I could toward his defeat, even if it meant electing a Republican.
Yes, I love that cute little pixie look she has going on. :)
If Jane wants to take on Reid, I’d be in. He’s vulnerable. Wonder if she has any primary challengers in mind.
I’d also be in for taking the fight to Blanche Lincoln.
Pelosi reportedly said, if you can trust the sources, that she wanted a health care reform bill to pass and that “she’s prepared to lose seats in 2010 if that’s what it takes.”
If true, she knew a storm was coming days before the voting finally happened.
I wouldn’t mind going after Reps like Jim Cooper and Mike Ross. Again, I’d rather try to primary them out.
My point is that she needs to move us forward based on what happened, and not act like it was ok, when it was not.
Not clear enough in the diary?
I thought you were plenty clear.
As it stands this is nothing but a 20% Corporate Welfare Tax and repeal of Roe v. Wade.
It is worse than nothing.
I respect people who try to engage in constructive dialogue, and do my best to respond. But I won’t respond to people who misrepresent what I say, and this does.
Jane, not trying to attack you here. Please read to the end of the post.
Btw, it’s always easy to pick out some piece, claim it’s not accurate, and dismiss the whole thing.
Unfortunately, this
is what you were saying Monday morning, at least that’s how I read what you wrote all over this thread (and I’m far from the only one who read what you wrote that way).
How about this here:
Please try to understand that I’m on your side. My goal isn’t for fight you all over another thread, but to point out an undeniable truth:
Won’t happen. Not for a weak po. No way.
Shouldn’t even need to be said.
A response to appearance rather than ideas?
Strange comment from one who is sooo concerned about sexism and misogyny, even lecturing us and helpfully pointing out where others fall down on the job here.
The narcissism in this diary is stupendous.
The author’s contributions to health care discussions are beginning to be eclipsed by the attention-seeking.
What are you doing?
“See me! Appeal to me! Respond to me! God-dammit, Jane, why won’t you buy me a cup of coffee and hear me out? C’mon everybody, demand the floor so we can all beat this horse even deader!”
Wow, I’ve received ad hominem attacks on occassion over the years from people who have nothing better to throw at me, but I’ve never been called narcissistic before in my entire life. Fun experience. Thanks for that.
Do you have anything of substance worth saying? I’m guessing not so much. You’ve missed the point of the diary, so why don’t you just step aside and let Jane respond for herself if she cares to.
Jane, I do sincerely believe you’re making a miscalculation by hitching your wagon to what the failed and immoral leaders of the Democratic Party are allowing to happen in the name of achieving a fake win. If they go forward with this as is, they’re going down. Please don’t go with them and go on the record accepting such an immoral position, to boot.
it’s an invitation to a discussion and an opinion.
imo you are way out of line with the personal attacks
if there’s a misunderstanding, i bet it’s an innocent one. if so, a correction or even just a link could clear it up.
I am not attacking you. If I were, there would be no mistaking it. But you are so frenzied about this debate that I am surprised that you can breathe. You are practicing the politics of fission, so determined to whittle the one tree you CAN see well beyond a toothpick into its component atoms, and you are demanding that people who engage you do the same. Not buying.
Beat it to death, expecting those who will engage you to accept your premise, and doing it in flurries like you have in the last few days – and enlisting others to pound away at it is just pouring silly on top of that frenzy. This feels like ‘over-caffeination’ all dressed up as concern.
Years ago, a girlfriend was pounding away at me about something or other, and after several hours of it, I asked her flatly, “Why are you bitching me out for this?”
Her reply was, “Are you calling me a bitch?”
If you think me calling your screeds ‘narcissistic” is an attack on you as a person, you would be missing the point, and missing it in very bad faith.
Maybe that is not what you meant; so,your “narcissistic” remark is very unclear. And, I know. I do not have a dog in this fight….just an opinion.
Hi Knox, I didn’t interpret Jane in the way you did. My interpretation is that she clearly expressed her disapproval and dismay over the House bill. I don’t think she has ever backed off or softened that position. What she has done is to address the question of what it is we ought to do now, and in that connection she’s said:
And:
And:
And:
Clearly, this is a position that says that we should try to improve the bill by trying to get a PO into the Senate bill, and that we should not try to kill it because, in her view, it is not possible to do so, given the Administration’s determination to get any old bill out of the Senate.
Here, I strongly disagreed with and critiqued Jane’s argument on grounds that I don’t think she is right about killing the bill. She may be right and I may be wrong about that, but our disagreement is about that assessment, not about the desirability of killing the bill which, above, she clearly indicates she is for, if it could be done. In short, I don’t think there is anything wrong with Jane’s logic; only with her assessment that we can’t increase the likelihood of killing the bill with our activism.
Finally, Knox, I also don’t agree with you when you say:
My view is that she, along with the progressives in the veal pen, including those at HCAN made a serious strategic error, which is largely responsible for the situation in which we find ourselves today. That error was to make the PO our strategic goal, rather than Medicare for All, single-payer. I’ve argued for the position that advocacy of the PO was a strategic error in many diaries beginning months ago, see for example here, and I’ve related this critique to Jane’s advocacy earlier today.
Having said all that Knox, I also want to say that I agree with your characterization of the present House bill as immoral. Jane has characterized state-opt-outs as immoral, and I agree. Both of you agree I think, and so do I, that this bill is immoral because of its violation of reproductive choice. I also think, however, and I don’t understand why you and Jane appear not ti to share this view, that this bill is immoral because of the fatalities due to lack of insurance that it leaves on the table, both in the “band-aid period” of the first 3.5 years, and thereafter, as well as the bankruptcies and home foreclosures that it continues to allow to exist for the sake of keeping intact and even extending the scope of the present insurance industry.
My reasoning in favor of the view that the bill is immoral for these reasons is here, here, here, and here. Frankly, I don’t understand why people consider the bill immoral for the reasons that they do (which I share) while they don’t appear to consider the bill immoral for the reasons, I’ve cited.
Could it possibly be that to do so, would suggest that the only thing to do at this point at this point is to work to kill this bill even if by some miracle the final bill contains no opt-outs and also no Stupak, but only “normal” Hyde Amendment-type language?
For the record, newtonusr, I thought you were being personal too, and unjustifiably so. I may disagree with Knox’s particular construal of Jane’s views, but I certainly don’t think she’s exhibiting narcissism here. She ust thinks Jane, made a mistake. So do I, even if it’s a different one than Knox points to.
About 5-10% of my comments are apolitical.
Do you know what an argumentum ad hominem is? I really don’t mean to be rude on this point, but your comment @ 8 is classic ad hominem, intended to do nothing but dismiss me as a way of avoiding the substance of what I wrote in the diary. No point in debating it. Let’s just let others be the judge on this point.
Oh, please, enlighten me on what I’m not seeing here. While you’re at it, please do defend a position that argues any version of the following: we should accept H R 3962 now that it’s being turned into bs legislation dressed up as health care reform while forcing millions of Americans to choose between their reproductive rights and getting affordable health insurance.
My point is simple. First, have you noticed that after the self-congratulatory bs late Saturday night, the Democratic leadership has been largely silent about what happened? Sunday morning, I wrote H.R. 3962: Everybody won. (And nobody did.) because I was concerned that the DCCC would try to take victory laps, collecting contributions and calling their moral failure as a win. As it turned out, no concern was necessary. In an attempt to achieve a “win” at all costs, they screwed themselves into a deep hole. In this diary, there’s a link to a “thank you” event that was supposed to happen not far from where I live for one of the bigger weasels in what happened in the House, but had to be canceled.
Excuse me for reproducing a comment from another thread, but this is my comment to Jane’s Why the Democrats Can’t Pass A Bill Without a Public Option, By the Numbers (quote w/in comment is from Jane’s post):
The political problem that they are now quietly trying to pretend doesn’t exist is tied to the fact that what they did was immoral. Jane points it out explicitly in her post. I’m sorry you don’t get the immorality of what the failed leaders of the Democratic Party have done. They’re trying to let the whole thing quiet down, but we have to demand that they fix it or resign as failed leaders of the Congress. At the very least, we can’t make excuses for it as we wait for them to fix it or lose the midterms next year.
So, how about the politics for Jane if she doesn’t broaden her view and listen to her own conscience? She shouted loudly and repeatedly about the immorality of an opt-out provision. There are logical inconsistencies here that will not turn out well if she continues to try to side-step and dismiss and get defensive and even obfuscate instead of recognizing the inconsistencies and get on the right side.
From what I can see, she’s surrendering moral high ground and she’ll reduce herself to a small circle of people like you rather than win people to join her in advancing her goals.
Uh, would this be the latest version of “bloggers need to take off their pajamas, get dressed,” and take a look at the real world?
Now those who think they’re on the “inside” (though they’re just enjoying the view from the veal pen) think they can call the rest of us over-caffeinated narcissists?
Are you saying that Jane has made it her mission in life to call out others for their errors, but can’t take being called out herself?
Crikey. Been gone for a while, and looks as though we’re picking up where we left off earlier today. Can’t we all just get along? /s
Unfortunately, the train has left the station and it will get more cumbersome and less palitable when it rushes out of the Senate. I have always thought we need to kill the bill or pare it down to just deal with recision, pre-exisitng conditions, etc. Then we can come back and work on a strong PO without having to worry with denying people some truly good reforms. The engine for PO legislation could then be wrapped around the approach to the elections in 2010. I have a feeling that many of the BlueDogs would start to come around once we started putting some real pressure on them in their districts. And the Senate will just have to go through reconciliation, which is the issue to hit Harry Reid with in his re-election attempt. Rushing into a comprehensive bill now will only benefit Obama and the Bluedogs, and probably the Republicans. I say slow it down. Those who need it will them come to us.
Nothing personal to anyone, but the efforts should be to find a way to replace anyone and everyone in The Congress no matter which party as fast as possible.
Neither party or any person in it has done the people, the country, or our future any good.
As we can see with healthcare we will get what they want to give us not what we want or need, even if it’s to be paid for with our money.
Knox, you are way out of line to say that Jane is surrendering the moral high ground. You have beaten her about the head and shoulders this entire day about this and she has answered you every time, carefully, politely, and thoroughly. You cannot say that she is both right and wrong….. that doesn’t make sense. Please would you not be so strident. We like to talk here but I for one don’t take kindly to you smacking Jane.
You pulled out Jane’s words from some of the defensiveness and, honestly, you’re right. Reduced to the quotes you’ve chosen, her assessment makes sense. I’ve been trying to figure out why the debate on that thread was so heated. The best I could figure was that Jane assessed the situation between Saturday night and Monday morning, formulated a position, and started defending that position before she clearly told us what it was. As a result, I thought, many people seemed confused. I obviously was.
Putting aside the fact that you put Jane in the same category here with hcan, I do think she was right. She set a goal and so far, is achieving it, despite the sucker punch of the stupak amendment. What I’m saying is that the stand Jane chose was a strategic position that was acceptable right up until the inclusion of the stupak amendment. That’s where I now find myself disagreeing with Jane, though I think it would be more accurate to say that I agree with her, and have to accept that she believes that there’s not much that can be done about it.
Having said that, I agree with you about Medicare for All as an ultimate goal and about the problems in the “band-aid period” and beyond. Again, where I agree with Jane is that there were always going to be things in the legislation that we weren’t going to like. I’m guessing that she would argue that, had she started with Medicare for All, we would have ended up with something more or less like what we got anyway, including the stupak sucker punch.
Thanks for hearing me out and clarifying some things for me, lets.
Getting there!
Sorry I upset you. Opening this discussion has helped me a lot, actually. Hope it helped a few others, too.
Jane, I’m sorry I was a dick at times as I tried to figure this out. My concerns were sincere, and I sincerely apologize.
Don’t think it has helped. I think it has caused problems – perhaps you like stirring the pot.
No. I like understanding.
There’s something in the nature of this medium and in activism-via-blog generally that confuses things sometimes and that creates frustration for someone like me who wants to know that I’m doing things that contribute to the larger direction of FDL actions.
Regarding this topic, I think there were others who were confused along the same lines I was since Saturday night and, if so, maybe this helped at least one of them.
I am sorry your opinion of me has changed because of this, but I’m not sorry I went through the process of working this out.
So when someone else is sexist, in your eyes that is cause for scorching them, but you don’t like it when you get called out for the same thing.
Heated? :)
Nah.
OK, for the record, and for clarity, I have avoided the actual substance of the issue – I claim that this diary is narcissistic, I have no clue as to your personal status, and I regard this piece as a continuation of comments that you have generated since Saturday night’s vote.
For days now we have been treated to stuff like this:
and this:
and this:
and this, to Rayne:
and this:
and this beauty:
and Good Christ, the finale, to NorskeFlamethrower:
Except this wasn’t over the last few days – this was today… In one thread. This thread. I think this piece is a attempt to both sooth your prior rhetoric on the issue, and reinforce your need to pound away at someone, anyone, for the defeat WE ALL SHARE.
So let me get this straight – when you don’t have instructions, and specifically when you don’t get email replies, you tantrum.
When imagination fails you (as it has failed me many times during this HC fight), you proclaim that someone is “jockeying for a position in the blame game“.
When you can’t get the reply you like, you act like you have been pushed out to sea: “I’ll thank you for having given me the opportunity to express myself here as long as I have and be on my way.”
When confronted with an incontrovertible fact, you go passive-aggressve: “I strongly advise you all to let go of this defensiveness and regroup, or give up. Do as you please.”
When you are outmatched in effort, this is what you bring: “This circular firing squad is pointless. Time to move on.”
The last one – well, it’s a stand-alone gem: “Thank you. I want you to know that I tried hard to communicate privately. totally ignored, but didn’t stop. enough.”
You are carping, you are assessing blame, you are pointing fingers, you are defensive when cornered, you are threatening to take your ball and go home, and you are opening up the possibility that the leadership you so crave is perhaps lacking.
I have just reread the Kucinich thread again. I suggest you reread it as well.
You asked the question,
I can offer a partial answer – when we all decide that there was one good fight worth fighting for ourselves – whether it is called the PO, or Single-Payer, or Medicare For All, or whatever iteration of health care reform we think is appropriate for the times and the circumstances – and force our elected representatives into a position where it is no longer in their interests to ignore the enormous public opinion advantage we have, in spite of corporate dollars. I am arguing that there was, given everything but an ability to see into the future – no practical strategy BUT the one I chose for myself, and I will not ever cast blame on anyone for having chosen the way I did.
I will not ask that Single-Payer advocates apologize for their preference, nor will I castigate anyone for choosing the Public Option. But I draw the line at “stand up and take your medicine, because after you do, we can all move forward.” That would be self-indulgent, and narcissistic, and just stupid of me, and I will not do it. You are apparently satisfied only if you exact some culpability for a collective defeat, and it is the height of ingratitude.
Exactly. Agree only to elimination of the abominations this year and come back next year for the good stuff, which if we’re going for reconciliation anyway, may as well be expanding Medicare for everyone. Then if we can’t get 50 + 1 for that we’re still in a good position to compromise on a Hacker-type PO without an exchange, with subsidies, but no mandates. If we implement that immediately the insurance companies’ tongues will be hanging out for an exchange and mandates after the Congressional elections, and the very quick implementation of both t avoid everyone migrating to the PO.
Sure Knox, glad I brought you back into closer agreement with Jane, and Irespect your view that going for the PO was the right strategic position to take at least up till now, but even though I respect this view I think the facts of what has happened speak very loudly against the idea that the PO was the right strategy.
BTW, this is the second time that Dems have backed off a Medicare for All strategy and adopted a more convoluted middle way solution. The Clinton Administration did the same thing with Hillarycare, and it also failed largely because it was too complex to understand and market well against the insurance company PR machine. On the other hand national health insurance hasn’t been pushed by a Democratic Administration for 60 years, since Harry Truman tried it in 1948. Based on this sample of one, Dems have been scared to try it again. But now we have a sample of two suggesting that the KISS approach to universal coverage may be best. Is it really so unreasonable to think that this is the best approach to reset to now?
Also, I note that in your reply, you really haven’t addressed the questions I raised in this last part of it:
Also, in raising this question, I’m also suggesting another reason why the PO strategy was a bad one, and that is that almost from the beginning of the legislative process, PO bills that were put forward by the House and Senate were immoral because none of them solved the fatalties, bankruptcies and foreclosure problems, three problems that very other major industrial democracy has already solved. What say you to these questions and my conclusion about the immorality of all the current PO bills?
Twain, what “problems” did Knox’s dissent cause?
newtonusr, Yours is a very good post and a very good argument, but I can’t fault Knox for trying to evaluate what is going on and which paths forward were good ones and which were not so good. This is how we all learn, and I personally wasn’t offended by Knox’s effort at all, even though I think she mis-interpreted Jane.
For myself, I think evaluation is very important, because there will be a next time, and the people who’ve selected middle-way strategies in 1993 – 1994 and again in 2009 need to acknowledge that these strategies have failed, and that their failure may not be due to tactical difficulties, but to strategic error. Perhaps this is not the case, but we all need to hear the reasons why not, especially since those who have followed the middle-way of the PO were so sure that this was the best strategy we could use for hcr, and did all they could do to marginalize single-payer advocates along the way.
I don’t care what you think about what I was attempting to do, as you proved sufficiently enough in this very thread that you don’t get what’s immoral about H R 3962 as it was passed. I’m sorry you don’t understand it, but that’s not my problem.
Then there’s this:
Actually, it was the other way around. The concern over what I was seeing since Saturday came out first, and then I stupidly threw out the other problem. I was frustrated by what happened in the House and that frustration grew when I mistakenly thought Jane might be brushing off a serious moral issue.
You selectively left things out, for example:
What came immediately after that in the very comment? I’ll side-step the “outmatched in effort” comment, just because Jane’s work and my volunteer work are apples and oranges.
Actually, you left a lot out from that thread, and you have no clue about the emails I sent in which I asked for simple ‘go’ or ‘stop’ instructions.
Look, I’ve tried to find directions on my own. Ask masaccio what I did in reaction to his piece about Rep. Melissa Bean a few weeks back re preemption and regulation of the finanical services industry. Click on my name at the top of this diary. I’ve written three diaries on Rep. Jim Cooper and have already started a fourth. All I would like – and all I asked for – was to know if this was a direction I should continue to work in. If the answer was no, I would have pursued the Rob Miller angle, or another angle. Here ya go: 2 or 3 fucking letters – n o or y e s – and click on “send,” and not only am I saved hours and days and weeks of work in a wrong direction, but I can use my energy toward something that might matter more for FDL actions. I didn’t understand that that was too much to ask. Sorry.
Whatever, back to the issue of H R 3962 and stupak.
My point has been to move forward, not to assess blame. Frankly, it looked like that was what Jane was doing, pointing fingers at PP, for example.
My entire point has been to point out that it would not be wise to try to wash over what was shit in what happened Saturday night. Frankly, that’s what it looked to me like Jane was doing, though ‘lets’ helped me make better sense of what she was saying and what I was not understanding.
You say:
No. I’ve been most clear, saying things like this at the end of the diary above:
I’ll admit that I was wrong, at least partially.
I’ve thanked those who should be thanked and apologized to those to whom I am sincerely sorry.
As for you:
I’ll just moderate myself and not write anymore, saving the mod the effort of removing it.
Funny thing is, I’ve agreed largely with Jane’s positions and approach right up until I saw what I thought was an effort on her part to wash over the magnitude of a serious moral issue starting in the Kucinich thread Monday morning. Because I didn’t fully understand what she was saying, it seemed too much to accept to me.
Your comment @ 14 above really helped. Then I went away from here for a while to look at that thread again and at a few other threads. You really helped me make better sense of Jane’s position.
You wrote that I didn’t respond to you on things like:
I responded, though briefly, at the end above @ 22:
I’d write more, but I’m so tired I don’t know how I’ve managed to write as much as I have up to now.
You can say this about Jane, who is working nearly around the clock on the health bill?
Wrong, wrong, wrong. And insulting. If public option is in this bill at the end, it is because of her. Everybody else gave it up as hopeless months ago, but she turned it around.
Just looked at more of what you’ve written and @ 14 and at my far too brief response @ 22. I’m sorry it was so brief. I’d write more now, but am falling over! Tomorrow. g’nite!
Knox, coming late to your brave thread. I confessed to being an intuiter/feeler and when I communicate it is trusting some gut and emotional sensibility within and it is part of my moral compass that I rely on and am willing to share about.
Some appreciate it, it drives others with a different temperament up the wall at times. So we are all different. I am grateful as a single payer advocate this discussion is happening. Healthy for me and imho healthy for the site’s community.
I think we all share tremendous frustration right now and are processing that. I try to talk about my concerns over health care reform with acquaintances and friends IRL and there is a resistance to dealing with it that saddens me. So we got a gutless Congress and a remote Prez and what David Brooks calls a mere 20% of progressives that Obama is wise to ignore. Grrrrrrr. Except we progressives are the ones who are awake for all this. And though we are a minority in this country, with every betrayal and minimization of a human need, we as a group become sadder and angrier but wiser too in a way, and for me… resolved to dedicate myself to fighting for justice and social empathy.
I think you are right. There is anger. And I think we need our passion on this, our moral outrage.
I think we all bring important stuff to the table on this site. Some see the forest better than the trees, some see the trees clearly within the forest. Some are thinkers, some feelers. Some newbies. Some oldtimers. Some occasional visitors, some daily.
The pool of shares and knowledge is awesome. The depth of communication is awesome. The intelligence and wit and occasional whammying and honesty are compelling and educational and sometimes a bit wounding. So it goes. It is vital and why we are here. I am grateful.
And there is cronyism and there are subsets of cronyism. But as long as they don’t calicify to dissuade dialogue it is healthy.
So, Jane, I thank you for the site. Knox, I thank you for the thread.
And I will end my Pollyannaishness for now.
Tell us then how the push for Single-Payer figures into the current political environment.
Infrastructure, Executive and Legislative branch support, the ability to counter massive corporate forces, inherent knowledge of the voting and/or activist public, etc.
Setting aside the “fess-up and we’ll go forward together, but only if you fess-up” mantra, explain the mechanism.
In arguing the PO versus Single-Payer with you and Lambert in particular, I have asked this question with more specificity, and been met with stony silence. And let there be no misunderstanding about this – in my opinion, while Single-Payer is THE answer, just like ending wars and cleaning up the planet and finding a way to feed the world are not just laudable and not just defensible, but in my opinion mandatory… how?
Admiration for Dennis Kucinich and Bernie Sanders (who I truly admire) is fine if you watch debates and see them stumping on television. But the legislature we have – where it takes Democrats to really scuttle a health care initiative with style – who, and how?
When the President wants it, and I mean really wants it, it is within the realm of possibility. And when the President lays Single-Payer down like a great poker hand against two-threes, for the sake of collegiality, what are we left with (you are not conversing with some ObamaBot here. This is Barack Obama’s colossal failure, and to have engaged on health care was either a massive strategic blunder, or an attempt by a nearly-Republican President to lock up the issue in favor of corporate interests for the foreseeable future) – how?
Having allowed the public to be bombarded with such thick chaff that even people of good faith and open minds are scared, confused, unable to choose – how?
Dammit. Need sleep, but must respond.
What I meant by “she’s surrendering moral high ground” was that it seemed to me that the result of what happened in the House was to advance a public option at the cost of forcing women to choose between voluntarily surrending a right in a matter of conscience or not getting any of the fucking benefits, what few benefits there are, in what is now H R 3962, on the one hand, and, on the other, it seemed to me that Jane was asking us to accept it as if it were ok because of what was achieved, though that’s not what she was saying.
I apologized to Jane @ 25 above. It looks like such a little note, but I wrote it sincerely and I really don’t even know how else to say it.
I’m sorry that you find my concerns so insulting. Somehow, it still seems very significant to me (sorry for the sarcasm), though I was mistaken in my understanding of what Jane was saying about it.
At this point, anyone who reads this and still feels the need to tell me how insulted they are really needs to get some perspective on what really was at issue here.
I stand by every word. You are frustrated beyond belief, but remember that that does not make you unique around here. You might think of yourself as an accountability referee, but really, it is an unseemly blame-game.
You are not talking to rubes in these pages. We have seen what you have written. You have thrown every part of yourself at this fight, and when it came up craps, you sought culprits. You seek them still, and demanding audiences is indeed the height of ingratitude.
Hey! I have to admit that I have been very angry about getting sucker punched since Saturday by the Stupak Amendment that ripped the victory that I think H R 3962 could have been (however flawed the legislation w/o the stupak amendment would have been).
Angry might not even be the right word, as I haven’t slept much since.
I still think that Jane should take the tidal wave of moral outrage that’s sure to surface into account as she goes forward, trying to be more sensitive to it now and finding a way to channel it productively if possible later.
No, I didn’t.
When Jane put up a comment late Saturday night about a single payer project for Sunday, I was fired up and just looking to move forward to fight the good fight.
And when Jane came on the Kucinich thread Monday morning, I thought I was seeing something that I just made no sense at all.
What part of this aren’t you getting?
Just read my comment @ 44.
Btw, I am right about the problem that H R 3962 as it exists now creates for women’s reproductive rights. I quoted this part of what Jane wrote earlier today:
Best to look at the entire thing @ 17.
My point is that you think you’re dismissing me with bullshit like:
But the fact is that there are many people who are just as angry about it as I have been since it happened and you’re not dismissing me as much as you’re making an ass of yourself. You really might want to shut the fuck up before you come under attack from people who actually take constitutionally protected rights seriously and who think that what Pelosi traded for her ‘win’ was way too much.
Ingratitude. Really? Whatever.
Knox, I appreciate your gracious reply, but comparing the two quotes above, I don’t think you’ve really confronted my questions. I know that there will be things in any bill that we don’t like, but I suggested that what’s in the current PO bills is not simply unlikeable but deeply immoral, as well.
Let me put it this way, If States are allowed to opt-out of the PO, do you think that will cause 108,000 additional deaths between now and the operational date of the exchange in 2013 compared to other bills that Congress might have passed? If women have to get private insurance policies supplementing their primary policy using their own funds because of the Stupak amendment, do you think this will result in 108,000 deaths between 108,000 additional deaths between now and the operational date of the exchange in 2013 compared to other bills that Congress might have passed? Do you think both together will result in 108,000 additional deaths between now and 2013?
Well, all the PO bills currently on the table before Stupak and opt-out were even considered, would result in 108,000 deaths between now and the operational date of the exchange in 2013, compared to other bills that Congress might have passed. That’s why I believe that these bills are deeply immoral. Now, my question is, why don’t you agree with me on this, when you obviously do about opt-outs and denial of insurance supporting a woman’s right to choose?
While this is not at all a comment on what Knoxville said, surely you know that the amount of time a person spends working on an issue has nothing to do with the moral quality of their work. People whose work on this bill is pure evil are also, unfortunately, working very, very hard to get a sell-out to the insurance companies.
Also, having a miniscule PO in the bill that will do no good in holding prices down is not necessarily better than having no bill at all, as I’ve argued in the comment I linked to above.
Thanks. I appreciate it. I sharpened up my question here.
Knox, coming late to your brave thread. I confessed to being an intuiter/feeler and when I communicate it is trusting some gut and emotional sensibility within and it is part of my moral compass that I rely on and am willing to share about.
Some appreciate it, it drives others with a different temperament up the wall at times. So we are all different. I am grateful as a single payer advocate this discussion is happening. Healthy for me and imho healthy for the site’s community.
I think we all share tremendous frustration right now and are processing that. I try to talk about my concerns over health care reform with acquaintances and friends IRL and there is a resistance to dealing with it that saddens me. So we got a gutless Congress and a remote Prez and what David Brooks calls a mere 20% of progressives that Obama is wise to ignore. Grrrrrrr. Except we progressives are the ones who are awake for all this. And though we are a minority in this country, with every betrayal and minimization of a human need, we as a group become sadder and angrier but wiser too in a way, and for me… resolved to dedicate myself to fighting for justice and social empathy.
I think you are right. There is anger. And I think we need our passion on this, our moral outrage.
I think we all bring important stuff to the table on this site. Some see the forest better than the trees, some see the trees clearly within the forest. Some are thinkers, some feelers. Some newbies. Some oldtimers. Some occasional visitors, some daily.
The pool of shares and knowledge is awesome. The depth of communication is awesome. The intelligence and wit and occasional whammying and honesty are compelling and educational and sometimes a bit wounding. So it goes. It is vital and why we are here. I am grateful.
And there is cronyism and there are subsets of cronyism. But as long as they don’t calicify to dissuade dialogue it is healthy.
While I care about the substance, although not as much as you I guess, I also care a lot about what we do here. You are all over the map with this “Might not be a bad moment to point out that there’s something wrong in the leadership structure at FDL.” crapola, and this “I’ll thank you for having given me the opportunity to express myself here as long as I have and be on my way.” trope. You are to blame. I am to blame. If you have never heard of “We win and lose together, and victories are sweetened because we did them together, just as defeats are cushioned because we all have the same thing at stake” concept, I suggest you look into it.
And if you are under the impression that I cede equal protection as a “win” for Nancy Pelosi, you have not been reading here long enough. Her congressional district is not just adjacent to mine (Jackie Speier at present), but within a couple of miles. I know of this pol, have for a very long time. She is known as “the human cash register” in these parts, and her history goes back to her familial ties to Maryland politics, and some of the grimiest legislating in the history of the Republic. I have been more than explicit about her conduct.
You are not alone. You are to blame, and I am to blame, and all the phone calls I didn’t make and all the emails you didn’t send are nothing compared to what you are asking – that someone step up and put their neck in the block, so you and I can move forward. It is indefensibly arrogant to place your need for a scalp ahead of our need to do this thing we are trying to do.
I stand by my complaint – it is narcissistic to beat this into hamburger so you can get your trophies.
A great and honest answer. I’ll give you an honest one in kind.
The only way is bloody-mindedness and stubborness by progressives. Tell Obama to go screw himself. Advocate for single-payer and only single-payer until he’s tired of hearing it. Refuse to pass anything else. Block everything else, until he stops marginalizing us, and making fun of us because we’re beating him.
And when, finally, he really wants a bill, he and the leadership will know who they must deal with, and then we may not get Medicare for All in one bite, but at least we’ll get a good step toward it that will do something for people without doing anything for insurance companies, and won’t compromise doing the same thing again next year and the year after that, until finally we have Medicare for All.
Knox, FWIW I’m with you on this. I had trouble sleeping for the two nights after the bill passed myself. I wasn’t surprised by Stupak. But I was surprised that Pelosi folded and that the progressives didn’t react in anger and defeat the Stupakified bill. I was really disturbed that Pelosi and the progressives showed so little backbone. No one seems to understand that if you want to get anything really good in a negotiation, you have to be prepared to lose everything. If you’re not, you’ll come up way, way short.
I really think this is unfair. Why would you think Knox is scalp-hunting? And now I’ve got to sleep too. I’ll check in for your answer in the late morning.
I understand the argument you’re making. There’s no way around the fact that you’re right. What I’m saying is that, imo, Jane identified correctly what could and could not be done, and doing what could be done is preferable to trying to do what can’t be done and getting nothing. (Who’s sounding like Jane now!)
Still, you’re point about the immorality of not pushing for and getting Medicare for All is totally correct. But the immorality of others can’t be changed so easily, and we can’t use force to coerce others to shut the fuck up as we push the right system that would do the most good through to final passage and realization.
Jane focused on the immorality of an opt-out because the inclusion of an opt-out provision would create a bigger moral hole by adding to the one you’re identifying. She wanted to avoid an even bigger hole and I think she’s been successful there so far. Not a perfect solution…
I was blindsided by what happened Saturday and very angry about it. My focusing on that particular moral issue doesn’t mean I don’t see the problem you’re identifying. Frankly, I’m still not sure what the right thing to do about what happened Saturday even is. Jane might be right in saying that it needs to be let go for now. You might say: well, had the strategy been different and a more morally strong position taken from the beginning, shit like what happened Saturday wouldn’t have happened. You might be right, but my impression is that the result wouldn’t have been very different, if at all.
As things exist now, Jane asked if anyone had a better idea than focusing on doing what can be done to ensure something morally good comes out of this, and I don’t have any answer.
Unless we think that killing the thing as it now exists is best (which is where I was up until just a few hours ago), then I don’t have any ideas.
As Jane put it earlier today: killing it as it is now really isn’t an option, anyway. So what’s left but to make it as good as possible?
Not satisfying answers to your position, but I don’t have better!
I’m sorry if parts have not been clear. I’m literally falling asleep as I type!
My answer is this – the House Progressives were the only shot we had to cajole the PO (much less Single-Payer) from DC. The way I see it, the only lever we have (or perhaps had) is to deny this President his bill, his win. While I think an Obama HC loss is not necessarily lethal to his reelect, it is a very big hammer.
We needed to detach him from his COS, and pry him away from whatever other moderating forces have him at present. Fine. But having throw in with the PO of some flavor, we had one very big advantage – his word. His word now lies in tatters, and bipartisanship is his mantra – this is no surprise. He proclaimed it throughout the campaign, and until he actually decided to start the HC debate, could be relied upon to mention HC and a PO now and again.
Which leads me back to my original thought – why start the debate if all you are going to do is hide under your desk, and when asked about HC, point towards the Capital and say, It’s over there. I’m just waiting for something to sign…”?
I am not against the revolution of Single-Payer. IMHO, it is the ONLY system we should be looking at. But the guy in the nice chair is either too busy, or he ‘has his’ now, and the memory of his Mother’s end of life has dimmed. It is a terrific disappointment.
Your complaint has been properly filed. Fuck dude, at least when I was pushing and pushing it was for shit that mattered. What the fuck are you still pushing for here? Get over it. Let it go.
If you think that this has all just been a narcissistic fest, then why do you bother giving me attention? Just make your point in a single brief comment and be the bigger guy than me that you obviously are and ignore me.
If you read the comments above that I wrote to people I consider to be much more serious than you, you’d see that I was working through the issues in discussions with them and have come to understand a lot as a result.
At this point, you continuing this would be nothing but your own narcissism at work.
Go get laid or something, anything would be better than you wasting more of your energy on fighting with me.
You know what is going to happen? Obama is going to get his bill, and he is going to sign it, and then he is going to take a victory lap, and if you think we are sick of his stuff now, imagine that day.
That is the ballgame. The ballgame is not here in this thread. I would remind you of this, but you know it more clearly and surely than anyone.
If this post isn’t a not-so-veiled attack on Jane I’ll eat my hat.
H3692 passed the House. There’s absolutely nothing we can do about that. Ancient history. We affected a piece of legislation more than any online grassroots org has ever done. We didn’t get what we wanted but we learned some lessons. I fully anticipate Jane and our allies to work even harder on the Senate to get what we want.
We don’t know what will come out of the Senate. We don’t even know what is going to come up for debate in the Senate. Nor do we know what will come out of the conference committee. We can try to influence each of those processes but short of storming the Senate and putting 61 of our people in a position to vote we’re stuck with trying to pressure Senators. Once a bill comes out of the conference committee we’re limited to pressuring the House and Senate one way or the other. We’ll have to struggle with this one step at a time.
One thing I learned from that horrific post last night is that there seem to be some folks who simply don’t know how a bill becomes law.
And what is going to get accomplished by screaming and yelling at progressives because we didn’t get what we wanted? All these people pissed off, screaming at anyone who doesn’t agree with their individual POV. WTF is that gonna get accomplished? Some sort of bill is coming up for debate in the Senate. Either follow Jane’s lead in this or go off and start another front somewhere. We don’t have the millions of dollars the lobbyists have to influence Senators. What we have is a threat at the ballot box, nothing more. We’ve gotten more air time on the tube than any other progressive group ever because of this legislation. For myself, I think we did pretty damn good for a first time trying to push a piece of legislation through a moribund out of touch Congress. I’m not gonna waste my time pissing and moaning about what we coulda, woulda, shoulda done.
An interesting test awaits. If the progressives slow the PO down, will the insurance share holders move enough marginal Republicans over to vote for the piece of crap conferenced Health Care bill to stifle the plan? I think the Republicans and the Health Insurance companies know just how great it would be to get all of these new customers and be able to throw the sick ones onto the fake PO so that we can all subsidize them. This is the bill they would have written for themselves so its great to get the dumb-ass Democrats to take the fall for them. I don’t mind subsidizing sick people, I just hate to pay the 30 to 40 percent value-added tax to the Insurance companies.
All of you guys need to start thinking strategically about how we can eventually get real Health Care Reform in this country instead of this internecine squabble. You are the Ones, the people that lead the progressive community on this issue. Suck it up and start dealing again. Please.
Agreed, my point is that if the stupak isn’t taken out of it, there’s going to be hell to pay when the rage that has been simmering boils out in op-eds and over to public sentiment when the anger within finally starts coming out and forward onto the streets in protest. And the immoral failures who call themselves the leaders of the Democratic Party know it. I was concerned because A) Jane didn’t seem to want to do anything about it (looks like she’s decided that there isn’t much that she can do about it and wants to push the right people to do more)and, B) much worse, that Jane was presenting her position as accepting the immorality of what they’re doing as part of the process of compromising. Not a good place to be. What part of what I’ve been saying hasn’t been clear enough?
Then you need to work like hell to ensure that the Spupak Amendment is stripped by the conference committee, because that will be the only chance you have until the conference bill goes to the House and Senate for final approval. The conference committee is the only, repeat only, place the amendment can be stripped.
The war rages, the battle is pretty much lost in its current incarnation, but we live to fight another day. Now, how do we derail this inexorable march to medical insurance servitude? You are clearly right about Stupak and I don’t think even the Senate is ballsy enough to let it stand. I could be wrong. But I think the pressure needs to be firmly applied anyway. It is disheartening when we see just how far we have to go uphill and how weak or corrupt the Democrats and Obama are in getting change in this country. The War is Over, for the Unknown Soldier, but surely not for FDL.
Don’t eat your hat! If you think of Jane as being a person of power – even the person of power – around here, what I was doing was simply trying to speak truth to power. Nothing more. It was meant to remind her that she should either present more explicitly her anger at what happened with H R 3962 or, at the very least, avoid coming across as sounding like she thinks it’s an acceptable compromise along the way to getting whatever crumbs we might end up getting at the end of all this. It’s not an acceptable compromise. It won’t be viewed as acceptable by millions. We all should say so often, imo.
I’m not screaming and yelling blame at Jane or blaming her for what happend.
The fact is that the Democrats will lose big time if they don’t fix this. I’d rather be out in front on the right side of the issue looking at them crash into the ditch in my rearview mirror than be jumping into their bus as it’s going 90 mph just before they crash themselves – and us with them – into the ditch.
disagreement is not an attack.
and your comment:
sounds like a recipe for authoritarianism.
love love love you SD, but people disagree and i really really disagree with you here.
The Senate has nothing to do with the Stupak Amendment. The Senate can insert language into their bill that repeats the Stupak Amendment but they can’t do anything about HR 3962. When HR 3962 and whatever bill the Senate passes go into conference that will be where the fate of Stupak lies. If the Senate inserts Stupak-like language into their bill there’s a good chance it would be in the bill that emerges from conference. Our only chance of defeating Stupak at that point will be a NAY vote in either the House or Senate on the final bill.
I think Jane’s point is that there might not be much we can do about it and that it’s not her fight, but the fight of others.
My point has increasingly become that this is the mess of the failed and immoral Democratic leadership – who went one huge compromise too far – to fix or get run over by, and that, imo, we need to be expressing much more outrage about it than we are, because A) it is fucking immoral, and B) that’s not just my individual POV, as you put it @ 59.
Bad choice of words on my part. I have absolutely no problem with disagreement. What I see is ranting about something we can’t change, HR 3962. HR 3962 stands until the conference committee. Our chances of stripping Stupak I see as 50-50 at this point. If the Senate adds similar wording the odds worsen considerably. What more could we have done to prevent Stupak and get a better bill out of the House? I don’t know. I do know that now we need to focus on the Senate and after the Senate passes its version shift our focus to the conference committee, then on the House and Senate.
You’re right. We’ll have virtually no influence on what happens in conference. At that point we have to wait to see what emerges and go from there.
None of my comments are directed at you personally but at a train of thought I saw permeating the thread last night and here. I should have said thread in my first comment vice post.
Outrage? Where was the outrage when we invaded Irak? We can’t rely on public outrage here. We have to rely on ourselves and work like hell to gain allies. Most of the American public don’t even know there’s a health care bill in Congress, much less give a rat’s ass.
Didn’t even catch that! Good eye! Yeah, I’ve heard that a couple of times before when there was disagreement. Sorry, SD, but it’s not the best thing to be saying.
The funny thing is that letsgetitdone pointed out @ 14, maybe not even intentionally, that I agree with Jane on almost everything. This has turned into a something in the category of “a point that I’d like to emphasize” more than what I originally thought it was: constructive criticism.
Should I pull out a Colbert “apology accepted” (when one wasn’t offered) or not? Hmmm. Nah! ;-)
Seriously, this discussion helped me get perspective and understand Jane better. I’m sorry that I had to upset some people in order to get here.
peace SD. i don’t know either. not sure we have any sway with congress. (that’s not a concession, just confusion. please still count me in the never. give. up. camp)
Actually, Jane was right and I got stuck on the immorality of what ended up happening to H R 3962.
At this point, I just think that we should be on the right side of this issue, clearly and explicitly, and be careful never to sound like what happened was an acceptable compromise. It wasn’t, isn’t, and it won’t be, not ever, not if that’s the price we’ll have to pay for a public option.
Also would like you to know that I tried to express this concern privately the second I saw it in the Kucinich thread Monday morning. I think it’s ok for me to publicly present the email that I sent to Jane toward the beginning of that thread:
I only came to write a diary publicly more than two days later, when I didn’t get an answer and became concerned about the way things appeared to be going here.
I haven’t thought citizens had any sway in Congress for a long time. This exercise restores some of that faith, a word I hate using. But I’ve never given up trying. Not in my nature.
We’ve learned a lot about the leadership, using the term loosely, in Congress. We must use that knowledge to the limited advantage we have.
Knoxville. Being spattered with a comrade’s brains, blood and gore is immoral but one can’t let that distract from the objective at hand.
Speaking of leadership, not a bad idea for me to say thank you to Jane and her team for never once moderating out a single word of what I was writing here. Thank you!
We’re all in this together. We’re all going to stumble at some point and Jane’s no exception. We’re getting better at this shit and it’s not going to be long before we are indeed a force to be reckoned with. One step at a time. Win some, lose some. Never. Give. Up.
Gotta go to work. Only over a hour late now. *g*
How’s that for some perspective for me? Depressing thought…
I think one difference between what happened near the end of 2002 re the invasion authorization and this is that there was a lot of preparatory conditioning from the White House in 2002, both conditioning of the public and of the members of Congress, which continued into 2003 and beyond.
In this case, there was so little warning before it just happened and now there are already voices very much willing to speak out publicly and there are many Americans who will be joining those who do.
For example, the PCCC/Bold Progressives have already asked us to join with members of Congress who are speaking out loudly and to sign a petition to say that we stand with them.
For another example, I pointed out in this diary that OFA had to cancel an event to “thank” Rep. Jim Cooper in Nashville.
Not pollyannishness, LL. This old NF has been grinding away at these threads, probably in my sleep. Lots going on here. But an underlying issue, IMO, is that real progressives/liberals/Dems have been most royally out-maneuvered by the radical right, as channeled by azure doggies.
We’ve been had. They out-smarted us by once again trotting out the killer wedgie, i.e., choice. Did anyone see this coming? Dunno. Not smart enough nor connected enough to answer that. But I sure didn’t. Which suggests to me many of us didn’t. And we don’t like looking like chew toys for the right.
And the logical (but not logical) reaction to all of this is to find someone to blame. So shall we blame the perps or the leadership of the perpees? Insufficient to try to tar the right. Too big. Too redundant. Too everything. So we seek individuals to blame. It’s human nature, I guess, and we do it all the time. All. The. Time. And the right loves this about us. We play into their hands over and over and over again. We are reliably (and perhaps rightfully) wackadoodle when the sky is falling.
Blame game commences. It’s part of the ritual. And even though that’s immensely uncomfortable (witness past days of threads here), I think it’s part of the processing. Group processing has ever and always been painful. But it is what it is. And though we may never (almost certainly never, in fact) arrive at consensus, it’s how we surface the evidence, sort fact from fiction, inwardly digest what’s valid and deep-six the crap.
It’s an absolute certainty that among passionate people (e.g., pretty much everyone who posts and comments at FDL) there is going to be a mega-launch of emotion and emotional rhetoric. It’s what we do. And sometimes, that gets really ugly. Not sure there’s anyone here who hasn’t lipped off at one time or another. Okay, maybe Raven. LOL.
I am still uncertain what launched this massive outpouring from Knoxville (and look at the massive concentric circles she has generated) but it appears she is open to more civilized dialogue than what has appeared here over the past several days. Is she egocentric? Hell, I dunno. Am I? Are you? Are we? Yeah, to varying degrees.
But it has served a purpose. I think everyone here (including Knoxville) has clarified their personal position about the health care war, about FDL leadership, about smack-downs, about what else we can learn from this whole disturbing but instructive exchange.
So LL, I guess I just picked up the Pollyanna mantle for a moment. But one of the things I love about this site is how we generally work together to try to figure things out. Even when it’s hard. Even when it’s ugly.
Just sayin’.
That is what I was hoping no one would say around here. That “lock-step” is not a requirement, but only a progressive sensibility is asked for. They say healthy relationships in terms of honesty are like tough leather. Unhealthy ones are like peanut brittle.
Sorry to spotlight your comment since a lot of admirable exploratory communication has happened since. But I feel like single payer advocates have been inconvenient “messengers” to many here. Was hoping the longstanding fate of the messenger would not happen.
Optimistic it won’t.
We addressed it @ 66, 69 71 and 72 above. It was just a bad choice of words. No worries.
Hah, barbara. Healing words. Maybe if I hadn’t been writing my comment just above yours and seen yours I would have held off saying mine. I dropped my Pollyanna mantle in a way. :)
You say it well, re the Right. They are kitchen sink obstructionists. Anything goes. And anything went to dismantle our government for sure. And we are dealing with an administration that instead of the light at the end of the nightmare Bush tunnel is a new slicker oncoming train. But many in the election afterglow won’t see it as such. So we are dealing with a strident, baby with a lolli it won’t give up, the Right, and a resistant to any more despair group among the left center folks. Sigh.
knox, hopefully working out my own closure. We are all catalysts for each other. ty
Nicely put!
Please see my comment to SD @ 74. It’s probably the best brief explanation for what happened to start and how it’s ended up.
Let me put this another way. Sheesh. The progressive movement in this country is currently being reborn, online, with FDL paving the way. Jane is the founder of FDL and is it’s spokeswoman. Did every piece of this plan to mold HCR come from her? Probably not. Is there any other group who is out in front of this? Anywhere? Not that I know of. So I have a choice. I can either follow what develops out of FDL, disagreeing with whatever I’m not comfortable with along the way, but ultimately choosing to go with what comes out of here or not. Some other progressive group got a better idea? I can choose to follow that. The more ideas the better chance of coming up with things that can change the way our system works.
In response to SouthernDragon @ 85
I chose option C with this diary. I hope Jane has heard me out.
Thanks Knox, Have to say, I think that both you and Jane are predisposed to believe that we don’t have the power to kill the bill. It would be so easy to do it with so many Senators and House people looking to weaken it to the point where it’s clearly a poison pill for progressives, which, btw, I think it already is now.
Regarding the morality issue, I’m glad you agree with me that the fatalities, bankruptcies, and foreclosures left on the table by the bill make it an immoral bill. But, in that case I don’t understand your reaction to accepting that argument. Apart from important point that the core immorality of the bill is much greater than the immoral consequences produced by the opt-out, or the restriction of reproductive choice of women together by a very great amount, you’re saying here that it’s OK not to do all you can to block an immoral bill, because you and Jane are judging that killing the bill isn’t possible.
I think that many, many people disagree with that judgment and given the delicate power configurations surrounding the bill in Congress right now, there’s a very good chance that this judgment of yours may be wrong. My judgment that it is possible also may be wrong, but since we don’t know which is which for sure, aren’t we morally obligated to do our best to kill this bill, since even if Jane’s effort is successful in saving the PO, the result is that we have an evil and unacceptable bill that you, Jane, and other Firedogs following you have contributed to and accepted as a victory?
If you work for this bill now, and celebrate your victory in helping to get through a version of it with a minimal PO, are you then in a position to come back next year and say “This bill is a piece of crap and it’s a moral imperative that we now do “x,” “y,” and “z,” to make it minimally acceptable. I don’t think so, I think Congress and the President will laugh at you if you do that, and will say, “we listened to you last year, you got what you wanted, why are you bothering us again now?
Also, I can’t refrain from pointing out that the whole PO legislative effort which has reached this sorry state arose out of a casual, disputable, and arrogant judgment that Medicare for All wasn’t possible to pass so it should be taken off the table,” even though the same people accepted that it was both the best solution and the morally acceptable result. I’m afraid I’m disinclined to accept another possibility judgment made now that again dismisses another moral imperative (kill the bill) as impossible, based on the same sort of casual factual judgment with inimal analysis behind it.
Finally, you said:
I really think this statement of your has no basis in analysis whatever, and is just an unsupported assertion. I can’t help but think that it’s a statement made to console yourself for backing the wrong horse. You wwant to believe it wouldn’t have been better. You want to believe that Obama was right when he took single-payer off the table. You want to believe that the veal pen groups were right when they followed him. And you want to believe that Jane was right, as well, in following him down the PO road.
If Medicare for All had been on the table from the beginning and supported by the President, the campaign for reform would have entirely different. No deals with Pharma, no deals with the hospitals, a 30 page bill rather than a 1990 page bill. A campaign exposing all the immorality and fraud by the insurance companies, accompanied perhaps by the beginning of Federal investigations into their fraudulent behavior. Trips to foreign nations to hold town halls so Americans could hear about how national health insurance programs in other countries that spend only 50 – 66% as much as we do on care are seen by people who experience those programs. Republican appeals about socialized medicine falling because everyone knows that Medicare ain’t socialized medicine. Letting loose and encouraging formation of a mass movement supporting single-payer, empowering civil disobedience, strikes against insurance companies, and nation-wide marches for comprehensive change and health care as a human right. Full coverage by the Press of health care heroes like Margaret Flowers, Kevin Zeese, Paul Hochfeld, nyceve, Jane Hamsher (in another scenario), and countless others victimized by the system, and finally Barack Obama playing MLK in leading his flock in a new Civil Rights struggle of liberation from the insurance companies and for health care for everyone. Neither you, nor Jane, nor Obama, can possibly know that this wouldn’t have worked and that we’d be pretty much in the same situation as we are now, because human affairs don’t work in such a way that they are predictable to that extent.
What we do know is that there was a moral imperative to do this, and that based on the most superficial of judgments, very poorly grounded in the social sciences or anything but intuition formulated in the now past age of free market ideology dominance, this Administration and its supporters decided to go another way. And now we are all paying the price, and what’s worse, until we recognize that going this way was a mistake and that the overall strategy of hcr must be changed, we will keep paying it, and paying it, and paying it. You and Jane are both wrong about what to do about this bill. It must be killed now.
SD, appreciate where you are coming from and sorry to pluck out that line.
I appreciate your take, but I also mourn that we as Progressives were not united to fight what was going on with a weak, pro-corporate Congress. And we need to get united on this stuff. It is vital or the continued dismantling of our constitution will take place, the even greater grip of amoral corporations will destroy our country and our citizenry.
We need the leaders of the progressives to rally against a ruthless right and a bigger than we ever dreamed corrupt governmental leadership and a still frustratingly apathetic, ostrich majority in this country.
Single payer activism vs. Public option activism.
One of the reasons I launched my analysis of the new House Bill was I was asking from within the single payer advocate minority for FDL to switch to backing Bernie Sanders’ S703 bill, instead of the insurance friendly, anti-abortion horrifying one presently in the Senate.
Yes, the Senate will not embrace Bernie with open arms, but Pelosi et al. betrayed in many ways, but a big one was pulling the Weiner vote out from under us, that would have inconvenienced the Dems, any left with conscience, that they ultimately were behind universal health care, thinking that wimpy avoidance would help them with their next election with the fake populists who are chicken littles about big government.
Even if the Congress is not impacted, I am saying it would renew some energy among the single payer activists and help the progressives get closer together on this. But it is asking po people to switch tracks dramatically and dramatically soon and embrace what they had thought was not pragmatic enough.
Thanks, SD.
I agree with what you say, but my view is that we have to hit him up side the head with the biggest hammer we have. We have to establish progressive credibility with this Administration once and for all. If not, we will be rolled, and rolled, and rolled again. And that is apart from the arguments I’ve put here.
Yes, lets! Especially liked the stuff about the heroes of single payer finally getting some serious recognition for their leadership and commitment and rolo modelling. Only got to skim but so well said.
My emphasis on Bernie’s S703 as a way of killing the bill is also not going negative with a “kill” but having something to push for and embrace!!!! Savvy?
To be continued.
Right on, SD. But my view is that we try to kill this bill, not marginally improve an already immoral and terrible bill. Also, this bill effort has been over for months as I pointed out on July 24.
Can’t see why people don’t see this and work to kill the bill. I guess I think that once people start down a particular road, they just can’t recognize the reality of their failure until it’s long past the time when they can do anything about it. The possibility of a good bill was over a very long time ago. At that point, we should have reset to HR 676.
What is the public option, as constructed, supposed to accomplish by being included? Please be specific.
I’m trying to figure out if this is a moral victory or a practical one.
I know. When Stupak got into the Bill, the progressives all 100 of them could have voted against the final bill and sent Pelosi and the Administration back to the drawing board. That’s what they could have and should have done — line in the sand, SD, line in the sand.
Two of my earlier diaries.
9-8-09
Why Won’t FDL Officially Use Its Activism to Help Single Payers, Now, and Support HR Bill 676?
http://seminal.firedoglake.com/diary/7945
9-4-09
Can Public Option Progressives Reunite Behind Single Payer Liberals?
http://seminal.firedoglake.com/diary/7843
I think FDL and Jane will call anything named Public Option a win. Whether that public option actually performs a function is irrelevant. They don’t carer if it is robust, or actually offers competition, or will survive in the exchange for very long.
Like the democrats who say any HCR reform, regardless of what is, or who gets thrown under the bus, or whether it is actually reform, it’s a win.
I didn’t interpret SD as saying that if one doesn’t follow Jane, then one isn’t welcome here. I interpreted his remark as saying “get on with it,” either follow Jane’s lead or do what you think is right instead. I think he’s right about that.
I do libby, but the issue is what will we do when they slap S 703 down, which they will. That’s where killing the bill comes in. I believe in reply to one of your blogs I talked about trying to get a bloc of 18 progressive Dems to coalesce and refuse to pass anything except single-payer. That’s what we need now. Refusal! No! We need to show that progressive are not in the veal pen.
I’m preping for a meeting now and then will have to be in the meeting this afternoon. Hopefully, the results of the meeting will be up at FDL soon.
Can’t respond to this comment @ 87 now, but I will later today. My response will be thoughtful, but I can’t promise it’ll be satisfying for you…
Thank you. I don’t know why that’s so hard to understand.
Line in the sand. Depends on when ya draw it. Some folks seem to think that these people in Congress will do what we ask. Why should they? They’re backed by hundreds of millions of corporate dollars, they live in an entrenched culture of their own making and they don’t see us as a threat. Incumbents think we’ll vote for them no matter what they do and for the last upteen elections they’re right. We all know people who vote a straight party ticket regardless. Inherent in our efforts is an attempt to tell Dems in Congress that those days are over. We can petition, call, email, fax, protest, do sit-ins, all that stuff and at the end of the day it comes down to the vote on the floor. This is the first time in decades that a credible threat to incumbency has been made but it will only remain credible if next November we have done what we say we were gonna do.
Oooh I agree with this.
I think you’re painting with too broad a brush with regard to what Jane and FDL denizens do and don’t care about regarding the public option, though may be correct as it relates to the current condition of debate.
However, rather than speculate I think it makes more sense to try and get the position articulated:
Lobby to reduce the size of the mandate penalty, or at least keep it low.
Unless you have a magic wand and can insert a robust PO into the bill.
If the Obama administration is doing all this so that Obama can stick “revenue-neutral health insurance reform” onto his resume, then what we are going to get is an industry bailout, financed by taxes. People like complaining about taxes, especially Republicans and those who will be purged from the Republican party in its current quest for purity.
In fact I’m just going to make a simple diary about it.
A public option is supposed to offer competition in the marketplace in an effort to control costs of premiums, but not so effectual that it kills the industry.
I am all for this:
Lobby to reduce the size of the mandate penalty, or at least keep it low.
that is better than championing the House PO.
I’m aware of the intent of Jacob Hacker, wrong-headed as I think the idea is. For instance, using risk-pools as a way for paying for healthcare, and trying to optimize for highest average coverage at lowest average cost, means that a competitive market is antithetical to optimal outcomes. Splintering the pools only makes them less efficient, both in diversity and in friction.
Thanks Knox, I won’t expect to be satisfied, but I am interested.
Again, I agree SD. We need to draw our line in the sand at the ballot box. Progressives in the Senate and the House will have to draw their lines at not voting for immoral bills. When they do that, no one will be laughing at them anymore.
Here. I’m hoping to figure out just what page we’re all on.
What is the “public option,” as currently constructed, supposed to accomplish?
Again, there’s no good reason to accept Jane’s judgment that trying to kill the bill is a futile gesture. Even using reconciliation in the Senate, doesn’t guarantee passage of a really weak bill, because the progressives might bolt.
Good. I’ll look forward to it.
Not only progressives but all other Dems. If we successfully challenge a number of Blue Dogs and other Dems next year we’re talking about a whole new ball game. We will also have to watch out for conservative efforts, Dem and Rethug, to muzzle the intertoobz, cuz that’s where the impetus came from. If we don’t like what comes out of the Senate and then the conference committee we need to get working on challenges then. Actually we should be identifying prospective challengers now for those we already know we want out.
Which bill are you referring to? There’s only one bill that’s been passed and there’s absolutely nothing we can do to change or kill it. HR 3692 is going to conference. Period. As far as the Senate is concerned we’re gonna have to wait and see what bill reaches the floor and we’re gonna have a limited time to influence Senators one way or another.
Actually, Jacob Hacker’s original PO was intended to transition us from private insurance for essential health care services to Medicare for All, so, on fact, the original PO idea was designed to kill the private health insurance industry at least as the primary insurer of all but boutique health care services, only slowly.
Of course, the current distorted versions of the PO, are supposed to avoid competition from it that would kill their business. Unfortunately, it’s very hard to design a PO that will be so perfectly balanced as to provide real competition for the privates, but not such heavy competition that it cuts into their profits. And there’s no evidence that Congress has been trying to that anyway. Indeed, what they have done is to create one that is very small and weak, likely to be more expensive than private insurance plans, and likely to be a dumping ground for people who the private insurers don’t want to cover and find ways to drive out of their systems. This is the kind of PO that Jane and FDL are now going to the mat for, and it is the kind of PO and the kind of bill that I say we ought to kill.
That was quick.
Again, there’s no good reason to accept Jane’s judgment that trying to kill the bill is a futile gesture. Even using reconciliation in the Senate, doesn’t guarantee passage of a really weak bill, because the progressives might bolt.
I hope you’re right — and I hope you’ve started some sort of “kill the bill” lobbying effort so that we can get the public writing letters to their Senators to make this thing die the death it most thoroughly deserves.
Lacking that, I think we need to suggest something constructive to do for those who are not ready to fight to kill the bill. I don’t know if you’ve seen my other comments on FDL, or my diaries over at DailyKos.com, but generally I think Jane is achieving nothing of importance in trying to keep the public option in the bill. The right to buy unaffordable insurance from a “public option” is better than no right to do so, but it’s not a right worth fighting for.
Politics is about “what should we do.” The political classes will do what they want, which usually involves custodianship of the neoliberal state.
Oh, the “public option” in Pelosi’s bills is a fig leaf, a gesture to say “we approved a public option,” so the politicians can claim to have kept their promises.
You’re right again.
SD, I’m referring to any bill in the Senate that has mandates, along with a terribly weak PO, and an operational date of 2013, tolerating a brutal, and immoral “band-aid period.” I don’t care whether such a bill is in the Senate, or has come out the conference for a final vote, or whether it has or doesn not have opt-outs, or whether it is or is not Stupakified. Those last two things are just pimples on the pig’s ass. It’s the pig itself that is rotten and needs to be killed.
Maybe from their point of view. But from Jane’s it’s just the best thing that can be done right now to make the final bill coming out of the Senate better.
So you’re assuming the Senate bill will be same as the House bill or worse?
I agree with what you say. I’ll do some “whipping” myself, but organizing a lobbying effort to kill the bill is beyond my current capabilities. The main thing I can do is advocate that people do that, and leave it to them to organize.
Okay, gotcha. I’m not gonna get excited until I see what the Senate bill about to be debated is all about. We don’t know that yet and I think the machinery is in place to support or kill whatever that happens to be. If that doesn’t work we have another chance in the House with the final bill.
Sure, SD. What are the possibilities that we will see a better bill from the Senate?
I think the Senate bill may be better in that it doesn’t have the Stupak language. But it will be an immoral bill, and one the Dems will pay dearly for in 2010.
I have no doubt that there will be a bill. Seems to me the best thing we can do is push hard against Stupak. We need to light some fires under people but there will be a bill.
I don’t have a crystal ball but I’m not thinking they’re gonna spring single payer on us. I’m also not placing a lot of hope on influencing the Senate one way or the other. They’re definitely a different breed from the House. If we get a bad bill out of the Senate the House, imo, is gonna be the only place to stop it after conference, barring a fit of conscience on the Dem side in the Senate.