COMMENTS: 59
Howard Dean Is a Genuine Hero: Taking on Corporate 'Centrists' Like Lieberman
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I want to take a moment just to recognize what has been recognized before, but needs to be recognized right here and now one more time: Howard Dean is a genuine hero.
In coming out against the Lieberman-gutted health insurance "reform" bill, Dean is leveraging every shred of power he can muster to create the political space for the final bill -- whether passed now, or later after going back to the drawing board -- to be better and more progressive. He has made a compelling case that the bill "would do more harm than good," as he says in his Washington Post op-ed today -- and in doing that he has made the power struggle between Joe Lieberman's Palpatinian forces of insurance/drug industry darkness and the progressive movement far more symmetrical.
Before Dean's move, the fight was asymmetrical, as Chris Hayes noted in my interview with him on my radio show yesterday. Before Dean's move, Lieberman had the upper hand in that he was the only one who didn't seem to care whether he alone killed the bill by joining with Republicans for a filibuster. Now, though, Dean has said to progressive members of Congress that they should be OK killing this bill if that's what taking a stand for a better bill means. And you see some of them potentially starting to follow.
This is why the White House and the Beltway media is now publicly freaking out at Dean in a way they never freaked out on corporate Dems (Lieberman, Baucus, Nelson, etc.) who were previously obstructing the bill: Because Dean is threatening to change the dynamic that the Beltway was always counting on -- a dynamic that relied on progressives ultimately capitulating to the Joe Liebermans, the Rahm Emanuels, the insurance industry and the drug lobbyists. That dynamic only exists if progressive members of Congress -- and the larger progressive movement and general public -- believes passing the bill is more important than killing it to make it better. If they and we don't believe that, as Howard Dean doesn't and as new polls show we don't, then suddenly progressive members of Congress and the progressive movement can feel free to be as cutthroat as Lieberman himself.
We can feel free to risk sending a bad bill down to defeat in the cause of making it better -- because we know that the bill in its current, non-improved form is bad. And from that stand, we may get more progressive concessions before this thing is finally done. Just as the old dynamic was based on buying Lieberman's vote with insurance/drug industry concessions, this new Dean dynamic could means progressives forcing the leadership and the White House to, say, add back a public option back into this final bill as price for progressive votes.
Of course, there's debate about whether or not we think Dean is right on the substance -- about whether the bill is good or bad. I happen to think Dean is right -- I happen to believe that passing this awful bill is not worth it even if this awful bill has a few good things in it. Why?
Because we have the same president and the same Congress for at least another year and they will be forced to go back to the drawing board.
There is certainly a substantive rush to pass reform, what with thousands dying every year for lack of insurance. But there is not the political rush that seems to be the assumption in DC right now. That's a manufactured bullshit assumption -- the same one we heard when the very same set of bought-and-paid-for politicians used a financial crisis to rush through a Wall Street bailout with the very same "must pass it immediately" rationale. Now they're trying to use a health care crisis to rush through an insurance industry bailout.
But here's the thing: It's not like Barack Obama won't be president and Democrats won't control Congress tomorrow. They can go back to the drawing board right now and have the same political topography before them when they come back to the House and Senate floors. And last I checked, when this bill was in more progressive form (ie. with a public option and Medicare buy-in) I didn't hear any of these voices in DC say the bill needed to be on a "must pass immediately" track - only when the bill was gutted are these voices now screaming for it to be immediately passed...hmm...
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Posted by: maxpayne on Dec 19, 2009 4:33 PM
Current rating: 5 [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
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Posted by: mmckinl on Dec 19, 2009 5:42 PM
Current rating: 4 [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
The Health Care Fraud Bill practically out laws Federal Funds for Woman's issues. Enshrines profits and antitrust protection for Pharma and the Disinsurance Companies, while guaranteeing healthy political contributions ...
You have a choice, especially if you are young. Go with a Party like the Dinocrats, and be subjected to endless betrayal, or join a true progressive party, The Green Party.
Find your local Green Party
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» A new party is a fool's fortress...
Posted by: Finnegansawake
» RE: A new party is a fool's fortress... The Greens Aren't a New Party
Posted by: mmckinl
» RE: A new party is a fool's fortress... The Greens Aren't a New Party
Posted by: Sister_Lauren
» RE: A new party is a fool's fortress... The Greens Aren't a New Party
Posted by: mmckinl
» Progressives sit and behave appropriately and believe that this is the way to the appropriate heaven
Posted by: Prinzowhales
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Posted by: kettleblack on Dec 19, 2009 6:43 PM
Current rating: 4 [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
Great job, Sirota!
Single Payer for All!
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» RE: Take that, Joshua Holland!
Posted by: Joshua Holland
» Sometimes backing the wrong thing does put you against your principles
Posted by: james108
» The problem was backing the WRONG Democrat
Posted by: xbj
» RE: Sometimes backing the wrong thing does put you against your principles
Posted by: Joshua Holland
» And for the record
Posted by: Joshua Holland
» Yeah... I'd lay low too, permanently after working so hard 2 elect "Mr. Hope and Change"
Posted by: xbj
» RE: Yeah... I'd lay low too, permanently after working so hard 2 elect "Mr. Hope and Change"
Posted by: Joshua Holland
» Hmm, No...
Posted by: grumble-bum
» RE: Hmm, No...
Posted by: Joshua Holland
» Better a real GOP warmonger than a fake DNC one
Posted by: xbj
» RE: And for the record
Posted by: kettleblack
» RE: And for the record
Posted by: Joshua Holland
» RE: Don't wait - give up your Constitutional Rights now.
Posted by: kettleblack
» Also, Dean...
Posted by: Joshua Holland
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Posted by: rac on Dec 19, 2009 8:28 PM
Current rating: 5 [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
“And Rahm Emanuel's take away from Bill Clinton's failure to get health insurance passed was 'don't get on the wrong side of the insurance companies.' So their strategy was cut a deal with the insurance companies, the drug industry going in. And the deal was, we're not going to attack your customer base, we're going to subsidize a new customer base. And that script was pre-cooked so it's not surprising that this is what comes out the other side . . . Once the White House made this deal with the insurance companies, the public option was never going to be anything more than a fig leaf. And over the summer and the fall, it got whittled down, whittled down, whittled down to almost nothing and now it's really nothing.”
So the PO was a bargaining chip from the get-go? If true, the disingenuousness is cause for a revolt. Progressives need to let Obama know that he has to dance with the ones who brought him by urging progressive senators to defeat the too compromised bill as Howard Dean advocates otherwise progressives will be sending the wrong signal to the Obama administration. We want change and mean it.
The insurance industry is quite satisfied with the latest turn of events. The industry wants a cloture vote Monday. The insurers want a bill to pass (forget what Republicans are saying) because their lobbyists’ finger prints are all over it. In other words, they’ve compromised less than progressives have had to compromise.
I think Senator Reid should get behind budget reconciliation.
If he does that then progressives won't be the beggars at their own banquet. The moderates will have to conclude: The choice is to take the public option or to take the public option. The table, in other words, will have been turned on them and they will be scrambling for the scraps.
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Posted by: macktan on Dec 19, 2009 9:19 PM
Current rating: 5 [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
I'm concerned that Obama is proud of this bill, that he views it as reform enough to crow about it. I support Dean and I hope he continues to throw wrenches in the works. My phone calls certainly have no effect.
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» No, no, no!...grateful? Hell No! We should be getting ready for payback at the polls!
Posted by: Prinzowhales
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Posted by: Prinzowhales on Dec 19, 2009 10:53 PM
Current rating: 4 [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
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» Will the 'New and Improved' health care bill pay for my torn rectum?
Posted by: Lese Majeste
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Posted by: scremf on Dec 19, 2009 11:29 PM
Current rating: 5 [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
The evisceration of our healtcare bill is merely another syptom of an entirely corrupt political system. A system in which "real change" is not only implausible but entirely impossible. As a nation we have collectively sat idly on the sidelines and silently watched as corporations exerted more and more control over our government. There wasn't much of a fuss made when states one by one forced motorists to buy insurance from private corporations, indeed we heaped praise on our elected officials for keeping the public safe. Most of us progressives were too busy to bother much when a republican congress and Clinton pushed through NAFTA. Most of us didn't get real excited even as U.S. manufacturing companies setup their sweatshops wherever they could best exploit their workforce. Last but not least where were the angry masses when the U.S. Supreme court proclaimed George Bush president in 2000. What we now have is democracy in name only. What we really have is facism or a new form of corporate/neofacism.
Brothers and sisters, hermanos y hermanas what we need now is a revolution, and I ain't talking no tea party bullshit here. We can't win this one with guns, but we must still fight. Nothing less than our lives and the life of every single creature on our planet is at stake. We can start by demanding that no court in the United States recognize corporate personhood. This should be progressives mantra. SHUT DOWN THE CORPORATE MACHINE!!
We the people have every right and every responsibility to shut down any and every form of tyranical government and start from scratch if need be. If the current U.S. government/corporation isn't a terrorist organization then I'm a pig and I can fly.
Howard Dean is becoming more and more of a hero. Perhaps the day will soon come when Dr. Dean is willing to completly denounce Barrack Obama for the corporate sellout that he has actually become.
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» Right down to the last paragraph, I was in full support...
Posted by: Prinzowhales
» RE: ight down to the last paragraph, I was in full support...
Posted by: scremf
» RE: ight down to the last paragraph, I was in full support...
Posted by: GatoPreto
» RE: I'm beginning to understand how Colonial Americans felt.
Posted by: koolwoman
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Posted by: LHB on Dec 20, 2009 1:32 AM
Current rating: 5 [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
When those who get their news from the usual suspects find out what this legislation entails, they won't blame Republicans; Democrats will take the full hit, and they'll have deserved it. Refusing to support this steaming mound of Health Care "Deform" is about the most important thing one can do right now in order to ensure that Democrats remain in control of the White House and Congress.
If HRC Reform passes in it's current form, everyone under 30 that I know (I'm a university professor, so I know quite a few) votes either Libertarian, Green or Republican. Boomers like myself who have "Cadillac" Health Care plans won't be materially affected that much, but I don't plan on continuing to support a Party that views me as some kind of "useful idiot" whose support can be taken for granted, which works against the interests of those who are most in need of government assistance, and which makes me feel like I just stuck my head in a toilet every time I hear about their latest "compromise" in the interest of getting something "done."
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» Exactly...but, hopefully Americans won't return to their vomit and vote Republican...
Posted by: Prinzowhales
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Posted by: Perry Logan on Dec 20, 2009 2:53 AM
Current rating: 4 [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
Any of the other candidates in the primaries would have been perfectly fine, for the simple reason that they would not have bargained away our goals in secret meetings, as Obama has.
Ain't that a kick in the head? The Obama gang made meaningful reform impossible from the get-go--and then let their base work their asses off trying to achieve the impossible.
It just makes you want to march over to Democratic Underground, DailyKos, and HuffPo and start squishing O-holes, doesn't it?
The Hall of Republican Memes
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» RE: Squishing O-holes
Posted by: Alterkitty
» Obama Didn't Bargain, He Spread His Cheeks for Free
Posted by: LHB
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Posted by: xbj on Dec 20, 2009 5:09 AM
Current rating: 4 [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
Next, they put up Obama. It couldn't be more obvious. I screamed it FROM DAY ONE but everyone said we were nuts.
AS IF he's going to sign ANY bill that isn't a giveaway to Big Insurance.
EVERYTHING THE MAN HAS DONE HAS BEEN BUSH. Instead of the drunk swagger, we have outright lies and pretense to humility with a Mussolini stance.
OBAMA MUST GO. LIEBERMAN MUST GO.
THE BILL MUST GO UNTIL IT HAS A PROPER PUBLIC OPTION.
DEAN IS FINALLY RIGHT; DEAN HAS SEEN THE LIGHT.
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Posted by: duckpondpotter on Dec 20, 2009 5:56 AM
Current rating: 4 [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
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Posted by: Rusty Shackleford on Dec 20, 2009 9:25 AM
Current rating: 5 [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
If they run on the democratic ticket, they don't have my vote.
I just realized something today after reading this article...
Democrats try to score political points, just like Republicans. It has nothing to do with helping people, nor anything to do with making life better in general. They only pass things to try to make themselves look good for the next election.
It's a game of trying to stay in power. It has nothing to do with helping the American people.
For his sake, if Dean (or Sanders or Kucinich) ever runs for higher office, he'd better register Green, or Dem-Socialist or something OTHER than democrat. Because if he does register democrat, I'll cry that I can't in good conscience vote for him.
The party bosses control what their politicians do, and if a rogue democrat gets out of hand, they're viewed as a threat to the democrats' status quo.
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» FYI, Bernie Sanders is an Independent...not a Democrat!!!
Posted by: Quist
» true... but...
Posted by: Rusty Shackleford
» I agree Rusty.
Posted by: Quist
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Posted by: Prinzowhales on Dec 20, 2009 3:10 PM
Current rating: 5 [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
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Posted by: melpol on Dec 20, 2009 3:50 PM
Current rating: 5 [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
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Posted by: Jeanne on Dec 20, 2009 4:28 PM
Current rating: 5 [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
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» This is change, but for the worse --
Posted by: tatamchwh
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Posted by: johnuw93 on Dec 20, 2009 6:51 PM
Current rating: Not yet rated [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
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Posted by: PaulK on Dec 20, 2009 8:02 PM
Current rating: 5 [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
Everybody on the left (except Exxon's paid boiler room bloggers and the nuclear industry's paid bloggers too) understands that there are vast product improvements possible to massively lower carbon dioxide production. Global weird weather has to be fixed.
Everybody on the left (yada yada) understands that a 17% national unemployment rate leads to too many suicides and kids living under bridges. 92 billion for one bank isn't fair to the rest of us.
Everybody on the left understands that slowly bankrupting the national treasury just to get heroin out of the poppy fields of Afghanistan isn't working for the voters. If we value freedoms enough to teach freedoms to the world, we'd better practice them. No torture. No death camps. No death squads. No terror. No crooked elections. The civilians that we want to run foreign governments should have rights, not mass heroin addictions and not mass starvation.
We, the left, have a coherent political platform. What we don't have are enough politicians who can rear up on their two hind legs and advocate for what's right.
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» I'm not so sure
Posted by: james108
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Posted by: Romans1 on Dec 20, 2009 8:13 PM
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» Obama's one-note agenda
Posted by: tatamchwh
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Posted by: james108 on Dec 20, 2009 10:04 PM
Current rating: 5 [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
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» RE: Yay for Dean.
Posted by: flirt
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Posted by: Prinzowhales on Dec 21, 2009 9:55 AM
Current rating: 1 [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
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Posted by: mxcm428 on Dec 21, 2009 11:12 PM
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Posted by: mxcm428 on Dec 21, 2009 11:12 PM
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Posted by: mxcm428 on Dec 21, 2009 11:12 PM
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Posted by: decomo on Dec 23, 2009 9:45 AM
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SWF Video Converter
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