The Lost Opportunity

Scott Lemieux comments on this Jonathan Bernstein piece about Obama's inability to control the Senate. Bernstein notes:

Neustadt's classic is all about how the presidency is a very weak office, and how influence (what he calls "power") is, for presidents, only won through hard work and clever maneuvering.  It's weak because, as he says, that the other men (sic) in government are out to serve themselves, not him.  And their interests diverge from his.  In particular Democratic Senators from marginal states have very different constituencies than does a Democratic president, and they're not likely to support all the liberal initiatives he supports. 

True to an extent, though Bernstein misses the possibilities Obama had to use more of a hammer against recalcitrant Democrats and even some Republicans.

Scott expands on Bernstein's points:

In particular, people arguing that a robust public option could have been had if Obama had really wanted it need to be concrete: what specific and usable leverage, exactly, did Obama have over Ben Nelson and the dozen+ Democratic Senators who were clearly opposed to a public option with any teeth?   In most cases, just not very much. 

Again, true to a point. But both Bernstein and Lemieux ignore what was possible in the spring of 2009. Yes, Obama could not call Ben Nelson or Blanche Lincoln into the Oval Office and yell at them until they agreed to vote for the public option. And today, Obama certainly doesn't hold much leverage over moderates.

But let's go back to the spring of 2009. Obama was elected by a good margin. Millions of people came out to his rallies. He energized a whole generation of voters. He had an enormous cache of electronic tools to motivate people. The Republicans were running scared. The world was his oyster.

And he blew it. He blew it because Obama has proven to be a poor politician, in the sense of sheer political skill. People noted in 2008 that Obama had never faced a tough election campaign. That's still the truth. He never had much of a reason to show whether or not he was a skilled legislator and mover of policy. And his acumen in these skills has been disappointing.

Moreover, Obama has failed to understand the nature of leadership. As I wrote in a recent Global Comment piece:

Obama has learned just enough history to massively overcorrect for the errors of past administrations. He knew Bill Clinton made a mistake when he dictated health care reform to Congress in 1993. So instead he allowed Congress to form health care policy. Without active presidential leadership, critics of the plan took the initiative and shaped the debate.

Obama has also learned from George W. Bush. Rightfully disdainful of Bush’s cowboy approach to the presidency, Obama has refrained from making emotion-driven broad statements that might later prove damaging. Certainly this strategy has worked well in Obama’s foreign policy. While Iran has proven more intractable than Obama might have realized, overall, Obama has improved the nation’s standing the world.

However, many Americans liked Bush’s grandiosity. Bush’s Manichean view of the world appealed to America’s evangelical leanings that have shaped the country since its founding. Bush’s “Mission Accomplished” speech was profoundly stupid because it was wrong. But his rhetoric was good politics at the time.

Obama has had ample opportunities to speak to these tendencies in the American psyche but has consistently refused. Americans have historically responded to strong leadership, often regardless of actual policy—whether from Franklin Roosevelt or John Kennedy or Ronald Reagan or Barack Obama during his presidential campaign.

While we have to explain political shifts in more complex terms than leadership, Americans have consistently supported politicians who inspired them. Barack Obama convinced millions of Americans to vote for him not because of his health care plan but because he made them believe he would make their lives better. But when he took office, Obama forgot about this. His lack of vocal and inspirational leadership opened the door for the Teabaggers, oil companies, and special interests to fill the leadership vacuum, possibly threatening his presidency.

Obama could not call Ben Nelson into his office and convince him to vote for the plan. But he could have asked his legions of supporters to take to the streets to support his policies. He could have tapped into the desires that his base had for him. Legions were willing to do what he asked of them. And he chose not to take advantage of it. Instead, he chose to become a consensus-seeking centrist who ignored his base. The opportunity to mobilize people slipped through his fingers.

The great "what if" of the Obama president is this: "What if Obama had mobilized his supporters to rally for his programs?" Would active leadership and public rallies convinced moderate Democrats and even some Republicans that voting for the public option and most of Obama's other agenda items was necessary for their political survival? We'll never know. Instead, his unwillingness to use the bully pulpit opened up a leadership vacuum filled by Teabaggers which convinced moderate politicians that their interest was in watering down or voting against health care.

If Not Now, When?

Michael Tomasky gleefully reports that in the summer of 2009, Rahm Emanuel urged President Obama to ignore health care for the time being in order to focus on jobs. Tomasky is gleeful because he believed the same thing.

I really disagree with both Emanuel and Tomasky. From a sheer political perspective, maybe they have a point. The economy was horrible in 2009 and its failure to improve rapidly has hurt Democratic chances in the 2010 elections. Some criticism of the Democrats does hit home, particularly that Obama acted to protect big banks and auto companies and not working people.

However, we can challenge these arguments both on their merits and on their political acumen. First, had Obama not bailed out the banks and the auto makers, would unemployment be 15% now? It's a clear possibility. Certainly Obama didn't channel populist anger toward big corporations. I would have liked to see a little more of that, but his moves helped stabilize the economy and begin to move it back on the right path. Now, I definitely believe that the nation has only touched the surface in dealing with the structural problems that led to the recession, but that's not strictly or even primarily Obama's fault. In any case, for the time being, his measures seem to have helped.

But more to the point, Obama's decision to plow ahead on health care makes a lot of sense. The idea that you can put off a social program or legislative platform until later makes no sense. Political capital gets spent very easily. If anything, Obama was not aggressive enough in spending it, letting a lot slip through his fingers. But he was elected on a platform that included major changes to health care. He made that his top priority and he got at least some semblance of his plan passed. This is a huge legislative achievement, particularly in today's political climate.

You can make choices about legislative and political priorities. But on issues you don't prioritize, you absolutely cannot assume that you can just get to it later. Obama wanted his legacy to rest on health care and indeed it will.

Native American Health Care

Well, this ain't good:

Dozens of people given free blood sugar tests April 24 are at a slight risk of having been exposed to two forms of Hepatitis and/or HIV, which causes AIDS, due to the improper administration of the testing devices, University of New Mexico School of Medicine officials announced Thursday.

As many as 33 of 55 given the free blood sugar tests at an event at the Indian Pueblo Cultural Center could have been exposed to other people’s blood and possibly infected, said Dr. Bob Bailey, associate dean for Clinical Affairs for the UNM School of Medicine.

...

What they had determined by Thursday was that 10 students from the University of New Mexico Physician Assistant program had decided to administer free blood sugar tests and bought the testing devices themselves.

A faculty member from the PA program accompanied the students to the event, where the students administered the tests. The first error occurred when the students employed a particular testing device meant for a single patient on multiple patients, exposing them to another person’s blood, Bailey said.
The students were not properly trained on the device, he added. The third error happened when the students kept no records, so the school had no names of those potentially infected when they began trying to track them down.

“The UNM School of Medicine deeply regrets this error and sincerely apologizes to all those who may have been exposed, and to the Indian Pueblo Cultural Center,” Bailey said.

The real story here is that the health care system provides such poor care for Native Americans that student-provided testing, however poor it may be, proves really appealing for them. In fact, Native Americans receive less access to virtually all of our social services and other forms of infrastructure. For example, it took until the Clinton Administration for Navajos poisoned by uranium mining in the 1950s to receive anything resembling adequate care and compensation, by which time many of the affected were dead. A majority of residents on the Navajo reservation do not have electricity, despite the fact that enormous coal-fired power plants are just off their land in New Mexico.

Native Americans suffer from extreme obesity and diabetes rates due to the radical changes in their lifestyles and diets over the past 125 years. Infant mortality rates are higher than the national average, as is drug use, suicide, and many other negative health indicators. While some of this story is unique to Native American and Native American history, it also shares many commonalities with urban African-Americans, poor whites in Appalachia, and Latinos in many parts of the nation. For all of these groups, health care is inadequate and when it is available, it is often shockingly sub-standard, as we see in this story.

The other thing to wonder is why the students chose to do this. Obviously they saw this as a good opportunity to practice their craft. Was it because the patients were Indians? Do we just assume that the extreme poor and racial minorities are a open field for medical testing? Certainly we have in the past. While I doubt the students were malicious in their actions, it does suggest an unconscious belief about Native American bodies and medical testing.

But again, the real story is how our health care system serves so many of our citizens so incredibly poorly.

Wrong and Unfair

I usually really like Steve M's work, but I have to disagree with him pretty strongly in his analysis of Democrats and the economy.

Nine years ago, 47% of Americans thought Democrats were on the side of average Americans and 29% thought they favored big corporations -- an 18-point advantage for "average Americans."

Now it's an 18-point advantage for fat cats. However inaccurate the old perception may have been, the Democrats needed it, and they've lost it. I don't know if they even want to get it back, but they're risking long-term minority status, starting in the next couple of election cycles, if they don't get it back.

Look, you can give the vast majority of the goodies to the fat cats and a lot less to ordinary people when ordinary people don't need that much. But when people are hurting, the reality needs to match the FDR-like rhetoric. You have to deliver for ordinary Joes. And the current crop of Democrats didn't. That failure is the Democrats' Katrina.

...


Democrats have had a year and a few months to blunt the appeal of GOP talking points on these issues (and yes, I know that the president's approach on deficits and drilling has been GOP Lite). Instead, they pissed away the better part of a year on a health-care bill that's helped virtually no one so far and that most Americans think is awful, even if they don't know why. This could turn out to be a GOP decade, and it's because there are people on rooftops all over America, and Democrats haven't rescued them.

I think this is a severe overreaction and is unfair to the Democrats. First, I absolutely reject the idea that Democrats will become a long-term minority because people believe they support Wall Street fat cats. This is strictly a response to the economy and to effective right-wing rhetoric painting the Democrats as out of touch with common people. When the economy gets better, as it is already doing, Democratic numbers will improve. We can already see this begin to happen in a lot of polling data.

And wasn't it just 2 years ago that we were talking about Republicans becoming a long-term minority? And wasn't it just 6 years ago that Karl Rove was talking about a permanent Republican majority?

It's just not useful thinking in these ways. Things change, often fairly rapidly. This is especially true of the economy.

This argument is also unfair on the merits. There was a knee-jerk reaction among a lot of Progressives against TARP and the bank bailouts. I didn't exactly share this--because I frankly don't know what's best for the economy. That is such a complicated issue that I really don't know what had to happen. But I do know that banks could not continue to fail. Something had to be done to stablize the system. I've read in several places suggesting that TARP and the stimulus package prevented the nation from seeing 12, 13, even 15% unemployment. Those become pretty good bills with that in mind.

Moreover, I don't know that we can rightfully say Obama "pissed away" a year on health care reform. That was a hugely important bill. From an immediate political perspective, maybe health care reform as Obama conceived it didn't build a lot of political capital. And there's no question that Obama did a very poor job of using executive power to make immediate changes in Americans' lives. (This gets to another issue--if Obama holds an expansive view of executive power, as have most recent presidents, why does it only seem to apply to military and foreign policy issues and not domestic policy making? But that's for another post.) But the health care bill is a massively important piece of legislation. In one year, Obama left a greater positive impact on this nation than the majority of American presidents. It's more than either Bush or Bill Clinton accomplished.

The bill may be flawed and Obama's way of shepherding the bill might leave much to be desired, but let's not minimize the significance of health care reform just because Democrats are currently unpopular.

Asshat of the Day: Eric Cantor

Via Digby--House Minority Whip Eric Cantor has spoken out on the rash of threats and violence against Democratic members of Congress over our Maoist/Fascist healthcare reform but, not to worry, it wasn't helpful. His disgusting statements simply boil down to blaming the victim for the crime.

"That is why I have deep concerns that some, Chris Van Hollen and Tim Kaine in particular, are dangerously fanning the flames by suggesting that these incidents be used as a political weapon."

Nice, he even gives particular names, just in case the Tea Partiers are confused about who they're supposed to attack next. Apparently, reporting violence foments violence. How well did this work for the Catholic Church? Covering up child abuse clearly caused a decline in the abuse. The only kids who actually got molested were those who had previously reported molestation? What kind of sense does this make?

What happens if Cantor uses this argument about rape victims? There's no shortage of blame for rape placed on the victim, but he won't stay in office too long if he says, "Don't report the crime because you'll get raped again." Or on domestic violence, "Now, ladies, I know that abuse is wrong and terrible, but don't go to the police; you'll just make your husbands angrier. Do you really want that?" Absurd as all of this is on the face, he really is giving us the "I'll give you something to cry about" line. I guess that, because the threats, the violence, the blatant racism is happening to elected Democrats, it somehow makes it all excusable.

Cantor and the rest can try to deflect this stuff away from their party and onto crazy extremists, but who initiated the cries of Socialism? Whose media outlets discuss constantly the rising need for revolution? If Democrats became part of the axis of evil for questioning the veracity of WMDs in Iraq, I can hardly imagine the outrage and investigations if a Democrat faxed Michael Steele a picture of a noose, but I guess you deserve it if you have a D by your name and hold some crazy idea of justice. Up yours, Cantor, if the violence that appears to be coming happens, some of this blood will splash onto your hands, though you'll never accept that responsibility...asshat.

Morning in Amerika

It sure does feel good to live in a Maoist state. Health care reform centered around plans that largely originated with Shining Path members like Mitt Romney has fulfilled my dreams of destroying freedom.

Speaking of that, I have to engage in a self-criticism session, so I might be gone for awhile.

2016

If the health care bill is successful, a very high likelihood, it seems to reinforce Hillary Clinton as the likely Democratic nominee in 2016. Obviously, it's way, way too early to think seriously about this. But she won't be that old, she's done a fine job as Secretary of State, she has a huge set of supporters, and she's always been associated with health care.

Who knows what happens in the next 6 years, but I wouldn't be a bit surprised if Obama gave her his tacit support and let every insider know it.

Health Care Explainers

I'm collecting here the best explainer posts, widgets, and videos on the health care legislation that just passed. Immediately after the bill made it through, I started getting questions from friends who are politically aware enough to know it was happening, but not nearly as hooked-in as I am--and I couldn't even tell them what was in the bill. So, here's my attempt to help with that problem. Above is a video from GRITtv (yes, my place of employment) with Maggie Mahar of HealthBeatBlog.org and Jacob Hacker, the inventor of the public option (that we didn't get) explaining what's in the bill and when it takes place.

The Washington Post made this really great interactive gadget that should tell you how the bill will affect you.

The New York Times also has a gadget, though not quite as cool to my mind as the WaPo's, it is simpler.

The Kaiser Family Foundation has a handy subsidy calculator as well, just in case the last two widgets didn't tell you enough about your personal finances.

From CNN, a rundown on when different provisions kick in.

Nick Baumann at Mother Jones with a plain-English rundown of what happens this year.

MoveOn.org has Ten Things Every American Should Know, though frankly it's more like Ten Talking Points. Still, stats worth looking at.

CBS has a nice summary of the bill in bullet points.

Karoli at Crooks & Liars has ten immediate benefits of the bill and a rollout timetable.

This is just a start; I plan to keep collecting. Please leave your suggestions in comments, and feel free to steal this! Almost all of these suggestions came to me via Twitter, thanks to everyone who sent 'em.

More Thoughts on Health Care Reform

-It's more than a little understatement to say that it's great to see legislation that is actually designed to help people. In many ways, the fact that, even after all the amendments and tinkering, this was a progressive bill, just reinforces one of the broader divisions in politics, between those who are always seeking to improve the United States and are labeled progressive, in no small part because they are in favor of "progress"; and those who see the United States as already perfect and who believe tinkering or trying to improve will only lead to a fall from American perfection (which much better describes their view of the United States than "American exceptionalism" does). It's a sad-but-true fact that conservatives wish to preserve a status quo that leaves a lot of room for improvement.

-In all of this, the importance and greatness of Nancy Pelosi should not be overlooked or ever forgotten.

-To echo what Erik said, there has been no small amount of absurd hyperbole, and it hasn't even been limited to politicians. Acquaintances on facebook have made comments such as "we might as well take the Constitution out back and burn it right now," somebody being grateful John Boehner was their representative, and somebody even saying "Forgive them Lord, for they know not what they do," which was also apparently uttered by some guy named Jesus on a cross. Because, after all, the Jesus being crucified and wingnuts angry that a bill designed to help rein in insurance costs and aid families are totally the same thing.

In dealing with all this, I think Barney Frank hit it dead on, pointing out that the battle over health care became "the proxy for a lot of other sentiments. A lot of which are perfectly reasonable but some of which are kind of ugly. ... People out here today on the whole were, many of them, were hateful and abusive."

I couldn't agree more, and Republican efforts to disavow the hate-speech this past Sunday are as hollow as their objections to reform. When their supporters get ugly, Republicans are quick to try to disavow those supporters, but they've been encouraging this kind of language and these attitudes since the 2008 electoral campaign (remember all those crowds at McCain rallies calling Obama a Muslim and other names?). Republican representatives can't just hide from this language when it makes them look bad - it's as much a part of their movement as Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh, appeals to the Reagan years, and hawkish rhetoric. It's all part of the package, whether they like it or not.

-On that note, for those both inside and outside of Congress who claim to oppose the bill on Christian principles, I might recommend they go back and read that part about some guy named Christ. I believe he who recommended helping those in need, rather than continuing to deny them care and side with wealthy interests. If you aren't in favor of helping people, you can't really make any pretense to standing for a religion whose main figure preached helping people.

The Poisonous Republican Rhetoric on Health Care

Finally, health care is going to pass.

It's not great, but it's a start. Most importantly perhaps, for the first time since Lyndon Johnson was president, we have important new progressive social legislation. I'd like to think Johnson could have done better than Obama in controlling the debate, but I'm proud of what we've accomplished anyway.

However, I am again reminded of the poisonous Republican rhetoric. In defeat, they are using incredibly divisive and even dangerous language in discussing this legislation. How can the nation function when one party holds such hatred in their hearts for the other? A few examples:

Tom Price (R-GA): If health care passes, "We lose our morality. We lose our freedom."

John Shadegg (R-AZ): "This bill will destroy freedom and do damage to the very fabric of our society."

Marsha Blackburn (R-MN): "Freedom dies a little bit today."

Devin Nunes (R-CA): By passing health care reform, Democrats "will finally lay the cornerstone of their Socialist utopia on the backs of the American people. For most of the 20th century people fled the ghosts of communist dictators. And now you are bringing the ghosts back into this chamber."

Really? Freedom just died? We've lost our morality? Obama is now Stalin?

While it's hard to know to what extent the legislators believe their own rhetoric, certainly  many of their constituents do. And it's very worrying.

Kucinich

I basically can't stand Dennis Kucinich. He's the worst kind of progressive--knee-jerk, espousing kooky ideas about aliens, homeopathic medicine and other absurdities, etc. He provides the conservatives a perfect example of what we are.

But at least Kucinich finally came off his health care high horse and is voting for the damn bill. Anyone who doesn't vote for the bill from the left should be primaried out--not because of their positions but because they are terrible politicians who don't understand how politics are played. The idea that this bill is not better than nothing is absurd and irresponsible. For all the eye-rolling moments Kucinich provides me, at least he gets the political game.

Chamber of Commerce

I'm presently in a Washington state House district targeted by the Chamber of Commerce for anti-health care bill ads.

First, these ads are absurd. They are all about how terrible the economy is and now Congress is trying to push through health care.

But if the economy is in the gutter, don't I want the government to give me a health care assist? I know the bill isn't great at this point, but it's still a heck of a lot better than what we have now. I have trouble seeing how these ads are effective, but then I don't understand why poor and middle-class people don't overwhelmingly vote Democratic anyway.

Moreover, wouldn't the Chamber of Commerce have to be in the top 5 of most reprehensible organizations in the country. What would that top 5 look like?

1. Republican Party
2. New York Yankees
3. Coal Industry
4. U.S. Chamber of Commerce
5. Everything to do with the country music industry in Nashville.

That's a workable beginning to a top 5 for me.

Data Visualization on US Health Care Expenses and The People's Health Reform

Over at their blog, National Geographic has this graph up, comparing per capita health care expense (left side) to life expectancy (right side):

Note, as well, that the thickness of a line indicates the number of annual visits to a doctor, per capita. There are many systems that spend much less, where people have much greater access to health care, and out perform our system.

When one sees information like this, it's hard, if not impossible, to be utterly frustrated with the ridiculousness of the past six months of congressional wrangling over providing even the most minimal of public health care protections. And, unlike some, I don't see this as a failure of just the Democratic Party (though their part in this is huge), the White House, or even the Republicans whose job it is to represent the interests of Capital. It's also a total failure of the American people who lack the capacity, it seems, to institutionalize their supposed generosity of spirit. And that, I think, is because that generosity of spirit rarely reaches beyond clan, with noted exceptions of disparate individual acts of charity that have no capacity to remake deep, structural problems. That whole dynamic reminds me of the operation of politeness in Southern culture-- it masks a deep, dark violence.

This incapacity for social contractual generosity has long made me skeptical of "the People" as some sort of un-variegated mass standing in contradistinction to the halls of power. The People are too often dupes of those masters, or willing accomplices. In a comment on Howard Zinn's recent passing, Werner Herzog's Bear, on his blog I Used to Be Disgusted, Now I Try to Be Amused, remarked that,

Yet with his passing, we ought to confront a great fallacy in his writing which is being proven with every passing day. Namely, Zinn spoke of this amorphous "people" in his book that was always the victim, not perpetrator of America's crimes. This despite the "people's" historical enthusiasm for American imperialism, red baiting, and racist violence. When I see the tea bagger rallies with their hateful depictions of the president and insane talk of secession and conspiracy, I can't help but think, regardless of their "astro-turf" nature, that these people are indeed part of "the people" just as much as the massive crowds that turned out for president Obama's inauguration.

As we mourn Zinn's passing, we ought to admire his determination to gain a more critical and truthful picture of American history, but take that one step further and acknowledge that we have seen the enemy, and the enemy is us.

it's easy to suggest that the battle for healthcare since the Clinton Administration has simply pitted insurance, pharmaceutical, and hospital industries against the people, but I think that's too simplistic, because "the people," particularly those in the street, haven't been clamoring in a voice united for healthcare as a human right, and as a lynchpin of human dignity.

Then again, now that the SCOTUS has granted personhood to corporations, I guess a People's History of the healthcare debate would look much different, wouldn't it?

Free Abortion On Demand

It's Blog for Choice Day. And this year, a year many of us thought might actually be a good one for sexual and reproductive rights, has turned out to be a very lousy one indeed. We saw Democrats force the Stupak amendment into an otherwise fairly decent House health care reform bill, and do nearly the same thing in the Senate onto an already-pretty-crappy health care reform bill.

We saw the murder of Dr. George Tiller, abortion provider, in cold blood.

We like to talk about choice. We fight over terminology. But what have we really done, in the years since Roe v. Wade, other than hold the line and nervously try not to lose what we've won?

We criticize Democrats for not supporting us, we who put them in office. But what are we pushing for? When my Democrat Congresswoman from my quite Democratic district (BROOKLYN, people) sends me a form letter in response to my calls and emails about Stupak, reassuring ME that there won't be any federal money spent on abortion, what does that mean for us? Even the Democrats are more worried about antichoice arguments than they are about people like me bailing on them. Where are we going to go, after all, right?

Well, I'm tired of it. It's 2010. We need to be fighting for more gains, not hiding in a defensive crouch and praying we get to hold on to what we've got. Rights are not granted, they are taken.

Right after Stupak, I wrote:

Not enough. I want positives. I want to use this moment to affirm our right to a healthy, joyful sexuality and to talk about how we can achieve that. A messy, unruly sexuality—hell, part of the beauty of it is that it’s not clean and neat. It is like eating a peach, in the last lines of Prufrock, juices running down your chin, sweet and tangy. Those decisions that happen in a minute are sometimes wrong, and sometimes unplanned things come out of them, but we don’t need to be saved from it, we need to have resources and support to deal with it, from a relationship gone sour to unfortunate STIs or Plan B for a birth control failure—or, whether Congress likes it or not, safe, legal, insurance-covered abortion.

I want to come out of the closet and say yes, we like sex, and we have the right to have it. To say that if the government spends millions of dollars every year on technologies that are only good for killing people, it can include abortion in a health care plan.

We didn't get to the point of Roe v. Wade by having nice polite arguments. We got there by being angry, and demanding, and pushing. We got there by staking out a firm position: that our bodies are our own and we have the right to do what we want with them. We got there by calling for free abortion on demand.

So this year I don't want to hear any sugarcoating. I don't want any dancing around the words. Abortion. Sex. Pregnancy. There it is. "Choice" means a lot of things, it's true. But this year we should all remember at bottom what it is we fought for.

In Response to Drama over Health Care Reform

So the latest kerfuffle is over whether we should kill the bill or pass it and work on improving it. I honestly haven't had the time to do the poring-over of the Senate bill that I'd like, so I'm not going to stake out hard and fast turf on either side. I will say that mandates and no public option were a huge part of the reason I liked Obama's health care plan better than Hillary Clinton's, and it was an opinion that I fine-tuned for months arguing it on the campaign trail against much louder and better-trained voices like, oh, Paul Krugman's. It's what they have in Massachusetts, and it hasn't worked. David Sirota, on Twitter, called it a Giuliani move: making having no health insurance illegal is sort of like making being homeless illegal--and I agree.

ANYWAY. What is good is that the debate is now squarely between us on the left, and you can't tell who's going to say what based on their supposed position on the bar between ZOMG SOCIALISTS and milquetoast slightly-further-left-than-Ben-Nelson centrists.

And just like the primaries, shit has descended into some nasty personal attacks. Thankfully, since my primary exposure to that shit is on Twitter, and I don't follow too many assholes anymore, I haven't seen so much of it. Instead, it filters through on the sidelines.

I think the bill will probably be passed. I think we have to think long and hard about this, because while we have to fight to get everything good out of the House bill we can into the final bill (which is why the staking out of intransigent positions on the left is GOOD STRATEGY, among other things) we do have to take an honest look at the Senate bill and say: if this is the best it ever gets, is this worth passage? Kind of like getting married--you can't marry the person you hope someone turns into, you have to marry the person they are. (OK, enough folksy analogies from me. Palin I ain't.)

Over recent weeks I've been having this argument/discussion with coworkers and other Really Smart People on the left about what's going on with teabaggers and others. I'm firmly of the camp that says that the left is once again getting out-organized. If we had a solid union movement that educated its members and contextualized issues for them along some sort of class basis, I firmly believe that we'd have less angry incoherent teabag signs and much more protests of the people that deserve it: Wall Street.

So. Jane Hamsher is apparently making common cause with teabagger types in her quest to kill the bill. While I shudder at the thought of trying to make ANY common cause with someone like Grover "drown-government-in-the-bathtub" Norquist, I think that acknowledging the populist anger behind the teabaggers is worthwhile.

For instance. Sure, they're astroturfed. They are also real people who are really pissed off.

So this post this morning, from my otherwise-friend Matttbastard (who also has the luxury of Canadian health care and so has far less a horse in this race than I do) kind of ticked me off.

Ok, so: We have an astroturfed right-wing social movement of sorts (almost singlehandedly keeping the polyester lobby and Lee Greenwood from starving) that, following a TOTALLY SPONTANEOUS RANT on CNBC from Rick Santelli, decided to utilize the angry-shouty bits of Saul Alinsky to get their ugly red state mugs on Hardball every fucking night for several months straight. And this is the (bipartisan) model that Hamsher apparently wants to emulate (nearly 8 weeks after the mission accomplished moment that was NY-23) because “the only difference [between wingnuts and progressives] is the messaging”?

This combines SEVERAL things I hate into one paragraph. "Ugly Red State mugs" well gee, you know what? Those are real fucking people too. I'm so tired of the red state/blue state snobbery I could spit. You know what? I lived in red states. I busted my ass on multiple political campaigns in red states and saw one of them turn blue (Colorado). I've talked to pissed-off overworked people who are just looking for someone, ANYONE to give them a narrative of how they got so fucked--and we haven't been doing it.

Also, since when does anyone who calls themselves a lefty get to snarl and sneer at populist street protest? Sure, I laugh at "look at this fucking teabagger" too, but you know what else I do? I wonder why the fuck we're not out there, because at least those people are putting some effort into it. And to some degree they ARE protesting the right people, even if the narrative they have (ZOMG SOCIALIST!) is just factually wrong.

(See latest Global Comment piece for more on activism being actual work)

Alan Grayson got cheers from nearly every corner of the progressive blogosphere for taking what were essentially right-wing tactics (boil down message to one scare-tactic sentence. Repeat. Refuse to apologize.) to the floor of Congress and the major media outlets. Because it WORKED, it was media-savvy and it was a progressive staking out some turf and refusing to cave in.

So while I disagree with partnering with Grover Norquist, who is no kind of populist and every kind of rich plutocratic asshole, I absolutely don't have a problem with acknowledging that the teabaggers A. have some legitimate grievances and B. are using tactics that get attention. I also don't have a problem with someone staking out a hard and fast progressive position and vowing not to swerve from it.

We got the shitty health care bill we have because progressives refused to do that, while assholes like Joe Lieberman and Ben Nelson weren't afraid to.

Sexism and Stupak

You know, over and over, lefties and liberals have told feminists that they have to look beyond sexism and abortion rights. Hell, I've been one of them. I criticized feminists during the primaries who seemed to excuse blatant racism from the Clinton campaign while freaking out about Obama calling a reporter "Sweetie." I've noted that historical feminism was a white middle-class movement with white middle-class goals.

But right now, I'm really, really pissed about this Stupak amendment (as if you couldn't tell). And yes, this is an issue that is personal for me: I'm a cisgender woman, heterosexual and of childbearing age, and I have no desire for kids.

And I'm sick and tired of hearing that I should look at the broader picture, that there are worse issues than sexism, blah blah blah.

I've heard this from well-meaning "liberal" men, but I've also heard it from activists I admire, who are usually RIGHT when they point out the myopia of much of the feminist movement (such as it is).

But this is the thing: millions of poor women, many of them women of color, will be hurt badly if this amendment stays in the bill. Shit, it'll affect me, but I can probably still get an abortion if I need one. This isn't a bourgeois issue and we're not being myopic or selfish assholes to be righteously, ferociously angry and ready to fight this tooth and nail.

This is women's lives. I care about race and class issues, poverty and health care and immigration and transgender people's rights.

There are lots of lines in the sand that I'll draw. One of them has been crossed right now, and yes, it's personal. Because over and over again our issues get written off as things that should be compromised for the greater good, or we're made to feel guilty because we're worrying about something silly when there are worse oppressions out there.

I'm not going to play oppression olympics or other such bullshit. I'm just going to keep fighting this with every breath I've got, and I don't care who you are, if you tell me I'm wrong for that, you can kiss my ass.

What Max Baucus Needs to Hear

From Left in the West, a letter from a longtime Baucus supporter in Montana to the senator:

Dear Sen. Baucus,

I just want to let you know how disappointed I was with your vote yesterday to refuse to entertain either of the public option amendments that came before your committee. I've been a supporter, donor, and advocate on your behalf for many, many years. But yesterday you had a chance to do something important for small businessmen like me, and you let me down. My BC/BS premium went up 20% this year, over $1,200, and I'm healthy. I have no realistic option here in Lewistown. So, next time you need a ride from the airport, call someone else. Signs put up around the county? Good luck with that. A contribution? Ask Blue Cross. I'm done. My next vote will go to a real Democrat. You had a chance to make history. Instead, you'll go down in history as someone who could have made a difference, and chose not to. That's if history remembers you at all. I should have known it would end up like this.

Profoundly disappointed,

Jeff

Baucus really has blown this. It's unclear whether he cares about his long-term reputation or if his only concern is campaign contributions. But any chance Max Baucus has to be remembered as a good senator is gone.

Hero of the Day

The U.S. needs more Alan Graysons.

Domestic Violence--A Pre-Existing Condition?

In case we needed any more evidence that the American health insurance system is a complete disaster, Washington DC and nine other states have declared being a victim of domestic violence to be a pre-existing condition.

That's reprehensible on so many levels, it's hard to know where to start.

The states are:
Arkansas
Idaho
Mississippi
South Carolina
North Carolina
South Dakota
North Dakota
Oklahoma
Wyoming

What a surprising group of states there! These 9 states are totally known both for their generous social services and for their compassion! The one question I have is where's Texas?

Why DC also did this is unknown.

Via Feministing.

Medicare For All

George McGovern calls for a simple solution for the nation's health care crisis: Medicare for everyone.

This is interesting. I'm not enough of an expert on health care policy to know how feasible this is. Certainly one wonders about the costs. But Medicare has been a massive success that everyone loves. Even right-wingers defend Medicare, they just laughably separate it from government-run health care. I think the real win out of this proposal is rhetorical; it forces the right to put up or shut up on Medicare. If they oppose its expansion, is it because they oppose Medicare entirely? A good political move I think.

Of course, since our health care policy is being decided by a rather dim senator from a rural, all-white state in a remote corner of the country who receives a huge amount of campaign contributions from the health care industry, I'm sure nothing good will happen. But McGovern is on to a really good idea here.