Wednesday, October 21, 2009

Cause and Effect

Four months of this:

Obama Not Demanding Public Option Be Part of Health Care Reform, Aides Say

AP - WASHINGTON - The White House will not commit to health care legislation that would cap insurance premiums or tax benefits, taking a wait-and-see approach as congressional negotiators seek a deal, advisers said Sunday.

President Barack Obama will not demand that a final bill include a government-run plan as a way of driving down costs through competition, though that's his preference, they said.

"There will be compromise. There will be legislation, and it will achieve our goals: helping people who have insurance get more security, more accountability for the insurance industry, helping people who don't have insurance get insurance they can afford, and lowering the overall cost of the system," aide David Axelrod said.

Asked on ABC's "This Week" if Obama would sign a bill that ended the antitrust exemption for the insurance industry and allow caps on premiums, Axelrod said, "We'll see what Congress does."

... Leads to this:
Top Aide: It's Time For The White House To Take Stand On Public Option
TPM - Last week, at a meeting between Senate health care principals and Obama administration officials, the White House basically told Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid it would be leaving most of the big legislative decisions on reform to him. This week, Reid is faced with an onslaught from pressure groups, including labor and the grassroots, demanding that he include the public option in the health care bill he brings to the floor.

In a sign that Reid may be willing to acquiesce, if only the White House helps him whip the caucus into shape, a top Capitol Hill aide tells me "Right now, we don't have 60 Democratic Senators in lockstep with one another on the public option...we need the president to send a strong signal to those in the room negotiating the merger, that the public option is, really, what he wants in the final bill."

This weekend, White House adviser Valerie Jarrett reiterated the White House's non-committal stance on the public option. The aide's plea for more White House involvement suggests non-committal statements like Jarrett's are insufficient to save the day for public option in the Senate's bill.

When you say you "support" the public option, but don't make it an essential element of the bill, this is what happens.

I know some of you think I've been to hard on Obama, but this is exactly what I'm talking about when I say that if the public option makes it into the final health care bill it will be in spite of his efforts, not because of them.

When you strongly support elements of the bill (like he has done with the universal mandate and no pre-existing conditions), they get cemented into the bill and Douche caucus senators come to terms with the fact that they'll have to support them. When you say you support something but don't deem it a deal-breaker and then do nothing else to actually support it, that shows the Douche caucus senators that you're open to dropping it and gives them room to oppose it.

There is no "principled opposition" to the public option among conservative Democrats. They do the same song and dance every single time:

Step 1: Pick an issue where they can look like they're to the right of the rest of the party and grandstand on it.

Step 2: Make loud noises until it's dropped so they can go home and claim victory.

When you say the public option isn't essential, that's where they draw their battle lines. They may be screaming assholes, but they aren't completely brain dead. They know better than to go the mat opposing something that the politically popular President (and leader of their party) has deemed essential to his biggest legislative priority.

But when you leave them to their own devices, they will be douche bags.

They can't help it, it's all they know.

2 comments:

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