Much more thoughtful and receptive than Barney Frank, but the ravening beast in me prefers Barney Frank.
Category: Healthcare
This business will get out of control. It will get out of control and we’ll be lucky to live through it.*
There was a scuffle at a healthcare reform rally, and someone’s finger was bitten off.
*Admiral Josh Painter, The Hunt for Red October.
Te Stoopid, It Burns US!!!!!
Maria Bartiromo asks 454 year old Congressman Anthony Weiner if why he is not on Medicare (1:37 in vid).
Umm…You have to be 65 to qualify.
Jeebus, is she anything but a life support system for a pair of tits.*
*Yes, legs too, she has nice gams. The point is that she is a profoundly stupid woman who has her job because she is eye candy.
Who Got Pictures of Max Baucus Sodomizing an Underage Goat?
Because Max Baucus (DINO-MT) has now explicitly stated that he supports a public option:
U.S. Senator Max Baucus has finally broken his silence regarding his personal position on including a public option in health care reform legislation. Last Monday night (8/17), in an unprecedented conference call to Montana Democratic central committee chairs, the powerful leader of the Senate Finance Committee told his strongest supporters that he supported a public option.
While discussing the obstacles to getting a public option through the Senate, he assured his forty listeners, “I want a public option too!”
….
Seriously, I’m beginning to think that some of the Blue Dog types (technically, Blue Dogs are only a caucus in the House of Representatives) are starting to get some very serious push-back, and it scares them.
Jon Stewart is a F%$#ing Genius, Having a Liar for Lunch
Here is Jon Stewart showing Betsy McCaughey to be a complete liar.
Of course, Andrew Sullivan thought that it was valuable to publish her lies in 1993, and she was rewarded by becoming the NY Lieutenant Governor, and is still treated as someone who should be talked to.
Well, Dr. Krugman, this Liberal Never Trusted Obama
I figured that he would throw progressives and liberals under the bus since the entire Donnie McClurkin affair, when Obama deliberately threw gays under a bus to win the South Carolina primary.
He’s done it with:
- Rapid withdrawal from Iraq.
- Releasing torture photos.
- His support of “fair trade”.
- Stupid tax cuts in the stimulus package.
- Pursuing war crimes by Bush and His Evil Minions™
- Bailing out the banks.
- Gays, particularly with Don’t Ask Don’t Tell.
- The use of civilian courts to try terrorists.
- Closing Guantanamo (with an assist from craven Congressmen).
- Ra
So now, Paul Krugman notices that progressives have finally drawn a line in the sand on the public option:
It’s hard to avoid the sense that Mr. Obama has wasted months trying to appease people who can’t be appeased, and who take every concession as a sign that he can be rolled.
Indeed, no sooner were there reports that the administration might accept co-ops as an alternative to the public option than G.O.P. leaders announced that co-ops, too, were unacceptable.
So progressives are now in revolt. Mr. Obama took their trust for granted, and in the process lost it. And now he needs to win it back.
Gee, you think?
I’ve been saying this for over a year.
Rachael Maddow Explains the Republican Hive Mind
Brilliant!
It’s nice to see a woman to use a sports metaphor, and it’s better than most sports metaphors.
Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy
Michelle Bachmann is Pro Abortion Rights?????
She was on Hannity’s show, and she was talking about Obama’s healthcare reform plan, and she said the following at about 5:35 in her interview:
“That’s why people need to continue to go to the town halls, continue to melt the phone lines of their liberal members of Congress,” said Bachmann, “and let them know, under no certain circumstances will I give the government control over my body and my health care decisions.”
You go girl!
Meanwhile, Back in Bizarro world
Guess who is going to hold a fundraiser for the first Virginia Congressman who takes the pledge not to vote for a health plan without a public option?
Terry McAuliffe….Yes, that Terry McAuliffe, a man who has been repeatedly excoriated by lefty bloggers like me as a corporate stooge, and little more than bagman for political contributions from wealthy people and special interests.
In fact, I did a happy dance when he lost the primary race for VA governor for this reason.
But he is sponsoring this initiative:
Terry McAuliffe thinks it is time to “insist” on the public option. We couldn’t agree more. Terry’s agreed to host a fundraiser with Virginia and national bloggers who are insisting on a public option for the first Virginia Congressman who will take our pledge! This will be an awesome event to highlight and honor any Virginia Congressman who shows leadership on this issue. If you would like to be a part of the host committee for this event, shoot me an email at notlarrysabato@hotmail.com. Lowell and I are already on board, and I’m sure there will be many others!
Good for Terry McAuliffe….I cannot believe that I just said that.
I would also be remiss in mentioning that Act Blue has a page to donate to Congressmen who take the pledge not to support any bill that lacks a real public option, and it’s already raised nearly $300K.
I’ve added the link to my Act Blue page too.
In the Interest of Fairness
Here is a French Provincial dining room table’s response to Barney Frank.
Stephen Colbert is a f$#@ing genius.
Mixed Emotions Here
Representative Eric Massa (D-NY) described Senator Charles Grassley’s “Pull the plug on Grandma” talking point as “Treason” (0:41 on the video).
It’s refreshing to see someone pushing back on Republican rhetoric, but there is a reason that treason is the only offense specifically outlined in the Constitution: it’s there because the Kings of England repeatedly misused the charge to go after politically inconvenient people.
So it’s nice to see pushback, but I am far more comfortable with how Barney Frank handles it.
Of course, Massa is a Democrat, which means that he will likely apologize in the next few days.
Have I Mentioned that I Love Barney Frank*
Here he is taking on some teabaggers, though I would suggest that people who think that Act Pink does any good listen to his comments toward the end, when he says that, “Disruption never helps your cause. It makes you look like you are afraid to have rational discussions. You just drive people away.”
*In a 110% purely heterosexual kind of way, of course, as the General would say.
Giving Blowjobs to Corpses for Cheeseburgers Since 2005*
Time Magazine notes that Tom Daschle, failed nominee for head of HHS, and regular talking head on the Sunday shows regarding healthcare, is also extremely well paid by the health insurance industry.
The problem with corruption in Washington is not campaign donations, though they are a bit of an issue, it is the fact that anyone who is in Congress knows that if he sucks up to corporate interests, he can get a 7 figure a year gig lobbying or giving strategy advice when they leave office.
*Yep, it’s another of Matt Taibbi’s bon mots.
Lawrence O’Donnell vs. Representative John Culberson (R- TX): Complete Pwn463*
O’Donnell, asks if Culberson would vote to repeal Social Security or Medicare, and shows where he is lying.
What’s the word for this behavior???
Oh, right….journalism.
*Ownage.
Rachael Maddow Gets It, MTP Edition
Seriously, there are 60 Dems in the Senate. It is reasonable to expect that all 60 of them will vote for cloture, whether or not they vote for the bill.
“These People Are Unappeasable”
Krugman nails it on MSNBC:
Of course, this does not prevent the White House from capitulating on the public option, because, as I’ve said before, Barack Obama does not care about healthcare reform, he cares about being able to sign some sort of healthcare reform bill, even if it is bad and has no real reform, because he gets to claim success.
They are talking Co-Ops, which we know won’t work, because they haven’t worked. If they were even marginally successful, we would see hundreds of them, some of them huge, and we don’t….They can be counted on the fingers.
Ezra Klein Dead Pool
This is at least the 2nd time in as many months that Ezra Klein has called the Washington Post Editorial Page, and by extension it’s execrable editor Fred Hiatt for printing clearly dishonest garbage in a guest OP/ED.
In this case, it was Danielle Allen, who put forward the “death panel” dishonesty.
I figure that if honest evaluation of the accuracy and truthfulness of the Washington Post editorial pages becomes a regular feature of his blogging, Mr. Kline will soon be looking for a new job.
In would be nice if they instituted even the mildest fact checking in their editorial page, though this would necessarily make Charles Krauthammer’s articles read like this:
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1000 Words On Healthcare
Time to Boycott Whole Foods and Shop at Trader Joes
Because Whole Foods CEO John Mackey thinks that all you need to do to fix health care is to eat natural foods, particularly those purchase from his store.
This guy runs a major retailer, and has been virulently anti-union, and is a Randroid nutjob, so shop elsewhere for the month of August.
Howard Dean Calls Out the Dems
He is saying that Democrats who work to kill or minimize the public option will be primaried:
Former Democratic National Committee chair Howard Dean fired one of the clearest warning shots at hesitant Democratic lawmakers on Thursday, insisting that if the party was unable to produce a health care bill with a public plan, there would be electoral consequences.
“I do think there will be primaries as the result of all this, if the bill doesn’t pass with a public option,” Dean said, in a phone interview with the Huffington Post.
The essence of the problem is that no one fears the people, the majority of the people who favor real healthcare reform, and it has to be more than primaries.
We have to be willing to support Green Party candidates and the like in the general election against the most egregious of the Blue Dogs in the general.
If we lose 4-5 seats this way, it will move 40-50 allegedly Democratic Party votes in our direction in Congress.
We can see the effects of real challenges to incumbents in the voting patterns of Arlen Specter, which have become much more loyal since Sestak decided to run against him in the primary.
Right now, there are no consequences for DINOs who actively oppose core party values.