Health Care Bill Debate
- Thread starter madanthonywayne
- Start date
How about this figure from the same link;
"the Medical Expenditure Panel Survey (MEPS) estimated that the percentage of uninsured Americans under age 65 represented 27 percent of the population."
How about _you_ offer some stats, instead of rubbishing ones put before you?
And then gets billed. So you live, and spend the rest of your life paying some fatcats.
Wally mart is the healthcare solution in "The Land of the Free®" is it? How good is their Oncology department?
Infamy
See, that's the thing. I can't think of a time in my life when a liberal would have drawn such indifference for advocating armed insurrection against the government, speak nothing of toting a gun while doing so in response to a presidential event.
But it's like I said about the Ricci decision. That's the really curious factor about most of the, "I would have a really good job if it wasn't for some unqualified black man that got hired instead of me," stories. In how many of these cases is a job otherwise guaranteed?
In the end, life is unfair. We decide how to distribute that imbalance. In order to reduce it, the advantaged class sometimes has to give.
Some disagree. The burden should be placed entirely on those who start with a disadvantage.
That's the fundamental difference of opinion.
That one might not necessarily have done the damage does not mean one does not enjoy its fruits. The solution is not that these get to have their cake and eat it too.
To reiterate something I posted recently:
Imagine two potholes in the road. They are of different sizes. It will require different amounts of material to fill each.
You have a better solution than putting the same amount of material in each hole? I'd love to hear it.
Potholes. I want the potholes filled. There are certainly better solutions than waiting for the wind to blow enough dust into the pothole to level it with the street.
By advocating armed insurrection?
Given the advocacy of armed insurrection, I'm going with the latter.
Like if one is losing the argument?
I happen to think there's a difference. See, a lot of the harsh Bush criticisms are commentary on fact. But the conservatives don't like what the commentary says. So they are offended by it. The Obama-Joker whiteface socialist bit is commentary based in fantasy.
As time passes, more and more information comes out about the Bush administration as the operatives all scurry after their reputations and try to cash in on the fleeting glory of their place in history. And we're finding out that a lot of what we thought was going on, that people said we had no right to think was going on, was actually going on. So if, after Obama is finished, we find out he really was trying to kill your grandmother, I'll admit I was wrong.
And he was so concise and coherent about it.
So Mr. Kostric isn't responsible for his own actions? As Challenger's topic article points out, this isn't getting much traction with the public. A collective yawn.
Still, though, those who wonder about it, in addition to changing standards, will likely have an opinion about Mr. Kostric's choice to make a scene. By advocating armed insurrection.
The statement itself, I'm fine with, Acid. Perhaps that's what you're missing. Mr. Kostric is welcome to embarrass himself if he wants to. I'm watching the shifting context of libertarianism and how the public responds to it. Fascinating.
I mean, come on. The Patriot Act? The war in Iraq? The demolition of habeas corpus. And the catalyst is health care?
That's absurd. Infamous, even.
Iceaura said:
See, that's the thing. I can't think of a time in my life when a liberal would have drawn such indifference for advocating armed insurrection against the government, speak nothing of toting a gun while doing so in response to a presidential event.
• • •
Acid Cowboy said:
But it's like I said about the Ricci decision. That's the really curious factor about most of the, "I would have a really good job if it wasn't for some unqualified black man that got hired instead of me," stories. In how many of these cases is a job otherwise guaranteed?
In the end, life is unfair. We decide how to distribute that imbalance. In order to reduce it, the advantaged class sometimes has to give.
Some disagree. The burden should be placed entirely on those who start with a disadvantage.
That's the fundamental difference of opinion.
That one might not necessarily have done the damage does not mean one does not enjoy its fruits. The solution is not that these get to have their cake and eat it too.
To reiterate something I posted recently:
Lots of people like to boast of their own achievement. "I did it. I worked hard. I didn't need the state to compensate for me." Yes, but many of those worked hard in advantageous endeavors. Because of past injustices, proportionately fewer minorities have the tutoring and extracurricular activities that help students excel. Last year, I was listening to a story on NPR about the state of the family. Normally, I use this example for that, and not this. I mean ... er ... yeah, work with me here. They were talking to parents and children about what the kids are up to, and it was actually kind of horrifying. One nine year-old was explaining her two musical lessons each week, her tutoring sessions for math, her karate lessons ... the horrifying aspect was that this poor girl would have to pencil in fifteen minutes to do the sort of nothing stuff that kids do, like wander around in the woods or look at the clouds or go jump in the river for the hell of it. And, yes, they talked to minority families as well, but it would be irresponsible to conclude from that small sample that blacks (accounted for, as I recall) and Hispanics (not accounted for, as I recall) are on par with Asians and whites. Proportionately fewer black and Hispanic children have such busy, expensive schedules. Proportionately fewer black and Hispanic children go to computer summer camps and the like. Yes, these white kids are working hard, but in a certain aspect, that's beside the point. When the deprived minority communities achieve equal representation in these endeavors, then you can call off the compensation. If you do it sooner, you will only perpetuate the imbalance.
Imagine two potholes in the road. They are of different sizes. It will require different amounts of material to fill each.
You have a better solution than putting the same amount of material in each hole? I'd love to hear it.
Potholes. I want the potholes filled. There are certainly better solutions than waiting for the wind to blow enough dust into the pothole to level it with the street.
By advocating armed insurrection?
Given the advocacy of armed insurrection, I'm going with the latter.
Like if one is losing the argument?
I happen to think there's a difference. See, a lot of the harsh Bush criticisms are commentary on fact. But the conservatives don't like what the commentary says. So they are offended by it. The Obama-Joker whiteface socialist bit is commentary based in fantasy.
As time passes, more and more information comes out about the Bush administration as the operatives all scurry after their reputations and try to cash in on the fleeting glory of their place in history. And we're finding out that a lot of what we thought was going on, that people said we had no right to think was going on, was actually going on. So if, after Obama is finished, we find out he really was trying to kill your grandmother, I'll admit I was wrong.
And he was so concise and coherent about it.
So Mr. Kostric isn't responsible for his own actions? As Challenger's topic article points out, this isn't getting much traction with the public. A collective yawn.
Still, though, those who wonder about it, in addition to changing standards, will likely have an opinion about Mr. Kostric's choice to make a scene. By advocating armed insurrection.
The statement itself, I'm fine with, Acid. Perhaps that's what you're missing. Mr. Kostric is welcome to embarrass himself if he wants to. I'm watching the shifting context of libertarianism and how the public responds to it. Fascinating.
I mean, come on. The Patriot Act? The war in Iraq? The demolition of habeas corpus. And the catalyst is health care?
That's absurd. Infamous, even.
superstring01
Moderator
So, what sort of remedies should be taken for, say, white children who've had absolutely none of those advantages? Do we just forget about them because too many other white people have done well in life. You know, make it totally skin based and thumb our noses at them? And what is done about the children of wealthy minorities (of whom there are millions) who've always had everything handed to them.
While the above statement (that I quoted) wasn't necessarily advocating doing something based upon race, it started to sound like it.
Because of this, I think it's equally sound to look a bit more holistically at the issue and base "affirmative-action-like" programs on economic history and not race. Advancing race for the sake of advancing race is. . . well it's racism. I'm not say we should be racially blind: that's a pipe dream. But providing under-privileged children (of which there are far more who are white) is good for everybody. Advancing economic equality through solid educational and job opportunities actually addresses both issues without ignoring the glaring fact that white people, too, have millions of horribly under-privileged families.
~String
I should have deferred to Reagan to make my point of the abrogations of freedoms. In the 1964 "A Time for Choosing", Reagan said:
t doesn't require expropriation or confiscation of private property or business to impose socialism on a people. What does it mean whether you hold the deed or the title to your business or property if the government holds the power of life or death over that business or property? ...Every businessman has his own tale of harassment. Somewhere a perversion has taken place. Our natural, inalienable rights are now considered to be a dispensation of government, and freedom has never been so fragile, so close to slipping from our grasp as it is at this moment.
These words are as true today as they were 45 years ago, in fact more so.
joe, once again you are attempting to evade debate. I asked you to prove that Obama ended habaes corpus and torture. You responded with a link, I'll stop at that. I responded to the link and the previous assertion you made. You responded by basically running away from the claims you asserted and that I had pointed out. Your evasion was completed with the new assertion that MAW said that Obama was like Hitler. Which I should add isn't a total evasio since you did have this in the post I was responding to, but that wasn't what I was responding to.
First, the claim was a Hitler type character not Hitler himself. Second, Obama has well surpassed any claims of being Hitler. He has moved considerably faster than any in our history in attempting to completely transform our country. A claim, BTW, that would be in line with campaign rhetoric. Five days before being elected Obama stated that we were five days away from fundamentally transforming our nation. Of course, he got boost from Bush with TARP.
But even this does not do justice to Mad, as his point wasn't that Obama was like Hitler. His point was that more in line with the rebelling of Obama's governance. It was the example of guns and Hitler that set everyone off in the wrong direction. But to Mad, Hitler wasn't the game the objections to Obama politics was. The guns and Hitler were simply the tools used to make the point, and a point I might add that Mad didn't originally post. Mad simply cleverly turned the original posters' derogative purposes to his own advantage.
There I have responded to the original points and the evasion.
Challenger78
Valued Senior Member
Seriously The dems need to grow a spine, and fight the republicans.
Otherwise they're nothing but a centrist party.
I mean, here, was have opponents of environmental bills that oppose it because it doesn't go far enough.
None of them have had the disadvantages of being black.string said:
It's not just lack of advantage we're talking about.
That's been done - scholarship programs, quotas on the legacy admissions, etc.string said:
The perfect is the enemy of the good.
The major disadvantage category factor is and has been race. It's the strongest predictor of net wealth.
"the reality of it's cost, and the fact that you are paying for [shitty Veterans' care] with your body."
Was this an unhappy realization for you, BR? Do you think our boys are getting a good deal/for a good cause? Cause more and more people aren't so sure.
Was this an unhappy realization for you, BR? Do you think our boys are getting a good deal/for a good cause? Cause more and more people aren't so sure.
So other jobs aren't bad therefore those in them don't deserve healthcare? and they don't pay for their health care the tax payers do.
Health care is a right with out it you can't truly have a right to life.
A right to life-
And Liberty... where have I heard that before? I just can't find my happiness.
And Liberty... where have I heard that before? I just can't find my happiness.
Say it enough times, and one day it might come true?
You know, some of Jesus' followers expected him to return during their lifetime. It's two thousand years later, of course, and people are still waiting.
My point being that if you cling to a general, even timeless assertion, someday it might actually come true. The facts that, forty-five years later, we still have freedom, and the greatest recent threats to our freedom comes from the Reagan heritage in the Republican Party, are significant in understanding the difference between a legitimate concern and the constant Chicken Little routine we hear from the right.
The sky is always falling, haven't you heard? Don't mistake mud thrown from somewhere off to our right for a comet.
John T. Galt said:
You know, some of Jesus' followers expected him to return during their lifetime. It's two thousand years later, of course, and people are still waiting.
My point being that if you cling to a general, even timeless assertion, someday it might actually come true. The facts that, forty-five years later, we still have freedom, and the greatest recent threats to our freedom comes from the Reagan heritage in the Republican Party, are significant in understanding the difference between a legitimate concern and the constant Chicken Little routine we hear from the right.
The sky is always falling, haven't you heard? Don't mistake mud thrown from somewhere off to our right for a comet.
superstring01
Moderator
I found this commentary on CNN rather interesting:
With the majorities in both houses and the current Democratic president, I keep wondering when they will be able to get their various members in line and actually come up with a bill before the mid-term elections.
~String
Commentary: Dems, not GOP, may kill health care reform
By Roland S. Martin
(CNN) -- Democratic members of Congress, party strategists, and even President Obama have tried their best to portray Republicans as obstructionists to health care reform, and want us to believe that if the effort fails, it's all because of the GOP.
That's bull. The failure to pass health care reform would be a yoke around the Democrats' neck, and the cause of losing the moment would be their inability to achieve unity among themselves.
Democrats have the perfect political hat trick. They control the White House, the U.S. Senate and the U.S. House, with a strong majority in both houses.
But I'm reminded of something Rep. John Conyers, D-Michigan, told me nine years ago: Democrats know nothing about party unity.
Conyers was being interviewed for an election special I was working on for a now-defunct black cable network, and he said that if Democrats had a majority of the votes in the House, they had a unified group of only about 165.
That's because when you throw in the 50-something Blue Dog Democrats -- strongly conservative members whom some party loyalists liken to Republicans in Democrat clothing -- then you have a different kind of dynamic than you do in the GOP, where the strong base of conservatives typically stays in line.
Then, of course, you have the far-left members, loud and noisy, and oftentimes unwilling to compromise their positions in order to move legislation forward.
When you put the far left and the far right of the Democratic Party in one room, you will see fireworks that rival a Democratic-Republican fight.
And that's exactly what we are seeing on health care reform.
All summer, the conversation has been dominated by the White House trying to placate conservative Republicans and Blue Dog Democrats on the various health care bills that the House and Senate are considering.
Both groups are adamantly opposed to growing the federal government, and with a rising deficit, the last thing they want is another $1 trillion program. (Although most didn't mind the $1 trillion we spent on the useless war in Iraq -- but I digress.)
Obama administration officials thought they had the liberal and progressive wing of the party in their pockets and set their sights on satisfying conservatives in both parties.
But over the weekend, Obama and Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius totally botched the deal by giving the impression that the public option wasn't a major goal. That sent the progressives/liberals nuts, and now the White House is trying to put the genie back into the bottle.
The progressive/liberals are angry because they believe they have given up way too much in this health care bill, with nothing to show for it in terms of Republican and Blue Dog Democrat support.
Yet what no one wants to mention is that many of them are still seething over having to accept massive cuts in the stimulus bill by Republicans and Blue Dog Democrats in order for that to pass. Obama implored them to support the changed bill for the good of the country, and they bit their lip and sucked it up.
In many ways, the Democratic Party is too democratic. It includes so many special interests that it's hard to achieve major consensus without having to satisfy everyone. Republicans? They have a simpler base and have always found it easy to drive an agenda.
President Obama is desperate to toe the line on achieving bipartisanship with this health bill. He wants as many Republican votes as he can get, but he's not making considerable headway in that area. Maybe he has a shot at upwards of 10 votes in the Senate, but you can forget the House.
Now, because of the public option mess, he is going to have to shore up his progressive/liberal base. But those people are now emboldened and unwilling to cede more ground.
So the time the president wanted to spend on wooing conservatives will have to be spent on keeping his angry progressive/liberal wing intact.
Democrats have floated the idea of going it alone and passing health care reform. Some have said the president will pay a big price among independent voters if he does that.
If health care was his first priority to getting elected, that should remain the case. Damn the 2010 midterm elections, and damn the 2012 presidential elections.
Congress has been trying for more than six decades to achieve health care reform, and the Democrats have all the stars lined up to do so. Of course, even with their large majority, it won't be a cakewalk getting a bill passed in the Senate.
If it doesn't happen now, I don't want to hear any carping from the left. Your own party had a shot and screwed it up. Democrats, you will have no one to blame but yourselves. It's now or never. So stop whining about the Republicans and get your own house in order.
With the majorities in both houses and the current Democratic president, I keep wondering when they will be able to get their various members in line and actually come up with a bill before the mid-term elections.
~String
Keep feelin' fascination
The thing that strikes me is that the press is aware of this aspect, and is willing to sound it.
No, it's not particularly incredible that they would get to it. That's not what I mean. Rather, I'm wondering if this isn't a milepost in the public discourse. We could be approaching a minor, or even major, junction.
The minor is microcosmic to the issue. That is, the White House has made a number of mistakes in the course of the health care debate. But those aren't actually the questions that have dominated the headlines. The real question has to do with, as I said a week and half ago,
Now, I'm not claiming any brilliant insight there. The point has been growing more and more obvious in the macrocosmic context of the general course of the political institutions through the short period of the Obama administration. I can't find a date on this one, but Randy Bish of the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review offered it at some point during the debate:
Randy Bish (n.d.), via Cagle Post
Martin's commentary for CNN brings the point even closer to the main theme of the discussion simply by making the point prominently. There was some discussion among the cable hosts and pundits (namely MSNBC, and perhaps some on FOX) a couple months ago about a rising theme in the GOP of simply ducking out of the health care debate and hope things go badly enough to help their posture for 2010. As I recall, some prominent congressional Republican leader said they wouldn't be offering up a health plan of their own because what's the point.
Regardkess if whether the pundits' characterization of those couple of day is accurate, one thing this points out is that many have at least been tacitly aware that the genuine drama of health reform will take place within the Democratic congressional caucus.
Perhaps the political lesson for the spinmeisters will be that even more melodrama is needed for distraction. Are Bish's cartoon and Martin's article part of a larger trend toward considering reality in the health care debate? Is health care the issue on which the general, larger tone of strangeness in American politics will falter? That is, are we seeing a larger turning point pertaining to the whole anti-Obama hysteria above and beyond just the health care debate?
I would hope the moment is occurring for at least the health care debate. I'm not certain, though. I'm likely looking at this far too idealistically. The administration hasn't yet burned all of its credibility with me. Certainly, I have my concerns, but Obama has time left to resolve those issues. So with this I'm watching the administration's general mistakes with the issue, primarily exercising its influence quietly in conference, instead of asserting its position and presuming a leadership role, to make sure that's how they play out. Obama's great potential is that he seems to be playing according to an abstract theme that I can in certain contexts appreciate. Health care is the latest sign. It is only after the left wing turns out and starts asserting itself in response to rising agitation by the right; it is only after the talking heads begin reiterating the demand; it is only after Secretary Sebelius caused an outcry last weekend ....
In that same prior post, I noted the appearance of Austan Goolsbee, an administration economist, on The Daily Show:
Apparently, it took the Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services saying it to get the point across:
And now, with all the hue and cry, the president emerges to reiterate his support for the public option. There is the superficial but still valuable political currency of making that reiteration among an outcry in favor of a public option, and there is also the longer view that gives the president the appearance of responding to the country's views. He began with very basic considerations, projecting a much more conservative approach to the health care issue than many of his supporters expected. They have fashioned their response to the absolute freak-out taking place on the right wing with considerable calculation. As the administration necessarily offers more and more details of its style with the passing of time and demands of political issues, there are a number of themes dating back to the Clinton administration, at least, and in some general contexts probably a bit longer than the republic itself, suggesting Obama is fashioning his presidency according to a dynamic myth. Recent iterations of the myth seem to focus on certain themes that seem contradictory. How can one show presidential leadership within the confines set by growing concern about governmental power in general and executive strength in particular? These concerns ran especially thick during the recent Bush administration, but in other contexts they were frequent alarms sounded by President Clinton's opponents as well. Obama's choice to stay quietly in conference appears to be a mistake. Much of the public, including some of his supporters, worry that he's given away the whole reform in promises made to special interests. To the other, what would he have risked by being out in front the whole time? Telling Congress what to do? That's the hard thing about what bills have been put together so far: they're congressional bills. Obama didn't just write up a policy and send it over with a note saying, "Please pass this." The derisive, "Obamacare", gets a quiet groan from his supporters because the issue is his insofar as it's supposed to be his. He promised it. He says this is what his administration is going to do. But this is Congress' effort so far.
And things are a disaster. The results so far don't begin to approach expectations. Administration hands have been testing for weeks, at least, the political impact of the public option being nonessential to health care reform. Sebelius might be the flashpoint. Obama speaks.
How, even as a general question, can he lead without the appearance of telling Congress how to do their jobs? The conflict sharpens and range of resolutions narrows in the current political climate.
He is trying to be a president who emerges to lead as needed.
And that's a really hard gamble. Not only does it have low odds for success, there are also, independently of that, pretty good odds of botching the execution in the first place. Consider the interplay betwen those two factors, and one has to wonder if his play to the myth is conscious or not. The appearance, in other words, could be entirely coincidental.
But ... in trying to guess how the parts come together, it depends entirely on what parts you do and don't have. I speak only in terms of possibility here.
____________________
Notes:
Mason, Jeff. "Obama stands by public option in healthcare debate". Reuters. August 21, 2009. Reuters.com. August 21, 2009. http://www.reuters.com/article/GCA-BarackObama/idUSTRE57D47P20090821
See Also:
Abouhalkah, Yael T. "Obama pumps up public option -- finally". Midwest Voices. August 20, 2009. Voices.Kansas.com. August 21, 2009. http://voices.kansascity.com/node/5525
Superstring01 said:
The thing that strikes me is that the press is aware of this aspect, and is willing to sound it.
No, it's not particularly incredible that they would get to it. That's not what I mean. Rather, I'm wondering if this isn't a milepost in the public discourse. We could be approaching a minor, or even major, junction.
The minor is microcosmic to the issue. That is, the White House has made a number of mistakes in the course of the health care debate. But those aren't actually the questions that have dominated the headlines. The real question has to do with, as I said a week and half ago,
The most effective opposition to health reform has come from Blue Dog Democrats; the central problem for passing meaningful health reform legislation lies entirely within the Democratic Party.
Now, I'm not claiming any brilliant insight there. The point has been growing more and more obvious in the macrocosmic context of the general course of the political institutions through the short period of the Obama administration. I can't find a date on this one, but Randy Bish of the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review offered it at some point during the debate:
Randy Bish (n.d.), via Cagle Post
Martin's commentary for CNN brings the point even closer to the main theme of the discussion simply by making the point prominently. There was some discussion among the cable hosts and pundits (namely MSNBC, and perhaps some on FOX) a couple months ago about a rising theme in the GOP of simply ducking out of the health care debate and hope things go badly enough to help their posture for 2010. As I recall, some prominent congressional Republican leader said they wouldn't be offering up a health plan of their own because what's the point.
Regardkess if whether the pundits' characterization of those couple of day is accurate, one thing this points out is that many have at least been tacitly aware that the genuine drama of health reform will take place within the Democratic congressional caucus.
Perhaps the political lesson for the spinmeisters will be that even more melodrama is needed for distraction. Are Bish's cartoon and Martin's article part of a larger trend toward considering reality in the health care debate? Is health care the issue on which the general, larger tone of strangeness in American politics will falter? That is, are we seeing a larger turning point pertaining to the whole anti-Obama hysteria above and beyond just the health care debate?
I would hope the moment is occurring for at least the health care debate. I'm not certain, though. I'm likely looking at this far too idealistically. The administration hasn't yet burned all of its credibility with me. Certainly, I have my concerns, but Obama has time left to resolve those issues. So with this I'm watching the administration's general mistakes with the issue, primarily exercising its influence quietly in conference, instead of asserting its position and presuming a leadership role, to make sure that's how they play out. Obama's great potential is that he seems to be playing according to an abstract theme that I can in certain contexts appreciate. Health care is the latest sign. It is only after the left wing turns out and starts asserting itself in response to rising agitation by the right; it is only after the talking heads begin reiterating the demand; it is only after Secretary Sebelius caused an outcry last weekend ....
In that same prior post, I noted the appearance of Austan Goolsbee, an administration economist, on The Daily Show:
Think of it this way: Last night, Austan Goolsbee, a member of the Council of Economic Advisers and chief economist of Obama's Economic Recovery Advisory Board, appeared on The Daily Show, and actually managed to make a good deal of sense. Perhaps this is a small challenge for a triathelete and sometimes stand-up comedian, but when people are getting their distillations from a comedy show?
But given days of news coverage to sift through and analyze, there is little to glean from the cacophony that compares to Goolsbee's appearance on The Daily Show ....
.... There are legitimate concerns to be discussed. Goolsbee gave the Obama outlook on health care reform a frightening aspect when he said the president wasn't after socialized medicine but to keep the insurance companies honest. A Sisyphan labor, to be certain. Most liberals see this as an exercise in futility. And, to our horror, the rhetoric suggests a public option is not vital to Obama's consideration of the issue. For many liberals and independents, that was a deciding factor in their vote.
But given days of news coverage to sift through and analyze, there is little to glean from the cacophony that compares to Goolsbee's appearance on The Daily Show ....
.... There are legitimate concerns to be discussed. Goolsbee gave the Obama outlook on health care reform a frightening aspect when he said the president wasn't after socialized medicine but to keep the insurance companies honest. A Sisyphan labor, to be certain. Most liberals see this as an exercise in futility. And, to our horror, the rhetoric suggests a public option is not vital to Obama's consideration of the issue. For many liberals and independents, that was a deciding factor in their vote.
Apparently, it took the Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services saying it to get the point across:
U.S. President Barack Obama stood by proposals to create a government-run health insurance program on Thursday while insisting the move was merely one element of a wider plan to reform the industry.
A debate over the so-called public option has overshadowed Obama's plan to expand health coverage to tens of millions of Americans while reducing costs and making the health insurance sector more competitive.
On Sunday Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius said the public option was "not the essential element" of the overhaul, sparking furor among supporters and forcing the White House to clarify its message about Obama's chief legislative priority.
"She really didn't misspeak. The surprising thing is she'd been saying this all along," Obama told a radio program on Thursday, referring to Sebelius.
(Mason)
A debate over the so-called public option has overshadowed Obama's plan to expand health coverage to tens of millions of Americans while reducing costs and making the health insurance sector more competitive.
On Sunday Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius said the public option was "not the essential element" of the overhaul, sparking furor among supporters and forcing the White House to clarify its message about Obama's chief legislative priority.
"She really didn't misspeak. The surprising thing is she'd been saying this all along," Obama told a radio program on Thursday, referring to Sebelius.
(Mason)
And now, with all the hue and cry, the president emerges to reiterate his support for the public option. There is the superficial but still valuable political currency of making that reiteration among an outcry in favor of a public option, and there is also the longer view that gives the president the appearance of responding to the country's views. He began with very basic considerations, projecting a much more conservative approach to the health care issue than many of his supporters expected. They have fashioned their response to the absolute freak-out taking place on the right wing with considerable calculation. As the administration necessarily offers more and more details of its style with the passing of time and demands of political issues, there are a number of themes dating back to the Clinton administration, at least, and in some general contexts probably a bit longer than the republic itself, suggesting Obama is fashioning his presidency according to a dynamic myth. Recent iterations of the myth seem to focus on certain themes that seem contradictory. How can one show presidential leadership within the confines set by growing concern about governmental power in general and executive strength in particular? These concerns ran especially thick during the recent Bush administration, but in other contexts they were frequent alarms sounded by President Clinton's opponents as well. Obama's choice to stay quietly in conference appears to be a mistake. Much of the public, including some of his supporters, worry that he's given away the whole reform in promises made to special interests. To the other, what would he have risked by being out in front the whole time? Telling Congress what to do? That's the hard thing about what bills have been put together so far: they're congressional bills. Obama didn't just write up a policy and send it over with a note saying, "Please pass this." The derisive, "Obamacare", gets a quiet groan from his supporters because the issue is his insofar as it's supposed to be his. He promised it. He says this is what his administration is going to do. But this is Congress' effort so far.
And things are a disaster. The results so far don't begin to approach expectations. Administration hands have been testing for weeks, at least, the political impact of the public option being nonessential to health care reform. Sebelius might be the flashpoint. Obama speaks.
How, even as a general question, can he lead without the appearance of telling Congress how to do their jobs? The conflict sharpens and range of resolutions narrows in the current political climate.
He is trying to be a president who emerges to lead as needed.
And that's a really hard gamble. Not only does it have low odds for success, there are also, independently of that, pretty good odds of botching the execution in the first place. Consider the interplay betwen those two factors, and one has to wonder if his play to the myth is conscious or not. The appearance, in other words, could be entirely coincidental.
But ... in trying to guess how the parts come together, it depends entirely on what parts you do and don't have. I speak only in terms of possibility here.
____________________
Notes:
Mason, Jeff. "Obama stands by public option in healthcare debate". Reuters. August 21, 2009. Reuters.com. August 21, 2009. http://www.reuters.com/article/GCA-BarackObama/idUSTRE57D47P20090821
See Also:
Abouhalkah, Yael T. "Obama pumps up public option -- finally". Midwest Voices. August 20, 2009. Voices.Kansas.com. August 21, 2009. http://voices.kansascity.com/node/5525
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Buffalo Roam
Registered Senior Member
And in which Amendment does such right exist?
Show us where exactly in the Constitution, the exact words.
mmph
rep weiner for president please
Something rather remarkable happened on Tuesday's Morning Joe. Rep. Anthony Weiner of New York pointed out that the health insurance industry has no clothes, and Joe Scarborough, after first trying to spin it some gossamer threads, broke down and said, By God, you're right, this emperor is a naked money-making machine! (link)
Rep. Anthony Weiner (D-NYC) Leaves Joe Scarborough "Speechless" Part 1
Rep. Anthony Weiner (D-NYC) Leaves Joe Scarborough "Speechless" Part 2
Weiner Challenges the Republicans to Put-Up or Shut-Up on Healthcare
rep weiner for president please
Something rather remarkable happened on Tuesday's Morning Joe. Rep. Anthony Weiner of New York pointed out that the health insurance industry has no clothes, and Joe Scarborough, after first trying to spin it some gossamer threads, broke down and said, By God, you're right, this emperor is a naked money-making machine! (link)
Rep. Anthony Weiner (D-NYC) Leaves Joe Scarborough "Speechless" Part 1
Rep. Anthony Weiner (D-NYC) Leaves Joe Scarborough "Speechless" Part 2
Weiner Challenges the Republicans to Put-Up or Shut-Up on Healthcare
Huzzah! That's a TV Moment. Hope for the triumph of reason. And hope for us all. :thumbsup:
Buffalo Roam
Registered Senior Member
I will when Canadains stop shipping their health problems to the United States.
strawman crap
the constitution is what it is now due to the incorporation of the moral imperatives of the day
"Finally came the great Monday--Monday was the Court's 'decision day'--when the Chief Justice announced the name of the first case to be decided (Helvering vs. Davis, in which the constitutionality of old age insurance was challenged) and, signaling that the Court's opinion was to be read by its author, nodded to --Justice Cardozo. Victory! My letter of May 25 began: Dear Ma 'n' Pa--Yesterday was a big day! I hadn't really expected the decision until next week. The result itself was not so surprising, but gratifying nevertheless. Late yesterday afternoon Lois and I went down to see Miss Perkins and split a bottle of (domestic!) champagne with her!" (link)
uhc will trod behind this precedent
i will sue the feds for age discrimination.......
Medicare, Medicaid, and the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) accounted for 20%, or $599 billion. Nearly two-thirds of this amount, or $391 billion, went to Medicare, which provides health coverage to around 45 million people who are over the age of 65 or have disabilities. The remainder of this category funds Medicaid and CHIP, which in a typical month provide health care or long-term care to more than 45 million low-income children, parents, elderly people, and people with disabilities. Both Medicaid and CHIP require matching payments from the states.
..... and force the issue. i can be just as susceptible to sickness and disease as the young and elderly. ja, look after my goddamn ass since i am the one paying for all this largesse that other segments of society benefit from.
my frikkin welfare is theirs
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Time to Debunk Lies about Healthcare Reform!
As many of you know there is a movement afoot in the US to reform its healthcare system where overall quality has fallen behind international norms and costs have sky rocketed growing at multiples of the gross domestic product for decades. A signficant portion of US citizens cannot afford healthcare services and that number is growing daily.
Healthcare reform has been tried numerous times before and each time failed. Our government is very corrupt and easily influenced with money. Each time healthcare reform is attempted, the healthcare industry and thier allies bring out the lies to scare citizens into inaction. This tread is dedicated to debunking those numerous lies.
Yesterday I was watching hannity on faux news when he brought out a lady named Shona Holms. She is a Canadian who claimed she had a brain tumor and needed immediate surgery but could not get it in Canada because of a waiting list. So she crossed the border to get treatment at the Mayo Clinic. The bottom line of the hannity piece is that she would have died on a waiting list in Canada. The story sounded fishy to me so I jotted down her name and did a little research.
It turns out Shona was lying...imagine that. She had a benign cyst which is not malignant brain cancer.
http://www.ottawacitizen.com/health/reality+check+reality+check/1783177/story.html
I look forward to seeing a long list of debunked lies because frankly of the many things Republicans and their masters in the healthcare industry are saying about healthcare reform in the US, I have never found one truthful statement...not even one!
As many of you know there is a movement afoot in the US to reform its healthcare system where overall quality has fallen behind international norms and costs have sky rocketed growing at multiples of the gross domestic product for decades. A signficant portion of US citizens cannot afford healthcare services and that number is growing daily.
Healthcare reform has been tried numerous times before and each time failed. Our government is very corrupt and easily influenced with money. Each time healthcare reform is attempted, the healthcare industry and thier allies bring out the lies to scare citizens into inaction. This tread is dedicated to debunking those numerous lies.
Yesterday I was watching hannity on faux news when he brought out a lady named Shona Holms. She is a Canadian who claimed she had a brain tumor and needed immediate surgery but could not get it in Canada because of a waiting list. So she crossed the border to get treatment at the Mayo Clinic. The bottom line of the hannity piece is that she would have died on a waiting list in Canada. The story sounded fishy to me so I jotted down her name and did a little research.
It turns out Shona was lying...imagine that. She had a benign cyst which is not malignant brain cancer.
http://www.ottawacitizen.com/health/reality+check+reality+check/1783177/story.html
I look forward to seeing a long list of debunked lies because frankly of the many things Republicans and their masters in the healthcare industry are saying about healthcare reform in the US, I have never found one truthful statement...not even one!