Now that he’s reporting from Huffington Post, I don’t read Dan Froomkin as consistently as I once did, which is a great error on my part. Froomkin’s got an elegant, succinct post up on “Ten Flash Points In The Fiscal Commission Chairmen’s Proposal”:
The two deficit-hawk extremists President Obama put in charge of his fiscal commission released their personal suggestions for cutting the federal budget deficit on Wednesday. And while it’s quite possible that not a one of them will make it into the commission’s official recommendations, which require the approval of 14 of the 18 commissioners (not just two), the document will inevitably be welcomed as a “serious” contribution to the debate – at least by Republicans and conservative Democrats.
__
But taken as a whole, the plan authored by Erskine Bowles and Alan Simpson would have devastating effects on the government and its ability to help the most vulnerable in our society, and it would put the squeeze on the middle class, veterans, the elderly and the sick – all in the name of an abstract goal that ultimately only a bond-trader could love.
Go read the whole thing — all ten points should be widely disseminated and dissected. But #4 particularly caught my eye:
The plan’s proposals for Medicare in the short run are heavy on euphemism. “Expand cost-sharing in Medicare to promote informed consumer health choices and spending,” of course, means increase fees. “[A]sking doctors and other health providers, lawyers, and individuals to take responsibility for slowing health care cost growth,” means pay cuts to health providers — and plaintiffs’ rights.
__
But the long-term plan is basically to set a cap on the rate of growth of federal health expenditures. The rate would be capped at no more than 1 percent more than the increase in gross domestic product. Economist Brad DeLong’s reaction: ” Oh my God! Ration city, here we come! What clowns vetted this thing?”
__
Should that target not be met, well, then, the president would be required to submit — and Congress would be required to consider — “reforms to lower spending.” The ones listed include such things as increasing fees or, interestingly enough, adding a robust government-run “public option” for health insurance. But much more draconian measures presumably would also have to be considered. There’s just no mention of them here.
Emphasis mine. One more opportunity for Grover Norquist and the firebaggers to snuggle up together… one more circular firing squad to distract us “progressives” from fighting our real enemies?
Uncle Clarence Thomas
.
.
I don’t understand why you can’t deal with the world as you find it.
.
.
FlipYrWhig
But the public option is the one true litmus test of liberalosituditivity! How could the catfoodies have mentioned it? I don’t know where to direct my rage… and I’m blissfully happy about that!
NR
It’s hilarious that you complain about Jane Hamsher working with Grover Norquist when Obama appointed Alan fucking Simpson to chair his deficit commission.
But FDL is the real problem here. Right.
Sentient Puddle
If the framing of the report is inevitable, fuck it, why stop at the public option? Go Medicare for all!
Turgid Jacobian
Christ Jesus. Break the doctor’s cartel, and you will see prices decline.
xyzxyzxyz
I was watching MSNBC and they had invited “Peter G. Peterson from the Peter G. Peterson Foundation” to talk about the initial “report”. Ok, I give….who is Peter G. Peterson, how did he get his money, what stake does he have in entitlement reform (which he seemed very interested in), and what influence does he have on this commission?
I was waiting for the MSNBC talking head to answers some of my questions….which in retrospect was a stupid thing to wait for.
Nick
@NR: Obama may have appointed Simpson to the commission, but Jane Hamsher is still a pompous bitch with an ego that could orbit the sun who doesn’t care about anyone but herself.
Mark S.
Do I have to get my cocktail napkin out?
KG
@Turgid Jacobian: the doctor’s cartel? What exactly would breaking that mean? Because my first thought is witch doctors and snake oil salesmen. And for some reason, I just can’t see the rise of those as being a good thing.
Ailuridae
@Turgid Jacobian:
Sadly neither the Democrats or Republicans have, up to this point, been willing to talk about that 80o pound gorilla. The US government’s long term deficit problem is a healthcare spending problem. Discretionary spending or even Social Security are non-issues when you talk about the scale of health care spending and inflation. That health care spending problem’s primary drivers are extraordinary compensation for doctors individually and for providers as businesses that are both the result of a cartel.
FlipYrWhig
It just occurred to me. The Catfood Commission’s embrace of the public option can only be an attempt to further discredit the public option! O, public option, why hast thou forsaken me!
Ailuridae
@KG:
America either has to remove the arbitrary supply constraint that drives the extraordinary wages of doctors or the doctors themselves have to accept wage controls. Continuing with the current system where doctors wages are artificially inflated because far fewer doctors graduate US medical schools every year than are needed is quite literally going to bankrupt the country.
DonkeyKong
Well, look at the positive. No more free medicare scooters, no more Beck rallies on the Mall.
aimai
I’m sorry, who are our approved enemies here? Jane Hamsher? My Doctor? I can’t keep up with the instructions about who to attack and who to ignore?
aimai
WyldPirate
@Nick:
Sounds a lot like you, Nick.
Steve
@Nick: Also too, Julian Assange is a big jerk, and Michael Moore is fat.
NobodySpecial
@Nick: Which, of course, is exactly the reason why we should oppose a public option, right?
joe-nah Lowell-burg
Good ideas on defense spending cuts, but wtf is a giant income tax cut doing in a report about deficit reduction?
Steve
@NR: You know, the Republican co-chair of the commission was likely to be a big jerk no matter who Obama appointed, for a reason I hope I don’t have to spell out.
Quiddity
Finding Froomkin (or anyone in particular) on Huffington Post is not easy. It’s got an overly busy front page. Contrast that with the New York Times’ cleaner interface (or even the Los Angeles Times).
General Stuck
@aimai:
jeebus, it is the firebaggers stinking up and confusing the battlefield with non stop dumbass Obama fail memes. The rest of us on this blog have been trying to focus on the wingnuts. And I think it is very indicative and par for the course the past two years, that leftists hammer other democrats, then point fingers at those who respond with some perspective and, of all things, facts, and then claim it is in fact us, non ideologues, that are the distractions to fighting the wingnuts. classic. bait and switch. brats.
El Cid
My guess would be that that bit about the spending reform kicking in would never in anyone’s imagination actually include a public health insurance plan (“public option”), but I guess it’s supposed to be clever to mention it now so it seems like “both sides” are represented.
Or maybe meant, stupidly, to see if the people and politicians who were for the PO would be duped into backing this type of effort.
Anyone who thinks that such a provision would really be enacted, should this draft be close to the eventual proposal, is crazy.
NobodySpecial
@Steve: Indeed. Better to dun Obama for appointing Erskine Bowles than Alan Simpson.
WyldPirate
@Mark S.:
No, that’s not how you do it.
first you need an elevated platform, say a second floor balcony or the rarefied elevation of social status one acquires by being in a very high income bracket.
second, you ascend your platform to peer down on all the lesser being crowding around you.
Third, you pull out your dick and piss on the poor fuckers below you and tell them that you are raining down liquid gold on them and that they should catch as much as possible.
At least that’s similar to how I understood Ronnie Raygun’s explanation of how trickle down economics would bring prosperity to all once while watching him give a speech while trippin’ ballz on some good orange sunshine.
Nick
@NobodySpecial:
No, we should support a public option, a lot better than Jane ever did.
But should we still support a public option now that the mean old commission does too?
azlib
Nah, the big elephant in the report is the 21% of GDP cap on the Federal Budget. The GOP will negotiate it down, of course and then whenever the budget exceeds the cap, they will scream bloody murder.
The whole lack of interest or concern about the biggest deficit problem we have (medical costs) in this report just proves they are not serious about deficit reduction. If this report was an exercise by a PolySci class, they would get an “F”.
NobodySpecial
@Nick: Well, you opposed a public option because Jane Hamsher is fat, so I’m not sure what inducement we could ever use to get you to support one without some rant about rainbows and ponies.
General Stuck
@FlipYrWhig:
Silly, a catfood commission PO cannot exist on planet firebag, and therefore, does in fact, not exist, but lives only in your silly Obot head, and doctored documents.
FlipYrWhig
@NobodySpecial: Is anyone “opposed to” a/the public option? Or is the issue that no matter no good a policy a/the public option is, there weren’t enough votes to pass it nor an evident way to flip votes against it to for it?
ProudSocialist
This is all nonsense. If you tax the rich back to Eisenhower levels there would be no need for spending and “entitlement” cuts. That and massive defense cuts.
Obama is a disingenuous politician. He’s a shill for the rich–it’s so obvious.
Nick
@Steve:
Jane Hamsher isn’t fit to wipe either one’s ass.
ThatLeftTurnInABQ
Keeriist on a crutch!
Just for once, just for the sheer novelty of it all, can’t we have a policy oriented thread in these parts that doesn’t get threadjacked into a firebaggers vs obots theatrical production that reads like a cross between West Side Story and Waiting For Godot, if it were choregraphed by the Three Stooges and directed by Sam Peckinpah?
yes, yes, don’t even bother replying. I know – the answer is: No – SATSQ
[sigh]
Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to get dressed for a Spanish Civil War re-enactors meeting. We are going to be doing the fall of Barcelona for the 47-bazillionth time, because that never gets old. At least everybody knows their roles and lines.
El Cid
@Nick:
It will never, ever happen, no matter what the deficit commission proposal says. No reason to fuss about it.
Cermet
@KG: I am not sure but I would think the artificial control on the number of medical schools hence the number of possible doctors would be a big one – then many useless general requirements that make no sense for most doctors – like all learning surgical procedures. Getting rid of the first – limiting schools could cut direct medical costs within fifteen years.
Culture of Truth
It’s also worth noting that most of the other members are in Congress and woud have whatever they voted on hung around their necks like the proverbial albatross.
NR
@Nick: I can’t wait for the Democratic ads in 2012. “Jane Hamsher is a bitch, so we gutted the New Deal!”
Really, the whole thing is Jane Hamsher’s fault.
Nick
@NobodySpecial:
No I support the public option and proud to say I did more to try to get it passed than she ever did.
General Stuck
@El Cid:
There is no reason to fuss about anything in this brain fart report. Yet, people still are. Why is that?
Ailuridae
@FlipYrWhig:
Well I am certainly not opposed to a public option but now that we have a very good idea that the public has an incredibly favorable view of Medicare and the medicare “at cost” expansion was also popular I think for simplicity’s sake progressives should push for a Medicare expansion rather than rallying around the term public option. Sure, it is all semantics but a Medicare expansion would assuredly be more effective than an independent public option and would having the added benefit of simplicity.
Suck It Up!
@NobodySpecial:
did I miss it? when did Nick oppose a PO? I’ve never seen anyone here oppose a PO. What I’ve seen are people who would dump the PO – and it was a weak one – in order to get a comprehensive bill.
Speaking of the PO. Isn’t it in the bill somewhere that states can implement it on their own? Is FDL trying to get individual states to do that?
Nick
@NR:
No, the whole thing isn’t Jane Hamsher’s fault, but she could do us all a favor and disappear anyway because she sure as hell hasn’t helped an iota.
NR
@Steve: Which raises the question of why he created the commission in the first damn place.
Nick
@Suck It Up!:
I had the opportunity last month to do some phonebanking for Peter Shumlin, who wants to not only establish a public option in Vermont, but go as far as a single payer system.
That’s more than most on FDL has ever done, I’m sure of it.
Sly
@xyzxyzxyz: Ok, I give….who is Peter G. Peterson, how did he get his money, what stake does he have in entitlement reform (which he seemed very interested in), and what influence does he have on this commission?
Peterson was an advertising executive who initially became prominent when he headed a commission on Private Charities, where he first started getting the attention of Old Money. Nixon then gave him an advisory role on international commerce. What role he had in formulating Nixon’s actual policy is unknown, but he did suggest that the U.S. needed tighter control over its currency, and the Nixon Shock (indefinitely suspending direct convertibility between dollars and gold) did exactly that.
In the mid-eighties he went on to co-found the Blackstone Group, a private equity firm, with Steve Schwarzman (the guy who compared ending the carried interest deduction, the thing that allows hedge fund managers to only pay 15% on their income, to the Nazi’s invading Poland). He’s been championing policies that would amount to a windfall for private equity firms pretty much since then, including bankrolling the deficit propaganda film I.O.U.S.A.
As for his influence, he’s pretty much the go to guy for funding the “fuck the middle-class while wearing a happy face” coalition. His activities entail convincing working people to cut their own throats for the sake of hedge fund managers and bond traders, and he does a very good job at it.
Nick
@General Stuck:
It satisfies the sellout lust
Zifnab
@joe-nah Lowell-burg:
Not really. They want to freeze soldier salaries, close down bases, and cut spending on basic gear. They leave the nuclear weapons arsenals and the defense contractor budgets untouched.
It’s like managing a school budget by firing half the teachers while you’re paying $10 per stick of chalk. And adding co-pays to VA benefits (presumably so you can kick Veterans off the program if they miss a payment) is a particularly vicious kick in the nuts.
Why oh why do the Republican deficit hawks so hate our troops?
El Cid
@General Stuck:
I don’t know about others, but I feel it will be the general outline of what is eventually agreed on and enacted (in aim and substance, maybe not the process), no matter how much it is considered impossible to touch the 3rd rail of Social Security.
El Cid
@Ailuridae: “Public option” was as stupid a term as “stimulus”.
ruemara
@NR:
Alan Simpson was one of the 2 Republicans who were appointed, along with 4 Democrats, by Obama. Considering the way appointments are handled, probably from a list of likely candidates. The rest were picked respective party caucuses. He was not Obama’s #1 pick to head this because he has a soopersekritantiliberalhatetehgheysteholdz agenduh. He’s a bleeding co-chair. Where’s half the ire for Erskine Bowls’ part in this idiocy? There was a chance for some decent suggestions and they release this?
El Cid
@Sly: He also is a billionaire.
Mark S.
@Zifnab:
That’s the best analogy to the defense budget I’ve ever read. Kudos!
FlipYrWhig
@ThatLeftTurnInABQ:
I would totally watch that. The snapping, the gunplay, the aimlessness…
ruemara
@Zifnab:
I did a page by page breakdown of the best cuts. Some were defense contractor cuts. Its in this place…somewhere.
Suck It Up!
@ruemara:
Using only Simpson’s name helps to fans the flames.
To me it doesn’t matter who’s the chair/co-chair. They each get one vote.
FlipYrWhig
@El Cid: I love the term “public option.” Public… public library, public park, public school. Option… choice, nobody’s forced into it. It’s generally beneficial and it’s a choice. Public. Option. Cool.
Bobby Thomson
@xyzxyzxyz:
Pete Peterson is an incredibly wealthy old white billionaire who has literally made it his life’s mission to destroy Social Security. He is a malevolent, cold-hearted sonofabitch who actually makes Dick Cheney look like a philanthropist.
He also owns several Democratic Senators and paid for the staff for the Catfood Commission.
Davis X. Machina
@FlipYrWhig: Joe Lieberman certainly is. But he doesn’t post here as near as I can tell.
FlipYrWhig
@El Cid: I mean, picking at the term “public option” is like picking at the term “social security.” It’s too abstract! It doesn’t say anything about what tangible good it actually does!
dollared
@ThatLeftTurnInABQ: I’m not doing it again if you do your lines in Catalan! Splitter!
General Stuck
@El Cid:
I don’t agree
Sly
@El Cid:
I figured that fact would be implicit in his being the co-founder of a large private equity firm.
He also does a lot of charity work. As does Hamas.
Mnemosyne
@aimai:
Actually, attacking your local hospital (especially if it’s a for-profit as the majority of them are these days) isn’t a bad idea. There’s a huge amount of rent-seeking set up in our current system well beyond the usual bugaboo of the actual insurers. If your local hospital stopped paying insurance companies tomorrow, they’d still expect you to pay $100 a day to rent space in the bed you stayed in to a subsidiary of theirs that they set up to maximize profit.
WyldPirate
@General Stuck:
Despite our previous disagreements, Stuck, you come across as one of the more decent and thoughtful Obots here. Some of your Obot buds here, however, have a problem whenever anyone dares to voice any sort of criticism of President
Black JesusObama.People are entitled to criticize him and and people here do indeed do so with–of all things–facts. But there is a pretty goddamned rabid crowd that is just as bad as the people that defended every fucking evil thing Bush did.
For instance, i remember a few weeks ago, the board owner himself was criticizing the decision to escalate in Afghanistan. Now I understand when Cole does it, folks aren’t likely to jump his ass. But let some other person do that, then it’s Katy bar the door. And the explanation they give is fucking stupid beyond belief. Presidents break campaign promises all the time. He didn’t, because he is stone cold afraid of the howl of “weak on defense” from the Rethugs.
I say this because there is too much damned history behind the failures of outside interference in Afghanistan. They have a long history of playing competing suitors off against each other. Obama had to be aware that history and the recent history of buying off the sides in Iraq as being the cornerstone of the Petreus’ counter-insurgency. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that native people are going to resent the fuck out of the US propping up a corrupt government. Shit, they may want a corrupt government, but they want to chose them, not have them propped up with the backing of a foreign military.
Davis X. Machina
@dollared: Will there be any POUMA’s there?
MikeB
The income tax cuts would be offset by eliminating all tax
deductions, including home mortgage interest deductions for
regular folks. My question would be what deductions would
be eliminated for big corporations to offset the cost of their tax cuts?
If they are talking about corporate write offs for jet planes and
entertainment, conventions, golf outings, wining and dining
business associates, etc, this would be an interesting concept.
(It’ll never happen of course)
An interesting analysis of “business deductions” was written by
Michael Kinsley in 1981 at the beginning of St. Ronnie’s
administration, it’s worth a read…
http://www.tnr.com/article/politics/the-mystery-the-free-lunch
General Stuck
the drool. [[THE DROOL!!]]
Sly
@El Cid:
There are a number of things in the draft proposal that are anathema to the other 16 members of the Commission. Even seemingly innocuous things, like reducing farm subsidies. Kent Conrad, darling of the budget hawks, will not stand for that. Whenever cuts to farm subsidies are even mentioned in committee he starts throwing a conniption fit.
You know the story about King Solomon settling an argument between two women over which one was the real mother of a baby? His fabled wisdom is demonstrated by the unseriousness of his response: cut the baby in half. He knew the real mother would never stand such a thing and, as it turns out, she didn’t.
Bowles and Simpson are arguing that we should cut the baby in half FOR REAL, and the sages of the Beltway are thunderously applauding their “wisdom.”
El Cid
@FlipYrWhig: I don’t mind the “public” part. But “option” doesn’t have the slightest hint at what it means. I thought something like “public health insurance” would make more sense. In fact, I know it does. I’m not surprised, however, that such an indirect phrase was used instead of something more comprehensible.
KG
@Cermet: ok, fair enough. I’m a lawyer, I occasionally hear “cartel” talk about the practice of law. I’m just trying to figure out what people mean. The concern I have is if you have a lot of shitty medical schools, turning out shitty doctors, that is going to be worse for society as a whole than having fewer medical schools turning out fewer well trained doctors.
lawguy
@General Stuck: Absolutely Obama cannot fail, he can only be failed. So quit your belly aching.
Sly
@WyldPirate:
I wonder why.
Mnemosyne
@El Cid:
I totally disagree. I think B&S only pulled this stunt because they knew they weren’t going to be able to get this plan or anything like it past 14 members of the commission, so they decided to short-circuit things and bring their plan out to overshadow anything the actual commission comes out with. Now they’ve gone and pissed off the other members — including people who might have liked this plan — and blown the whole thing up.
If there ever if a final report that they can get 14 votes on, I will be astonished. I think it’s all going to fade away.
Joe Beese
@ThatLeftTurnInABQ:
Yes, how unfair to bring Obama into a discussion of the Catfood Commission that he single-handedly created by Executive Order and then stuffed with his hand-picked economic hitmen.
lawguy
@Nick: What just did you do?
FlipYrWhig
@El Cid: Well, I think it’s supposed to be a “public option for health insurance,” called “public option” for short. Similarly, “social security and disability insurance” for aged people and surviving family members is called “social security.” It’s not a marketing coup or anything, but I’ve never found it to be as lackluster as many people say.
El Cid
@Sly: I certainly would assume that parts like that would vanish, and the parts about reforming Social Security and Medicare in line with — though probably not exactly — the draft proposal, and maybe lifting the cap on Social Security contributions over $100K. Maybe the VA co-pays. I could see something about reducing farm subsidies, but probably along with some sort of process of reviewing which would allow them to continue, so it would mainly be for show. Capping spending & very bizarrely revenue at some percentage of GDP, I don’t think will make it. But maybe.
@General Stuck:
Yeah, it’s just my read and intuition on the situation. Certainly I’ve been wrong before. And I don’t think that if it happens it will be very soon.
Cermet
@ruemara: Lets see – we have a navy that out numbers all countries navies (blue water) put together by a factor of at least five or six! We are building a fleet of aircraft (F-22) that are totally unneeded and another follow-on fighter that is even more useless and will be even more expensive once production starts; we have massive bases in Europe and Japan – why? We have more multi-billion dollar missile subs than Russia has blue water warships.
That doesn’t even cover the vast number of near billion dollar attack subs and lets not forget each carrier battle group costs $100 billion dollars to create, operate and maintain for fifteen – twenty years and we have fifteen of these stupid, wasteful pieces of shit.
The list goes on and on – we spend more on defense than the top 46 richest countries in the world combined and this is to fight a hand full of terrorist hiding in the hills?
We spend to maintain and equip a navy/army/air force that is susposed to fight two and a half full world wars when we have no nations that will attack us in any manner for the foreseeable future and these asswipes don’t know what to cut except our SS, Medicare benifits (that we pay through the nose for every damn pay check), and do away with our principle middle class tax write off?
Anyone – and I mean anyone who does not put defense first, front and center to cut at least 30% of its budget is a lying and utterly useless piece of shit who hates amerika.
General Stuck
@lawguy:
Actually, you are wrong, per usual. I actually think this commission was fail by Obama for forming it. It was a half baked effort to try and look tough on the deficit before an election. My problem is folks like you and the other firebaggers once again trying to create a mountain out of a molehill, on a report that is meaningless. Christ, all the wingnuts have to do is sit back and watch the “progressive base:” do their opposing Obama for them. AND THIS IS OPPOSING OBAMA FROM THE LEFT AND NOT ONE THING ELSE.
No bellyaching, but you and the others will be treated like republicans by me, or even worse than them the next two years, for flogging bullshit like this report into some kind of self important medal of being a better democrat,. And distracting us from focusing on fighting the wingnuts.
El Cid
@Mnemosyne:
Given the overall aims of the draft, I hope you’re right. I do think that a sane model might be possible, theoretically, but not in this political climate. Unless there’s some huge reversal toward Democrats in 2012, which at this stage I don’t foresee. Some do.
FlipYrWhig
@Mnemosyne: This is my thinking too. And, furthermore, I think the whole thing was started, supermajority requirement and all, to ensure that anything the commission came up with would have to represent a huge conceptual breakthrough that would win over a few of the hardest-core partisans on there.
I think Bowles and Simpson are figuring that by releasing their draft it’ll make people say, “Damn, _that’s_ what it would take?” And maybe from there you’ll end up with people seizing upon one piece or another and saying that it has the seal of approval from the commission — which is how the 9/11 commission recommendations re-entered political debate.
But the 14/18 requirement is pretty daunting, and, IMHO, designed to be daunting.
ruemara
@Joe Beese:
I am so gonna love doing this each time you say that.
and, I quote:
Senate Budget Committee Chairman Kent Conrad (D-N.D.), who has long advocated creation of an independent budget panel, called the agreement an “understanding in concept” that holds the promise of at last addressing the nation’s most wrenching budget problems.
snip
Conrad and other Senate moderates had threatened to oppose a significant increase without a budget commission.
snip
Under the agreement, the commission would have 18 members, including six lawmakers appointed by congressional Democrats and six lawmakers appointed by congressional Republicans. Obama would appoint six others, only four of whom could be Democrats.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/01/19/AR2010011903310.html
I have no problem with you just hating Obama. It’s your personal feelings and I respect that. I completely agree that he’s not the Kucinich you’re looking for. But, you don’t get to have your own facts.
El Cid
@FlipYrWhig: Okay, but I had to explain to many of my neighbors and friends and coworkers just what it meant. Most didn’t have a good idea.
Davis X. Machina
@FlipYrWhig: I was just grateful it never received a ‘cute’ name, like CubCare here (Maine). Washington state has AppleCare, Iowa has Hawk-I, etc.
MightyEagle FreedomCare, anyone?
ruemara
@Cermet:
I wholly agree. I’m just not sure how you get people to believe we haven’t completely disarmed and are now inviting the muslim terror hordes to date our daughters and rape our apple pie. And, for love of god Montressor, don’t say bully pulpit.
El Cid
@Cermet: Yeah, but F-22’s are really cool.
FlipYrWhig
@General Stuck:
I’ve wondered sometimes if the “deficit commission” was something that Obama could use to keep some of the deficit-hawkiest Democrats (like Evan Bayh and Kent Conrad and Lieberman-for-Lieberman) in the fold for HCR. You know, if they were bellyaching about how Democrats shouldn’t be made to look like reckless Big Spending Liberals, maybe Obama could say, Look, we’ve got this deficit commission working hard on ways to get the budget under control, so we’re alert to your grievances and will do our level best to address them.
xyzxyzxyz
Thanks for the Peter Peterson primer Sly and El Cid. I also read some of the info on his foundation’s web site…..you have a totally different take on the man and his positions. Somehow, I think you are providing a more accurate description ;) .
General Stuck
@FlipYrWhig:
Could be, could be several reasons for it. My guess is he will think long and hard before forming another. Chalked up to lessons learned by a new presnit. And likely at the time, he also didn’t realize he had a faction of faithless liberals on the internets that would stab his back at every turn. More lessons learned. People don’t come to the WH with previous experience at presidenting. It is all OJT at a hard school of knocks.
Mnemosyne
@El Cid:
We can only wait and see. I will say that, having been on committees myself, there’s nothing that pisses committee members off like having the leaders short-circuit the whole thing and announce their plans without consulting the committee. Heck, even having one committee member act unilaterally usually leads to some pretty ugly fights, so I’m pretty sure what we just saw was the death of the commission.
There are some overhauls to our tax system that would be helpful and, of course, there’s still work to be done to get our health system to stop bleeding money. A couple of the ideas in the B&S plan aren’t bad, but they’re way overshadowed by the really horrendously bad ones (end EITC? really?)
Mnemosyne
@FlipYrWhig:
So you think it was really the Blue Dog Placation Commission?
I think you may be right, especially since Kent Conrad, one of the whiniest, belly-achingest Blue Dogs ended up on there.
Cermet
@ruemara: Oh, Red Dawn … because we only have more weapons, ships aircraft, missiles and all of it is orders of magitude better than any possible enemy AND we have the European forces but if we cut the DoD by 30% we’ll go down – the worst part is that this is EXACTLY what would be said by the repub-a-thugs, their media slaves and the average amerikan and all I can say – that is the level of intelligence in this nation, home of the stupid! We deserve our fate but those frackers are taking me down (and you guys – in the gender neutral sense of the word) with them!
WyldPirate
@Sly:
No need to be fucking intentionally stupid, Sly.
It’s pretty clear that I’m using it because most of you fuck nugget Obots think and act as if Obama is infallible and beyond criticism just like many Christians act as if their God/father/son/jesus/holy is infallible and beyond criticism.
Elie
@FlipYrWhig:
LOL!!!
Me too
Chyron HR
@WyldPirate:
Yes, yes, we think Obama is a “messiah”. Nothing says “True Progressive” like unironically quoting Rush Limbaugh.
Nick
@lawguy:
huh?
FlipYrWhig
@Mnemosyne: Blue Dogs and Broders.
I continue to find just about all Obama’s alleged betrayals and capitulations on economic policy to have been the result of Blue Dog obstructionism, rather than any attempt to curry favor with Republicans.(1) How do you buy off Blue Dogs? Deficit hawk stuff.
If you need 14 of 18 to get a recommendation accepted, and 6 are selected by Obama, 6 by Congressional Dems, and 6 by Congressional Repubs, that’s actually an interesting structure for deliberation, because at least 2 people from each bloc would have to be persuaded. IMHO anything that would actually get through a structure like that _really might be_ something worth looking into.
(1 I don’t think that’s necessarily what’s happening on DADT or Afghanistan or detainees.)
RinaX
@General Stuck:
I had pretty much ignored all of the belly-aching about the commission, because I never understood what the big deal was. However, I knew that there was no way that the true blue progressives of the very important blogs were going to be denied their outrage. And once I found out that this wasn’t even the actual report, and that to even make it to Congress that it would have to be approved by 14 of the members, I was even more certain that the outrage would increase ten-fold. And it did.
Sly
@WyldPirate:
If only we all had the political acumen of Jane Hamsher, Jon Walker, and Marcy Wheeler, we wouldn’t have such difficulties. We really need to heed the cautions relating to the pitfalls of personality cults from a bunch of Deaniacs.
FlipYrWhig
@RinaX: Impotent rage is the most thrilling kind of rage, because there’s no reason to calm it down.
Sly
@FlipYrWhig:
Bouts of intense depression and anxiety followed by manic and addictive rage. The political equivalent of Bipolar Disorder.
Makes sense.
Quiddity
@General Stuck:
Get ready for a whole lot more of that and from a lot of mainstream Internet liberals (Atrios, AmericaBlog, Digby, Salon, Booman, even TPM is moving there).
And you use a very interesting turn of phrase “stab his back”. As if liberals are the ones who have reversed on a pledge. I won’t go into the details, but there are a number of instances where Obama has not followed through on various campaign pledges. So who is betraying whom?
SectarianSofa
Depressing. Republicans in general, and ‘serious’ ‘bipartisan’ bullshit like this even more so.
FlipYrWhig
@Quiddity:
Ooh, scary. What are they gonna do, mope Obama into submission?
lawguy
@General Stuck: Well, if you think that supporting Obama is supporting liberal/progressive ideals, I really don’t know how to respond to that, except to say that there are some good medications out there that treat just those kinds of delusions.
As far as the cat food comission is concerned, they have accomplished their goal, and Obama’s. Move the discussion so far right or libertarian, that now cutting SS and raising the retirement age seems well golly gee moderate in comparison.
FlipYrWhig
@lawguy: Jesus Christ, it’s not even “the commission”! How can it be “Obama’s goal” if it involves the commission being in such disarray that they can’t even agree to anything and the chairs have to release a draft document that pisses off everyone involved?
General Stuck
@lawguy:
Well, that’s the rub, isn’t it. Supporting “ideals”. Yes, I think Obama and I support liberal ideals. But the term progressive is not conducive nor necessarily related to the ideal. It is a point on a ideological map, that is closer to the ideal that it was before a law, or initiative was completed.
Plugged into our political system and actuation of governance, “ideals” that are liberal are not the only ideals in competition. The right wing has ideals as well, and they get a vote in a democracy. So claiming some high ground by using the term progressive is an unrealistic and even untethered from reality position to take, or label to claim. Other than in the legend section of one’s own mind. And seems to me to be quite false andconceited, and arrogant. For those who only support the ideal, and nothing much else.
Obama’s moves the ball further toward the ideal, now that is progressive, the one not a noun.
Sly
@FlipYrWhig:
Everything that happens is because Obama has willed it into existence with his magic blackity-black Jesus powers. If you disagree, then that is merely evidence that you have been captured by his cult of personality.
Don’t
tase meput me in the veal pen, bro.Nick
@Quiddity: Liberals wouldn’t stab Obama in the back. They’d whine someone else isn’t doing it for them.
Nick
@lawguy:
I’d support liberal/progressive ideals, but I honest the God don’t even know what the fuck they are.
FlipYrWhig
@General Stuck:
Well said. I think this is the “Greenwald Dilemma.” The theory seems to be “Stand up for your liberal ideals and you’ll always be right and you’ll always win.”
General Stuck
@FlipYrWhig:
Moral victories, if nothing else. But a win is a win for the self possessed, right? Meanwhile, the wingnuts make off with the shirt on all our backs.
Nick
@FlipYrWhig:
Well, that’s half right
But seriously, I don’t mind the argument “You’re a Democrat, stand up for Democratic values” except I wish people like Greenwald would pay more attention to the voters who call themselves Democrats and see that in many cases, they’re lying to themselves.
But to say it’s a key to victory, that there’s some secret bloc of voters just waiting for Dennis Kucinich clones to come around to vote for, I mean how fucking delusional could you be?
Democrats know they won’t win standing up for Democratic values. What this election proved is…you won’t win either way, so maybe our argument to Blue Dogs should be “you’re going down anyway, go down with passion and with zeal. Go down in a blaze of glory”
If standing up for Democratic values worked, Tom Periello would still be a Congressman, and don’t give me this “he was in a red district” bullshit because if you’re using that as an excuse, you’re contradicting yourself.
“If you stand up for progressive values, you’ll win…in half the country”
no, duh, really
Democrats are going to lose no matter what. They only win when Republicans are in power and fuck up royally. So they should be enticed to go down in a blaze of glory. Go down like Tom Periello.
Lawnguylander
Blue Dog Placation Commission is a good way to describe the thing but it was formed to get them to agree to get behind the stimulus, not HCR. I can’t link to it from my phone but if anyone is interested, David Waldman wrote a post about it some time back and it should be easily googleable. That’s not to say that Obama didn’t think it was a good idea to look into ways to address the national debt. It would have been crazy of him to try to balance the budget in the midst of a deep recession and he most definitely has not so far and won’t in the next few years, I’m sure. But the long term national debt is a different story and a problem that does need to be addressed.
catclub
@KG:
“whole than having fewer medical schools turning out fewer well trained doctors.”
Important if true. Are US trained doctors really 100-200% better than French or English trained doctors? Their pay would indicate that, but their results would not.
In addition, there are lots of things that someone who is trained at a level less than 4 yrs med school + 3 yrs residency + 3 yrs specialty training can do – like diagnose and prescribe for strep throat.
FlipYrWhig
@Lawnguylander: Dammit, I was going to say the stimulus but I couldn’t remember the timing and didn’t take the time to check. Thx.