Carville Answers

This just simply has to stop.

Liberals are not perfect or innocent, Democrats are especially not perfect or innocent, and I definately am not either. However, all this bullshit by the Republicans simply has to stop.

Hypocrisy in Politics is rampant and it drives me crazy and we see it on both sides of the aisle. That being said there are simly too many assholes out there trying to make political points over the Christmas Day attempted bombing. The famous quote from the McCarthy hearing "have you no sense of decency" rings truer and truer as everyday passes. Bold face lying from Dick Cheney to Peter King to Rudy Guilliani maybe normal business in the Health Care Debate and expected to a certain extent.

When these scum go out there and lie when some jerk tries to kill 300 innocent people enough is enough.

A few facts. 9/11 happened when Bush was President. I am not even argueing that it was his fault. There has been a spate of Republicans stating there were "No" terrorist attacks under the Bush Administration. Rudy "America's Mayor" made this statement today, Mary Matatlin advisor to Dick Cheney stated this a couple of weeks ago. This is nothing but a big fat lie. A big fat lie about the death of thousands of Americans.

For those who do not have as big of balls as Cheney et al. there is the statement that Bush kept us Safe, (Well Except for 9/11). That is a pretty big fucking except. Somehow the "us" in that statement doesn't extend to the thousands of men and women killed in Iraq for a war that was unncessary at best, and damaging at least.

President Obama doesn't "believe we are at war", he doesn't use the word terror enough. Damnit do these people think we are on school playground somewhere.


Do these same people remember making the argument that you shouldn't disagree publicly with the President when are at war. That it is aiding and abetting the enemy to have an open and honest debate about the merits of a war. These imbeciles who hid behind the flag of patriotism back then to support a stupid ass war now jump at the first chance to attempt to damage a sitting US President. No wonder so many people are turned off by politics. I am not going to suggest these people don't have a right to question the President or are unpatriotic to do so.

No. But they are complete dipshits for the way they are doing it. You may agree or disagree with the decision to put the underwear bomber in the court system. Be honest enough to accept that is the exact same thing Bush did with Reid and you expressed absolutly no concern back then. Matter of fact a number of Republican's took it as matter of pride to say hey look what Bush dide. Do not suggest that Obama doesn't care about American lives because he made the same decision that Bush made. Again this is irrelevent whether or not you agree, it is simple honesty.

With two wars, terrorist attempts, 10% unemployment, an ongoing debate about Health Care, can we have some damn adults for a change. This is one reason that everytime a crisis has been brought before the country and President Obama whether or not you agree with his decisions you have to appreciate that we have a President that is acting like adult and expecting those around him to do the same. (I am so thankful when I wake up every day and read the paper I don't read a headline about President McCain or President Bush.)

Remember these assholes are not arguing on merits they are lying! Take a few minutes to watch.

I Love Maps: Health Spending vs. Life expectancy

Click chart to increase size.

Recurring Themes: Paul Krugman gets it

I have the theme several times here that many people on both the left and the right are constantly surprised when President Obama keeps his promises. It is the left's turn to get hyperbolic about President Obama delivering a health care reform pretty similiar to what he had promised. Paul Krugman calls out the left in his most recent column.

But that says more about the complainers than it does about Obama himself. If you actually paid attention to the substance of what he was saying during the primary, you realized that

... what you’re getting is what you should have seen

On the specific matter of this Health Care Bill, the more I read the complaints from the left (which I consider myself) the more delusional I think many of them may be. I would have liked to have gotten a better policy. You gotta ask what could have been done different. When it comes down to it there was no leverage on Lieberman. Krugman addresses as well.

But on health care, I don’t see how he could have gotten much more. How could he have made Joe Lieberman less, um, Liebermanish? And I have to say that much as I disagree with Ben Nelson about many things, he has seemed refreshingly honest, at least in the final stages, about what he will and won’t accept. Meanwhile the fact is that Republicans have formed a solid bloc of opposition to Obama’s ability to do, well, anything.

Kill The Bill?

Many progressives have started the chorus of Kill the Bill and start over.

My gut reaction is very similiar, and I understand the desire to do a better job than what this piece of legislation is going to end up looking like. In addition as an active progressive I can completely concur with the feelings of wanting to stick a fork in the eye of Senator Joe Lieberman. (FBI: you are monitoring this, that was a figure of speech).

Kill the Bill and start over with a clean slate. That is what is coming from various corners of the liberal masses. I believe one of their greatest concerns, which I fully agree with, is that politicians will attempt to sell this as the reform that was promised and say all done. The result being a water downed bill and then politicians turning their attention to more important things you know like running for reelection.

That would be very difficult to swallow as a person who has fought hard over the last 14 months or so trying to improve our system. However, is there a middle ground to grab hold of? Is it possible to Pass the Bill and start all over?

In football it is often the right call to punt on 4th down even when you were so close to getting that first down. Why? Football is a game of field possession. When you make great strides to move the ball down the field, it often makes more sense to punt to protect that field position instead of going for it all, missing, and setting the opposition up in even better position.

I know, a very clunky comparison. I guess what I am asking is it better to take what we got and keep fighting? One of the very simplest and most important aspects of Health Care Reform was that no person should go broke from getting sick. I guess, if the bill before us does that and I am not sure it does, then maybe we should punt.

I reserve the right to say that there is potential that this bill does more damage than good. In that case Kill the Bill might be the right call.

A Picture is worth a 1000 jobs

There is a danger of posting this picture at the same time Paul Krugman ( just to the right of here) is talking about the possibility of a double dip recession. That being said:

The graph provides for an interesting peek at the economy through the job loss lens. I have always stated that the President is like the quarterback of the economy, he gets too much credit for a good economy and too much blame for a bad one. What sticks out to me is that job losses peaked in January of '09 and we have had a fairly steady improvement since. Secondly, while I do not know the precise number, the majority of the stimulus funds are still in the pipeline. Hopefully, they will counteract the possibility of the double dip recession.

You Spin me right round, Baby like a record Baby Right Round

http://thehill.com/homenews/senate/70107-new-public-option-plan

Reports of the demise of the Opt Out Public Option are coming in fairly steadily and the reports of the next round of compromise are hitting the news. This morning "The Hill" is reporting that Senator Reid has asked Senators Schumer, Carper, Landrieu to work on a compromise that addresses the few Dems left to get on board.

The reporting suggest a new version of the Public Option will emerge next week.

Drum roll please the new Plan will be

National Public Option Opt-In with Triggers.

Hmmmm. Now why does that sound so familiar?

Oh yeah

Here is my proposed compromise (mind you we have compromised way beyond anything I would truly liked to have seen). Nationwide State Opt-in plus triggers by state.

http://mysteryj.blogspot.com/2009/11/health-care-debate.html

A note on Reoccurring Themes:

I have fallen into the habit of returning to some earlier themes time and time again. I am not sure if this is a sign of brilliance of laziness. Such themes have been I Love Maps and today the fact that both sides the left and the right are aghast that President Obama continues to do what he campaigned on.

Today's edition is on the Afghanistan troop deployment. After long deliberation President Obama has ordered an additional 30,000 troops to Afghanistan over the next 6 months. Personally I have rather mixed feelings on this matter. I will continue to consider and work through. The point of this post, regardless of the left's hand wringing and the right's complaining about dithering, this is pretty much what Senator Obama campaigned on.

A central piece of his foreign affairs plan was to remove ourselves from Iraq to focus on Afghanistan. He often made a point about deliberation and thoughtful consideration and this exactly how we got to today's announcement of the troop escalation. While I may not be very happy with this announcement I can not be surprised.

I Love Maps: The Empire Strikes out Edition

Visualizing empires decline from Pedro M Cruz on Vimeo.

Health Care Debate

The vote is scheduled for tonight. The Senate is a curious creature, by design. Tonight's historic vote is simply to decide whether or not to debate the bill. The Republicans will threaten to filibuster whether or not there can be a debate. Which will require 60% of the US Senate to vote for debating the bill. This is not voting on voting on whether or not to vote on the bill or voting on whether or not to pass the bill. This is a vote on whether or not to talk about the bill on the Senate floor.

Second thought ,there are reports out that a handful of Senators are still searching for a Compromise, sigh. Mind you these are merely the Democrats compromising among themselves and maybe Olympia Snowe. The debate started public option vs. no public option, add in possible triggers that would never be triggered, opt-in to state wide plans and possible statewide coops. The latest manifestation was the nation public option with the States having the ability to opt out of the plan if they didn't want to be apart.

The most recent discussion is back to triggers this time the triggers would be more stringent and take place in 2013 when the rest of the reforms take place.

Here is my proposed compromise (mind you we have compromised way beyond anything I would truly liked to have seen). Nationwide State Opt-in plus triggers by state.

Setup the plan allow states that want to participate to join in from the beginning do so. There would be a whole slew of states that would likely do so. In addition for those states that do not opt-in would be governed under the trigger mechanism. If insurance coverage in any state does not meet the affordability standards established they would be required to offer the National Plan in their State Insurance Exchange.

This thought occurred to me a couple of weeks ago. I didn't do much with it at the time because the Opt-out option was gaining traction and looked like it had more than a fighting chance. We are getting close to crunch time.

Senator Schumer and Senator Carpenter are reportedly the central figures in working between the Conservative Dems and the rest of the caucus especially the Progressives. They were the duo that came up with the Opt-out compromise. We will see if they are able to patch something together.

Last note on Compromise. The progressives are in a serious bind. First, let's establish there are a large number of them that truly wanted a single payer system akin to something between England and France. There are a large number of people in this country that would jump at such a system. However, the progressives never really brought that to the table. They compromised before they ever started the discussion. Their compromise was the public option. Ok so true single payer is not going to happen we won't fight you on that as long as you give us the Public Option. That will help us swallow the fact that we are not getting what we and many, many of our constituents want.

Then the conservative started chipping away at the public option with opt-in, triggers, co-ops etc. Getting closer to the final voting the progressives were forced to find a compromise that they could live with. That compromise was the National Plan with State Opt-out. This was a big but grudgingly acceptable step away from a National Public Option. Not to mention how far away from their original position of a National Single Payer system. Now that we are on the brink of voting 3 - 4 Senators who have not moved 1 iota from their original position are calling for even greater compromise. The Conservative Dems are in a much stronger position Vi's a vie the Progressives. This going to come down to high wire chicken.