"The Referees Are Back On The Field"

The House passed a sweeping Wall Street reform bill yesterday including the formation of a Consumer Financial Protection Agency. The vote was along party lines with zero Republicans voting to reform the very sector that damn near brought this country to its knees last year. And joining the Republicans were 27 bought and paid for Democrats including Dan Boren who I would just LOVE to see tossed out on his ass this year, even if its by a Republican.

Next step of course is for it to get eviscerated in the Senate as Harry Reid "negotiates" with the bought and paid for Democrats there....

New Dems, ConservaDems, And Blue Dogs Are Damaging The Democratic Brand

At some point soon in the future the Democratic establishment along with the White House had better figure out that stuff like this is what is going to give the Republicans back the House and possibly the Senate if its allowed to keep happening. Right now we are allowing a small group of Republican light members of Congress to bring all of our legislation so far to the right as to not resemble mainstream Democratic thought. And I can promise you that those select few won't be the ones who really catch hell behind it, it will be the overwhelming majority of elected Democrats who rely on their base to come out in big numbers to vote for them in midterm elections. I truly believe that New Dems, ConservaDems and Blue Dogs wouldn't really mind if the Republicans took over Congress again so long as they keep getting money from their corporatist backers.

If somebody doesn't reign them in soon and stop "compromising" with them on issues that should amount to common sense and DEFINITELY amount to mainstream Democratic thought, we really will have a blood bath next year, no matter how bad the GOP screws themselves. When these folks start getting threatened of being stripped of seniority and or chairmanships then we will see how beholden they are to special interests. Until that day you can expect to see more of this kind of obstruction within our own party.

It is what it is.

A Lesson Not Learned

There was a remarkable political lesson last year that wasn't really learned because of subsequent events. However someone should point this lesson out to Harry Reid as we head into a cloture vote tonight just to start debate on health care reform, and then head into a final cloture vote later.

Last year with the financial markets on the edge of collapse the House held a vote for TARP. At the time the people of this country were made aware of how dire of a circumstance we were in and how easily we could have slipped into a depression. A couple of big name financial firms had already essential been vaporized and more were right over the horizon.

In the midst of this some of the Republicans in the House decided to vote against TARP. At the time I don't know if their leadership had miscounted or were stabbed in the back by some of their caucus but the result was the bill came up short of the votes needed to pass and chaos on the floor of the House ensued. What happened next was utterly predictable.

The markets fell sharply and GOP members of the House were raked over the coals for being insufficiently serious about the problem our nation was facing. In the end this episode probably as much as anything else helped to sweep Democrats into both halls of Congress in major majorities last year. When push came to shove it appeared to most anyone that these Republicans were more interested in playing politics than fixing a problem, and they paid for it.

Now the problem of course is that TARP has been such a PR disaster on a lot of fronts and Democrats have been so fucking inept at defending it even at all that nobody really wants to look back at the days that led up to its actual passage. If they did then they would remember that Republicans were so surprised but the country's reaction to their fuckery on the first vote that they panicked. All of a sudden McCain was suspending his campaign and on the second vote some off those Republicans who just couldn't find their way to voting for it the first time got on board to take the heat off. What that means is that when there is a crisis in this country and people play games like not voting to at least attempt to fix the problem, the American people are not going to be happy. The important thing is that in the end the fix actualy works and can be sold on an ongoing basis.

Which brings us to health care reform and a few corporatist Democratic Senators who are holding out for sweeteners.

Here is what Harry Reid should say to each and every one of them: "Fuck you, pay me!"

What I mean is he should literally tell them to step the fuck off and bring the bill up for a cloture vote tonight and dare them to vote against cloture. Dare them to put their careers in the Senate on the line by refusing to even allow the Senate to debate health care reform, a reform that an overwhelming majority of Americans agree we need even if they don't agree what it should entail. Dare the sorry muthafuckas to totally abandon the base of their party and join with the Republicans.

Matter of fact, double dare them.

See the thing of it is, this can be what they like to call these days a "teachable moment". There is no rule that says Harry Reid can't bring the bill back again in the next few days and put it up for debate again. Basically the bill has to truly be defeated for that to happen and he still has to the power to keep bringing it back. But what some of these assholes need to see is what will happen to their poll numbers if they should happen to vote against cloture.

I am thinking specifically of Blanche Lincoln who is fighting to get reelected next year, but her poll numbers would also be an example to her corporatist bretheren like Mary Landrieu and Ben Nelson. Its about time we stopped caving these assholes and instead putting their ass on the spot and making THEM cave. Fuck it, if they have the balls to say no when the bill is up for cloture then so be it, let them live with the consequences for a few days.

But my money is on them folding like a bad hand and from that point on they will be dealing fom a point of weakness.

If Harry Reid never stands up to them you can expect that every single item on the Democratic agenda will go through the same bunch of bullshit. And we already have seen what the result is when that happens, just take a look at the stimulus bill. Had we punched their asses in the throat earlier this year and rammed through a better bill then its highly likely that all the economic numbers, including unemployment, would look substantially better. Instead we gave them practically everything they wanted, fucked up the bill, and now the Democratic brand is damaged because of it.

So Harry Reid just go back and google the headlines after that House vote last year. The get on the floor tonight with confidence and put the bright lights on the ConservaDems and make them follow through on their hollow threats while the world is watching.

Trust me on this, they wont be able to take the heat.

If We Can't Shame Them, Shun Them!

If every state Democratic Party decided to shun any Democrat in Congress who is trying to hold up health care reform, I wonder what kind of response we could get....

Well we have our first test case, corporatist Dem Mary Landrieu:

Democratic Louisiana Sen. Mary Landrieu is out as keynote speaker for the Palm Beach County Democratic Party’s annual fund-raising dinner next week because party leaders dislike her stance on health care reform, county Democratic Chairman Mark Alan Siegel said today.

Landrieu, a moderate who recently described herself as “extremely concerned about a government-run, taxpayer-funded, national public plan,” has not committed to voting to cut off a likely Republican filibuster and forcing a vote on the legislation.


Democrats need 60 votes to invoke “cloture” and force a vote.

“We just didn’t want to have a keynote speaker who’s not committed to cloture. It would have just been wrong,” said Siegel, who said party higher-ups and rank-and-file members had voiced displeasure with the choice of Landrieu as a keynoter.

Good on Palm Beach for making a stand. Hell we won't demand that Landrieu vote for the health care reform bill, but she should for DAMN SURE be willing to commit to voting for cloture. That is the least she could do. And until she and the rest of her corporatist Dem partners commit to that then they should be treated like red headed step children.

Hitting The Right Pressure Points

Greg Sargent is reporting that Health Care For America Now has commissioned a poll of the Blue Dogs' districts to show them that their constituents not only want health care reform but also a public option:

Health Care for America Now, the major umbrella pro-reform group, has commissioned a big new poll of 91 conservative House swing districts — including many Blue Dog and rural ones — that finds the public option has solid majority support among those voters.

The poll and its accompanying memo — which is being circulated among House Dems and was sent over by a source — also send a strong warning to conservative Dems that if health care fails, the resulting damage to the President will rebound on them.

The poll, by respected Dem pollster John Anzalone, finds that 54% of these swing district voters support the public option, and makes the case that these voters emphatically don’t want a “trigger,” the compromise of choice in some quarters:

The public option shouldn’t be considered in isolation. Including a public option is essential to implementing an individual mandate. Voters also already prefer the implementation of a public option, and do not see a need for a trigger. There’s over-whelming opposition to an individual mandate when the only choices are private insur-ance, but there’s net support for a mandate when people have the choice of a public option. And swing district voters are convinced private sector healthcare has failed to make health care affordable, and prefer the public option now rather than waiting on a trigger option.

It also says that failure to get reform done will be courting disaster, and could rebound specifically on swing-district Dems as it did in 1994

Now that is good of course but as we all know the Blue Dogs aren't necessarily opposed to health care reform or a public option because of some misguided belief that their constituents are against a public option or health care reform. With that in mind there was another nugget in the polling that caught my eye.

The risks of inaction to Democrats in swing districts increases if voters perceive opposition stems from ties to the insurance industry, as 74% are concerned that the health insurance industry will have too much influence over reform.

I remember there being a lot of concern trolling back when several liberal and progressive groups went after blue dogs and ConservaDems with ads tying them to money from health insurance lobbyists. President Obama's Chief Of Staff Rahm Emanuel thought it was counterproductive among other things that can't be repeated. But it turns out that this is just the pressure point that strikes a chord with their constituents. According to this poll, the more their opposition to health care reform, a core plank of the Democratic Party, the more their constituents will turn on them.

We are on the home stretch and its time to turn up the heat on those bought and paid for Democrats in Congress. We need to let them know that if they continue on the path of opposing the public option we WILL expose them as being puppets of the health insurance industry. We have to do whatever needs to be done to make sure this bill goes through with a robust public option reflecting the will of the people, including those that live in swing districts.

Looks Like The House Is At Least Getting It In

By now most people know that the AP has reported that chairman of the Senate Finance committee, Max Baucus, has pretty much sold us all down the river by putting together a health care reform bill with no public option and no employer mandate. I have a sneaky suspicion that the CBO is going to bust him upside his dome anyway when they send it up for analysis but the truth of the matter is if he really does go that route, every liberal and progressive person in this country should commit on the spot to giving money to defeat him the next time he is up for reelection, even if it means contributing to a Republican challenger. And no I am not kidding.

On the other hand it looks like the Democratic leaders in the House of Representatives are actually, you know, leading.

House Energy and Commerce Chairman Henry Waxman said he hopes to restart work on healthcare legislation Wednesday after cobbling together the beginnings of a possible agreement with centrist Blue Dog Democrats.

snip

Reps. Waxman (D-Calif.) and Mike Ross (D-Ark.) emerged from more than three hours of negotiations late Monday to say that the Blue Dogs were weighing an offer from Waxman. Blue Dogs have asked Waxman to get a cost estimate for the bill.

"The chairman has made an offer," said Ross, who is the lead Blue Dog on healthcare reform. "We have asked that he get a [Congressional Budget Office] score, that is, find out how much it would cost. We're going to review it and see if it's something we can accept."

Ross and Waxman would not discuss any specifics of the proposal. But Ross said it addresses all 10 of the concerns Blue Dogs have raised with the bill.

Waxman emerged from the negotiations saying, "I feel very good right now. I don't think failure is a reasonable option."

snip

Talks nearly collapsed in acrimony Friday as each side hurled accusations at the other. But late Friday, they agreed to keep negotiating. The House is scheduled to leave at the end of the week for its summer recess.

"This is the week for markup," Waxman said. "If we're going to do the bill out of committee, this is the week."

Earlier, House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) had emerged from the talks, saying there is no way for the lower chamber to meet its Friday deadline for a vote on healthcare.

"That clearly will not be possible at this time," Hoyer told reporters. He said the deadline can't be met because of procedural hurdles and promises leaders made to give lawmakers time to read the bill.

But he added, "We have other days available to us." He has previously said that the House could meet Saturday, Monday or Tuesday.

In contrast to our bought and paid for Senator Max Baucus, we have both Congressman Henry Waxman and Congressman Steny Hoyer both trying to make it happen before the August break in the House of Representatives.

Maybe its time for Rahm Emanuel to send Max Baucus a dead fish.