It’s Obama, Not Lieberman
15 December 2009 10:31 am by Taylor Marsh
updated
“If you think you are sick of Joe Lieberman now,” Jim Shea, a columnist in The Hartford Courant, wrote Monday, “just wait until you get sick.” – Lieberman Gets Ex-Party to Shift on Health Plan
We’ve gone from the Teddy Kennedy health care bill to the Joe Lieberman bill.
The Senate proving it’s a failed institution if the Democratic majority can only support legislation that does nothing close to what it’s original intent was meant to be. With senators unwilling to stand up on principle rather than the holy writ of getting any win, no matter what it means. But the anger directed towards Joe Lieberman is off by a branch. Where this failure lands is on Pres. Obama’s doorstep; an executive who can’t bring himself to lead.
Pres. Obama is desperate for “a win” on health care (and everyone, especially Joe Lieberman, knows it), because he took for granted that it would be easy to get it done. Naive doesn’t even come close to the President’s miscalculation, but that’s what happens when you stand too long looking into the reflecting pool.
Reader AliceP over in t4h’s diary has a question for Pres. Obama:
What kind of bubble is Obama living in? Forcing everyone to buy healthcare insurance when companies have monopolies in each state and there is no low cost alternative?
This is a gift to the Republicans – when middle and lower class Americans find out that the way they are now covered by Obama’s plan is that they will be fined or penalized if they don’t buy insurance companies there will be millions of VERY ANGRY people.
Who will they be angry at? Why the owner of the brand new government health plan – Barack Obama.
He is letting senators who have personal/wife/financial ties to the insurance industry hijack the process. I can think of two right now: Bayh and Lieberman. I’m sure there are more.
Indeed.
Pres. Obama doesn’t care. It’s a 2010 win or bust for him, with the health care train now careening towards an end of the year crash.
First Obama let the August recess come and go without a bill. Getting bested by Sarah Palin’s “death panels” squeal came next. The finale of getting beat by Joe Lieberman having operatic overtones, given Joe’s recent history with progressives in Connecticut. Mr. Obama doesn’t care about the deatails as long as he can say he beat seven presidents who failed that came before him. He’s betting history won’t remember the minutia; it will simply be written that it was Barack Obama who got it done. Never mind that he simply settled for the scraps of what was left over during a year of abysmal Democratic compromises, because Pres. Obama doesn’t want to force his will and spend capital that will have him accountable, with his own calculations resulting in reconciliation.
The only hope is the House, who should not think twice about killing the bill if it comes out looking like Lieberman, Stupak language included. However, Speaker Pelosi has already proved how far she’ll sell out to help her boss, never meeting a principle she wouldn’t bargain away to help Barack.
In fact, the Democrats don’t have the moral purpose for this fight. They’re not Republicans, who actually are willing to go down fighting, no matter how wrong they are on any given issue.
Given that Pres. Obama will not stand himself and fight for anything on this health care legislation, why should other Democrats? If the “leader” of your party doesn’t have the stomach for the fight and will sell out to the lowest common denominator there is little left to say or do.
Talking about his grade the first year with Oprah, Pres. Obama said he’d give himself a B+. With a health care “win,” in his eyes, he goes up to A-. If you’re judging through the lens of ego gratification, I’d say he’s right.
This wouldn’t be happening with Hillary. Her unflinching passion and purpose for health care reform, seen through her first failure, would have given us a leader who’d put political capital down to get it done. No, she wouldn’t have written the bill, learning from her mistake, but she would have laid out markers of what was expected and she would have fought tooth and nail to get it done right. She certainly wouldn’t have accepted a bill that put more burden on the American middle class, while not coming close to covering enough people to make it matter, with costs not contained. And she wouldn’t have stood by silently while the bill was crafted as a gift to bolster the insurance monopoly across this country. Oh, and Clinton would never have sold out women to a bunch of men willing to put our civil rights on the chopping block. She’d have worked with Republicans and conservative Dems to the end, but used reconciliation in a heart beat to get a bill to the public that was actually good and actually meant health care reform. Whatever bill Obama ends up signing won’t be either. Ezra Klein talked about 150,000 people being impacted by the current bill last night on “Countdown.” What a meager vision from Democrats.
The problem isn’t Joe Lieberman, who simply read the political wind to find no will from his adversaries for the fight. It’s Barack Obama. It’s easy to roll a politician who isn’t invested in details.
What did you expect from someone placed in the Oval Office without a resume? We might just as well have pulled some checkstand clerk out of the nearest Wal-Mart to squat in the Oval Office.
Is there one single area, one single issue, that Obama hasn’t been a dissappointment?
“In fact, the Democrats don’t have the moral purpose for this fight”
That would include working for peace between Isr/Pal, and holding Israel accountable for its destruction of a two state plan.
It would also include seeking accountability for the KNOWN crimes of the Bush Administration.
It seems the Democrats are no more “moral” in purpose than the scumballs in the Bush Administration were.
Is there one single area, one single issue, that Obama hasn’t been a dissappointment?
Easy to answer: No.
PissedOffAmerican says:
15 December 2009 at 10:53 am
You weren’t around here during the primary, POA, so you aren’t aware that I am not only *not* surprised, I foretold exactly what’s happening.
At this point I’d also take issue with the comparison between Bush, as at least Bush fought to the wall for what he believed, even if he was totally wrong, not only morally, but on the facts he chose as his foundation. It’s why I made the comparison to Republicans in the first place.
BREAKING —
Obama at a Home Depot announcing the cash for clunker home appliances. He sounds like he doesn’t believe what he’s saying.
Has anyone considered that when the feds stop proping up different industries that this house of cards will collapse again?
“…at least Bush fought to the wall for what he believed….”
On that count I will agree, if we insert the phrase “the neocons” where you placed the name “Bush”. I’m not convinced that Bush’s “beliefs” figured into it, I really don’t think the jackass had coherent “beliefs”. I think the over-riding driver behind Bush’s tenure was his malleability, allowing the “beliefs” of others, such as Cheney, Perle, Wolfowitz, Bolton, etc., to drive policy. Bush’s “beliefs” were whatever Dick Cheney told him they were.
Indeed, and agreed.
The only thing Obama is invested in is Obama. I mean really when he gave himself a B+ I almost got sick. The thing is all of this is going to go sour on his watch. He is looking more and more like a one term guy. I think he will probably be fine with that. He has solidified his place in history and in the global elite. I actually think he thinks this job is too hard anyway,I think Michelle probably thinks the same thing.
Via ABC’s Jon Karl, Reid meeting with Snowe…
http://twitter.com/jonkarl/status/6700163726
Trigger up?
IMHO Nancy Pelosi started compromising principles very early on in the Obama saga.Princess Nancy certainly did not want to have to deal with Hillary Clinton and neither did many of the other backstabbers in the Democratic Establishment.I wonder if they are aware that they have sown the seeds of their own self destruction. They are chasing the base away, to where, I do not know. I am sure that there are many of us who are all done with this corrupt crew and the idea that we have nowhere to go just is not going to fly this time.
Well that means the trigger,which means nothing.
I hate Joe Liberman and I wish the press would ignore him but oh no he is the man of the moment.
Oh….. Joe says he is “never hesitent to take on the insurance companies” He is right now lying through his teeth and they are giving him the microphone.
Lieberman saying he will vote for health care bill if there is no public option and no Medicare buy in. Being interviewed right now on CNN.
Ooops. Sorry LL. Kind of doubled up on you.
Susan Collins won’t vote for the bill as stands now.
Just posted the video of Lieberman, kris.
It was so obvious that none of the Democrats in the meeting this morning have the least fear of Obama.
I don’t know if I buy the what Hilary would have said and done at this stage, but you are right this is a total mess….
To think that I confidently wrote yesterday that there would be no deal with Lieberman! (sigh….)
Arianna at the Huffpo has a good piece today.
Obama clearly meets the smart enough requirement. But there are two steps he must take if he is to course-correct. First: stop listening to Larry Summers. Second: stop thinking that reaching a consensus is the same thing as leadership.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/arianna-huffington/can-the-obama-white-house_b_391843.html
The thing Arianna gets wrong about Obama, though I hope he rises to the challenges he’s put in his own way, is that you have to have real passion and know the SPECIFIC direction in which you want to go in order to lead. It remains to be seen if Obama can stand on a line.
If Obama is so smart why does he not see the train wreak coming via healthcare?
Rep. Capuano Tells Fellow Dems: ‘You’re Screwed’, by Ryan Grim
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/12/15/rep-capuano-tells-fellow_n_392685.html
Some of us are seeing the kind of things we expected / feared. Some are seeing what they never expected, or thought a remote possibility, or whatever. Some aren’t seeing.
What is Obama seeing? The Dem majority? The DNC? Which, LL, is a follow-up on your very good question “If Obama is so smart why does he not see the train wreak coming via healthcare?”
I very much agree with your post, Taylor. This is the reason I supported Hillary Clinton in the primary. She would have done better on health care because she already had the experience of failing at it and knew the pitfalls. Women tend to be more progressive on health care anyway. I hate to sound cynical, but the American public just doesn’t seem to matter anymore. We so need leadership and someone willing to take the risk of actually standing for something. I also think a very weak bill may backfire at election time. We’ll see.
And here’s how the public graded Obama in August… Amazingly different results
http://tiny.cc/p32n3
Oh sure, Hillary would have just made those Liebermans and Snowes and Collins do whatever she said. I’m sure of it, NOT! Isn’t the bitterness from Hillary’s defeat getting old? I’m just asking. Hillary seems to have gotten over it, why don’t you all?
Why do most of you want Obama to fail? Wouldn’t that mean another republican in the White House? Is that what you really want? “If I can’t have Hillary, I don’t want anything at all, I’m taking my ball and going home, so there”
Nobody wants Obama to fail. We all want this lazy, jive talking turkey to wake the FU** up is all. How anybody could possibly know what “Hillary would have done” is absurd. If I had wings I could fly. If my father was a Rockefeller I’d be rich. If I’d been elected president we’d have world Peace today. Coulda, shoulda, woulda and if I had a penny for every stupid thing I’ve ever said or done…..well you all get the point? Peace
“Nobody wants Obama to fail.” Really, nobody? I think that by attacking him from the left while he is getting bludgeoned from the right is pretty much guaranteeing that he fails. It makes no sense to attack the only person who might have a chance of changing some of the policies of the last 8 years. Do you think attacking him is going to wake him up, it will only serve to weaken him, thus giving Republicans midterm gains and of course, then he isn’t going to get anything done in 2011 and 2012. Great plan, who thought that one up?
Here, send a message to traitor Joe Lieberman demanding he help enact a strong single payer public option into law.
http://bit.ly/traitorjoe
You mirrored my thoughts exactly, Taylor. I voted for Obama in November but at least I can look myself in the mirror and know that I supported Clinton in the primary. If only more Progressives would have taken off their rose colored glasses and recognized that the 2008 Hopey, Changey fad was built on a foundation of inexperienced, shifting sands….
At this point I almost wish that McCain had won. At least then I wouldn’t feel so bad about my utter and complete disappointment in the performance of The President of the United States of America.
“If I can’t have Hillary, I don’t want anything at all, I’m taking my ball and going home, so there”
I assume you are not talking about your humble hostess around here, as I’ve supported Obama since he won the nomination.
I’ve been a lone feminist progressive supporter of Obama on Afghanistan, saying so in writing after writing, as well as across cable. I also support him on settlements in Israel, among other aspects of his foreign policy.
So again, I assume you aren’t directing your swipes at moi.
I didn’t see your comment, dude, before mine posted. I’m still very glad Obama won, praying to all the gods that he can get his act together, even as it’s likely 2010 is lost at this point.
Your disappointment in Pres. Obama is shared by thousands.