Not Leading
23 January 2010 12:07 am by Taylor Marsh
Embarrassing.
But if Josh Marshall and Talking Points Memo is laying out Barack Obama it’s time for the White House to wake up and hear the alarms. No one went farther out on a limb than TPM did during the primaries to assist Barack Obama in every way they could, seldom doing critical analysis on him.
Everyone hopes that Barack Obama regroups and begins to actually lead, because we’ve all got a lot at stake. He has the people around him to manage it.
But right now Democrats seem to be in a state of paralysis, especially where health care is concerned. That it’s happening openly, where everyone can witness it is deeply troubling. This article by Brian Beutler is just absolutely stunning. Beutler talks to Sen. Sherrod Brown:
Nevertheless, he doesn’t imagine the President will lay out a way forward in his State of the Union address next week, and he won’t push any buttons in the Senate.
“I doubt if he does, I don’t think he’ll do a procedural thing. I don’t think he will engage in process,” Brown said of State of the Union.
Traveling with Obama today, he and House members from Ohio aired suggestions and opinions about how to get the Senate back into the game–but Obama’s not on the same page. “Everybody had opinions about what the President should do [vis-a-vis the Senate and particular senators],” Brown told me. “But he ain’t bitin’.”
It’s doubly tough that this all comes the week before the State of the Union Speech this coming Wednesday, when Pres. Obama is due to give yet another speech. Virginia’s Bob McDonnell will give the Republican response.
There is just this terrible sinking feeling that these people haven’t one clue how to get out of the mess they’ve created. The worst of it being that the one time we get full transparency it’s to watch their incompetence in the light of day.
But take heart! The other guys are worse. They’ve just figured out a way to win stunning upsets in places like Massachusetts without using the word Republican, which voters are buying into in droves. Not encouraging.
so why wont the house just rubberstamp the sen bill like so many pundits are clamoring for? bc wh and senate has screwed themf rom the outside. the house has delivered many key bills the dems ran on. the sen has done squat and the wh appears to have chamberlin has a guide.
http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/2010/01/health-care-fate-hazy-as-house-dems-wary-of-being-burned-by-white-house-and-senate.php
Total effing paralysis, t4h. Dingell’s words are chilling.
So is this poll:
http://publicpolicypolling.blogspot.com/2010/01/2012-presidential-poll.html
The biggest problem I see is all the dirty deals made behind closed doors. Nebraska, LA. I don’t even like the whole Union deal and I am pro union.
My fear is all the Republicans in upcoming elections playing Scott Brown man who drives around in a truck.
They have found a way to connect with people that Obama has not.
the repubs are using the old nixon trick- nixon didnt even use the term repub in his 72 ads! nixon would go out and court blue collar americans. talk about the silent majority who wanted law and order. worked like a charm.
taylor- what a shame. like u say this is all we have to keep the right from returning to power.
Hey isn’t it ironic that Nixon proposed the first real national healthcare plan. How many here are old enough to remember that?
Almost makes one yearn for the good old days when the boys in the back room picked somebody who knew what the hell day it is, and we were less likely to get stuck with a junior senator with no executive experience (but gives nice speeches).
I dare say that the average department store manager could do better than this schmuck. Yes she could.
It’s gonna be a long four years, I’m afraid, as everything goes south, including jobs, wars, health care, the dollar, state financial problems and entitlements, and that’s without considering the effects of global warming, the drug wars, earthquakes and whatever else might happen. Hold on tight! There’s an inexperienced operator at the wheel!
kennedy townsend speaks out on the kennedy clan’s fury at coakley’s loss. of note- she slams dc dems for learning wrong lessons from borwn’s win. stunning if true- viki was not asked to stump for coakley. only after axelrod got involved coakley finally called on viki jan 7! i bet a kennedy runs and wins back this seat in 12
http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2010-01-21/youve-got-to-fight/?cid=hp:beastoriginalsC2
Just face the facts: Obama is incapable of leading and is now a lame duck. He’s unwilling to fight for any principle and i read where he is going to speak at the GOP leadership convention. It’s sad. Conservatism is dying but Obama keeps performing CPR on it.
Anybody seen the “hitler learns of Brown’s win” video? It is farkin FUNNY! When Hitler pounds the table and screams “I can give a speech without notes why can’t HE!” I almost pissed my pants. I wonder if the makers of the movie had any idea it would become such an icon and be used so much!
Hey Carol. Well, the template for Scott Brown, who didn’t mention that he was Republican while running is Bob McDonnell, from Virginia. He will give the response to Obama’s SOTU on Wednesday. That’s what they’re going to do. Run away from their brand, then when they get elected enforce it. Unlike Dems they know what to do when they win.
History is something else, isn’t it, kris?
Ga6thDem, one year ago there were articles everywhere about conservatism being dead. Jay Leno did the joke on that one, with Obama & Dems resuscitating Rep. in a year.
Hey t4h, like I said after Coakley won, Vicki may, after she’s fully through her grief run against Brown. But nothing will change what happened on Tuesday, which damaged Obama & the Dems deeply.
DB put it up In the News, secularh:
http://www.taylormarsh.com/2010/01/21/hitler-finds-out-scott-brown-won/
I loved the video; it’s hilarious.
Well, David Brooks has another good column out [surprises me that he's having a hit parade these days, but... I gotta call 'em like I see 'em]. He observes the current situation and the possible strategies the Dems might choose to deal with it. Please read the whole thing before you judge.
January 22, 2010
OP-ED COLUMNIST
Politics in the Age of Distrust
“…while most families were concerned about jobs, Democrats in Washington spent nine months arguing about health care. The country was already tired of self-serving back-room deals, so the Democrats negotiated a series of dirty deals with the pharmaceutical industry, the unions and certain senators.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/22/opinion/22brooks.html?em=&adxnnl=1&adxnnlx=1264251832-FQw1d3txIymdPPvm2pkA3A
Then considering what Brooks says, check it out:
Obama With Defiant Tone, Vows to Push Agenda
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/23/us/politics/23obama.html?hpw
And, you know that big banking “reform” proposal Obama just announced? Just more secret deals!?
January 23, 2010
By LOUISE STORY and ERIC DASH
“Only a year after the government stepped in to aid Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley by granting them access to the federal safety net, policy makers are developing an exit path that would allow them and others to escape limits on banks being proposed by the Obama administration.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/23/business/23bank.html?th&emc=th
Banks May Get Help to Escape Risk Limits
See also:
Pharma Deal with WH to Net Industry Billions
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/11/11/pharma-deal-with-white-ho_n_353499.html
Who Struck that Deal with Big Pharma Anyway?
http://washingtonindependent.com/71361/who-struck-that-deal-with-big-pharma-anyway
Finally, remember how prices went up after Big Pharma got the WH deal, in anticipation of them having their prices capped? Well, now we’re stuck with those higher prices, you know! Think they’ll go down, now that HCR is dead? Not a chance. No one’s talking about that little boondoggle.
Last Year Drug Prices Soared in Wake of WH Deal
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/11/business/11price.html
“There is just this terrible sinking feeling that these people haven’t one clue how to get out of the mess they’ve created.”- Taylor
More comments on the “mess” in Jan. 23, 2010 NY Times:
Included in the Editorial section:
Here’s How to Help If President Obama wants to avoid a double-dip recession caused by another wave of foreclosures, then he should do more to help keep at-risk families in their homes.
Included in the Op-Ed section:
The Lady and the Arlen By GAIL COLLINS
If the Democrats are looking for a wake-up call from Massachusetts, the big rooster in the room is the plethora of underwhelming candidates they are fielding.
They Still Don’t Get It By BOB HERBERT
The Democrats seem not just helpless to deal with the crisis, but completely out of touch with the hardships that have fallen on so many Americans.
Mobs Rule By CHARLES M. BLOW
It seems as if Obama and the Democrats made the mistake of believing that a heart once won was forever won. They were wrong. The mob is fickle.
Savoring this irony! Okay, I post this without a link because, well, it’s “Michelle Malkin” after all! But, pause–breathe–I’m posting this because Malkin’s got her britches in a wad now, over the fact that “wingnuts” are in danger! So, I’m sort of loving this. She is madder than a wet hornet that Sarah Palin has decided to stump for McCain, and mad as well that Brown is endorsing McCain in November, and “weally weally” mad that McCain is fighting for a more “liberal” brand of Republicanism. Democrats should take heart at the Brown win, because the seeds of the end of extremist right-wing Republicanism are germinating….Be careful what you wish for, GOP [evil laugh....bwahahahahaha!]:
Conservatives: Beware of McCain Regression Syndrome
by Michelle Malkin
Creators Syndicate
Copyright 2010
Pay attention: In the afterglow of the Massachusetts Miracle, there are flickers of peril for The Right. I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but like Paul Revere’s midnight-message, consider this warning “a cry of defiance, and not of fear.” Conservatives have worked hard over the past year to rebuild after Big Government Republican John McCain’s defeat. But McCain isn’t going gently into that good night.
Red Flag Number One: A reader from Arizona informed me the day after the Bay State Bombshell that he had received a robo-call from Massachusetts GOP Sen.-elect Scott Brown. “He basically wanted me to vote for John McCain in November,” the reader said in his description of the automated campaign call supporting the four-term Sen. McCain’s re-election bid. “No wonder [Brown] said he hadn’t had any sleep…he was busy recording phone messages!”
Red Flag Number Two: Also in the wake of the Massachusetts special election, the nation’s most popular conservative political figure, Sarah Palin, announced she would be campaigning for her former running mate in Arizona in March. Palin told Facebook followers that she’s going to “ride the tide with commonsense candidates” and help “heroes and statesmen” like McCain. Facing mounting conservative opposition in his home state and polls showing him virtually tied with possible GOP challenger and former Rep. J.D. Hayworth, McCain welcomed the boost: “Sarah energized our nation and remains a leading voice in the Republican Party.”
Savor the irony: After a career spent bashing the right flank of the party, Sen. McCain is now clinging to its coattails to save his incumbent hide.
And pay attention to the hidden, more troubling irony: While he runs to the right to protect his seat, McCain’s political machine is working across the country to install liberal and establishment Republicans to secure his legacy.
And Cindy McCain is “Redefining Republican”
http://www.noh8campaign.com/
Well, now ANDY STERN threatens WH that “labor” might not work for Democrats if HCR isn’t passed. You know, Stern tops the list of WH visitors this past year; his accessibility is legendary, so someone at the WH loves them some STERN. But, if I were Democrats, I wouldn’t let STERN do my talking for me right now. The American people wouldn’t appreciate it. They aren’t feeling very sympatico with big labor these days. This isn’t “helpful” as they say, ANDY.
http://theplumline.whorunsgov.com/labor/seiu-chief-if-dems-pass-scaled-down-health-bill-labor-will-have-trouble-staying-focused-on-national-politics/
Don, on Cindy McCain, and her wonderfully outspoken daughter, Meghan, I say CHEERS! I support equal rights; I support GLBT rights, and they are courageous to publicly support them, too.
re: labor popularity dropping
PRINCETON, NJ, Sep 3, 2009 — Gallup finds organized labor taking a significant image hit in the past year. While 66% of Americans continue to believe unions are beneficial to their own members, a slight majority now say unions hurt the nation’s economy. More broadly, fewer than half of Americans — 48%, an all-time low — approve of labor unions, down from 59% a year ago.
http://www.gallup.com/poll/122744/Labor-Unions-Sharp-Slide-Public-Support.aspx?CSTS=tagrss#1
Let me preface this by saying that I’m a clasical anarchist. Not to be confused with a seeker of chaos. ANARCHY as defined by Webster: a philosophy (theory) that regards the absence of all direct or coercive government as a political ideal and that proposes the cooperative and voluntary association of individuals and groups as the principle mode of organized society. That is what our Founding Fathers (and Mothers) had in mind when they set this country up. See: Enlightenment. When I hire (elect) somebody, I want them to do what I tell them to do. I do not want them to tell me what I should do, or think, just because they believe that that is the best thing for me to do, or thing. I do not want a leader. I want a follower. Someone who will do what I, or the group, tells them to do. Peace
As far as “the economy,” this is how Obama has been “stupid.” The stimulus sent too much of its money to people who were thankfully still working, via tax cuts. The Administration and the Federal Reserve have also been terribly wasteful in how they spent money to prop up weak banks, instead of doing what we did in the 1980s and ’90s. Back then we put weak banks out of business, fired their managements, wiped out the shareholders and protected only the depositors. It is almost always cheaper for the FDIC to take over an insolvent bank quickly, than to allow a weak bank to run a slow drip off the government IV and eventually have to take it over anyway.
Bottom line: the economy is still very weak fundamentally, but neither Pelosi nor the voters will approve more funds to fix things. Understandably so, because first Bush (via TARP) and now Obama have done it wrong almost every which way. So right around election time if we get a double dip in the recession, guess who will get the blame?
Wish I could go live in Canada.
No man is wise enough to be another man’s master. Each man’s as good as the next — if not a damn sight better.
I know my own nation best. That’s why I despise it the most. And I know and love my own people, too, the swine. I’m a patriot. A dangerous man.
Sentiment without action is the ruin of the soul.
–Edward Abbey, Anarchist
Re Joyce Arnold’s comment on the economy… here is a more technical explanation of why the housing market is much sicker than it looks. Basically, delinquent mortgage borrowers, used to be able to catch up on their loans much of the time. Now delinquent borrowers much more often, just can’t make it. Many of their homes will head to foreclosure in due time, even if they are not yet listed for sale to weigh on the market for residential real estate. http://www.theinsightfultrader.com/delinquent-mortgage-borrowers-find-it-harder-to-catch-up/
I don’t think the deal labor made with the White House is being treated fairly. They have a point if their members have been negotiating better healthcare for their families over pay raises for years.
The problem seems that all these side deals were being made in the first place. The goal of the WH seemed to be to make some stupid product that would not hurt any of the special interests instead of getting good policy.
Early in his political career Obama started his rise by alligning himself with the “good government” wing of the party. There was a woman legislator in his district who was an early mentor. Before long he threw her under the bus when he realized that he needed the Daily machine. It seems to be a pattern and it goes to Taylor’s main critic,he has no core set of beliefs. A more charitible way of putting it would be open-minded to a fault.
Don Bacon~ I think you should run for political ofice.
office
sunlight~ It seems like I remember Hillary talking about taking all the risky morgages and putting them in one place, like a resolution trust, and then reworking them to help people keep their homes. Like in the situations you describe,if people were given a fresh start with a lower morgage payment,after having their principle adjusted to reflect current values,wouldn’t that be cheaper than pouring money into these big banks?
Without a job you have no money. A person with no feet has no need of shoes. Peace
Or any other fancy footpath or trail that you might construct for him/her to use. Peace
Think about what you’re saying people. Peace
LL,
I ran for office once, thirty years ago, school committee. I was sort of new in town, so I lost, but it was interesting. I recommend it.
My campaign had its amusing moments. Before one panel discussion, the moderator came up to me, told me that he thought that bibles should be handed out in schools, and asked me my opinion. I said that I’d have to check with my friend Meyer Singer (a prominent Jewish lawyer in town) to see what he thought about it. The moderator turned on his heel, and when the panel was introduced, although everyone in the room was holding my flyer with my name prominently displayed, the moderator introduced me as “Ray” Bacon. So, with that as a characteristic moment, my political career ended with that campaign. I do recommend it, though.
Lake Lady, you are correct in principle. If a homeowner can’t afford the current mortgage payment, and could afford the mortgage payment if the principal were written down to reflect current market values that would be the right thing to do. But writing down the loans would force the banks to fess up to their losses, which is precisely what they are trying to avoid.
I suspect that a number of large banks would have to admit they were insolvent if they did that. At that point, we would see which banks are truly insolvent. The FDIC would then have to take over the insolvent institutions. Right now the FDIC is busy liquidating insolvent community banks but insolvent big banks have political immunity. That needs to change.
Before the 2005 Bankruptcy Act, bankruptcy judges had the power to adjust a mortgage borrower’s principal to realistic amounts, just like they do today on a business’s commercial mortgage when it goes into Chapter 11. That power needs to be restored for individual borrowers too.
Public Law 109 – 8
Bankruptcy Abuse Prevention and Consumer Protection [!!] Act of 2005
A bill which significantly raised the bar for, and increased restrictions against, declaring bankruptcy.
YEAs 74 NAYs 25 Not Voting 1
Yeas included: Baucus (D-MT), Bayh (D-IN), Biden (D-DE), Bingaman (D-NM),Byrd (D-WV), Conrad (D-ND), Inouye (D-HI), Jeffords (I-VT), Johnson (D-SD), Kohl (D-WI), Landrieu (D-LA), Lincoln (D-AR), Nelson (D-FL), Nelson (D-NE), Pryor (D-AR), Reid (D-NV), Salazar (D-CO) and Stabenow (D-MI)
Yeas and Nays i9 in the House: 302 – 126
Here is some very interesting if wonkish reading. Did the central bank conspire against the american middle class? If this is true it throws a whole new light on Time’s,Man of the Year and his upcoming confirmation battle.
p://www.zerohedge.com/article/scandal-albert-edwards-alleges-central-banks-were-complicit-robbing-middle-classes
Don Bacon~ I have some people trying to get me to run for Mayor of our little burg. It is the second time people have encouraged this. I can’t consider it until my little grandson Sammy turns three and is ready for preschool.First things first right now I am busy being a granny nanny
Sorry to see Biden’s name on that list. Isn’t the credit card industry located in his state? Stabenow is purhaps a bigger surprise considering the terrible place her state is in and has been in for quite a while.
OMG Bayh wants to throw poor people in the ditch!
http://thinkprogress.org/2010/01/23/bayh-obama-freeze/
Simon Johnson gets the gray matter moving today. Despite his current push for a bad bill,which in theory I think I understand, Krugman would be a brillant pick for Fed. Obama and his current influences in the WH would never go for it but it is fun to think about.
Just think Elizabeth Warren at Treasury,Krugman at the Fed and Volker as his economic advisor.That would have a chance of restoring things eventually. A girl can dream,can’t she? Oh, and how about Dorgan as Chief of staff?
Seriously,only a real shake up is going to allow him to fullfill his much vaunted potential.
I forgot to add the link!
http://baselinescenario.com/2010/01/23/paul-krugman-for-the-fed/
http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2010-01-22/obamas-power-outage/2/
“Obama has to make a fundamental personal and strategic choice: Either continue to do a little of this and little of that and call it pragmatism, or take on the fight to make the nation face up to its economic crisis, make the tough political decisions to get the job done—and make the necessary adjustments in his foreign policy to free up the funds and the time for determined and steady leadership. It takes time, relentlessness, toughness, and a lot of political skill to prevent America from sinking. Mr. Obama’s confusing rhetoric about matching and weak bargaining sense on health care suggest that he has yet to grasp the point: Great presidents don’t run away from crises; they use them to pound home necessary fixes in American government and society.”
Worst week for the Prez; worse to come!
“Heads will still have to roll.”
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/821dce96-0786-11df-915f-00144feabdc0.html
Taylor Marsh: “But as I’ve said before, my hyper partisan days are over. I’m back to doing what I do best; just telling it like it is.”
Taylor this was music to my ears. I used to say in the past you were the smartest read on the internet or ANYWHERE and the most truthful and honest.
Americans are becoming keenly aware of hyper partsan talk/info etc. We just want honesty and truth and we don’t care who or where it comes from. NO ONE or no ONE group is wrong ALL of the time. I become suspicious of people I know who profess to be right all the time. I distance myself from those who cannot self reflect or admit wrong or apologize(Taylor, I am not saying you are wrong…I am just making analogies here having to do more with much of the hyperpartisan stuff out there). The American public appreciates a little self criticism or introspection just like they like movies about self transformation.
We know and sense truth and honesty. We gravitate towards those people who admit their flaws and have some empathy or understanding for the other side every now and then. It makes someone more credible.
So, in a nutshell, as I have said before, Taylor, I am so glad to have you back. I , too, am back.
as a historian i thought some quotes from our great leaders past u might find appropos to today!
To announce that there must be no criticism of the president… is morally treasonable to the American public. Theodore Roosevelt —
When they call the roll in the Senate, the Senators do not know whether to answer “Present” or “Not guilty.” Theodore Roosevelt
Rhetoric is a poor substitute for action, and we have trusted only to rhetoric. If we are really to be a great nation, we must not merely talk; we must act big. Theodore Roosevelt
Rules are not necessarily sacred, principles are. Franklin D. Roosevelt . hmmm how appropos to today no?
“words-just words”
Thank you t4h
A President’s hardest task is not to do what is right, but to know what is right.
Lyndon B. Johnson
SEND THIS TO OBAMA
There is but one way for a president to deal with Congress, and that is continuously, incessantly, and without interruption. If it is really going to work, the relationship has got to be almost incestuous.
Lyndon B. Johnson
hah
What convinces is conviction. Believe in the argument you’re advancing. If you don’t you’re as good as dead. The other person will sense that something isn’t there, and no chain of reasoning, no matter how logical or elegant or brilliant, will win your case for you.
Lyndon B. Johnson
While you’re saving your face, you’re losing your ass.
Lyndon B. Johnson
You want a friend in Washington? Get a dog.
Harry S. Truman
lbj’s quote on what convinces is conviction says it all to me. people can tell if you have convictions or not.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/35030898/ns/politics-the_new_york_times/
“WASHINGTON – President Obama is reconstituting the team that helped him win the White House to counter Republican challenges in the midterm elections and recalibrate after political setbacks that have narrowed his legislative ambitions.
Mr. Obama has asked his former campaign manager, David Plouffe, to oversee House, Senate and governor’s races to stave off a hemorrhage of seats in the fall. The president ordered a review of the Democratic political operation — from the White House to party committees — after last week’s Republican victory in the Massachusetts Senate race, aides said.
In addition to Mr. Plouffe, who will primarily work from the Democratic National Committee in consultation with the White House, several top operatives from the Obama campaign will be dispatched across the country to advise major races as part of the president’s attempt to take greater control over the midterm elections, aides said. “
“We are turning the corner to a much more political season,” said David Axelrod, a senior adviser to the president, who confirmed Mr. Plouffe’s role. “We are going to evaluate what we need to do to get timely intelligence and early warnings so we don’t face situations like we did in Massachusetts.”
Seems something got their attention
isnt plouffe the dude who called us progressives bedwetters? turns out the bedwetters were right as we warned obama to get with it. glad to see wh is now worried.
plouffe speaks in wapo op ed on what dems need to do:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/01/22/AR2010012204216_pf.html
Plouffe is also the author of the gauzy homage to Obama -The Audacity to Win: The Inside Story and Lessons of Barack Obama’s Historic Victory
If plouffe and axelrod are running the show then we’re doomed in Nov. these are the same jokers that helped Deval Patrick win the Gov. in MA and he not can’t break 40% approval in that state.
oh great! Poof is back. recently in an interview he seemed to be living on a different planet.
Loved the quotes Texan!
Thanks to all for the many good links regarding the present mess, and for the historical quotes. Roosevelt’s “To announce that there must be no criticism of the president… is morally treasonable to the American public” is one I particulary like to pull out, t4h. Thanks for the reminder.
djjl says:
23 January 2010 at 3:46 pm
“‘We are turning the corner to a much more political season,’ said David Axelrod, a senior adviser to the president, who confirmed Mr. Plouffe’s role.”
Meaning a return to full campaign mode, and something at which they were quite successful? If so, I wonder what that means to a very, very short governing season and mode.
I don’t think they’re all that in to governance = see Ga6Dems’ comment on Patrick and remember this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8M6×1H08aFc
David Plouffe, WaPo:
– Pass a meaningful health insurance reform package without delay. If we do pass it, dozens of protections and benefits take effect this year. Parents won’t have to worry their children will be denied coverage just because they have a preexisting condition.
from Senator Reid’s website (extract):
*The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act will provide $5 billion in immediate federal support for a new program to provide affordable coverage to uninsured Americans with pre-existing conditions. This provision is effective 90 days after enactment, and coverage under this program will continue until new Exchanges are operational in 2014.
*The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act makes an immediate and substantial investment in Community Health Centers to provide the funding needed to expand access to health care in communities where it is needed most. This $10 billion investment begins in 2010 and extends for five years.
*The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act eliminates pre-existing condition exclusions for all Americans beginning in 2014, when the Exchanges are operational.
http://dpc.senate.gov/healthreformbill/healthbill46.pdf
What’s an “exchange?”
from a Teuters news repeot, Jan 21 2010
Both House and Senate bills would create insurance exchanges in which small businesses and individuals can shop for coverage. The Senate bill would create state-based exchanges. The House bill would create a national exchange. House Democrats have said the final bill will likely include a national exchange.
Negotiators have agreed that the exchanges would be opened to collectively bargained health plans beginning in 2017.
The House bill would allow insurers to charge older people up to twice the amount they charge younger policy holders. The Senate bill would allow insurers to charge older people up to three times what they charge younger people.
http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE60I58T20100121
Oh. Senator Red says the exchanges will go into effect in 2014, the Reuters article says 2017.
So the “dozens of protections and benefits [that] take effect this year” if the HCR bill is passed DON’T include health care for the masses until — 2017?
Outrageous!!!!!!!!!!!!
Reminiscent of the delay in credit card requirements. Just give ‘em some time to screw you some more!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
“Present.”
David Plouffe, WaPo:
We need to show that we not just are focused on jobs but also create them.. .full recovery will happen only when the private sector begins hiring in earnest.. .That’s why Democrats must create a strong foundation for long-term growth by addressing health care, energy and education reform.
–
By addressing health care, energy and education reform? Strong foundation?
The problem won’t be solved by addressing reform, and a strong foundation, it will be solved by a jobs creation bill. Do it.
The US is bleeding jobs because it is national policy to do so in order to enhance corporate profits. Until that fact is recognized, and turned around, and there is material aid to the housing sector, the current trend downwards in unemployment will not be checked. US workers don’t need or expect Democrats to “create a strong foundation for long-term growth” they need and expect jobs.
Regarding “long term growth” Plouffe should harken to his own words in the Op-Ed: “Voters are always smarter than they are given credit for.” Just ask Martha Coakley.
David Plouffe, WaPo:
Make sure voters understand what the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act did for the economy. Democratic candidates should lift up the police officers, teachers and construction workers in their state or district, those who are protecting our communities, teaching our children and repairing our roads thanks to the Democrats’ leadership. Highlight the small-business owners who have kept their doors open through projects funded by the act.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/01/22/AR2010012204216_pf.html
Good luck on that–
Bureau of Labor Statistics Report:
IN 2009 JOBLESS RATES INCREASED IN ALL FIFTY STATES AND DC
Over the year [2009], jobless rates increased in all 50 states and the District of Columbia. The national unemployment rate was unchanged in December at 10.0 percent but was 2.6 percentage points higher than a year earlier.
Among the nine geographic divisions, the Pacific continued to report the highest jobless rate, 11.7 percent in December. The East North Central recorded the next highest rate, 11.3 percent.
Michigan again recorded the highest unemployment rate among the states, 14.6 percent in December. The states with the next highest rates were Nevada, 13.0 percent; Rhode Island, 12.9 percent; South Carolina, 12.6 percent and California 12.4 percent. The rate in South Carolina set a new series high, as did the rates in three other states: Delaware (9.0 percent), Florida (11.8 percent), and North Carolina (11.2 percent).
All states and the District of Columbia recorded statistically significant increases in their jobless rates from December 2008. The largest of these increases were in Nevada and West Virginia (+4.6 percentage points each), closely followed by Alabama (+4.5 points) and Michigan (+4.4 points). Over the year, 44 states experienced statistically significant changes in employment, all of which were decreases. The largest statistically significant job losses occurred in California (-579,400), Texas (-276,000), Illinois (-237,300), Florida (-232,400), and Michigan (-207,100).
http://www.bls.gov/news.release/laus.nr0.htm
David Plouffe, WaPo:
“Don’t accept any lectures on spending.”
This is not a lecture: The deficit tripled from fiscal year 2008 ($455 billion ) to 2009 ($1.4 trillion).
Frank Rich:
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/24/opinion/24Rich.html?
Obama has blundered, not by positioning himself too far to the left but by landing nowhere — frittering away his political capital by being too vague, too slow and too deferential to Congress. The smartest thing said as the Massachusetts returns came in Tuesday night was by Howard Fineman on MSNBC: “Obama took all his winnings and turned them over to Max Baucus.”
snip
It’s too late to rewrite that history, but it may not be too late for White House decisiveness. Whatever happens now — good, bad or ugly — must happen fast. Each day Washington spends dickering over health care is another day lost while the election-year economy, stupid, remains intractable for Americans who are suffering.
Obama needs more independent economists like Paul Volcker, who was hastily retrieved from exile last week after the Massachusetts massacre prompted the White House to tardily embrace his strictures on big banks. Obama also needs economic spokesmen who are not economists and who can authentically speak to life on the ground.
snip
When it comes to economic substance, small symbolic gestures (the proposed new bank “fee”) won’t cut it. Nor will ineffectual presidential sound bites railing against Wall Street bonuses beyond the federal government’s purview. There’s no chance of a second stimulus. The White House will have to jawbone banks on foreclosures, credit card racketeering and the loosening of credit to small businesses. This means taking on bankers who were among the Obama campaign’s biggest backers and whose lobbyists have castrated regulatory reform by buying off congressmen of both parties. It means pressing for all constitutional remedies that might counter last week’s 5-to-4 Supreme Court decision allowing corporate campaign contributions to buy off even more.
snip
Last year the president pointedly studied J.F.K.’s decision-making process on Vietnam while seeking the way forward in Afghanistan. In the end, he didn’t emulate his predecessor and escalated the war. We’ll see how that turns out. Meanwhile, Obama might look at another pivotal moment in the Kennedy presidency — and this time heed the example.
The incident unfolded in April 1962 — some 15 months into the new president’s term — when J.F.K. was infuriated by the U.S. Steel chairman’s decision to break a White House-brokered labor-management contract agreement and raise the price of steel (but not wages). Kennedy was no radical. He hailed from the American elite — like Obama, a product of Harvard, but, unlike Obama, the patrician scion of a wealthy family. And yet he, like that other Harvard patrician, F.D.R., had no hang-ups about battling his own class.
Kennedy didn’t settle for the generic populist rhetoric of Obama’s latest threats to “fight” unspecified bankers some indeterminate day. He instead took the strong action of dressing down U.S. Steel by name. As Richard Reeves writes in his book “President Kennedy,” reporters were left “literally gasping.” The young president called out big steel for threatening “economic recovery and stability” while Americans risked their lives in Southeast Asia. J.F.K. threatened to sic his brother’s Justice Department on corporate records and then held firm as his opponents likened his flex of muscle to the power grabs of Hitler and Mussolini. (Sound familiar?) U.S. Steel capitulated in two days. The Times soon reported on its front page that Kennedy was at “a high point in popular support.”
Can anyone picture Obama exerting such take-no-prisoners leadership to challenge those who threaten our own economic recovery and stability at a time of deep recession and war? That we can’t is a powerful indicator of why what happened in Massachusetts will not stay in Massachusetts if this White House fails to reboot.
Looks like Franck Rich has been reading Taylor Marsh.
I hope Obama and Rahm read Frank Rich too.
Does anyone know Taylor’s actual email address?. I want to send her a word document and I don’t know how to do it through her contact button.
President Obama needs to be as strong in other areas as he has been on SCOTUS, while staying strong on SCOTUS.
Hugh Hewitt on the SCOTUS ruling:
The question on every board room table is whether that company owes it to its shareholders, investors and employees to use its full abilities to elect good candidates and defeat bad ones. . . .Ask your General Counsel to run down your options, which are now truly unlimited. You can, if you want to –and I hope you do want to– spend $10 million in an independent expenditure campaign to defeat Barbara Boxer. (If you are a coal company, why wouldn’t you? And with an open declaration of why and how you intend to go about it.)
http://www.hughhewitt.com/blog/
Yeah, well, can Obama reboot? I think he thinks rebooting means going out and giving a speech about fighting for you. I’m sorry but Rich is right. No one believes he’s going to do it. Frankly, no one believes a word he says.
Lake Lady says:
23 January 2010 at 8:25 pm
——————-
After looking at the source code on this website, I noticed an e-mail address for taylor@taylormarsh.com (used for PayPal donations) and most likely the e-mail for website correspondence as well.
I apologize if I’m giving away secrets, but it took me all of 30 seconds to locate.
It’s been pretty heavy today.
How about we lighten up a bit?
Before you lay your heads onto
Those warm electric pillows.
This is Mr. Picky Quizmaster
With a question for Democrats,
Only Democrats.
Up-thread t4h quoted an ex-Dem president
Harry S. Truman
I’ve copied the name just as he wrote it
But there’s a mistake in it
What is the mistake in Truman’s name?
No period after the S
You got it.
Good for you.
Truman had no middle name.
So the period is inappropriate.
LL,
What Sandmann did is to hit Ctrl/u and scroll down to the paypal line
of code.
djjl says:
23 January 2010 at 6:31 pm
Frank Rich is right on this one.
Yep, ’bout time Rich was right on Obama.
Wonder how Tweety’s tingle is going?
Also, Bob Herbert is right, too, IMO. http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/23/opinion/23herbert.html?ref=opinion
djjl says:
23 January 2010 at 11:08 pm
I know. Tweety’s tingle will always be there, I have a feeling.
Thanks lynette. It’s a bleak couple of weeks for Obama – and for us citizens.
And they can’t blame on anyone named Clinton.
Should I have tingle envy?
Nope – I think he should be embarrassed to ever uttered that stupid line.
bernie sanders speaks out on how obama is failing and what we should do.
http://www.thenation.com/doc/20100201/sanders/print
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/arianna-huffington/obama-one-year-later-the_b_343209.html
Take a look at Arriana:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/arianna-huffington/obama-one-year-later-the_b_343209.html
How could a president whose North Star as a candidate was that he “would not forget the middle class” choose as his chief economic advisor a man who recently argued against extending unemployment benefits in the middle of the worst economic times since the Great Depression?
I’m referring, of course, to Larry Summers. According to a White House official I spoke with — later confirmed by sources in the White House and on the Hill — Summers was against the extension. And it took a lot of Congressional pushing back behind the scenes for the president to overrule him.
And, according to another senior White House official, when foreclosures or job numbers come up at the regular White House morning meeting, Summers’ response is that nothing can be done. Nothing can be done about skyrocketing foreclosures or lost jobs.
Nothing can be done — pretty much the opposite of “Yes we can,” isn’t it?
According to Plouffe, “reform is in Obama’s DNA.” Then how do you have in your inner circle a man who has “nothing can be done” in his DNA? Unless, of course, the problem on the table has to do with Wall Street, in which case “everything can be done, has been done, and will be done.”
snip
“I feel such an obligation to them,” Obama told Plouffe during the campaign. “They believe in me. In us. In themselves. What keeps me going day after day? Besides a clear sense of why I am running for president, it’s them, our volunteers. It is a special thing we’ve built here and I don’t want to let them down.”
I asked Plouffe if the president had read the book. “He read a couple of sections in it,” he replied, “and even discovered a couple of things he didn’t know.”
Well, if the president wants to make sure he doesn’t let down the millions who believed he really would change the rotten system, he should read the The Audacity to Win from beginning to end — and rediscover a whole host of things he knows, but seems to have forgotten.
Then he can complete the journey from The Audacity of Hope and The Audacity To Win to The Audacity to Govern.
Senator Sanders is better than most, but that’s not saying much.
“let Obama be Obama. Bring back one of the great inspirational leaders of our time [Obama]”
Sanders doesn’t have a clue about what leadership is. He confuses speechifying with leadership. Big difference.
“It [HCR] is a bill that can be successfully defended in a campaign”
I don’t think so.
“we must continue the effort, which Democrats have already pushed, to strengthen the safety net.”
He voted for the make-bankruptcy-harder bill (up-thread).
“replace chairman Ben Bernanke, a major economic adviser in the Bush administration, with a progressive economist who understands that one of the Fed’s core missions is full employment.”
That’s good — see Dean Baker’s take on my new diary.
“Pass a major bill that creates millions of new jobs”
That’s good.
“Democrats must be prepared to take quick and decisive action against Wall Street and other Big Money interests”
Good — but with Obama? (see Bernanke).
“Enact Senate reform.”
Sure — dump Reid, or let the Nevada voters do it ( It’ll take a bit longer).
texan4hillary says:
23 January 2010 at 11:33 pm
Bernie is right, too. How come we all can see it but the White House can’t??
Arianna, you can’t make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear.
The answer for Arianna is – he never was what he SOLD. Arianna is just dismayed because she too drank to Kool-Aid.
Thanks Sandman! Lots of nightowls around last night. djjl..you having sleeping problems?
Yes – last night I surely did.