Chuck Todd this morning: the President is still out promoting the "idea" of reform

[Phoebe Loosinhouse]

which is pretty pointless. I and others have made this same point before.

The "idea" of reform was accepted with the election. The sales job of that part of it was over Jan 20th. President Obama COULD have sent his healthcare bill (that he campaigned on and which is STILL superior to anything on the table) to Congress as a blueprint, a roadmap, call it what you want. He would have gained a lot of time and shown a lot of leadership. But he didn't. Oh, well.

So now, months into this process, we get roadshows promoting . . . nothing. The President is doing Town Halls with no bill to present and making himself and the entire Democratic Party look positively feckless. Here is my message for the all the "brilliant" political minds running this fiasco

IF YOU'RE GOING TO PROMOTE SOMETHING, HAVE SOMETHING TO PROMOTE

Our opponents rally and shoot down anything and everything and make up shit (senior euthanasia?!!) because we have handed them the perfect opportunity to do exactly this.

To salvage this miserable situation and re-convince the American public that they are CAPABLE of doing the job of legislating, I believe more than ever, that they should stay in session and GET IT DONE! At least stay in session until they HAVE a bill, for God's sake! Give the President and the people something concrete to discuss and debate over the break, not the "idea" of reform.

[Hubert Flottz]

1. I believe that Chuck Todd is as far right as Pat PukeCannon

Or Mourning Joe.

[babylonsister]

2. Chuck Todd is pointless,but the President sucks.

I hear you loud and clear. :eyes:

Short of someone who's liberal buying and supporting corporate media, what do you suggest?

How would you herd this bunch?

[Phoebe Loosinhouse]

3. Our circus has no ringmaster

I think that's what it comes down to although Pelosi seems to be a lot more effective than Harry Reid.

I didn't say the President sucks, but I think he's missed some opportunites and been given some really bad advice in how to proceed with one of the biggest, most important mandates ever given to a modern President. He had/has the opportunity to become an incredibly transformative President, and I hate to see him flushing a once in a generation opportunity for both him and us down the drain.

I don't understand your second sentence.

[babylonsister]

4. What miraculous thing should Obama do to get the

competing interests together. How can he tame the rethugs who are totally invested in defeating health care reform and Obama? What should he do about all those Dems who seem to have their own financial interests at heart?

If he had come out and declared what he wants, period., don't you think he'd have gotten some push back for that? He's already said he's a fan of a public plan, and it doesn't seem a whole lot of people are listening.

You tell me. How should this have been handled so that it would work? And p.s., nothing is set in concrete yet, so the endless complaints I hear from certain people get tiresome.

[Phoebe Loosinhouse]

8. As far as pushback for his own plan

When I have asked before why President Obama did not promote his own plan (link at bottom of this post) I have always been told that he did not want to repeat the mistakes of Hillary who apparently DID present her plan to Congress.

The 2 situations are very different - Hillary was not elected President(or anything else for that matter). She was appointed by her husband, had no mandate, and had a "secretive" process that alienated many. President Obama was elected with a significant majority in large part with the stated goal of healthcare reform and he ran with a very specific plan of his own. The situation couldn't have been more different, but President Obama bought into the finger waggers who told him not to be another Hillary, in other words, pull back from the discussions and let the Congress make their own sausage.

I think, my opinion only, that President Obama could have said, "Go craft a bill BUT: it must it must include a public option, it must cover all Americans, it must be deficit neutral, and it must forbid immediately the worst practices of the insurance industry like rescission and prior condition exclusions. It also must allow the possibility of states or regions creating a single payer system on their own if they choose to in the future." He probably would have lost most or all of the Repubs from the getgo. He will anyway no matter what bill comes out. But at least he would have had a package and some firm points to act as the lynchpins for reform.

I don't see why he couldn't make the same statements this afternoon or tomorrow. I think he and we would be a lot better off. At least we could be discussing and debating some finite points and not be watching the Blue Dogs and The Repubs hack all of the real reform out of the bills.

http://www.barackobama.com/pdf/issues/HealthCareFullPlan.pdf

[babylonsister]

11. And I think he stayed out of the fray for a reason. He, at least to me,

didn't want to influence what Congress would come up with, as long as it was better than the status quo. Maybe he should have, maybe he will. At this point, I hope he does. I read this little gem yesterday which I found interesting. The whole article is.


http://voices.washingtonpost.com/ezra-klein/2009/07/the_195_years_test.html#more

snip//

But it's also worth offering a more general reality check here: The public option is not now, and has not ever, been the core of the argument for heath-care reform. It is the core of the fight in Washington, D.C. It is an important policy experiment. But it was not in Howard Dean or John Kerry or Dick Gephardt's plans, and reformers supported those. It was not in Bill Clinton's proposal, and most lament the death of that. It is not what politicians were using in their speeches five years ago. It is a recent addition to the debate, and a good one. But it is not the reason were are having this debate.

[Phoebe Loosinhouse]

14. I don't know if you realize it, but you are condeming Obama with the faintest of praise

if you think his goal all along was just to get something, anything, as long as it was better than the status quo - what a puny, puny goal!

I had to say that, because you frequently seem to think that I criticize just to undercut the President when I criticize to try to make him become more of the President I had hoped for. I actually think you do more damage by making apologies for him, like you just did.

A public option WAS the core of Obama's plan which I have posted many times. It was the best thing he brought to the discussion. He has publicly advocated for it. Howard Dean has strongly and publicly advocated it just recently with his standwithdrdean website and petition. So now people are trying to pretend, "Public option, oh that was just a passing fancy." (!) It was actually the ONLY THING that did transform this into a discussion about Healthcare reform as opposed to Insurance reform, which seems to be more and more where we're headed.

[babylonsister]

16. Think what you want. All I see you doing,

re: Obama and healthcare reform is criticize. Do you think he's played his final hand yet? I don't. And I'm aware Obama advocated for the public option, as late as yesterday. I wonder how he can get that through the brains of the knuckleheads in Congress.

I'm giving him the benefit of the doubt. I also don't think he's going to settle for something less than a public option, if it's doable.

So how can he sway this conversation with the blue dogs and the recalcitrant Senate Dems? {I'm removing the rethugs from this equation with hopes that Obama really does see the uselessness of bipartisanship.}

[goclark]

21. Agree and Chuckie Cheese is a tool

CC gets on my last nerve.

Always trying to slant the news for his pay check.

[Phoebe Loosinhouse]

23. We'll find out today if his position on Public Option has changed

I certainly hope it hasn't.

Since the Republicans have pretty much revealed the fact that they aren't going along with anything anyway, he could just drop all pretense of bi-partisanship. That ship left the dock a long time ago. He could say of his opponents (pretending that he's only talking about Republicans):

"I get some pretty discouraged letters from people that indicate that they are starting to think that some folks in Congress seem more concerned about campaign contributions than the health of the American public. I don't think that's the case, but we need to bring some real relief to American families and PROVE that is not the case." If Blue Dogs get swept up in that, oh well, that's what they get for acting like Republicans.

Finally, I think at some point some group should do a HUGE market buy of saturation ads of President Obama himself saying what healthcare reform will bring. He has to get himself together at one of these Town Halls to do a blurb that can be shown uncut in about 60 secs of some brief powerful stuff. The Public LOVES President Obama and they will buy what he is selling if they hear it from him

[clear eye]

17. Excellent points. n/t

[global1]

18. I Just Read The Contents Of Your Link And I Believe That BO Has Been Promoting .......

his own plan all along. What is written in your link is his own plan - which does include a public option; it covers all Americans and is affordable and changes the worst practices of insurance companies - such as pre-existing conditions. It calls for competitiveness in the market. He's stuck to that all along. That was what all these committee's in Congress started with.

What am I missing here? It isn't up to him to give Congress a neatly written out bill that they just rubber stamp. He did what he should and that is give them a road map with the items that he wants and we should get in any final outcome by the Congress.

I can't find fault with that. Even in his Town Hall at AARP yesterday - he stuck by those same basic parameters in his vision of a plan. Most Americans embrace that.

[Phoebe Loosinhouse]

24. I know it's his own plan, that's why I posted it.

But President Obama has stepped as far away as possible from any "pride of authorship" from this plan and I think that is part of the problem today. He had a clear viewpoint in the campaign for Presidency that he did not follow through with when we are at the actual moment of reform.

Recall back to the time of the House Parties when people were supposed to be promoting "the plan" only there was no plan. There was something like 4 Guiding Principles or some such muck that were nothing more than bromides like: Healthcare should be affordable, Healthcare should be available to all, etc., etc. That would have been a perfect opportunity for President Obama to make public and promote his own specifics of what constituted good reform. He didn't and a big opportunity was lost in my opinion. This goes back to just bad ground management of his foot soldiers who were putting a cart before the horse in having those parties before they had a plan to promote. Those house parties would be coming in handy right about NOW.


That is why the entire debate has seemed so rudderless with all the competing committees with their rival plans. Look what the Senate Finance Committee has done - they have made a complete hash of the entire project. So, I find it difficult to believe that President Obama guided the debate or that he guided it enough.

I will pin the blame on whoever is supposed to be designing and managing the orverarching frame for all this - Rahm? Axlerod, who knows? But someone who ran a pretty flawless campaign is foundering here in the stretch.

Do I think President can still pull it off? Yes I do. But he has to be passionate and direct about what HE thinks real reform is. He needs to LEAD. The people need and want this desparately and I think the Congress can be pulled kicking and screaming to a better place than we are right this minute.

This is going to define his Presidency anyway, so he might as well doubledown and go for broke.

[global1]

25. I Just Finished Listening To Him At His Town Hall In North Carolina......

I saw somebody that is really passionate about this and very direct. I must say he pulled back just a little - he was just short of saying he wouldn't sign a bill that didn't include a 'public option'. But the inference was just that. I think he used some tact in pulling back on that - but to me it was a shot across the bow to the Blue Dogs and the Repugs.

Now they might take him up on his dare and call his bluff. I don't think they'll mess with him though. He's sounding tough and seems to be getting tougher as this get closer. He certainly is using his bully pulpit to get the word out. I think most people have come to trust him and his message is beginning to resonate.

[Hubert Flottz]

5. Our congressional democrats in Washington were deathly afraid

of Bush and the GOP for eight years and the GOP still has the power to scare the shit out of them. I'm sick of the cowards! They are either cowards, or they are totally owned and controlled by the medical industrial complex.

The democrats have had the best chance they will probably ever have to fix this right and they are too afraid or too greedy to do the people's work...the people's will. The democrats in Washington won so big last November that the GOP is the weakest it's been politically in a generation and the democrats still appear deathly afraid of the GOP.

The democrats in Washington still haven mustered the courage to address the crooked voting system or even to repair the DOJ.

[babylonsister]

7. I have nothing but contempt for a whole lot of Dems. Here we are,

the majority party, and we still can't get squat accomplished to benefit Americans because so many are bought and paid for.

It's very depressing.

[Windy]

12. Bravo!!!!! Exactly right Babylon! nt

[Captain Hilts]

13. The debate has gone out of control and the wrong people - blue cross Dems - are driving it.

Why WHY are we permitting Blue Cross Dogs to run this debate when the election - and ALL surveys - show that the US people want serious reform on this issue.

Senators representing about 5% of the population - the rural, flat part - are letting ignorant perceptions of costs and risks prevent reform.

The president is saying some of the right things, but he's only one voice in the chorus right now. He needs to speak more loudly and more forcefully. And not recant half his words the next day.

[natrat]

6. it's called a bully pulpit

obama could stand up for what is right and use his position and popularity to ....oh never mind the corporate masters would never permit that

[Phoebe Loosinhouse]

9. Some progress on this front according to this post from GDP

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=132x8558551

[clear eye]

10. The euthanasia talking point was handed to the wingnuts on a silver platter

First Congress refuses even to consider the best cost-cutting measures of all - the administrative cost cuts automatically part of any single-payer program. Then they drop the cost savings that would occur if the right to bargain w/ pharmaceutical cos. were added to Medicare pt. D. Then they refuse to bring up the savings Medicare could achieve if a dept. of enforcement against provider fraud were created to stop MDs and others from billing Medicare for procedures not done. Then the President goes on record saying that the savings for his whole program will come from Medicare by denying the elderly "excess procedures" determined by "cost/benefit" analyses and cutting payment rates to MDs (as though there aren't few enough Medicare MDs already), and gives the example of hip replacements (which affect a person's entire quality of life). Along with that, his OMB head starts intense pressure on Congress to turn over the oversight of Medicare (which has always been too popular for elected officials to cut) to a small Executive branch board intentionally made as unaccountable as possible--appointed by the President but not recallable by him/her. The legislation requires Congress to jump through impossible hoops if they want to keep any of the board's recommendations from becoming law (pass a joint resolution in both Houses in 30 days over the Chrismas holiday season). Then the idea of funding a public option w/ a tax on the wealthy quietly disappeared. Now they are dropping whatever savings might have been generated by having a public option at all to compete w/ private plans.

Of course Democrats haven't designed a plan with the intention of denying care to seniors, but the perceived need to pass something, anything, w/o bucking opposition from the health industry, seems to be leading Washington in a troubling direction. A situation is being set up that another REPUBLICAN Administration could easily use to gut Medicare. I'm glad the decision won't be made until after the recess. I think that all our elected officials need to hear our demands, and stop and think what the consequences will be of creating mandated private insurance and a subsidy plan to be funding solely by slashing Medicare. Don't you?

[Laelth]

20. Insightful and informing post. Thanks. n/t

:dem:

-Laelth

[kentuck]

15. I agree that it would be more difficult to criticize specifics..

once a bill is passed. At the present time, the critics are making up all kinds of shit, such as it is going to kill all the seniors, etc.

[clear eye]

19. See my post (#10) just above yours.

As the OPer said, the President needs to put the key points of his original program forcefully back on the table. We well might not like the outcome of anything goes health care "reform".

[kentuck]

22. good points..

Unfortunately, the President cannot write his own law. It has to go thru the Congress. It doesn't matter what the President might want, he needs something from this Congress to sell to the American people. At the present time, he is promoting an "idea".