GOD I HOPE YOU ARE WRONG OLEEB

Me too dickday. Me too.

Yeah but Miguel, what about the shareholders who get close to fifty percent of the profits after management pays itself?

There are broader economic issues here.

This way management is assured of providing all the health care it needs.

Better yet... "stand up for what WE believe and fight for it."

Great post, Oleeb. The part I find most frustrating is your (2) "Call all the parties to the table." This sounds good to people - even-handed, inclusive, consensus-minded, all that lovely stuff. I don't mind if they're AT the table, I just don't want them to have a VETO. Or even - since they come in packs - even with a VOTE.

I've watched these "Roundtable" approaches rise for 20 years now, and I can't participate anymore. These guys are skilled now, and they know how to play this game to a halt. One of the great failures of the Blair Gov't in Britain was their insistence on these sorts of mechanisms. The Gov't would set a goal (often a very good one); invite the positive proponents; but then invite all the industry groups who stood in direct conflict with the goal. It was like having the Coal Association at the Solar table.

As the man says, The balance sheet is breaking up the sky.

Why indeed invite the coal industry to a roundtable on solar? I'd like to see a poll taken of health economists, (ones not employed by special interests: Heritage Foundation et al), and see what the results are rather than taking a poll of all those special interests with a few independent experts thrown in to add an air of legitimacy to the debate.

Since I think single payer is a bad idea for policy reasons (which I daresay I'll get around to on my own blog eventually but isn't really appropriate here), which puts me on the outside looking in on this one, I suppose I'll just suggest that with a whole spectrum of political outlooks in the Congress it's probably possible that individual Congressmen come to their own conclusions for their own reasons (or because Kaiser has a lot of jobs in their district) and that in either case, they're doing their jobs, not selling out.

Or, that is, not selling out to anyone but their own constituents, who they're supposed to be sold out to.

CT. For me, it has absolutely nothing to do with "validating one's own beliefs." Making change & the path of the fight - I get that. I know how to do it. In fact, I immerse myself in material from dozens of perspectives before I dive full-time into a push for change. And even add a bit of thinking of my own. And when I do so, it's quite easy to get information on the industry's positions - as they've invested enormous amounts in putting it out there. Through marketing, conferences & lobbying, they are quite able to outspend the average citizen.

In a situation of such patent inequality amongst the players, why aren't you critiquing THAT? And why aren't you critiquing the fact that most of these paid representatives are there NOT with open minds, looking clearly & objectively at change, or the greater good, but are mostly there to deliver the same (self-interested) points? Instead, you're critiquing the citizens?

And yes, I DO attend meetings with them. But I pick which ones. And yes, I even take notes, though they usually contain nothing more than notes on how the paid reps are repositioning & spinning, who they're working on, how confident they look, etc. - simply because they're NOT (in 99% of cases) adding anything new. And certainly not proposing things like Single Payer or Coal Closure etc.

Until we start holding members of Congress accountable at every election (most especially primary elections) then it really doesn't matter if this blog is a fantasy or represents actual reality.

We (the American voter) abdicated our responsibility a long time ago with the "liberal" grassroots remaining fractured and tactical rather than cohesive and strategic. Until we have a few election cycles where the results equal the displeasure, this issue will not be solved in one fell swoop.

It's not selling out. It's not some conspiracy. It's a lack of focus, a lack of priorities and a lack of intelligent leadership at all levels in the debate, not just at the top.

Totally here what you are saying, but the same could have been said of Obama's candidacy (or Dean's) but they were able to generate grassroots interest despite bigger budget arrayed against them.

I think now is the perfect time for us to use viral communications to by-pass the traditional power structures. Baring that, we need an effort to start weeding out the degenerates from our Congress each and every election. Unless we fix the foundational issue (lack of voter participation to force accountability on Congress) I am afraid that any solution we come up with will be held hostage by time and the notoriously short memories of the average American voter.

Otherwise, we could very easily be right back in this same spot, fighting to win the same battle once again. Or trying to simply keep the ground we gained rather than moving on to conquer new challenges.

First, quinn, this isn't about you... however as usual, your first move is to make it so. The post was directed to TheraP's comment. Of course, your being in Canada means you aren't going to these meeting anyway -- this is a US matter, so I have no idea what you are talking about.

Second, if reps show up to these small meetings, I think it's fantastic. What better way to sharpen one's skills and access them in a small, nonthreatening environment? If however, a person is of the mind where the last opinion they hear is the one they hold, they have no business expressing their opinion to begin with.

If you want to go into a room full of like-minded people to "debate", all you will get is Kumbaya. That might make you feel good, but it doesn't accomplish anything. People have fought and died for making the world a better place. If you are intimidated by voicing an opinion in a room merely due to the presence of the "opposition", I have no sympathy.

What TheraP has described is an opportunity, not a calamity, especially since it's just a discussion. What better way to strengthen your arguments for when you write to your elected representatives?

Those two campaigns you mention had leadership and a goal. The problem in the battle for health care (and a significant point in the post) is that the Democrats have abdicated the goal or even discussing leading us in the direction that just about every honest observer knows we ought to go. If they will only lead when it is easy and bipartisan and they abdicate in every instance where they should be fighting for what is right then we'll never see progress, let alone significant change.

It is the abdication of leadership, whether on healthcare, domestic spying, torture, illegal wars, corruption throughout the executive departments, on just about every major issue for years now that has been the hallmark of failure for the DC Democrats. It is why they have failed for years to pass anything that would amount to signficant legislation designed to point the country in a new and better direction. It isn't a conspiracy, it is a way of life and of operating that keeps DC Dems in office and in the consulting business but doesn't yield any significant benefit for the people. They like to console themselves by winning re-election anyway when people buy their BS excuses. Once reelected they say to themselves: "It's okay, I don't have to actually get anything done. All I have to do is make it looked like I tried and they'll be satisfied."

The people as an aggregate cannot lead spontaneously on their own for more than a moment even if the blogosphere were whipping them up. It's not the sort of thing that can be sustained from disperate centers of influence except in the most extraordinary of circumstances. The people as a whole require strong, resolute, identifiable leadership to move coherently on anything. One can hardly call the leadership of the Democrat Party on healthcare or just about anything else strong or resolute. But you can identify the leaders of the appeasement first crowd: Harry Reid (and Tom Daschle before him), Nancy Pelosi, Rahm Emanuel, Steny Hoyer.

Take the popular opposition to the idiotic Wall Street Bailout. It wasn't even close. The people knew from the very start it was a stick up and immediately opposed it in huge number. But the vast masses were unable to mobilize despite giant majorities who understood that the $750 Billion heist was a bad idea. Only the lunatic right wingers, the most marginalized of persons in Congress at the moment, even attempted to oppose it. Few others had the courage to voice any opposition to it. Most Congressional Democrats were instantly cowed into supporting whatever came down the pike. It was very reminiscent to the Patriot Act foolishness. So without any credible leadership the will of the people was totally and quickly ignored by Democrats who took comfort in being part of the herd that stampeded right over the cliff in the biggest, most outrageous boondoggle in history ever put into one legislative proposal.

When our alleged political leaders nearly always abdicate, it is practically impossible for the masses to organize themselves effectively. It is all the worse when the alleged leaders of the people announce in advance that they will not even make any attempt pursue the goal the people want or need them to pursue which is also the one they said they were for at campaign time, e.g. "health care for all" but what they end up supporting is some pitiful means of finding ways to subsidize the insurance industry so more people have minimal coverage but the major problem--the rapacious insurance interests--are assuaged.

This kind of appeasement policy costs us more today, only complicates and makes reaching the obvious goal of national health care more difficult and expensive to reach in the long run, and it provides even more ammunition for the Republicans down the line to roll out their standard argument about how the government involvement they themselves supported actually made things worse, therefore, we cannot possibly consider moving toward the option that would have worked had we just tried it the first time since doing it wrong didn't work before, doing it the right way now would be even worse. But it didn't happen in this hypothetical first time because our Democratic leaders abdicated and didn't even attempt to implement national health insurance as they should have. In fact, they wouldn't even discuss it. Thus, the original appeasement move haunts us forever as it places the forces of reaction and the insurance interests in a position of permanent strategic advantage and the people at permanent disadvantage as though all their money and influence weren't enough of an imbalance to begin with.

This pathological dynamic in the health care area also exists on most major issues facing the nation and thus the DC Dems blow it over and over and over. You can take a look at most major issues and see the very same pathology defeating progress again and again over the years. It simply does not work! It actually undermines our ability to reach the goal!

As an example, what took the wind out of the sails of opposition to Bush's numerous crimes and snuffed out the building anti-Bush sentiment in Congress and the nation after the last midterm elections? It was Pelosi announcing at the outset that "impeachment is off the table." What a dumbass move! Even if you don't intend to impeach, why take the one genuine threat you have off the table prior to any engagement? Why discourage the opposition from "doing" anything substantive? What the hell is the benefit in that? It's a recipe for defeat and disappointment.

The use of this very same strategy on a host of issues is what allowed a minority of Republicans to cow the majority Democrats over and over again in the past Congress making them incredibly unproductive and unpopular to boot! The Republicans spent the whole Congress bitch-slapping the Dems for trying to get along, branded them as do nothing pussies and presto chango that is how the public perceives them! What a surprise! Seems no amount of humiliation is too great for the Congressional D's to submit themselves to.

Democrats seem to find no end to the uses for this strategic recipe for appeasement and failure. It needs to come to an end. If it doesn't, no change will occur, let alone the change we've been seeking.

I'd be wary of any proposal labeled "reform" because that can mean anything even gutting medicare and medicaid. Remember when they "reformed" welfare, they only removed the word "poverty" from every centrist's dictionary.

Exactly right. We need to have a national strategic vision with a local tactical focus. We also need to turn out and be passionate about every single election. Primaries are crucial and we treat them as throw-away. There is still a lot of work left to do on fronts that start much closer to home than 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.

Thanks for saying it, so I didn't have to, ct.

Oleeb, we agree on the scope of the issues as well as more than a few policy proposals to address those issues. You are correct in all of your very detailed analysis of Congressional failings and the consequences thereof.

What I think you miss is the prime motivator in all that corruption and inertia - voters who refuse to hold their representatives accountable.

Unless progressives, which I consider both of us to be given where we would see the country go in the future, can find a way to both motivate and educate the American voter, we will never see the change in leadership we need in Congress to allow someone like Obama to get some truly phenomenal things done.

Absent movement on the part of voters, however, Barack is left navigating the system we allowed to evolve over the last 230 years.

I am impressed by his ability to move the ball forward in that environment and to chart a course that will take us the direction we want to go. I am pleased by the strategic choices he has made and can see the fruits of that pragmatism growing over time. It may not be as quickly as we think we should get there and is also a course less direct than we would like, but it is required because he doesn't have a true mandate until Congress feels the fear that can only be generated by their constituents.

We won't see that happen until the 2010 primaries at the earliest.

I think we should get the weasels to do special software for translation for CT. Or maybe they're flummoxed too!

Weasels, I salute you!

There are no machines anymore. Candidate centered politics has been the order of the day for decades now. You are wanting something that doesn't occur: action from the people without leadership. Unless and until their is identifiable, strong leadership nothing like what you suggest can or will occur. I agree that it should happen but it won't happen from the grassroots up spontaneously. Somebody is going to have to grow a pair and lead.

Howard Dean stood up and would have been our leader had they not sbotaged him. I still feel certain that Dean would have destroyed Bush at the polls in 2004. But that was the last thing the DC Democrats wanted. When he said he represented the Democratic wing of the Democratic Party the reaction amongst DC Dems was like the look on a vampire's face at dawn in the middle of an open field. Fear. Panic. Hate.

The center and conservative wings of the Democratic Party fear people like Howard Dean far more than they fear any Republican I can assure you. And if there's any group more afraid of a Dean-like leader than the centrist and conservative Dems it is the Republicans. Such a leader would spell the end of this idiotic game where the Republicans run the show no matter who is in the majority. That is why Dean was crucified and that is why they hate him to this day and resented every success he scored as chairman. I wish Leahy would retire so he could run for the Senate in Vermont. He and Sanders would be an awesome tag team!

Obama claimed to be such a leader on the campaign trail but it seems pretty clear to me that was all marketing and not intended to ever become a reality. The whole "movement" stuff was a means to propel his campaign mechanism, not to generate real change.

And, er....

Also.

(buttseks!!!!!)

Ack, ack, ack. I caught you again Bwak.

Tsk, Tsk, Tsk. What happened to all those years in finishing school?

Dean came in third in Iowa as a result of a concerted effort on the part of the media and DC pols to scuttle his juggernaut of a campaign and throw the election to Kerry. Remember, the lead up to Iowa was a panic from the establishment about Dean. He had the Democrats on fire and then the drumbeat against him began. "He can't win." "He's too angry" "He's too liberal" and so it went for a pretty intense three months prior to Iowa. The centrists and corporate interests rallied to Kerry because he was the one who could win remember? He couln't be attacked because he was a war hero and Dean was skiing instead of being in the military during Vietnam. That's why Dean came in third in Iowa. It wasn't an accident or lots of horrible mistakes by Dean's campaign. It was an ambush and it worked. They took him down.

Any machines that still operate are based on personality and not anything resembling a political organization called a machine. Once a particular candidate is no longer on the scene any organization that was there previously disappears too. There are established interests and people with inordinate influence and they are mostly business people and the toadying pols who service their needs and call themselves centrists or belong to the DLC.

The point about leadership is that without it, the people cannot sustain spontaneous movement in a particular direction or initiative. Leaders do emerge to do this. Obama could be that kind of leader, but as I read on the home page of TPM that he's dining this evening with George Will, Bill Kristol and David Brooks I think we can pretty well forget about progressive leadership from our new President. It's corporate centrism all the way with the same folks who brought us the mortgage crisis, Iraq, and the exporting of good jobs in full command. Oy!

Oh, almost forgot... the reason centrists and establishment DC Dems fear a guy like Dean more than the Republicans is because he would exclude them if he got to power and would instead put liberals in key positions of influence. The Republicans wouldn't depose them from their positions of influence in the Democratic establishment.

The Republicans also fear such a person because they know he won't play the game where they call all the shots and the Democrats dance to their tune even when the Dems hold all the real power.

You're on a roll oleeb. Your premise makes perfect sense to me. It is also necessary that we keep this conversation going publicly if we stand any chance of getting the change we need. Where would we have been in the space/technological boom of the 60s and 70s had JFK not decided we were going to put a man on the moon? There was little popular support for such a massive investment prior to his decision to pursue it. Likewise with LBJ and the 'Great Society'. With the corporate interests working against us, it's almost a sure thing that by the time such change is instituted, it is or will be too late by the time a full blown popular movement is born. JEM and CT have a point though, and without a concerted grassroots movement, however small, we stand little chance of instituting the changes we need. It's time our progressive leaders grow some, and not just BHO.

PS: the popular support for the space program -- in terms of spending dollars -- ran out pretty quickly. Go read THE RIGHT STUFF by Tom Wolfe and note how Apollo 13, no one even cared about a live broadcast to the moon.

NASA's funding peaked in 1965... and it was hard to get it to grow that long.

Sure people enjoyed a single moon landing -- but for enduring interest? Forget it. Why do you think they nixed the last 3 scheduled lunar landings? No public support.

DUDE! Much of the space program (like the boosters) was ripped off wholesale from the DoD and the Air Force's efforts. These rockets existed before the space program.

True, the Saturn rockets did not. They were the only ones however. And by the way, we couldn't rebuild one of those now if we tried. That's because Apollo was more of an engineering feat than anything else. That's why the technology is "lost" -- it's not generally purposeful. The development of the integrated circuit and the microprocessor during that time -- which were not done for NASA -- is a more significant tech development. The government actually took leadership there, but you need to learn more about how industry and the government work together. I suggest you check out Noam Chomsky.

Dude: show a little humbleness if the level of your understanding is based on a few Discovery and History Channel programs.

Dude: go stick your snout in the book I showed you... You will enjoy it and learn something.

Dude: Ike didn't want to pull a stunt mission because he knew that it would eventually deflate under it's own weight -- which turned out to exactly be the case.

Dude: so sorry to shatter your myths, but you are in over your trotters on this one.

The "leaders" abdicate because it is a truism that no decision is better than the wrong one.

Hmmm - unless you count the leaders that actually got a second term when they made all the wrong decisions instead of no decisions.

It happened here in the US just recently.

Brilliant and makes steam come out of my ears. So we should use this as a template for pushing back, starting now. We need the 350 billion in TARP for health care. End of discussion. Implement Medicare for All tomorrow.

Exactly. I am beating the drum here in Montana because Baucus has decided to be a leader in Health care. We elected him. So we should have some say. He doesn't listen very well, but if it's overwhelming, it could help. Jon Tester does listen to the phone calls jamming his offices as in the recent bailout vote. He voted against it. His staffer told me that the phones never stopped ringing.

Thanks to all of you for taking the time to read the post and for your comments!

I think there's been plenty of foreshadowing about what's going to go down. I hope I'm wrong but I doubt it.

It's DLC all the way and then some. Hanging out with Will, Kristol, and Brooks? Fashioning the stimulus to appease Republicans instead of invigorate our moribund economy? A health care proposal that is essentially a massive subsidy program for propping up the insurance interests? No investigations let alone prosecutions of the Bush regime's multiple, obvious, blatant and very serious criminal acts? What about any of this gives us hope for real change? All I see are signs pointing toward a minor tweaking of the status quo, pro-corporate, centrist policies that are unlikely to meet the challenges we face in adequate fashion. Maybe all these signs are wrong and don't mean what they appear to mean, but usually they do.

Once again, we stand facing each other stroking, stroking, stroking... And as I said above, I’m not really interested in conducting the circle jerk your comments so often lead to. I'm truly sorry I upset you so by calling you 'Dude". I know you're still reacting to being labeled 'daft' as well. Your continuance in maintaining, that I built my argument upon my throw away statement that there was a technological boom in the 60s/70s betrays your obtuseness. It does nothing to wipe the grime from the lens through which your 'clear' thoughts evaluate the world around you. I can only repeat, and hope some of this gets through. Other than that, I can only suggest, as you did so often on a recent thread, that you review my previous comment, and perhaps visit a power plant. Cheers!