remind me why I can't afford to have Obama lose.

Perhaps six months ago there was a typically bad tempered exchange here not directly about Obamacare but about the reviewer in the Nation who discussed Paul Starr's Remedy and Reaction

with the sub heading

The peculiar American Struggle over health care reform.

I threatened at the time that I would read it and give you the benefit  of my reaction and in response to a complete ,and understandable, absence of encouragement here it is

The stuff about which we have had passionate arguments here and prompted promises  from some of us to abstain from voting or even to vote for the Romster starts at around page 194. If you borrow it from one of the not yet closed public libraries, go there.

One of the counts against Obama was that he didn't impose his plan on Congress.Perhaps influenced by the claims of Brad Delong and other refugees from Hilarycare that she fatally cut into her potential support by insisting on doing it her way.

As if he had a choice . As Starr ,page 201, reminds us there were only 58 democratic senators in Jan 2009 and one of the two independents was Joe Lieberman who had endorsed McCain..Al Franken was seated on July30th but by then Ted Kennedy was dying and unable to participate. The dems had wisely passed a budget resolution however giving them the option of using "reconciliation" to enact a health care bill.

While he was still active however Kennedy used his coalition building skills to enlist Republican involvement.

Separately the White House was cutting deals with enough players in the Health Care industry to provide some protection against another round of "Harry and Louise"

to be continued