Yesterday, TPM Live Wire had a post titled “Dem Lawmakers Begin Backing Away From Health Care Reform“. I thought the title was a clear over-reach, since the post only referred to one single Democrat, and that too a no-name member of the House, Stephanie Herseth Sandlin of South Dakota.
But we have [...]
Evan Bayh edition:
Even before the votes are counted, Senator Evan Bayh is warning fellow Democrats that ignoring the lessons of the Massachusetts Senate race will “lead to even further catastrophe” for their party.
“There’s going to be a tendency on the part of our people to be in denial about all this,” Bayh told ABC News, [...]
People of a certain age will remember Playboy’s longtime PR catch phrase “What Sort of Man Reads Playboy?”
Well, what sort of man does the Republican Party welcome into its fold these days?
Looking at the newly-former Democratic Representative from Alabama, Parker Griffith, one would have to say:
A man who doesn’t care two hoots about terrorism, and [...]
Funny how once Ben Nelson realized he was becoming a Pivotal Senate Vote, he started to find insurmountable objections to abortion language that he had earlier indicated he was willing to live with.
Here’s Nelson, back on November 17:
Sen. Ben Nelson, D-Neb., who last week insisted that the Senate health care bill include tight restrictions passed [...]
It strikes me that what we are witnessing is Democrats’ version of the iconic I-am-Spartacus moment from the 1960 film.
One by one, Democratic senators are standing up to say: “I am the one who is prepared to kill healthcare reform if my idiosyncratic demands are not met.”
Sadly, this is the only type of I-am-Spartacus moment [...]
No one in the Democratic party has any right to say that they are surprised by the garbage that Joe Lieberman is pulling. A lot of people are bandying around the word “betrayal”. But betrayal is a word you can use only when you have some reason to be surprised by the action [...]
Now that Joe Lieberman seems to have finished having his way with the healthcare reform bill, the natural question is: who goes next?
If the rumors circulating last night are true, and Medicare expansion has indeed been pulled from the bill to mollify Lieberman, there are now 59 votes for cloture. So now Harry Reid [...]
The right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.
Can there be any doubt that if these rights were not already enshrined in our body politic, if they were being proposed for the first time by President Obama, there is no way that the Republicans (and Joe Lieberman, in all probability) would allow them to [...]
On the whole, I think I approve of this speed-dating version of legislative negotiation. The Gang of Ten negotiations beat the misconceived pointlessness of Max Baucus’s months-long committee negotiations hands down.
Here’s the early report (all rumors, really, since lips are officially sealed). The public option has not been euthanized, it has been [...]
Economy + War = More Trouble For Dems In 2010?:
“You have a Democratic president and Democratic majorities in Congress, and they delivered double-digit unemployment and an unpopular escalation?” this Dem said. “People might wonder what we need Democrats for.”
I have been making this case here for five years.
