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It’s all about money. From the military-industrial complex, the Southern strategy, to Willie Horton, to gays in the military, to whitewater, to Monica, to compassionate conservatism, to faux-patriotism, to mushroom clouds, to palling around with terrorists, to rev. wright, to kenyan births, to death panels.

The republican party has shown itself willing to use almost any and every inconsistent argument they can to fill the pockets of big-industry. Heck, supply side economics had the same goal but wrapped in a veneer of intellectual thought. The nihilists are where it’s at at the moment so the republican party has cynically adopted that facade in order to stop any law that has the effect of redistribution of wealth.

it takes a lot of chutzpah to flat out lie like this…
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This year, the liberal insistence on a marginally relevant public option has been a tactical mistake that has enabled the right’s “government takeover” disinformation jihad.
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You parents would be ashamed of you, Klein….

Klein just can’t write anything about the right without taking a swipe at liberals. Limbaugh obviously rules his life as well.

Thank you, Joe. Every time you’ve pointed out the latest assault on rationality from the GOP on the blog, a bunch of us have said, “put it in the print version.” Thank you for doing so. This needs to be the new CW, every bit as much as that the “divided Dems” storyline was from 1980 until now. Hopefully, this kind of article can help jolt the GOP into reform. For whatever reason (the iron law of institutions?), electoral carnage has done nothing.

Keep it up.

Mike Pence, fact based? Really? Prove it.

What is great about calling liberals traitors, because they didn’t support the war in Iraq, while calling Republicans nihilists?

Well said, Joe. Obviously, I don’t agree that the Democrats “enabled” the Republicans by talking about the public option, and the rest of your article backs me up. When a party has sunk a slow as the Republicans have sunk, there is no way to NOT enable them. You can put something as reasonable as end of life counseling in a bill and they will shout “Death panels!” If you put something mildly controversial like the public option in the bill, then that’s pretty much the apocalypse now isn’t it? There is no way to NOT give the GOP an excuse to demagogue, so you may as well just bypass them and put together the most reasonable, effective bill you can. The Democrats however, are afraid to take “Yes!” for an answer.

Yeah, that is the soft bigotry of low expectations Klein has for Republicans, right there. Pence uses numbers to make his arguments, they just happen to be made up:

In the world where grown-ups live, Pence doesn’t know what he’s talking about. The new revenue needed is not in the “$800 billion range,” it’s in the $540 billion range. Pence nearly doubled the figure, just because he felt like it. For that matter, adding $200 billion to a price tag is not “rounding up,” and the notion that the costs will “fall squarely on small businesses” has already been debunked. Digby asked yesterday, “Has there ever been a slimier, more unctuous piece of work than Mike Pence?” No, probably not.

This whole health care debate in the media has been a triumph of political correctness. No one wants to impose any kind of standard of honesty on Republicans: “Everyone knows the poor dears don’t know anything! So we’ll just report what they say without fact-checking it.” But they don’t need cookies, they need spankings. The reason they’re acting out is because they’re so spoiled.

Spare the rod, spoil the child, Joe. Pence didn’t really earn that A you gave him. You’re just going to cause troubles for him down the line.

I think your regular injections of sanity into this morass are great, Joe.
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As someone more liberal than you, I might take offense at your subtle swipe over FISA, but pluk, even though he’s a birther, does retain some sense in that the public option is not marginally relevant. I’ll add my voice to his on the call for shame.
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As for the remainder, I really don’t think ‘nihilist’ is the right word. Do you know why?
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Do you remember the Oklahoma city bombing? I was around then too. What were the GOP sites and rhetoric like immediately before and after that bombing?
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The relevance?
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Just like in the days of Imus, when I jabbed you over your opinions about conduct in the racial arena, I’m reminding you that those individuals around then did not leave the GOP. They went underground to dogwhistle their extremism and hate. They didn’t change their views or their afilliations, and they didn’t resurface until the waning days of the campaign. They are now out in the open, and aren’t just nihilists.
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What is happing now is no surprise to me whatsoever, because it is these same individuals that are driving the debate on HCR.
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The problems is, Joe, tactically, they’ve begun to close the gap between themselves and Al Queda, and unless they are called on it, Americans may pay with their lives for it.
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Again…

It would be nice if Joe did a piece on the Republicans as they currently operate without a “the Democrats did it too” aside. Given how the Republicans operate I am beginning to wonder whether Pres Obama and his cohorts in the WH are also operating on another planet. How much kicking will they take? Is there a Stockholm Syndrome mentality in play. Lookit: Grassley should be given a swift kick in the pants and told not to darken the White House doormat again?

Derek,
I share your disappointment, but in the circles that Joe is operating his “yes, I bash Liberals too” paragraphs are unfortunately necessary.

The point of history we have reached is indeed unique, and the unravelling of Republican thought is exactly as alarming as Joe depicts it. We need sane opposition to the notion that we can solve every problem by throwing money at it but the people who would be able to point that out are no longer sane.

absent from all this, of course, is the fact that the media lets the republicans get away with it.

Paul if I were a postmodernist I’d take being called a nihilist as a compliment. The Republicans pretend that God talks to them, and they are constantly passing moral judgement on liberals, even though they don’t adhere to their own moral values. Calling them nihilists doesn’t even make sense.

the media lets the republicans get away with it.
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Actually I think there’s an implicit agreement that its officially OK to point and laugh at Sarah Palin and in a pinch Rush Limbaugh.
But Bill Kristol, Newt Gingrich and Chuck Grassley? Everyone treads lightly around the naked Emperors….

Sarah Palin is a curious one, I accept. While it is ok for people in the media to point and laugh, it is not ok for them simply to ignore her. Everything she writes about must be considered in detail, if only to be laughed at. This then gives the repubs an excuse to counter the laughing and pointing without necessarily backing up her crazy claims.

I can’t think of any other country in the world that would elevate the illogical, unintelligible nonsense that spews from her mouth into newsworthy topics.

Poor Joe, still trying to justify the Hoekstra dictations, while reminding all of us that he’s no liberal. For a column as self-righteous as this, it’s a remarkably fluffy piece, which neither cites the bill directly, nor provides facts and figures. As critiques of the GOP go, it’s like being attacked with a featherduster.

Joe:
As a Republican, and also living in Central Pennsylvania, I too can attest to the tribulations of watching my own parents deal with the physical challenges as they grow older. I have also had the “end of life” discussion with them, and now they both have living wills.
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I am for the “end of life” counseling clause within the current House bill. Just because a few people have digressed to calling it a “death panel”, does not place everyone in the same boat so far as the current HCR proposals are concerned. But, I also do not think that people like Sarah Palin are totally off base. With Universal Healthcare, also known as the “Public Option”, there will be rationing of care I am convinced of it.
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My problem is with the bigger picture of it all so far as Obama has proposed. The “Public Option” will undermine the entire health insurance industry. Over 80% of the people in America have health insurance. The only thing a “Public Option” will do is destroy competition within the insurance industry, and we will be left with one huge Government run program that gives no one a choice.
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That said, the reason Seniors are so up in arms with this insane proposal are the cuts Obama has planned. He will totally gut Medicare as it is known today in order to fund Universal Healthcare for everyone. 1/3 of the funding must come from current Medicare payments into the system in order for his proposals to work. Obama has said so himself just recently in Colorado. He spoke of the “Medicare Advantage” program, and how he will cut that program in order to fund his “Public Option” plan. This will seriously jeopardize our Seniors. They will then have to go to Medicare A/B/D solely for insurance. This will cost nearly 20% of their incomes, which many do not have. Medicare Advantage offers those on fixed incomes the opportunity for very good healthcare insurance, but at a cost that remains affordable on their pensions and social security benefits. They earned it Joe, Obama just wants to take it from them and re-distribute to those who are either too lazy to go out and get a job or are in this country illegally.
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End of life counseling or death panels are just smoke screens. The liberal media has focused on this issue in order to advert the real travesty of all of Obama’s proposals. It is not the GOP who is high-jacking HCR, it is Obama and his Administration. By focusing on a very small part of it all, the real debate should be on how he will fund his proposal without funding it on the back of our Seniors.
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Medicare and Social Security are two major Government programs. We do not need a 3rd Government giant which will grow even larger than either Medicare or Social Security combined. Once put into place, this new program will grow to become the biggest unrestrained government program the world has ever seen.
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In Great Britain, where they have a Government Healthcare Program. It is out of control, and the 3rd largest employer in the world. So big that no one in the British Government can touch it. It employs well over 1.5 million bureaucrats. Do we really want that monster here in America? I say definitely not!

Rusty, without dealing with the rest of your post, I just wanted to comment on your last paragraph. There have been many many ignorant things said about the NHS by American commentators/Republicans and frankly, as a Brit, it gets me mad.

Yes, the NHS employs 1.5 million people (or thereabouts). However, by a very long way not all of them are “bureaucrats”, because obviously that figure includes doctors, nurses, technicians, janitors in the hospital, ambulance drivers, hospital managers etc.

Further, no politician in the UK can touch the NHS NOT because it is “too big to fail” but because it is a national treasure, an institution that pretty much every person in the country relies on.

Finally, and unfortunately for Americans, no government healthcare program is being proposed in the current healthcare debate. The most you might get is the government setting up its own competitive insurance companies. It won’t employ doctors, nurses, technicians etc.

From Rasmussen: “Without the public option, just 12% of Democrats Strongly support it. ”
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Other than that? Sure, its “marginally relevant”.
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I guess, in Joe’s imagination, the vast majority of Democrats are a bunch DFH liberal activists or something.

Joe Klein:

This year, the liberal insistence on a marginally relevant public option has been a tactical mistake that has enabled the right’s “government takeover” disinformation jihad.

Obviously you and I (and many, many people) differ on these two points:
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1) providing a way out of the current health insurers’ clutches for all Americans (while not forcing them to pay into the coffers of the very corporations whose policies deny them care) is an essential policy politically and on its merits, not “marginally relevant” in the slightest –unless one’s political philosophy abounds with enthusiasm for left/right “compromise solutions” of government paying exorbitant sums to giant corporations on behalf of helpless citizens
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2) the public option is in no way responsible for rightists’ (and enormous insurers’) irresponsible, demonstrably false and remarkably poorly rebutted campaign of lies, and to perversely suggest that the popular rhetoric of the Progressive Bloc in the House –the Democrats who look to the American people like they stand for something (for once)– causes rampant public misinformation is to strain credulity in the service of centrist ideology
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Has it ever occurred to you that you may simply be wrong on the policy?
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Has it ever occurred to you that a blind adherence to your ideology may be preventing you from acquiring basic facts, and objectively reviewing good policy proposals, Joe Klein?
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Isn’t there just the tiniest something to be said for liberals’ track record over the last decade with respect to identifying advantageous and insanely bad policy ideas? Doesn’t the fact that we’ve been right about so many things for so long count in your mind toward an accumulated credibility?
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Haven’t you been the one blinded by centrist ideology and mired in the thinking of the past, Joe Klein?
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In your piece “The Incredible Shrinking Democrats” (Sunday, Feb. 06, 2005), you made this set of incredible claims:

The President has merely stated the obvious, that reductions [in Social Security benefits] will be necessary. Reid…made the absurd comparison between Bush’s very conservative investment-account proposal and Las Vegas gaming tables.
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Bush’s private investment accounts, combined with a reduction in benefits or higher taxes, is one way for baby boomers to lighten the burden of our retirement upon our children. There are other ways, but none without pain. A far more profitable—and absolutely necessary—reform would be a market-oriented overhaul of Medicare, but Dems just say no to that too.

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When you look back on what you wrote just a few short years ago, don’t you have the slightest inclination to review the philosophy and methods that caused you to embrace these shockingly wrong policy positions, Joe Klein?
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Even more important than how completely correct some liberals were to compare “Bush’s very conservative investment-account proposal and Las Vegas gaming tables” is the idea you propose to “reform Medicare” by making it “profitable” with a “market-oriented overhaul“.
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Since you seem to advocate doing the reverse of what liberals’ proposals are –reforming the health care system to make it less purely “market-oriented” and to include more government services– it isn’t surprising that you would reflexively consider giving ordinary folks like us the choice between public an private irrelevant at best, evil at worst.
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But maybe I have that wrong…maybe your position has changed. So let me ask you to clarify:
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Do you still favor
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1) George W. Bush’s Social Security Privatization proposals
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2) An “overhaul” of government health insurance (Medicare), the purpose of which is to make it “market-oriented”
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, Joe Klein?
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If not, and if you have prudently privileged reality and facts over rigid centrist ideology, then you may want to reconsider your position on liberals’ eminently reasonable (and essential to reform) courageous stand on preserving Americans’ public option –especially in light of how egregiously wrong the health care reform (and Social Security reform) policy ideas you supported just four years ago were .

Rusty, you are waaaaay off base on the disinformation about Britains’ health care. I have a colleague who moved there, and none, repeat, none of the problems you claim actually exist.
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Stick to the facts and go light a candle for Timothy McVeigh, or something…

Joe Klein:
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Sorry, I’m on the way out of the door to work, I forgot to say:
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…Thanks so much in advance for reading and considering this. I’d truly appreciate it if you were to give these ideas at least the tiniest bit of consideration.

SZ,
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Just think of what might have happened had Bush succeeded in privatizing Social Security, given the collapse in the stock market immediately prior to the end of Bush’s term.
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Now that should give even the staunchest conservative baby-boomer cause for pause…

Further, no politician in the UK can touch the NHS NOT because it is “too big to fail” but because it is a national treasure, an institution that pretty much every person in the country relies on.

Er, so, you can’t touch it because it’s “too important to fail.” That is exactly the same expression as “too big to fail.” Furthermore, the end point is the same – you can’t get rid of it.

Finally, and unfortunately for Americans, no government healthcare program is being proposed in the current healthcare debate.

That’s what they say now. But frankly, looking at the government’s record and Obama’s frequent habit of perpetrating falsehood, I just don’t trust them.
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The fear is that the public option is a Trojan Horse.

Rusty, you are waaaaay off base on the disinformation about Britains’ health care. I have a colleague who moved there, and none, repeat, none of the problems you claim actually exist.

So you deny the size of the NHS?

Well, where to begin with the Rusty nonsense?
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1)Let’s start with the tired silliness about rationing. We already have rationing with the current “system” of health insurance providers standing between you and your doctor. The rationing depends on your ability to pay. How much is your life worth, Rusty? As for those who can’t pay, they are dependent on luck and, where they can find them, free clinics.
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2) Obama is not, as you know full well, planning to gut Medicare Advantage. He is proposing to reform the system by eliminating overpayments, which have been very wasteful. Currently, Medicare Advantage is about 14% more expensive than it should be, relative to its achievements. Do you endorse wasteful spending? Ah, but you are a Republican – so you must have been delighted by Bush’s fiscal idiocy.
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3) As for your idiotic remarks about the lazy and illegal immigrants – well, it’s interesting that you classify anyone who is unlucky, especially in the Bush recession, as “lazy”. And Obama has repeatedly said that Medicare and health insurance will NOT be open to “illegal immigrants”. Can’t you make an argument without dragging in the usual tired rhetoric from the GOP? Let’s remember that Democrats reformed welfare, and oversaw a budget surplus. No Republican has run one for the last 50 years. Perhaps you should fix your own lazy party?
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4) Since you make some remarkably stupid claims about the NHS, let’s clarify your lies. The NHS employs a TOTAL of about 1.5 million people, not “1.5 million bureaucrats”. Of those people, just under 50% are clinically qualified, so why not stop the scaremingering about bureaucrats – especially when you either don’t know the facts, or don’t care to provide them. There’s nothing patriotic or decent in misleading your fellow Americans.
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http://www.nhs.uk/NHSEngland/aboutnhs/Pages/About.aspx
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As matters stand, the US healthcare industry employed about 14 million people in 2006.
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http://www.bls.gov/oco/cg/cgs035.htm
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Let’s do the math:
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The UK – approximately 60 million people, with 1.5 millionhealthcare providers in the NHS. So 40:1 is the ratio of people to health care providers.
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The US – approximately 300 million people, with 14 million in the healthcare industry. So roughly 20:1 is the ratio of people to healthcare providers.
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Which system has more of a bureaucratic monster, eh Rusty?

“The only thing a “Public Option” will do is destroy competition within the insurance industry, and we will be left with one huge Government run program that gives no one a choice.”
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France has a public option alongside a private option. The company that provides the private option (Fortis) is the 6th largest company in Europe.
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The only reason the public option is a threat to U.S. Insurance companies is because they’re awful. Given a reasonable alternative, most will go to the public option because we’re fed up with reflexive disallowals and pre-existing barriers. If the private companies want to compete, they can offer a superior product. Which, by your stated philosophy, shouldn’t be too difficult, because the government sucks at everything, right?

homerhk:
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One question: How many of the 1.5 million are bureaucrats?
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Secondly, it is widely known that a government backed, “public option” will eventually turn into a Universal Healthcare Program run by the US Government. The private insurance companies will not be able to compete with a tax payer subsidized government program. It is simply the Democrats way of pushing in a program which will eventually end with their dream world of socialized medical care.
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So far as your “national treaure”. For one person’s “national treasure”, is another’s complete nightmare.
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Please read more…
http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Health/Bad_Medicine.html
http://lc.org/media/9980/attachments/list_nhs_%20uk_newspapers.pdf
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“Great Britain represents all that is good and bad with centralized, single-payer health care systems. Health care spending is fairly low (7.5% of GDP) and very equitable. Long wait lists for treatment, however are endemic and rationing pervades the system. Patients have little choice of provider and little access to specialists.”
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So much for “national treasures”…
http://healthcare-economist.com/2008/04/23/health-care-around-the-world-great-britain/

I debate whether it’s worth responding to you Yoshi, but following the calm example of President Obama, here goes:

I don’t know why you put quotes around “too important to fail”- – who were you quoting? not me. and it’s not about failing. It’s about the fact that the NHS provides free at the point of service healthcare to each and every person within the United Kingdom. It’s about the fact that this service is provided to be consistent with the Country’s view that healthcare is a right not a commodity. It’s about the fact that no politician would ever dare take away one of the few things that the parliament has got right.

Now, you just don’t trust Obama – that’s fine and that’s your right although I would ask you to list me 10 falsehoods that you claim he has made. Leaving aside that, and let’s assume you are right in not trusting Obama, can you trust the English language? Can you trust the actual language of the bills, rather than the Beckified version thereof? If you can’t do that, then what’s the point because even a bill enacted which has a headline bold statement saying “Government will not run any healthcare” or some similarly unequivocal statement will not be trusted.

A final point, and a hypothetical. If you were able to trust Obama that the public option wouldn’t lead to government run healthcare, would you still object to it? or do you have any reality based legitimate objections to it – if so, please elucidate. That is, what is the reason other than the slippery slope argument against it.

As I read Klein, the “marginally relevant” refers to the importance of the public option in achieving the goals of reform–not to its importance politically.

When you see This Week seriously discussing Sarah Palin’s latest effusion you know that the panjandrams of the MSM have no journalistic values worth talking about. They provide a ready made platform for mindless drivel and talk among themselves about how Sarah Palin is talking for…. its all about ratings and keeping one’s seriously overrated contract in good shape for the next negotiation.

“The only thing a “Public Option” will do is destroy competition within the insurance industry, and we will be left with one huge Government run program that gives no one a choice.”
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Half the states in the nation are dominated by one private insurer so the competition argument is yet another canard. Add it to the lie that single payer systems are dominated by bureaucrats. The facts are most single payer systems pay less than 1% on administration, compared to the 30% in the US.

Rusty:

One question: How many of the 1.5 million are bureaucrats?

Shorter Rusty: I have no idea what the facts may be, so I’ll just peddle ignorant nonsense, because I am a GOP troll and facts don’t matter.

I share your disappointment, but in the circles that Joe is operating his “yes, I bash Liberals too” paragraphs are unfortunately necessary.
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I call bullsh*t. If you work in an environment where racism is endemic, does that require you to use the word “n*gger”?
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There is no excuse for telling lies in print, PD — and I can’t imagine why you think there are.

Isn’t it Thursday?

I don’t know why you put quotes around “too important to fail”- – who were you quoting? not me. and it’s not about failing. It’s about the fact that the NHS provides free at the point of service healthcare to each and every person within the United Kingdom.

The first reason you cited is the only reason you cited in your previous post:

Further, no politician in the UK can touch the NHS NOT because it is “too big to fail” but because it is a national treasure, an institution that pretty much every person in the country relies on.

So they can’t touch it because it’s too important. If they did touch it, it might fail (or break, etc), and you can’t have that. Thus it is “too important to fail.”
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This is exactly the kind of status quo that many Americans want to avoid. A centralized behemoth too important to change.

Now, you just don’t trust Obama – that’s fine and that’s your right although I would ask you to list me 10 falsehoods that you claim he has made.

Isn’t it a little odd to demand an arbitrary number of 10? Leaving that aside, here’s an important one: “if you like your plan, you can keep it.” If the public plan is so great, many businesses will start switching to it (hopefully, because an insurance plan without a pool is broke), thus switching the healthcare for all their employees. Since about 53% of Americans are insured through their employer…a lot of people over here aren’t going to have the benefit of keeping their plans.
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Another falsehood: this will not add to the deficit. Rubbish. Despite the attempts of a few people to insist this will save $6 billion over a decade, the CBO is still adamant it will not.
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Now, those are only two misleading statements, but since they concern the healthcare of up to 53% of Americans and the entire nation’s financial state, they’re pretty consequential, wouldn’t you say?

I know this article won’t spread much beyond the site, but thanks goodness someone is starting to call the Rs what they are: hysterical loons bent on destroying anything they don’t like out of spite. And personally, I couldn’t care less if Joe takes some cheap cracks at the liberal fringe. It’s a small price to pay for an honest debate.

I think you will probably get one of those nice little notes that Joe Klein saves for these occasions:
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Dear SZ, Thank you for your feedback, but “I have neither the time nor legal background to figure out who’s right”.
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http://swampland.blogs.time.com/2007/11/26/fisa_more_than_you_want_to_kno/

Where to start, Rusty?

- why don’t you tell me how many “bureaucrats” are employed by the NHS? you made the allegation that it was 1.5 million; that has been laughably and easily demonstrated to be false. What is the figure you’re going to go with?

- so, again following the example set by President Obama, I read the links you provided to me: I’m not sure you did, though. The first one is an article from someone who, if you read the article, objects to the public-private funding of the NHS as too much private money and therefore not enough quality care. A quick google search of the author’s name produced this pretty good passage about her in a Guardian article from 2005: “In particular, she is angered by the widespread use by the government of a paper claiming to show that American private providers Kaiser Permanente delivered healthcare more cheaply and efficiently than the NHS. Her group’s rebuttal, published last year in the British Journal of General Practice, argued that the paper’s methodology was spectacularly flawed. ” – so that’s not really any help.

Another link was, as far as I can tell, a collection of supposed horror stories of the NHS from the Daily Mail and the Daily Telegraph – which by the way are the newspaper equivalent of fox news (save for the cricket reporting and the crossword in the Telegraph both of which are excellent); and in any event don’t prove your point or disprove mine. It’s worth pointing out that the only reason those newspapers can do stories like this is that there is a constant review of conditions etc in NHS hospitals. Because the whole thing is, at the end, centrally managed it is possible to take a step back and look at areas where improvement is needed – it’s also possible to collect statistical data on the entirety of the service. That is not possible where healthcare is managed by a number of different private companies: do they, for example, release a list of how many times treatment has been refused; how many rescissions have taken place, how many times there is a delay in treatment? Of course not.

I’m not going to comment on the third one because it just looked like some basic abstract with figures set out but not substantiated. The idea that 40% of cancer patients never see an oncologist, for example, is something that I find absurd and completely contradictory to my own experience.

Shorter Yoshi:
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We can’t possibly have a more efficient competitor in the healthcare market, even though it would benefit businesses and the American people. Why? Because.. because.. because.. it’s scary, people! Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!

Why? Because.. because.. because.. it’s scary, people! Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!

As I said, the current rhetoric of this President and a look at history are not the greatest for bolstering my confidence.
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(Not to mention people like this guy:

http://hotair.com/archives/2009/08/18/video-dem-wants-to-eliminate-private-health-insurance-altogether/
How many on the left think like him, I wonder…)

Ho hum, Yoshi, you didn’t as expected answer my points.

I picked the arbitrary number of 10 because you said: “Obama’s frequent habit of perpetrating falsehood” so I picked a number that might be considered to be “frequent”.

your first example of a lie just doesn’t stack up. the public option would only, as i understand it, be opened to a limited number of people (ie those not provided with employer covered healthcare) through the proposed exchange. so, he’s right. in any event, as you must know, an employer can change the insurance coverage any time it wants, whether this legislation is enacted or not.

as for the deficit question, Obama has said he won’t sign a bill that adds to the deficit. it’s a bit hard to accuse him of falsehood when he has kept to his word so far.

Excuse me, I forgot to scroll up. Here’s what I said at the bottom:

Why? Because.. because.. because.. it’s scary, people! Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!

As I said, the current rhetoric of this President and a look at history are not the greatest for bolstering my confidence.
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(Not to mention people like this guy:

http://hotair.com/archives/2009/08/18/video-dem-wants-to-eliminate-private-health-insurance-altogether/
How many on the left think like him, I wonder…)

Joe, I strongly disagree with your line that “the nutters are a tiny minority”. They are not a tiny minority, they are the base of the party. Palin and Limbaugh are not the representatives of a tiny minority. They represent the largest faction of those who still identify themselves as republicans. Sarah gets away with her crazy rants because she is playing to the base, not some little group of nutters that support her.
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They rely on outright distortions and lies because that is all they have left. They have no rational leadership. They have no ideas of their own. They play the only card they have left and that’s the Joker. When the majority of the republicans call out Limbaugh and Palin as nutcases, then you can call the screamers a minority. As it stands today, they are the spokesmen.

I picked the arbitrary number of 10 because you said: “Obama’s frequent habit of perpetrating falsehood” so I picked a number that might be considered to be “frequent”.

If you haven’t noticed, he frequently repeats those claims. As in every op-ed he writes and every town hall he visits, and every press conference he’s called.

your first example of a lie just doesn’t stack up. the public option would only, as i understand it, be opened to a limited number of people (ie those not provided with employer covered healthcare) through the proposed exchange. so, he’s right.

A-hem.
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At a minimum, the exchanges would be open to small employers, but government officials would have the discretion to open the exchanges to larger employers.

In fairness…

In a report last month on a bill advanced by House Democrats, the Congressional Budget Office said millions of people would gain employment-based coverage and millions would lose it. The CBO estimated that the number of people gaining the coverage would exceed the number of people losing it.

As for the losers, “CBO and the JCT [Joint Committee on Taxation] staff estimate that, in 2016, about 3 million people (including spouses and dependents of workers) who would be covered by an employment-based plan under current law would not have an offer of coverage under the proposal,” the CBO said.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/08/16/AR2009081601887.html

as for the deficit question, Obama has said he won’t sign a bill that adds to the deficit. it’s a bit hard to accuse him of falsehood when he has kept to his word so far.

He is pushing a bill that would add to the deficit. Actively pushing it. In town halls, op-eds, and press conferences. While you are technically correct, the idea that this absolves Obama of dissembling is hilarious.

Forget this thread. My reply is at the bottom.

well no, he is not pushing a bill that adds to the deficit. he is pushing certain reform proposals and is suggesting ways to keep costs down, a la savings from Medicare and the Public Option. So, while it is difficult to blame Obama for lying when he has said all along he doesn’t intend to sign a bill that didn’t bend the cost curve, it is equally difficult to take your concern about costs control seriously seeing as though you oppose any means to get there.

From the same washington post article:

“In the marketplace, called an exchange or gateway, employees could end up with more and better options, analysts say. Even a top Republican staffer to the Senate committee, who is not authorized to speak for the record, agrees with that assessment.”

so i guess it’s right that the insurance might change but it will be change for the better.

As usual, liberals when confronted are not able to discuss anything with rational debate. They simply revert to their lies and defamation tactics to those they oppose.
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But, the American people see through the smoke and mirror show of Barack Obama. They know his agenda is full-blown socialism, starting with socialized medicine. First attack the private insurance industry and create a Government backed program that will eventually bring down the entire system.
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As an example, instead of survival rates for Prostate Cancer being nearly 100% in the first 5 years after diagnosed (92% survival rate) in America. We shall see outcomes of 51% instead which is the current British Healthcare statistics. That would be approximately 450,000 men dying needlessly under Obama’s plan.
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Please read this article from Times Online;
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/health/article6797717.ece

I’ll reply to both your comments here for simplicity.

well no, he is not pushing a bill that adds to the deficit. he is pushing certain reform proposals and is suggesting ways to keep costs down, a la savings from Medicare and the Public Option.

The CBO is a non-partisan financial scorekeeper of the government. They are adamant that this bill will add to the deficit over a decade given the options on the table so far. Asking me to believe in nebulous assertions about “Medicare savings” over them is…well…not enough.

From the same washington post article:

“In the marketplace, called an exchange or gateway, employees could end up with more and better options, analysts say. Even a top Republican staffer to the Senate committee, who is not authorized to speak for the record, agrees with that assessment.”

so i guess it’s right that the insurance might change but it will be change for the better.

The marketplace on its face is a nice idea, which is why you see Republicans agreeing with it. The proposal to create “portable” coverage is a similar idea that enjoys bipartisan appeal. All of these things propose to create greater competition, which will enable basic free-market dynamics to bring costs down and quality up.
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What the WaPo article addressed in the same paragraph, which you do not quote, is another side effect of HR 3200:

But Democratic legislative aides said there is no assurance that any of the options offered in the exchange would be the same as employees’ current coverage. But Democratic legislative aides said there is no assurance that any of the options offered in the exchange would be the same as employees’ current coverage.

No guarantee that the coverage will be the same as what 83% Americans approve of…no guarantee they’ll like it.

Sorry, I copied that quote twice.

Yoshi –
While most lefties honestly do not want a government takeover, it just so happens I do.

Right now we spend over $6,500 per capita (15% of our GDP) each year on healthcare, which is a full $1,000 more than the second closest spender . . . Yet we’re ranked 33rd in the world for infant mortality (6.3 per thousand live births) and 30th for life expectancy (80.97 years).

On the other hand, France spends $3,400 per person, has an infant mortality rate of 4.2 per thousand, and a life expectancy of 84.23 years. These stats hold true for most Western nations, and the one common factor is that they all have (drumroll please):

Single Payer & Universal Government Run Healthcare!

If something works in, you know, reality, why keep hating on it?

In the richest country in the world, healthcare is a right, just like police and fire protection, public schools, and roads to drive on. Those things are provided by the government because all citizens deserve equal access, and there is no private sector incentive to provide anything equally.

Well, you’re honest. In response:
-
1) A good chunk of that spending is private, implying individual choice. It seems that most Americans want to keep that.
-
2) The infant mortality statistic is tied to our life expectancy. Meaning that upon survival of birth, our life expectancy is not necessarily inferior to those of other countries.
-
3) Correlation is not causation.
-
4) Healthcare is not an enumerated right, just as food and shelter are not. EMTALA dictates that healthcare emergencies are provided for, just as police and firefighters respond to emergencies.

1) I hear you, and while I for one might be willing to give up some choice in healthcare for a better outcome, I understand that not everyone would be willing to do so. But that’s not a reason to exclude the option of a public plan. Republicans want their half, and the middle, too. Your all for “choice” in healthcare until people make a choice you don’t like.

2) And infant mortality is, if I’m not wrong, tied to healthcare.

3) Absolutely, but these stats at least demonstrate that government-run healthcare is not automatically doomed for failure. Again, many on the right insist that every single payer system leads to death and heartache, and we can see that that is not true. There are flaws in the systems, sure. But we’re not all gonna die the minute a government option is offered.

4) See Yoshi, my thinking is that it kind of falls under the “life, liberty, etc.” category, as in “it’s hard to be a good citizen and take part in our grand democracy if you’re dead or dying.” Or in terms that Republicans might relate to, “capitalism doesn’t work if the consumers are all dead.” Having a healthy society is in everyone’s best interests, just like having roads to drive on, schools to go to, and police officers and firefighters to protect us. Sure, codify it into law if you want, but like all laws it starts as a basic moral principle. However, I have a feeling that we differ on the moral principles . . .

http://edlabor.house.gov/newsroom/2009/07/cbo-scores-confirms-deficit-ne.shtml
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Which makes clear that the CBO is not “adamant” about the bill adding to the deficit. They say that it is deficit neutral. But hey, why let inconvenient facts get in the way of wingnut propaganda, eh Yosh? Why don’t you stop making “nebulous” assumptions when the facts are against you? Or does that go against your GOP house training?

Derek:

I find your line that “Republicans pretend to talk to God” amusing. It is liberals who believe they are God. No matter how hard you try, protest and scream about how illogical or corrupt all conservatives are, you are seriously deluding yourself to believe that liberals are pure and holy.

“As an example, instead of survival rates for Prostate Cancer being nearly 100% in the first 5 years after diagnosed (92% survival rate) in America.”
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The cancer survival rate in the U.S. is as much as 15 percentage points higher for someone with insurance than for someone without insurance.
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If you’re arguing for universal health insurance that includes preventative checkups, I can finally say I agree with you on something.

Hi y’all, georgia,

Understood, I’m just not sure that the political element is a separate one.

This was sent to us from Bozeman, MT…

[Names have been changed to protect the Americans.]

“Hello All,

By now you have probably heard that President Obama came to Montana last Friday. However, there are many things that the major news has not covered. I feel that since Alan and I live here and we were at the airport on Friday I should share some facts with you.

On Wednesday, August 5th it was announced locally that the President would be coming here. There are many groups here that are against his health care and huge spending so those groups began talking and deciding on what they were going to do. The White House would not release ANY details other than the date.

On about Tuesday Alan found out that they would be holding the “Town Hall” at the airport. (This is only because Alan knows EVERYONE at the airport.) Our airport is actually located outside of Belgrade (tiny town) in a very remote location. Nothing is around there. They chose to use a hangar that is the most remotely located hangar. You could not pick a more remote location, and you can not get to it easily. It is totally secluded from the public.

FYI: We have many areas in Belgrade and Bozeman which could have held a large amount of folks with sufficient parking. (gymnasiums/auditoriums). All of which have chairs and tables, and would not have to be SHIPPED IN. $$$$$

During the week, cargo by the TONS was being shipped in constantly. Airport employees could not believe how it just kept coming. Though it was our President coming several expressed how excessive it was, especially during a recession. $$$$$

Late Tuesday/early Wednesday the 12th, they said that tickets would be handed out on Thursday 9am at two locations and the POTUS would be arriving around 12:30 Friday.

Thursday morning about 600 tickets were passed out. However, 1500 were printed at a Local printing shop per White House request. Hmmmm, 900 tickets just DISAPPEARED.

This same morning someone called into the radio from the local UPS branch and said that THOUSANDS of Dollars of Lobster were shipped in for Obama. Montana has some of the best beef in the nation!!! And it would have been really wonderful to help out the local economy. Anyone heard of the Recession?? Just think, with all of the traveling the White House is doing. $$$$$ One can only imagine what else we are paying for.

On Friday Alan and I got out to the airport about 10:45am. The groups that wanted to protest Obama’s spending and health care had gotten a permit to protest and that area was roped off. But that was not to be. A large bus carrying SEIU (Service Employees International Union) members drove up onto the area (illegal)and unloaded right there. It was quite a commotion and there were specifically 2 SEIU men trying to make trouble and start a fight. Police did get involved and arrested the one man but they said they did not have the manpower to remove the SEIU crowd.

The SEIU crowd was very organized and young. About 99% were under the age of 30 and they were not locals! They had bullhorns and PROFESSIONALLY made signs. Some even wore preprinted T-shirts. Oh, and Planned Parenthood folks were with them, professing abortion rights with their T-shirts and preprinted signs. (BTW, all these folks did have a permit to protest in ANOTHER area.)

Those against health care/spending moved away from the SEIU crowd to avoid confrontation. They were orderly and respectful. Even though SEIU kept coming over and walking through, continuing to be very intimidating and aggressive at the direction of the one SEIU man.

So we had Montana folks from ALL OVER the state with their homemade signs and their DOGS with homemade signs. We had cowboys, nurses, doctors you name it. There was even a guy from Texas who had been driving through. He found out about the occasion, went to the store, made a sign, and came to protest.

If you are wondering about the press? Well, all of the major networks were over by that remote hangar I mentioned. They were conveniently parked on the other side of the buildings FAR away. None of these crowds were even visible to them. I have my doubts that they knew anything about the crowds.

We did have some local news media around us from this state and Idaho . Speaking of the local media, they were invited. However, all questions were to be turned into the White House in advance of the event. Wouldn’t want anyone to have to think off the top of their head.

It was very obvious that it was meant to be totally controlled by the White House. Everything was orchestrated down to the last detail to make it appear that Montana is just crazy for Obama and government health care. Even those people that talked about their insurance woes, the White House called our local HRDC (Human Resource and Development Committee) and asked for names. Then the White House asked those folks to come. Smoke and mirrors, EVERYTHING was staged.

I am very dismayed about what I learned about our current White House. The amount of control and manipulation was unbelievable. I felt I was not living in the United States of America , more like the USSR !! I was physically nauseous. Alan and I have been around when Presidents or Heads of State visit. It has NEVER been like this.

I am truly very frightened for our country. America needs your prayers and your voices. If you care about our country please get involved. Know the issues. And let Congress hear your voices again and again!! If they are willing to put forth so much effort to BULLY a small town one can only imagine what is going on in Washington DC.

- Bozeman, Montana”

So what you are saying is that liberals have been right about “conservatives” all along and you’re just realizing it now. Well, thanks and welcome to the party. While you’ve got your thinking cap on:

“There are Democrats who are so solicitous of civil liberties that they would undermine legitimate covert intelligence collection.”

.
It’s axiomatic that both the Second and Fourth Amendment’s protection for citizens undermine government’s ability to provide security (witness the assault-rifle toting nut jobs at health care rallies in yahoo country). Your patently “conservative” argument for undermining the Bill of Rights for the sake of “intelligence collection” simply can’t be defended because there is no encroachment that can’t be similarly justified and because those protections must be absolute (as nearly as we can keep them) or they mean nothing. Besides, showing “probable cause” doesn’t do any such thing.
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I suppose you’ll come around when it’s so obvious, even a “centrist” can see it.

Yeah, well the media only insists on reporting on it because a fair amount of people are interested in it. Which is due to ratings, which is due to…money.
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Sad, sad, sad.

“I find your line that “Republicans pretend to talk to God” amusing. It is liberals who believe they are God. No matter how hard you try, protest and scream about how illogical or corrupt all conservatives are, you are seriously deluding yourself to believe that liberals are pure and holy.”
.
I think I take a fair number of shots at liberals, including Obama, who I now regret supporting. The point I was trying to make is calling Republicans nihilists makes no sense. Nihilists do not believe there is a God, nor do they believe in any moral imperative, either based in reason or the divine. Finally, they also do not believe in teleology, or the idea that history has any sort of purpose or end point it is moving toward. You guys are waiting to get swept up into the clouds to be taken to the New Jerusalem.

Thank you Joe Klein –
.
While this article doesn’t go nearly far enough in it’s exploration of the Republican transformation from political party to something else entirely. It does begin to focus on a story that most of the press has decided to ignore. While a few have begun to unshackle themselves from the dominant journalistic construct of false equivalence, most have gone out of their way to shore up, make excuses for and otherwise pretend that the Republican party is still playing the standard political game.
.
Now, this doesn’t mean I completely agree with all of your assessments. I do believe that there are reasonable conservatives, especially among the consultant class (not Kristol) that are appalled by what they see, but are keeping their heads down and their businesses a float. I also understand why a number of commenters resent that even in your declaration to avoid the trap of false equivalency, you just can’t help but put liberal nuttery in the same sentence as Republican fanaticism as if this is comparable in any way, shape, form or fashion.
.
More needs to be written about the Republican transformation. The Republican rhetoric has become so hot, we are right to be afraid of how and where this will end. Despite 200 years of the peaceful transfer of power, since November, Republicans have quietly nursed an anger on the right who have come to believe that anything other than conservative rule is illegitimate. So they invent this birther nonsense and the GOP officials continue to encourage this lunacy, knowing full well its nonsense and its just the kind of thing that will fuel the conspiracy theories of a lone gunman.
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So now we have a stolen presidency and subsequently a stolen country. Is it any wonder that we now see armed citizens, even one with a historical connection to the militias of the 90s showing up at the Presidents town hall. Senator Tom Coburn gets on MTP and says the government deserves this? The constant and outrageous lies from birthers to death panels is literally destroying this country from the inside out. Now simply saying that politics ain’t bean bag ignores the fact that politics ain’t without rules. We need to hold the GOP accountable when Perry advocates secession because its politically convenient, when Sarah Palin accuses the president of trying to kill old people because she is trying to find something to maintain the spotlight and when Joe the plumber says he wants to take the speaker of the house behind the woodshed to beat her up. Republicans need to be held accountable for their failure to stand up for our democratic ideals. Respect for the office of the Presidency and Congress, for our system of due process, our voting system which is frankly a lot more telling than who is wearing flag pins.
.
But most importantly, Joe, you might want to include at least one reference to the role of the media, without whom this scenario could not have been possible.

Just a little pedantry. I liked this column, but it was a mistake to refer to Father Coughlin as a “neo-Fascist”. He was their contemporary. You should have used “proto” or “crypto” as modifiers. Or just called him a Fascist.

I don’t think the GOP is a legitimate partner in any policy debates, which is horribly unfortunate.

I never thought I’d applaud Peggy Noonan as the voice of reason:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124716984620819351.html

This was sent to us from planet Earth…

[Name has been published because this American isn't a bedwetting, paranoid, "conservative" coward.]

“Meanwhile the Teabaggers, crying at every opportunity about how “our government” has been “stolen from us” will have absolutely nothing to say about a secret sidebar deal between… some person in the government and… some rich guy… to run around assassinating people for money. Oh, and did I leave out the fact that all the money’s gone and nobody got assassinated?”
[...]
The last “administration” appears to have ordered prisoners tortured in order to extract false confessions to bolster their lies about connections between Iraq and Al Qaeda that everyone in the world already knew were lies, and now we find out they were contracting out political assassinations to private entities, and even doing that on the sly.”
.
But the guy with the health care plan is the Nazi.”
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Remember, though: Don’t look backward! We traded away getting to the bottom of the torture/wiretapping/no-bid, non-contract assassination outsourcing, so as not to “suck up all the political oxygen” for universal health care the public option regional co-ops.”
.
– David Waldman

Where’s my check then? Telling the truth – that the MSM has continually lied (i.e., knowingly made factually-incorrect statements) about the “Birthers” issue has done nothing more than cost me hours of my time.
.
The real money is in doing what the Beltway establishment wants, and the Beltway establishment doesn’t want to tell the truth about that issue.

Hulagate seems to have taken to writing bad fiction. This is just another variant on the story about Michelle Obama and the caviar:
.
http://americandigest.org/mt-archives/5minute_arguments/no_lobster_and.php
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Yes, a wingnut lying like a rug. This piece of dreck is all over kook-world, and all hulahoop-fruitloop did was just copy and paste.

I can’t believe anyone would continue to argue that the irrational and paranoid Republican response to health care reform has something to do with the details of what the Democrats are proposing.
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There are two reasons why the Republicans are against it: 1) the Democrats are for it and 2) it will help poorer people.
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That’s it. Stop looking for other imaginary explanations.
.
All through the primaries we heard about how Obama, unlike HRC, was not a polarizing figure, which would make him better able to pass things like health care reform. No more ‘Hillarycare.’ And yes, he was less polarizing and that was a perfectly valid argument. But now that he’s actually threatening to do something about health care he’s being compared with Nazis and accused of planning to create death panels to kill old white women.
.
Democrats can do absolutely nothing to prevent these attacks. They can only acknowledge they’re inevitable and respond appropriately.

“…the liberal insistence on a marginally relevant public option has been a tactical mistake that has enabled the right’s “government takeover” disinformation jihad.”

Asked by ABC News about a package of insurance market reforms that have been endorsed not only by President Obama but also by the insurance industry, Sen. Jon Kyl came out against all three proposals.
.
In particular, the Arizona Republican signaled that he opposes requiring insurance companies nationwide to provide coverage without regard to pre-existing conditions; requiring them to charge everyone the same rate regardless of health status; and requiring all Americans to carry health insurance.”

Shorter Kyl: “It’s a government takeover of health care (we don’t need no stinking public option)!”

http://edlabor.house.gov/newsroom/2009/07/cbo-scores-confirms-deficit-ne.shtml
.
Which makes clear that the CBO is not “adamant” about the bill adding to the deficit. They say that it is deficit neutral. But hey, why let inconvenient facts get in the way of wingnut propaganda, eh Yosh? Why don’t you stop making “nebulous” assumptions when the facts are against you? Or does that go against your GOP house training?

We’ve already been over this.

The first thing of note is that while these numbers are perfectly accurate in that if you score the impact of HR3200 and some accompaning legislation related to Pay-Go to be voted on soon you will get the $6 billion surplus, but under the cautious methods used by CBO this is somewhat to put the cart before the horse. Because the latest message from the CBO Director’s Blog, released early Saturday morning still puts the matter as follows:

According to CBO’s and JCT’s assessment, enacting H.R. 3200 would result in a net increase in the federal budget deficit of $239 billion over the 2010-2019 period.

But more importantly CBO is here sticking to the $239 billion figure (as bolded by me).

http://angrybear.blogspot.com/2009/07/tri-committee-health-care-bill-deficit.html
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Sorry, but Ways and Means isn’t going to get away with spinning the CBO.

Yes, Yoshi, we went over it for a whole thread, in which you tried to lie about the whole issue by using outdated estimates, just as you are doing here. Numerous commenters pointed out your lies, and yet here you are again, spewing out falsehoods. I realize that as a GOP stooge you lack character and integrity, but your stupidity never ceases to amaze me. Did you really think we would all forget how you were reduced to silence on this issue? Once again, the CBO has stated that the bill is revenue neutral. You know this perfectly well, and you come here peddling lies – just as you did about MoveOn and Rachel Maddow. Start behaving like an American – and tell the truth, for once in your sordid little existence.

I think the point is, given the current abysmal intellect of our public, as well as our corporate press, industry and their “conservative” and “centrist” allies can spin anything any way they want:

“Majorities in the poll believe the plans would give health insurance coverage to illegal immigrants; would lead to a government takeover of the health system; and would use taxpayer dollars to pay for women to have abortions — all claims that nonpartisan fact-checkers say are untrue about the legislation that has emerged so far from Congress.
.
Forty-five percent think the reform proposals would allow the government to make decisions about when to stop providing medical care for the elderly.”

Some “centrists” can even manage to spin support for a robust public option as giving the professional liars and “nihilists” the license to do their dirty, traitorous business.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/32464936/ns/politics-white_house/

in the federal budget deficit of $239 billion over the 2010-2019 period
.
This represents a burden of 10 dollars per citizen per year.

It would help if people did a little bit of long division before they took advantage of people’s inability to get their heads around large numbers.

oops.
Missed a decimal point. It’s 96 Dollars per citizen per year and only reflects the effect on the Federal Budget. The saving to individuals on their payments to insurers and providers are not part of the calculation.

Yosh:
.
http://cbo.gov/ftpdocs/104xx/doc10480/07-25-IMAC.pdf
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This is the most recent document produced by the CBO, although you already knew this from the thread on the topic. And it makes clear that the bill is basically deficit neutral, with estimated savings of 2 billion dollars, with the possibility of more savings to come. Now quit lying like a rug to kiss the GOP’s white southern ass.

Grollican, you really are getting desperate. Push away all the hyperbole and we’re back to your assertion that the CBO has scored HR 3200 as deficit neutral. It appears this needs explanation.
-
First of all, the press release you endlessly cite is from Ways and Means in Congress – specifically, from somebody who wants to get this passed. In other words, a partisan. He doesn’t use any exact quotes from the CBO because he wants everybody who reads the release to believe his spin.
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Second, the blog entry I cite is by a lefty who realizes that the CBO still scores the bill as anything but deficit neutral. If I may quote from the Director’s Blog once again…
-

According to CBO’s and JCT’s assessment, enacting H.R. 3200 would result in a net increase in the federal budget deficit of $239 billion over the 2010-2019 period.

-
http://cboblog.cbo.gov/?p=332
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Staring you in the face. I’m sure you’ll quote this paragraph if you go to the link:

By the end of the 10-year period, in 2019, the coverage provisions would add $202 billion to the federal deficit, CBO and JCT estimate. That increase would be partially offset by net cost savings of $50 billion and additional revenues of $86 billion, resulting in a net increase in the deficit of an estimated $65 billion.

…and probably quote it to me, but that doesn’t get away from the statement in the first paragraph. Read the blog entry I posted above for details.

yoshi,
Your post is ignoring the fact that the whole reason for the back and forth with the CBO is to whittle the extra spending out of the bill. In case you didn’t notice health care refrom is a work in progress and Obama has reapeatedly insisted that he want the final result to be revenue neutral.

I know that people’s eyes start glazing over whenever ‘billions’ of dollars enter the picture but just for perspective United Healthcare in 2007 earned 5.2 Billion Dollars on 81 Billion in revenue.

“You guys are waiting”

Not much of a stereotype there. Way to stay open minded

Well esteemed libs your quarrel is not with Rusty on the size and scope of NHS but with a Member of Parliament who has given recent interviews about the health care system in Great Britain. He is probably a better source of information than my brother’s sister’s cousin that you serve up.

Groucho Marx was decades ahead of his time:

I don’t know what they have to say,
It makes no difference anyway,
Whatever it is, I’m against it.
No matter what it is or who commenced it,
I’m against it.

Your proposition may be good,
But let’s have one thing understood,
Whatever it is, I’m against it.
And even when you’ve changed it or condensed it,
I’m against it.

I’m opposed to it,
On general principle, I’m opposed to it.

Rusty –
.
How many “bureaucrats” work for the insurance companies? How many bureaucrats compared to actual health care providers/specialists/experts?
.
In short, the insurance industry here in the US is nothing BUT a bureaucracy, yet I don’t see you railing against the unknown employee of said company who is the one making the decision as to whether the treatment course – tests, medicines, etc. – your doctor has prescribed for you will be covered.
.
I am very lucky – I’ve had excellent coverage though it hasn’t come cheaply. From 1994 until this past June, I was covered via Oxford. However from 1994 through June 2009, my employer’s premiums (and mine since I pay part) have increased by over 500%. We now have coverage via GHI (Emblem) which offered cheaper premiums than Oxford, however my out-of-pocket expenses have increased. Higher co-pay for doctor visits, tests and medication.
.
I have Crohn’s (diagnosed in 2004; prior to this I was healthy, active, and rarely took anything stronger than advil or otc cold medicine. I’m 41.) – a pre-existing condition which would exempt me from obtaining health insurance outside of my employer, and believe me, I have looked. If I was laid off, to put it bluntly, I’d be screwed. Cobra would bankrupt me.
.
Your claims about Medicare have already been refuted so I won’t be redundant there. But as for 80% of people being insured – where did you get your numbers? And even if you’re correct, just what type of insurance are we talking about? Catastrophic which does nothing to cover preventative care? VA/Medicare/Medicaid which is already “run” by the government? People who think they have adequate insurance until they try to get care and are denied/rejected by their insurance companies?
.
Do you actually know people from Europe/Canada/Australia who actually have “socialized medicine” and thrive under it (like, oh, Stephen Hawking) or do you just get your information from random articles on the ‘net?
.
Lest you think I’m just another bleeding heart liberal, I’m not. I’m still a registered republican from a very republican family, though I consider myself an Independent – socially liberal, fiscally moderate-conservative. (the ones who are no longer welcome in the party anyway.)
.
Health care must be a right, not a privilege for the fortunate like myself, or the wealthy. And if you’re going to look to (science) fiction to rationalize your fears, put down the Rand and Orwell and try something more optimistic. Like Star Trek.

Where’s my check then?

Kattest, you are what is commonly referred to as a useful idiot, or tool if you prefer.

Besides, we all know the real reason Obama hasn’t provided an original long-form certificate is because lizard people hatch from eggs.

Admittedly I am late to this discussion but thank you donovong for picking up on the Mike Pence line. Not only is Pence not serious nor using facts to make an argument against health care reform, the truth is the guy is a dummy. Not very bright. The word stupid comes to mind. Why Joke Line would include him in the article at all is mind boggling to me, i guess he was trying to look really really hard to find a Republican in Congress who isn’t pushing bat sh*t crazy nonesense and are in a leadership position.

One thing I will also point out is that Joke Line is so afraid of being labeled a liberal that he felt the need to spout mountains of perceived transgressons of “those on the left” before describing the truly outer edges of the fringes of liberals and progressives just so he could come back and talk about mainsteam Republicans.

This is the most recent document produced by the CBO, although you already knew this from the thread on the topic. And it makes clear that the bill is basically deficit neutral, with estimated savings of 2 billion dollars, with the possibility of more savings to come.

…oh come on. I can differentiate between the terms ‘IMAC’ and ‘HR 3200.’
Here’s a quote from later in the piece, which would have saved you some trouble had you read it:

By that point, H.R. 3200, as introduced, would already
be on track to achieve tens of billions of dollars in Medicare savings each year… (Total federal
resources devoted to health care programs would increase under the introduced
version of that bill, however, because of the provisions aimed at making health
insurance available to more people.)

The spending will outpace the savings…in short, common sense.
-
PD: We’ll see. I’m hoping for the best.

Joe – very good article. I’ve been in that situation with my mother, and no, it’s not an easy conversation. My sympathies to you for the uncertainties you and your family face.
.
Here’s another (minor) obscenity for you to address, and that’s the (presumably computer generated) links that attach to your story online.
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So your line “I had lunch with him the next day to discuss this.” is followed by “(See 10 players in health-care reform.)”
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Some even have the affect of implying things about your meaning: “How can you maintain the illusion of journalistic impartiality when one of the political parties has jumped the shark? (See pictures of angry health-care protesters.)”
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Why are these men so reluctant to be rational in public? (See how to prevent illness at any age.)
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And the best/worst: He will have to come up with something, though — and he will have to do it without the tiniest scintilla of help from the Republican Party.
(See pictures of Republican memorabilia.)

A poster at reason.com summarized what’s wrong with Klein’s argument the best:

I wondered where the “nihilists” slur was coming from, but his focus on the “death panels” claim makes it clear that he is arguing a variant of the Ezra Klein position:

If you don’t trust the government to run health care, you are a nihilist. Your lack of faith in the goodness of the state reveals that you utterly lack values and don’t believe in the goodness of anything.

That’s literally his argument. Because Joe Klein is a piece of [snip].

This was his argument during the Bush administration, too. “Please, please, won’t you just trust the Bush administration to use unaccountable power wisely? How can you not believe in the goodness of the Bush administration? You NIHILISTS!”

And unaccountable power is what we are talking about here. Government boards that we do not have the right to directly vote for will determine what treatments your insurance company will and will not be allowed to offer coverage for. Their decisions will not be subject to judicial review, so they cannot be sued. If I can’t vote it and I can’t sue it, I don’t trust you to do it. Period. To Joe Klein, this lack of trust makes me a “nihilist”.

Joe Klein is always driven into a rage by the spectre of anyone who thinks that there should be procedural and legal checks on state power. So this column is not surprising in the least.

Klein wrote: “There is a legitimate, if wildly improbable, fear that Obama’s plan will start a process that will end with a health-care system entirely controlled by the government.”

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But this isn’t “wildly improbable” at all. Whether one supports single-payer healthcare or not, the entire idea behind the public option was to work towards such a goal.

The idea came from Jacob Hacker and Roger Hickey (both of whom are advocates of single-payer) and they shopped it to the Obama, Clinton, and Edwards campaigns in 2008. The whole idea was that a public option was politically palatable — while a single-payer plan was not.

TAPPED had an interesting piece about the history of the public option the other day. No reason to deny what its purpose is, Mr. Klein. It’s not a “wildly improbable” fear. It’s precisely what the public option was designed to do.