WTF Barack??

[Sebastian Doyle]

You just plainly spelled out (to Chuck Fraud) why we NEED single payer to cover everyone, and yet you don't think we should do exactly that?? :wtf:

How the fuck does that make sense?

[stray cat]

1. ultimately the payer is the taxpayer ie government.

[Sebastian Doyle]

5. Yes.

Same as it is for anything else the government does.

Like supporting illegal wars in every fucking oil producing company. Or subsidzing industries who kill their own customers by design, such as tobacco or FrankenFood producers like MonSatan.

And if they didn't fund all that shit, they would have enough money to give every man woman and child in this country the standard of health care that every millionaire politician on Capital(ism) Hill has.

[SDuderstadt]

16. I'm not sure I can take anyone who invokes the name...

"Monsatan" in a post seriously. It's like when I'm reading something and come across "Bushler" or "cabal" or "BFEE". You just know what follows is going to be CT drivel.

[Sebastian Doyle]

29. That's OK

I can't take any of your Bush Crime Family apologist posts in the dungeon seriously either. :)

[BlooInBloo]

2. Because he's President, not dictator. Durr.

[WestSeattle2]

30. Indeed! Many seem to forget that 435 House members and 100

Senators will be voting on the eventual proposal. Our recent dictatorship ended when Barack was sworn in.

[tekisui]

3. I think it makes sense. He laid out why SP is needed,and that

he wants everyone to be covered, which can only be done with SP. He is taking what he can get. As long as the public option is in the bill, it will become SP. The insurance companies have this country by the balls. It isn't easy to break away from them.

[HopeOverFear]

7. He said something in this speech to the AMA that I sincerely hope was a lie

he said that a public option would not lead to single payer. I sincerely hope he was lying on purpose. lol

[tekisui]

10. I think he played dumb on that.

Repukes know that public option will become single payer. That is why they are so against it. Insurance reform and expanding coverage wouldn't get this much of a fight if it were not for the public option that will be able to out-compete with the for-profit insurance companies.

[HopeOverFear]

12. Exactly. I wish the folks who are passionate yet petulant about single payer

would understand that.

[tridim]

4. Single payer would never pass

He has no choice but to go forward incrementally.

[foginthemorn]

27. Well, since Obama did not even try for it, we will never know if

it would have passed.

[vaberella]

45. Get a clue. There's a bill already in the House.

It can barely get any votes from House Reps, only about 70 signed on out of 400 something. You think that's going to pass....if it can't make it past the House it won't get a the light of day to the senate.

That's why.

[karynnj]

47. Well, we know how many Senators signed to co-sponsor Sander's bill

The fact that it is zero indicates that every in the Senate knows their peers will not pass it. There is no mystery here. There are only 100 Senators and most of them have known most of the others for years.

[zulchzulu]

31. Exactly!!! n/t

[HopeOverFear]

6. Yeah! Because Single Payer is the Republican's health care plan

oh wait.....no it's not

:eyes:

[Sebastian Doyle]

11. No, single payer is the health care plan that most other "civilized" countries have.

It's also the plan that President Harry Truman intended for the US to have in 1947, about the same time those other countries were putting their own plans together.

The Republican plan is corporatism now, corporatism forever, and they will do their damndest to turn any sort of wishy washy "public option" into exactly that.

(and by that, I don't mean the Howard Dean public option. I mean the bastardized false version of that that would be endorsed by the likes of Snake Schumer, the ADA, and other known enemies of the American middle class who pretend to be on our side.)

[HopeOverFear]

13. That was 1947. This is 2009

Between 1947 and 2009, the Health INsurance Industry and the pharmaeutial industry have put a ubiquitous stranglehold on this country. They're a behemoth that you are NOT going to take down all in one fell swoop. IMHO, public option can be the long but steady road to that.

[Sebastian Doyle]

17. As I said, that depends on what is meant by "public option"

If it's a DLC neutered "public option", then it's nothing more than corporate fellation horseshit that will be packaged as "reform", and once everyone is "covered" (i.e. forced to buy corporate coverage) the prospect of REAL reform will never be seen again.

A TRUE public option, as Howard Dean has called for, would be true competition for the corporate pigs, and they would be forced to either change their criminal ways, or find a new way to steal peoples' money and give up entirely, which would leave a single payer system by default.

[HopeOverFear]

25. I think we're on the same side here

and so is Obama and Dean. But, you must remember, we're not going to get a perfect bill. There's going to be something in that bill that not everyone likes. But we need to move forward with SOMETHING. We have to PROGRESS. Not REGRESS.

[Sebastian Doyle]

33. The perfect bill would be HR 676

The true public option IS the only thing less than that which can be called PROGRESS, because anything less than that will be designed to fail.

I truly do hope that President Obama's definition of Public Option is the same as Dr. Dean's, and that he vetoes any bill that is less than that, which is what he said he would do yesterday, but after that press conference, I can't be sure. He said some things which seemed supportive of a real public option, but other things that seemed to endorse a mandatory Romneycare type thing, the same crap Hillary ran on in the primaries (which Obama opposed then, and one of the main reasons I voted for him, and not her in the caucus here)

The Romneycare is not acceptable, nor are the Conrad Coops or any other such rigged to fail scams which would eventually be abandoned because they wouldn't be able to compete with corporatecare.

[HopeOverFear]

40. Oh yes. That bill would sail by so easily. I mean look how easy

the public option bill is going.... The blue dogs and the repubs would just roll out the red carpet for single payer...


:eyes:

[avaistheone1]

42. Bullshit. That behemoth is only going to get stronger if don;t take it done now.

What a bunch of spineless Democrats from top to bottom we have these days.

FDR would have handled things much differently that is for sure.

[Justitia]

43. Which is exactly how FDR got single-payer enacted all those yrs ago....oh, wait....

Good lord.

Why don't you act as "whip" and tell us how many Senate votes you can count on for single-payer passage?

[avaistheone1]

52. FDR did just about everything else.

If he had lived I am sure we would have seen it. Who else can match FDR's social achievement, but LBJ?

The useless, spineless Dems of today from top to bottom are a joke.

[4lbs]

54. FDR caved on civil rights legislation because the Southern Democrats threatened to NOT pass any

other legislation he wanted.

So, minorities had to wait 30 years.

[asteroid2003QQ47]

53. How many more must die on the march down your long, steady, Public Option Road?

Let's have some numbers, what's acceptable to you IYHO?

[karynnj]

48. You are standing on your head to differentiate Howard Dean's

public option from the likely public option in the bill. The fact is that you are comparing Dean's words with what Kennedy and Dodd could get through a committee. As Governor of VT, Dean did what had to be done by the state's constitution - balance the budget, by cutting money to healthcare. If he were a Senator don't you think he would do as other Senators wanting to improve healthcare are doing - finding the best passable bill?

If President, Governor Dean, like President Obama, would not push for something doomed to fail, but would work within the system to get the best changes possible. I am very convinced that when we look back - say 10 years from now, if a bill like the Kennedy bill emerges, it will seem a major accomplishment. Consider that SCHIP is now seen - not as a limited program, but as the program that has insured millions of kids over the last decade. Would you have criticized Kennedy for modifying the previous year's Kerry/Kennedy bill which used the same funding mechanism, but created an entitlement national program to create SCHIP? Or, would you have objected that it was unless because it was not single payer and not for everyone?

[solstice]

8. It doesn't. Nor does it make sense that people who can't afford mandated health insurance could be

given an exemption.

Isn't that nice of Obama's plan? Poor people who need health insurance most but can't afford it won't be required to buy it. That was my WTF moment.

And he said NOTHING about a subsidy.

This whole press conference is a big WTF for me.

Not only did he call of Chuck Todd but Jake Tapper too.

As long as Obama keeps equating health care reform with lower costs, more people than not will only focus on the costs, which is playing right into the repugs' hands.

[babylonsister]

22. You're not happy? Quelle surprise!

:rofl:

[solstice]

46. And you're attacking me because I question Obama and don't blindly worship him

or rationalize everything he says?

Quelle surprise!

[JuniperLea]

9. Why is it so many want Obama to do the sort of thing...

We despised seeing Bush do? Where is the sense in being an evil dictator like Bush?

Jesus people!

[RollWithIt]

14. Because he refuses to be like Bush was!!!!!!!

Duh

[Clio the Leo]

15. I TRIED to get the man declared King.....

.... and no one would listen to me!

http://static.open.salon.com/files/king+obama1233407361.jpg

... he's got the perfect head shape.

[Phx_Dem]

18. There's probably 10 people in the House & Senate for single-payer.

Why can't people understand that? It's can't pass, or even come close. But if we get a public option and it works out well, maybe that mindset will change down the road.

[slipslidingaway]

21. And the other cosponsors on HR 676??? n/t

[ChimpersMcSmirkers]

24. It's even more basic then that. The public barely supports the medium grade reform being offered now

[Justitia]

44. It's "All or Nothing". Get ready for nothing, if these people have their way. -eom

[BlueIdaho]

19. Politics

is the art of the possible.

[babylonsister]

20. And there you have it. nt

[Bluenorthwest]

26. Things that were called impossible include: aviation, electricity, the

Untied States of America, the moon landing, women flying planes, and the election of Barack Obama.

The 'art of the possible' as a calling card for why one can not do what is right is not a mitigation, but an admission of a shortcoming. Many things are impossible until the fist mind comes along good enough to simply do it. "The art of the possible" means "this is what I am capable of producing".

[BlueIdaho]

36. Yeah - luckily none of those things had to make it through congress...

Complain all you want - In a democracy, politics has been and will be the art of the possible.

[Thrill]

23. Obama has never been against Single Payer. He just knows there isn;t

a chance it hell it will pass.

[dysfunctional press]

28. he's a corporatist, plain & simple.

my prediction: the final bill the he WILL sign will contain a mandate to buy insurance, and NO public option as a choice.

[Sebastian Doyle]

38. If that's the case, he can kiss any chance of re-election goodbye

Along with every goddamn traitor in either house of Congress who voted against TRUE reform.

[karynnj]

49. What constitutes true reform? Are you the official designator?

Would a bill that gets rid of pre-existing conditions, keeping everything else the same, be true reform? I think it would, though it is not sufficient by itself. Would a bill creating the type of tapering subsidies in the Kennedy bill that gradually decrease from the point where a person is elgible for Medicaid to the 4 times the poverty level be true reform? I think so.

Which vote will you use? I don't think there will be a vote for Conyers' or Sanders' bills.

Politics is the art of what's possible. Look at your own icon's history as governor of VT. He did not push impossible things - and that is to his credit. Why hold Obama to different standards?

[Aramchek]

32. in order for political change to last it must be gradual and for the public good,

yesterday's medicaid is today's public option is tomorrow's single payer

have a little patience

[Sebastian Doyle]

34. I don't have time for patience.

I don't care to elaborate any further on that, but I can't wait until 2013 for some half assed "solution".

[Aramchek]

35. why wouldn't you be covered by a Public Option?

[Sebastian Doyle]

37. I probably would be

Provided they do it the right way, and there's no bullshit "triggers" delaying it.

[HopeOverFear]

39. Yes you do.

You can make time. You've waited this long. As have I. It sucks, I know. But we can wait some more. Stop acting like a whiny child and at least TRY to appreciate what President Obama's doing.

[Sebastian Doyle]

41. The only "whiny children" around here are you goddamned cheerleaders

You don't know what I meant when I said I don't have time. Think about that.

[karynnj]

50. None of us know specifically what you mean, but if it is that

you currently can't get insurance due to pre-existing conditions or you are over the Medicaid level, but below 4 times the poverty level, you will at least get some help as soon as that measure goes into effect and the subsidies start. Getting just those two features, which is below the minimum change anyone is speaking of would be massive changes for many people.

That doesn't mean that we shouldn't push Senators and Congressmen to do more - though I assume letters, like those Obama spoke of, are FAR more effective than attack ads on Democratic Senators - especially when they are as lame as the one DFA picked up from the Bold Progressives.

[asteroid2003QQ47]

51. Sebastian, you are the wind beneath my wings! :loveya: n/t