Whipping the Public Option in CT: Courtney Punts Again

We Need a Huge Concerted Effort (0.00 / 0)

It appears that The Fix is in. To representatives who. . .  

fail to pledge that they will vote against any bill that does not contain a public option that is (1) available nationwide (2) on day one and (3) accountable to Congress and voters) stands as of today

I would say clearly: Do Not Expect Any Support From Formerly Hard Working Loyal Democrats in 2010.

This is a make or break issue.

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by: Ann Galloway @ Tue Jul 07, 2009 at 16:56:21 PM UTC

For a guy who was elected by such a slim margin (3.00 / 2)

... Courtney sure takes his voters for granted.

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by: CaptCT @ Tue Jul 07, 2009 at 17:43:10 PM UTC

If There's One Thing About Joe Courtney... (3.00 / 2)

...it's that he never takes his seat, or his constituents, for granted.

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by: dauphinb @ Wed Jul 08, 2009 at 05:17:47 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

Really? Check out the Energy Bill he just voted in favor of ... (4.00 / 1)

... it's a piece of crap.

If the health care bill is as bad as this energy bill, it may end up costing us even more money to get sick.

If Courtney is your Congressman, tell him to support a health care bill with a public option that is ready on day one, national and available everywhere, and accountable to our government. Ask him to articulate this position, and to promote it in the media.

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by: CaptCT @ Wed Jul 08, 2009 at 14:09:04 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

You Missed My Point (0.00 / 0)

Disagreement ≠ Taking People for Granted

Even when he's on the "wrong" side of the issue from your POV (or from mine), I know Joe is never unmindful of his constituents.

In a district like the 2nd CD, it would be impossible to please everybody all the time — in any case, a representative's true mission isn't to please us, but to represent our interests and values, which isn't always exactly the same thing — but it's quite clear to me that Joe always listens to his constituents, and never takes either their votes or his position for granted.

If you think otherwise, you need to spend a bit more time talking to the man.

PS: I downrated your first comment because it was just drive-by snark, without material relevance to the actual issues in the thread; downrating me in return was fair enough, as my reply was admittedly in the same vein.

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by: dauphinb @ Wed Jul 08, 2009 at 21:56:01 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Naive (0.00 / 0)

The reality of politics is that it takes lots of money to run a campaign and Courtney, like all politicians, wants to keep a flow of that money coming from business interests. So he compromises. At times, he puts special interests ahead of yours and mine. So although he may be "mindful" of his constituents, he will ignore their best interests at times, tell them otherwise or try to explain it in some credible way, and take it for granted that they'll vote for him anyway. [See the "Clean" (cough!) Energy Bill.]

If he truly "always listens" to his constituents, then he should be hearing this from you: Join the group of progressive Democrats who have formally committed to a public option that is available on day one, national in scope, uses the government's bulk buying power, and is accountable to the government.  

Based on your "faith" in him, I assume he would be glad to do so.

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by: CaptCT @ Thu Jul 09, 2009 at 13:00:45 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

C'mon guys, respond but don't downrate... (0.00 / 0)

As someone who asked for his contribution back, (after Courtney publicly dissed MoveOn), I kind of agree with CaptCT.

But I appreciate Dauphin's passionate responses.

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by: AndersonScooper @ Thu Jul 09, 2009 at 01:07:47 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

Not the only ones to be concerned about (0.00 / 0)

http://www.commondreams.org/vi...

Obama Hushes Healthcare Advocates

by Laura Flanders

Don't like the way the Wall Street bail-out turned out? It looks as if we're in for something similar regarding healthcare.

With popular fury at the status quo rising and hunger for a real, public option attracting over 70 percent approval in polls, the White House is urging public-option advocates to hush.

Step 1 Democrats Shoot Selves In Feet

Step 2 Go to Emergency Room and try to get Health Care without Health Insurance

because Connecticut voters count: http://www.CTVotersCount.org

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by: BlastFromGlast @ Tue Jul 07, 2009 at 18:56:12 PM UTC

Give him a break (4.00 / 1)

Joe Courtney has stood up for progressive issues time and again.  There's simply nobody better on healthcare in DC than him.  Joe's record from when he was in the legislature proves it.  Connpace anybody?  

Just because he smartly doesn't commit to positions prior to seeing legislation isn't reason to denigrate him.  Unlike many in Washington Joe actually reads the bills he votes on.  Give him a break.  I know he'll do the right thing.

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by: demdude @ Wed Jul 08, 2009 at 01:54:25 AM UTC

No one is "denigrating" (4.00 / 1)

And this is not about intentions or resumes, it's about strategy and actually getting results.

In order to ensure that anything resembling a real public option remains in the final version of legislation, it is up to House Democrats to draw a line in the sand that will not be crossed: no public option equals no passage, period.

If they don't do this, there very well may not be a public option in the final legislation (or perhaps it will be crippled by a "trigger"). At which point, all of the Democratic Reps who won elections promising health care reform in 2006 and 2008 will no doubt lament how they have to vote for such an "imperfect" bill.

Or we can work with them to encourage them to take a clear position on this now... and actually get better legislation in the end.

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by: tparty @ Wed Jul 08, 2009 at 02:08:46 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

Maybe Not "Denigrating"... (0.00 / 0)

...but threatening to withhold support... as if Rob Simmons or Sean Sullivan would've delivered single-payer, right?

I understand it's the proper function of activists to be somewhat absolutist, but it's the proper function of legislators to govern; we need to let our passion be at least slightly informed (note: "informed" is not the same as "diminished") by political realism.

this is not about intentions or resumes,

I disagree. Based on his public statements, and my own conversations with him, I have confidence that Joe's intentions on this issue align with my own... and his resume tends to validate that confidence. And so I trust that his vote will ultimately embody our shared intentions as well as possible, based on information he will have gathered and that I can't possibly have. This is the essence of representative government: Work hard to elect people who share your values... and then trust them. We liberals sometimes have a tough time with that last bit.

That's not to say there's no place for sharp criticism... but at this moment in history, on this issue, Joe Courtney is a damn poor choice of target for these arrows.

it's about strategy and actually getting results.

I agree. But for me, "results" in this case means providing coverage for some large fraction of the 40 to 50 million Americans who have no healthcare coverage... and providing some relief and assistance for the many more whose coverage is inadequate. Your strategy...

no public option equals no passage, period

...might indeed improve the odds of a strong public option, which I agree is the philosophically correct goal, and one I strongly support.

But this all-in bet also carries a very high risk of achieving nothing at all. And perhaps of us not having a realistic chance to try again for another 15 years. As a person who's lucky enough to have excellent coverage, I'm sharply mindful of what it would mean not to be covered; I can't morally justify demanding that all-in bet — before we've even looked at the hole cards! — when the "chips" on the table are the lives of the uninsured.

YMMV, of course.

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by: dauphinb @ Wed Jul 08, 2009 at 05:41:11 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

Results (4.00 / 3)

There may be some in this thread who have said they would withhold support from candidates who did not pledge to vote against a bill without a public option. I am not one of them. What I did point out that many of these candidates ran, and won, in 2006 and 2008, promising real health care reform. Failure to deliver on that promise - whether that means passing no bill at all or passing what amounts to an insurance industry giveaway without a public option - will surely affect progressive support for candidates in the future.

I understand it's the proper function of activists to be somewhat absolutist, but it's the proper function of legislators to govern; we need to let our passion be at least slightly informed (note: "informed" is not the same as "diminished") by political realism.

Here's where I strongly disagree. The Democratic leadership in Congress has simply shown no strategic ability to govern effectively. Not with the Bush Administration, and not with Obama. The stimulus passed only after being negotiated away before it even came to Congress, then watered down to get Republican votes, and we are seeing the results of that legislative error already. Now we have 60 votes in the senate and Harry Reid warns us he actually needs 99 to get anything done.

It is the responsibility of activists now more than ever not just to elect politicians and hold them accountable but to push them to govern effectively.

That's not to say there's no place for sharp criticism... but at this moment in history, on this issue, Joe Courtney is a damn poor choice of target for these arrows.

The FDL whip count targets targeted progressive Reps across the country. However all five of Connecticut's Democratic Representatives proudly signed onto the the HCAN principles which called for an option of a "public insurance plan without a private insurer middleman that guarantees affordable coverage." They are all being encouraged to take this pledge, not any specific one of them.

Your strategy... no public option equals no passage, period... might indeed improve the odds of a strong public option, which I agree is the philosophically correct goal, and one I strongly support.

But this all-in bet also carries a very high risk of achieving nothing at all.

The all-powerful Rahm Emmanuel himself has said, about health care fight, that the only thing thats not negotiable is that we win.

If progressives in the House make it clear that a plan without a strong public option will not pass, believe me, there will be a strong public option in the final bill. And doing so is the only leverage progressives inside or outside of Congress have to make sure one is included.

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by: tparty @ Wed Jul 08, 2009 at 12:35:59 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Please no more good intentions (4.00 / 1)

They all have good intentions. Even the Republicans.

And please, no more tagging allies as "absolutist." Single payer is a 50% compromise position from a UK-style "National Health" system, and a public option is a 50% compromise from single payer. Now you're buying into the line that progressives have to be the ones to compromise -- while we're down to a quarter loaf and the "compromise" position is to just hurl some money and the private insurers and pray that their additional profit will convince them to do the right thing for the people at the margins of society.

tparty is going after our friends because it seems that they are in one of two problematic positions: they either continue to misunderstand modern politics, bargaining away most of their position in return for nothing at all in pursuit of votes they neither need nor can realistically expect to get — or they are genuinely unable to be trusted on these issues.

I'm not sure if this process is the right way to sort the two groups out from one another. But it's clear as day that we're getting the merest of crumbs of the change we were expecting when we delivered near-supermajorities to the Democrats because some of those Democrats are defective, and directing public pressure at them is perhaps the only way we could find that out.  

–7.25 / –7.28 | http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/tw...

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by: mattw @ Wed Jul 08, 2009 at 15:56:34 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Absolutely Right! (0.00 / 0)

There's simply nobody better on healthcare in DC than him.  Joe's record from when he was in the legislature proves it.

I couldn't have said it better myself! I mean... the man has made progressive healthcare reform the central issue of his entire political career, and we're supposed to believe he's thrown us over because he (respectfully) declines to make a rash promise about a bill he hasn't even seen yet? It is to laugh!

I've spoken with Joe about this, and I'm personally confident he's absolutely committed to a public option. But most of all he's absolutely committed to meaningful healthcare reform now. The fact that he won't be pinned down to absolute promises about legislative details that are still in flux is, for this grateful constituent, A Feature, Not a Bug™!

I'm confident that Joe would vote against a truly bad bill — his record demonstrates that — but I don't want him to casually toss away what may be a once-in-a-generation chance at healthcare reform because it doesn't exactly satisfy some precise checklist. When it comes to a vote, Joe will have facts in hand that I can't possibly have; ultimately, I trust him to faithfully represent the values I know he and I share on this issue.

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by: dauphinb @ Wed Jul 08, 2009 at 05:15:31 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

If progressive health care reform ... (0.00 / 0)

... is the "central issue of Coutney's entire political career," as you say, then he should have no problem committing to a public option that is ready on day one, national and available everywhere, and accountable to our government.

Otherwise, we may end up with a health care bill as bad as the energy bill the House just passed. The American "Clean" Energy and Security Bill, passed last week by the House, literally strips the EPA of its ability to regulate the coal industry! That bill also "sets targets for reducing pollution that are far weaker than science says is necessary to avoid catastrophic climate change."  

The House actually made it easier for coal companies to pump cancer-causing, earth-warming crap in the air. And our Democratic Congressmen actually have the nerve to brag about this horrific accomplishment.

As long as Courtney can take your vote for granted, he doesn't have to worry about passing an energy bill that actually will prevent catastrophic climate change and he doesn't have to worry about passing a "progressive" health care bill.

If Courtney is your Congressman, you should give him a call and tell him to support a public option that is ready on day one, national and available everywhere, and accountable to our government. Ask him to articulate his position, and to promote the cause in the media.

If he's committed to "progressive" health care reform, he should gladly agree.

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by: CaptCT @ Wed Jul 08, 2009 at 13:57:58 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

If progressive health care reform... (4.00 / 1)

goes the way of the recent cap-and-trade bill, we are critically fucked.

We are like two horses in a harness on this, Cap. I read dauphinb's comment and thought the exact same thing.  

–7.25 / –7.28 | http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/tw...

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by: mattw @ Wed Jul 08, 2009 at 15:36:18 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

"critically fucked" (4.00 / 1)

... pretty well sums it up.

The Senate version of the energy bill is even worse. Let's hope Bernie Sanders, Al Franken, or some other Democrats (Dodd? Feingold?) can fix this bill before it gets passed. But I'm not optimistic.

You'd think that Congressmen with young children -- Dodd, Himes, Murphy -- would be the ones working hardest to fix this bill. Guess not. There must be a sign outside the House and Senate chambers that reads, "Check your soul at the door."

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by: CaptCT @ Wed Jul 08, 2009 at 16:38:29 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Grouping several responses... (0.00 / 0)

...for the sake of both space and coherence:

Cap:

If Courtney is your Congressman, you should give him a call and tell him to support a public option that is ready on day one, national and available everywhere, and accountable to our government.

He is, and we've had that conversation, and he absolutely does support a strong public option. (Didn't I already say that? Didn't he?)

Ask him to articulate his position, and to promote the cause in the media.

He has articulated that position. In fact, he does so in the very piece of "media" that heads this thread. Listen to it again: He says over and over that he supports a public option, and that he'll work hard to make it happen... and he's said the same thing every time I've heard him speak on the issue, whether at the HCAN town meeting, to a private group of supporters, or in interviews such as this one. His reluctance to "take the pledge" does not mean he's backtracked on public option, or any other principle; rather, it means he's reluctant to make preemptive promises about how he might vote on a hypothetical final bill that nobody's written yet. Unwilling to promise his vote before reading the bill? Sounds like a Feature, Not a Bug™ to me!

Cap and Matt:

As long as Courtney can take your vote for granted, he doesn't have to worry about passing an energy bill that actually will prevent catastrophic climate change and he doesn't have to worry about passing a "progressive" health care bill.
...
If progressive health care reform goes the way of the recent cap-and-trade bill, we are critically fucked.

Really? Do you think Joe should've voted against the energy bill? The House vote was so close that he and just a handful of others could've killed it. Do you think the planet would be less fucked if they had?

Before you rhapsodize about how much better (i.e., tougher) the House bill might've been if Joe and others had threatened to vote no, let me just remind you that, in your own words...

The Senate version of the energy bill is even worse.

...which suggests how unlikely it is that a tougher bill could actually become law, even if it could've passed in the House (which I doubt). Y'all may think doing nothing unless you can do the very best thing is the right approach, but I disagree: Climate change is an area in which we must start doing something right away, even if it's not perfect. Healthcare reform is another.

Cap:

There must be a sign outside the House and Senate chambers that reads, "Check your soul at the door."

Really? It amazes me how quickly this community loses faith in people. 9 months ago Jim Himes was a hero around here, practically the second coming of Ned Lamont. Now nobody seems to be able to speak his name without spitting on the ground. Do you really think he's "check[ed his] soul at the door" in such a short span (or that Courtney, Murphy, et al. have)... or is it just barely possible that there are some complexities and nuances involved in actually making law?

I can't understand why it's so easy for so many folks to believe that principled men and women, worthy of support in October and November, can have magically become the enemy by the following Independence Day. Occam's Razor suggests otherwise to me. And if you don't believe they've become the enemy, why not attack the people who already were the enemy instead?

Why do we have to abandon people the first time they're unable to take the giant steps we might dream of? IMHO, we'd have taken many more steps, albeit perhaps smaller ones, and consequently be measurably closer to our shared progressive goals, if progressives were just a little bit less voracious at eating our own young.

Matt:

He should have seen it, as the Education and Labor committee that he sits on has jurisdiction over the bill and the Chairman's draft has a public option in it...
...
To say that Courtney isn't familiar with the public option because he hasn't seen a bill that contains it

Are you being deliberately disingenuous? Of course he's "familiar with the public option" and of course he's seen a bill with a public option in it. Nothing I've said in this thread, nor anything Joe said in the interview that prompted it, suggests otherwise. But the bill you refer to is not the bill the pledge "whip counters" are asking about. Instead, the "whip count" asks members of Congress to promise, preemptively, to vote against a hypothetical final marked up bill that nobody's seen yet, because it hasn't yet been produced.

And Joe didn't even say he wouldn't vote against said hypothetical bill; he only declined to promise he would vote against it, as long as it's still hypothetical. That sounds like wisdom to me; I can't imagine why we'd want any other answer from a representative.

Disclaimer: Though I'm from Joe's hometown and have been an eager volunteer on his last two campaigns, I am in no way a spokesman for his office or his campaign. These opinions are my own, and I alone am responsible for them.

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by: dauphinb @ Wed Jul 08, 2009 at 21:43:33 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

right (4.00 / 1)

He supports it, but he won't demand it. We get it. You get it. What you don't get is that once enough Representatives have come on board promising to vote against anything without a public option, the final bill will have a public option in it. If it's negotiable to enough Democrats to produce a raw majority of the House, then the bargaining power rests with conservatives instead of progressives.

Are you being deliberately disingenuous? Of course he's "familiar with the public option" and of course he's seen a bill with a public option in it.

If a bill banned a woman's right to choose, we wouldn't have Joe Courtney or Rosa DeLauro needing to wait for the final language to oppose it. Because they're committed to a woman's right to choose. The problem is that they are not similarly committed to a public option in health reform. We are trying to change that. This is not journalism, it is advocacy.

Really? Do you think Joe should've voted against the energy bill? The House vote was so close that he and just a handful of others could've killed it. Do you think the planet would be less fucked if they had?

Cap and Trade is a different story, and I wrote a longish reply to CaptCT but spiked it because it was off topic. But if we have to let trust fund babies triple their wealth to save the planet, fine -- they seem to have the votes to demand it, and we need to save the planet. But health care is different -- adverse selection and moral hazard are baked into the enterprise. Decades upon decades of study have illustrated that a competitive market for health insurance actually forces the establishment of non-market institutions, as "uncertainty in the incidence of disease and in the efficacy of treatment" prevents the market from reaching an equilibrium that covers everyone.

Put another way, core to the enterprise is that the insurance market increases profits by not delivering services, and absent an institution that does not have that incentive, that will be the nature of the business for all time.

If there is no public option, then it really would be better for them to just leave the whole sorry enterprise alone. There's nothing less than a quarter loaf here. We've compromised enough.  

–7.25 / –7.28 | http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/tw...

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by: mattw @ Thu Jul 09, 2009 at 02:32:25 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

Different Issues (0.00 / 0)

If a bill banned a woman's right to choose, we wouldn't have Joe Courtney or Rosa DeLauro needing to wait for the final language to oppose it. Because they're committed to a woman's right to choose. The problem is that they are not similarly committed to a public option in health reform.

I think it's more a matter of the nature of the distinction than of anyone's level of commitment. The question of a woman's right to choose is inherently binary: It either is a right or it isn't. It's not possible to imagine incremental progress on that issue. It is however, possible to imagine incremental progress on healthcare (some might suggest it's hard to imagine anything but incremental progress). There's lots of distance between where we are now and where we need to go, and there are different imaginable paths, made up of differently sized steps, to get from here to there. You're suggesting that if the shortest path is blocked, the next best option is to pick no path at all; I disagree.

What you don't get is that once enough Representatives have come on board promising to vote against anything without a public option, the final bill will have a public option in it.

I absolutely "get" that that's one possible outcome. Another possible outcome is that the House might pass nothing at all. But in any case, simply passing a bill out of the House isn't the finish line, as you well know: The finish line is making effective law, and passing a strong House bill that can't possibly pass the Senate would be no different than passing no bill at all. You say...

If there is no public option, then it really would be better for them to just leave the whole sorry enterprise alone.

...but I'm not sure I agree, and I'm not sure the tens of millions who are totally uninsured would agree, either. I strongly support a public option — hell, I support flat-out single-payer, come to that — and it's likely that a bill without it would be a bad bill. But in advance of knowing the details, it's impossible to know how bad it would be, and thus it's impossible to know whether it would really be worse than the truly horrifying status quo. If a no-public-option bill offered meaningful access to healthcare to any significant fraction of those currently uninsured, it would not only not be "better ... to just leave the whole sorry enterprise alone," it would be positively immoral to do so. I speak here as a father whose daughter would almost certainly be dead had my family been misfortunate enough to be without healthcare coverage 8 years ago, so don't imagine you're more passionate on this issue than I am. This is not a game of ideologies we're talking about; it's massive numbers of human lives.

But this is all horses before carts: Nobody has said they would vote for a bill with no public option; they have only declined to prejudge bills that haven't yet been finished.

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by: dauphinb @ Thu Jul 09, 2009 at 04:52:22 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

Disagree (0.00 / 0)

I think it's more a matter of the nature of the distinction than of anyone's level of commitment. The question of a woman's right to choose is inherently binary: It either is a right or it isn't.

The flip version is "so is healthcare: it's a right, or it isn't."

The slightly longer version is that to those of us fighting about it, a public option is the binary value on which health reform is reform, or isn't.

And in the large picture, for those who don't believe a woman's right to choose is a right, of course it's not binary -- that's why that debate turns up in the form of parental notification laws, in laws restricting interstate travel for women seeking abortion in a jurisdiction where it's limited, in fights over birth control, in life-of-the-mother and health-of-the-mother definitions, in the legal boundaries of a trimester, in father's rights proposals, in mandatory waiting periods, in requirements that a mother examine ultrasounds, in plan b for rape victims, in foreign aid for health services that dispense contraception or perform abortions, and in probably a dozen other points that are being debated and pushed every day.

I'm going to go out on a limb and say that Rosa and Joe C would categorically block any one of those restrictions. If I'm correct in that (I don't want to put words in their mouths, but I perceive our delegation, minus Lieberman, to be 100% solidly pro-choice), it would illustrate that they perceive all those small points to be essential to the entire right to choose. They wouldn't give up a slice of it because they believe that entire right to be indivisible.

Someone who believed that healthcare was a right would treat the public option the same way. That's the acid test. Supporters will keep the bill whole, opponents allow it to be sliced up into a hundred bits. Conservatives want the public option to be negotiable, and still won't vote for it. Progressives will fight for it -- and "no comment" does not count as fighting.

I absolutely "get" that that's one possible outcome. Another possible outcome is that the House might pass nothing at all. But in any case, simply passing a bill out of the House isn't the finish line, as you well know: The finish line is making effective law, and passing a strong House bill that can't possibly pass the Senate would be no different than passing no bill at all.

This exercise is to ensure that nothing can pass the House, pre- or post-reconciliation, without a public option. No public option, no bill. If it is successful, it changes the math in the Senate so they won't even consider a bill without a public option. That is the desired outcome of the people you are arguing with, and it appears to be working.

But this is all horses before carts: Nobody has said they would vote for a bill with no public option; they have only declined to prejudge bills that haven't yet been finished.

And people will continue to be up in his shit on the subject until he DOES prejudge the category of bills that are "health reform with no public option."

–7.25 / –7.28 | http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/tw...

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by: mattw @ Thu Jul 09, 2009 at 05:48:59 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

shorter (0.00 / 0)

For those who want to see reform utterly eliminated, the reasonable-sounding compromise is their tool of choice. That's the reason I introduced the choice metaphor.

And as with choice, giving up just a few more points of contention won't get us closer to consensus, nor will it halt the demands for further compromise from those who wish to see the right banished completely.  

–7.25 / –7.28 | http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/tw...

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by: mattw @ Thu Jul 09, 2009 at 06:13:20 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

One More... (0.00 / 0)

...(hopefully quick) reply, and then I'm going to declare myself at least momentarily talked out on the subject.

I'm going to go out on a limb and say that Rosa and Joe C would categorically block any one of [that long list of anti-choice] restrictions. ...they perceive all those small points to be essential to the entire right to choose. They wouldn't give up a slice of it because they believe that entire right to be indivisible.

I don't doubt you're correct. But imagine, instead, a large subset of the population that was already subject to those restrictions. Would you insist that lawmakers promise not to remove any of them unless they could certainly remove all of them?

You're quite right that it's impossible to partly break something that's whole; it is not, however, impossible to partly mend something that's already broken. Healthcare in this country is broken, and I don't want anyone promising not to fix any of it unless they can fix all of it at once.

A partial fix now (and really, anything that's even vaguely politically feasible is a partial fix compared to the full single-payer solution we must eventually get to) has the potential to be improved and expanded in the coming years; failure to do anything would probably doom healthcare reform for another whole generation. I know which I would choose.

Finally...

Progressives will fight for [the public option] -- and "no comment" does not count as fighting.

None of the people we're talking about here have said anything like "no comment"; they've all come out strongly and consistently in favor of the public option. They just haven't done so in precisely the magic words the "whip counters" want to hear.

It's not a party loyalty thing: I'm all for beating up on Dems who oppose the public option... but our Dems don't oppose it!!!

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by: dauphinb @ Thu Jul 09, 2009 at 06:31:12 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

To extend the metaphor a little further (4.00 / 1)

If health reform was choice, we're "pre-Roe" right now. I understand what you're saying, but what they're going to deliver is going to be the landmark reform for years. Flaws in their reasoning, in their ability to anticipate future conditions, are going to haunt even the best bill. In retrospect maybe the "privacy" umbrella wasn't the best way to establish the right to choose, but now we have to defend the way it was done because the consensus that holds it together could come apart if we muck around with the foundations at this late date.

This is a tremendously huge enterprise here -- and that seems to me to be at the center of both of our arguments. You're arguing that if nothing passes, it will be hard to return to it next month or next year, and I agree. I'm also arguing, though, that it will be even harder to repair the foundations of a fundamentally flawed system two or five or ten years down the road, and that the public option is not something that can be fixed by changing a "200%" to a "300%" in the text someplace. If there is none in the bill that passes, it doesn't seem at all possible to insert one later; and without one, health reform will collapse in on itself.

Look at the news of Anthem's 20-30% rate increase -- and imagine the Federal government being dictated terms by a company or group of companies like that, helpless to reign in the cost because there's nowhere else for people to go. And then imagine that exact same demand being made in 2011, 2012, 2013, and 2014.

Because we've now guaranteed a 90% subsidy to everyone making up to 300% of the poverty line, we have to raise that revenue, and Congress will either have to a) bring in a tax increase of 10-15% every year, b) scrap the program entirely, c) de-insure people starting at the top edge of the income line we've drawn, or d) try to cobble together a public option that fits into the new Federal framework and can be passed in less than 12 months and hopefully implemented in 24 months after that. What a nightmare. My guess would be that we'd go with A the first year, a mix of A and C the second year, and a fierce debate between B and D the third year, after dozens of Democrats have been hurled from office by a bitter and disappointed public. Under the circumstances that we'd come back to add a public option, we are not likely to get it. It's now or never.

I can see that scenario as clear as we all saw the Iraqi insurgency picking off American troops three years after Bush stood in front of the Mission Accomplished banner. And if Obama, Pelosi, and Reid (not to mention Dodd, Courtney, Murphy, et al) declare health reform without a public option to be the panacea to America's healthcare woes, it will be their "Mission Accomplished" moment. We will have (you notice I'm skipping between metaphors now) invaded the private health insurance system with an inadequate level of force and no plan for holding our position when faced with hostile natives, who, after all, know the territory far better than our government ever could.

And Joe Courtney is going to be in a position like a Kerry or Clinton, defending an unsustainable misadventure that passed with his support because, well, he preferred it to be done the right way, but he didn't insist on it when it counted.

I'm having a lot of fun writing this, so hopefully it reads that way instead of paranoid and insane. Metaphors have a way of getting away from you as they go on.

But these guys know what the right thing is -- so it's exhausting in advance knowing how likely it is that they'll vote for the wrong thing when it's on their table because, well they have to do something. And of course,  it's doubly exhausting to know that you and I will be asked to get on the phones and defend this clusterfuck to voters in year 4 when you, I, our Congressmen, and the voters that we're talking to all knew that passing the bill without the public option was a colossally stupid idea.

I guess I want healthcare reform to succeed more than I want it to pass, and most of what we're hearing from DC is that people want it to pass more than they want it to succeed. It's a little bit of a leap to say that the public option = success, but there's the blunt instrument of rallied public opinion again. And besides for which nobody, including our wavering Congressional representatives, has really been advancing an alternative theory of what successful systematic reform would look like absent the public option -- they are just asking us not to demand too much of them right now.  

–7.25 / –7.28 | http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/tw...

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by: mattw @ Thu Jul 09, 2009 at 16:08:00 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

"faith" (0.00 / 0)

Really? It amazes me how quickly this community loses faith in people. 9 months ago Jim Himes was a hero around here, practically the second coming of Ned Lamont. Now nobody seems to be able to speak his name without spitting on the ground. Do you really think he's "check[ed his] soul at the door" in such a short span (or that Courtney, Murphy, et al. have)... or is it just barely possible that there are some complexities and nuances involved in actually making law?

Progressives support candidates for a lot of reasons -- party loyalty, because they "think like us" or they're part of our political community, for transactional reasons, because they will listen to and favor our interests, etc.

I would like to think that I don't have "faith" in any of these politicians -- they're not gods, they're ordinary people. And all of our Congressional delegation spends most of their time in DC -- they don't hear day-to-day what PTA moms are saying about their constituent services, what key activists are being ignored, what long-forgotten promises they're going back on. Some of them consciously reach out and make that a part of their process -- you're hearing less unhappiness with Dodd mainly just because he's reaching out and seems to be considering [everybody's] views. But most don't. So activists make noise. We've got a public forum here, and public pressure is a blunt instrument.

Maybe more to the point (this is personal for me, but I suspect a lot of MLNers are in the same position) ... I'm a child (politically) of the Iraq War, and the notion of trusting an elected official to do the correct thing without public pressure is incomprehensible to me. I won't ever forget that it was a Democratic majority that brought us that war. And I hope that you don't ever like a politician so much that you forget it, either.

I wrote a whole thing about cap and trade here -- but to trim it down, there's always more that an elected can do, and there's always going to be progressive critics demanding they do it. And, while a few might squeal at the sign of criticism from the left, I suspect that most Representatives worth their salt are going to take it as part of the public that they represent, and would probably be glad that people care enough to expect them to be better.  

–7.25 / –7.28 | http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/tw...

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by: mattw @ Thu Jul 09, 2009 at 02:57:52 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

Aww, C'mon! (0.00 / 0)

I would like to think that I don't have "faith" in any of these politicians -- they're not gods, they're ordinary people.

I didn't mean "faith" in any religious or mystical sense, as I'm quite sure you know; I meant it in the sense of "confidence" or "trust"... which ordinary people can earn through their words and deeds. Ordinary people can lose my confidence as well, of course... but declining to adopt a particular tactical approach doesn't rise to the level of a violation of trust.

I'm a child (politically) of the Iraq War, and the notion of trusting an elected official to do the correct thing without public pressure is incomprehensible to me.

Funny... though I'm chronologically a child of the Vietnam War, politically I'm pretty much a child of the Iraq War, too. But I seem to have taken a different lesson from it. For me, the message of the Iraq War was not that we should never trust elected officials, but that we'd better damn well work hard to elect officials we can trust. The details of day-to-day governance are — by design — beyond our direct control; the character of the folks doing the governing is within our control, so we'd better get that right. By working hard to help elect Joe Courtney, and to help reelect him, and by contributing in much smaller ways to the elections of Chris Murphy and Jim Himes, I think I've been putting that learning into action.

...activists make noise. We've got a public forum here, and public pressure is a blunt instrument.

Yeah, I've noticed the noise, not to mention the bluntness of the instrument. I'm just saying we should be directing the bludgeoning at people who actually deserve a smack upside the head, instead of our friends. Courtney, Murphy, Himes, et al., have not automagically become anti-progressive just because they won't be pinned down to this pledge.

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by: dauphinb @ Thu Jul 09, 2009 at 05:20:10 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

I trust Dodd to do the right thing more than most anyone in Congress (0.00 / 0)

... but he still voted the wrong way on Iraq. The idea that we could wipe our brows on election night and just leave it in the capable hands of our good friends in Congress is very attractive to me, but that hasn't seemed to work so well these last couple of years.

What's funny is that what was perceived as harshness in the world of blogs was pretty much the conventional wisdom a couple years later. If it weren't for their lousy votes, we'd either have President Kerry or Clinton right now. The question of how bloggers correctly assessed both the real-world outcome of the "give Bush the authority" compromise and the political impact of betting on reasonableness over principle is an interesting one, but maybe a little too navel-gazey. But bloggers seemed to have it right then, and I suspect that anyone who fucks up the public option will see their prospects for promotion in the ranks sharply diminish in the years to come -- I just have that feeling.

I know you didn't mean faith in the spiritual sense, I was just riffing off the phrase.  

–7.25 / –7.28 | http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/tw...

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by: mattw @ Thu Jul 09, 2009 at 06:08:14 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

Another Way... (0.00 / 0)

...of saying this...

I know you didn't mean faith in the spiritual sense, I was just riffing off the phrase.

...might be "I knew what you meant, but I was deliberately mischaracterizing your intent in order to make you seem stupid."

This has been an interesting and thought-provoking conversation, and I've generally found it stimulating, but it hasn't been without the occasional rhetorical rabbit punch, has it?

I'm a big boy; I can take it. But if the point of a public debate like this is to actually enlighten people, this sort of BS doesn't help anyone.

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by: dauphinb @ Thu Jul 09, 2009 at 06:48:51 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

Not really (0.00 / 0)

Saying that they're "men, not gods" was not really central to my argument anyway. Faith still means faith, and it would have been the same point whether the line read "not perfect" or "not superheroes" etc.

I agree that there have been rabbit punches up and down this thread, including from me, though I can't really understand why you think that's one of them.

–7.25 / –7.28 | http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/tw...

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by: mattw @ Thu Jul 09, 2009 at 14:59:14 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Checking their souls... (4.00 / 1)

Emissions from coal plants are a public health hazard and are destroying the planet. How does anyone, in good conscious, strip the EPA of its ability to regulate the coal industry's worst polluters? It's fiendish, like slowly poisoning your neighbors to death or corroding their lungs.

The House Democrats who we worked our asses off to elect should have written a bill that regulated coal emissions. Period. Voting in favor of a bad bill, and saying it ain't my fault, is just bullshit. Maybe it's time for Courtney and the other CT Democrats to join the Progressive Democratic Caucus so they can do more to get better bills passed.

Regarding losing "faith," quite frankly I often feel betrayed by my representatives lately -- on issues ranging from the trillion dollar gifts to Goldman Sachs, Citigroup, and AIG, to the energy bill, and now to health care. It's a lousy feeling.

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by: CaptCT @ Thu Jul 09, 2009 at 15:20:45 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

I Agree, Capt (0.00 / 0)

That's what I said about the energy bill:

http://www.myleftnutmeg.com/di...

and health and finance reform may go down the same drain.

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by: Jon Kantrowitz @ Wed Jul 08, 2009 at 15:38:58 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Also (0.00 / 0)

and we're supposed to believe he's thrown us over because he (respectfully) declines to make a rash promise about a bill he hasn't even seen yet? It is to laugh!

He should have seen it, as the Education and Labor committee that he sits on has jurisdiction over the bill and the Chairman's draft has a public option in it:

Ed-Labor Health Bill PDF

I should add that he is also a member of that committee's Subcommittee on Health, Employment, Labor, and Pensions. If someone wanted to recommend the bill to him, they could say on the phone to support the public option "as included in the tri-committee bill" and anyone answering the phone would know exactly what you were talking about.

To say that Courtney isn't familiar with the public option because he hasn't seen a bill that contains it, or that he doesn't know the implications of opposing a bill without it... well, that is to laugh.  

–7.25 / –7.28 | http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/tw...

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by: mattw @ Wed Jul 08, 2009 at 16:18:56 PM UTC

[ Parent ]