I think David Brooks is right. Why is President Obama doing this?

[MISSDem]

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/21/opinion/21brooks.html?_r=1

[FiveGoodMen]

1. We live in a terrible world if Brooks is even a little bit right

[MISSDem]

5. Hve you read his piece today or any in the last

few weeks? He is an admirer of the President and, I believe, wants what is best for the country, which is what we should all want.

[bemildred]

9. He's a self-serving asshole.

He gives a shit about nobody but himself. You heard it here first.

[depakid]

21. Which is one reason why I won't click on the link

I could care less what that charlatan has to say.

[WestSeattle2]

20. I agree with David Brooks. Idealogues in both parties have

a colorful track record of creating spectacular electoral train wrecks that take years, sometimes decades, to repair. How many times must we relearn that American's tolerance for change is limited to small, incremental steps? This is what it took to get Medicare launched:

"The groups who previously argued against national healthcare switched their focus from opposing the bill to creating new versions of it. As a result there were three prominent forms of the bill: John Byrne’s, the American Medical Association’s, and, of course, the Presidential administration's bill (known as Medicare). John Byrne was a Republican committee member who proposed that doctors' services and drugs would be financed; also, participation in government aid would be voluntary for the aged. If an elderly patient did need the help, his or her financing would be “scaled to the amounts of the participant’s Social Security cash benefits” and the financing would come from the government’s revenues. The AMA proposed Eldercare, which provided government financing for physician’s services, surgical charges, drugs, nursing home costs, x-ray and lab services. When brought back to the Ways and Means committee, these three bills were presented: John Byrnes, Eldercare, and Medicare. When deliberations began in 1965, both AMA members and their suggestions were rejected due to the AMA’s unruly conduct at meetings.

Deliberations became increasingly confusing. Wilbur Mills, the head of the Ways and Means committee, suggested combining Byrne’s ideas and Medicare. Mills took on the task of drafting the bill that ultimately became a law. In combining the two bills. John Byrne’s suggestion, which included lower taxes, had to be slightly altered as high-taxes were necessary for the program’s predicted high costs.

During March 1965, Wilbur Mills, with the help of many other people and groups, presented a draft of the bill to Congress. The bill went through more than five hundred changes between the Senate and the House. Finally, the bill passed with the majority vote in both the house (307-116) and the senate (70-24). It came about as two amendments to the Social Security Act. Title 18 became known as Medicare and Title 19 became known as Medicaid. Title 18 includes Part A, which provides hospital insurance to the aged, and Part B which provides supplemental medical insurance. Title 19 proclaims that at the states discretion, it can finance the healthcare for individuals who were at or close to the public assistance level.

On July 30, 1965, President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the bill making it Public Law 89-97. The signing took place in Independence, Missouri and was attended by Harry S. Truman. When LBJ signed the bill he “credited Truman for ‘planting the seeds of compassion and duty which have today flowered into care for the sick and serenity for the fearful’” Implementation of the amendments required extensive data processing and the re-configuration of hospital policies country wide.

The passage of the new healthcare program marked an important point in American history; it was the America’s first public health insurance program. Although the overall politics of Medicare and Medicaid were liberal, the help of both John Byrnes, a Republican, and the American Medical Association was essential in drafting what came to be known as the Social Security Amendments of 1965. Medicare and Medicaid were one of the few successful programs that lasted from Johnson’s vision of the Great Society."

[FrenchieCat]

2. Why is David Brooks doing this?

Because he is status quo, and doesn't want to see decent Health Care reform pass. I
It would hurt his party that much more, and he knows it.....
so he sings with the opposition choir.

Why are you even asking?

[JuniperLea]

3. Just more of Brooks' passive aggressive bullshit...

I think he's dead wrong... but he's part of the lying machine, mixing truth with lies like the devil himself, and repeating them until people start believing.

Be LIE ving...

[Autumn]

4. K/R n/t

[MISSDem]

7. what does k/r/nt mean?

??

[robinlynne]

10. k means kick r means recommend n/t means there is no thread, i.e. nothing written

below the subject line. no text maybe. so you don't go in to read the rest of the post because there isn't anymore than what you see in the subject line.

[Autumn]

12. Kicked and recommended,

that gives it a reply so more people will see it.

[bemildred]

6. Brooks is a "Conservative" tool.

Has been for a long time. Unless you want the be disinformed, there is no reason to take him seriously.

[babylonsister]

8. "Brooks is lying."

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2009/07/lets-look-at-politics-by-digby-theres.html

snip//

Mrs Greenspan interviewed Ron Brownstein today and predictably began by quoting David Brooks' pathetic little schoolyard taunt from this morning's NY Times:

"Machiavelli said a leader should be feared as well as loved. Obama is loved by the Dem chairmen, but he is not feared. On health care, Obama has emphasized cost control. the Chairmen flouted his priorities because they don't fear him."

First of all, Brooks is lying. The chairmen of the House committees wrote a bill that will be deficit neutral when you put all the legislation together. People know this, but they want to pretend that the CBO scoring incomplete plans is somehow meaningful. Brooks is simply following the Republican strategy to make health care reform Obama's Waterloo and he's doing his part here by portraying Obama as a wimp. Nothing unusual about any that. It's the oldest story in the book.

[RandomThoughts]

11. His comment comes from the perspective of USA being a center right country

If you actually ask about policies, like progressive taxes or health care, you see that his idea of the middle is the right.

The administration is not losing support from the middle, but some support is being deceived by right media through deception or unequal showing of perspective.

Also defending Machiavellianism says what side he is on. Fear only works for short term, then requires more fear, it is a downward spiral. Quite interestingly there is two reasons people don't do wrong. One is they fear the consequences, the other is because they know it is wrong.

Those motivated only with fear have no moral center to guide them. In that, since we have an imperfect society, there probably is some fear in the society for that reason.

However establishing the thought process of what is ultimately more morally right, removes the need for fear for those people, because they 'do' for a higher morale reason.

So those without morals descend to a torment of fear, which gets worse and worse over time to maintain its effect. While those that act because something seems correct or right do not need the pressure of fear since they are acting based on what they think is fair.

It is possible for two sides of an argument to both think they are being fair, at that point education and truth in information becomes what brings a society forward.

[MISSDem]

13. I always think of William Raspberry when I read these kinds

of posts that won't allow as to how the "other side" could ever get anything right or offer any thing helpful. There are folks on both sides of the isle who care what happens to the country and its citizens.

[bemildred]

15. Yah, me too. And a few others like Molly. nt

[Puzzler]

14. The latest GOP meme right now...

... is that Obama is losing the health care reform issue. This is untrue. The losing is 100% in the minds of the MSM. Brooks is parroting a variation of the current meme.

[Jim Sagle]

16. Bill Nelson, is that you?

:rofl:

[sasquatch]

26. +1

[MISSDem]

17. And he doesn't even talk about the wars that are dragging on and

on. What's with that in the new administration? The body count starting to add up in Afghanistan and....on and on we go.

[Fearless]

18. Sounds like sour grapes.

[MISSDem]

19. how do you mean sour grapes?

I don't see it.

[Fearless]

25. Just that imho it seems that he writes this in a tone...

That feels like he isn't getting his way.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

22. It's the usual Republicanite nonsense, the usual pressure to drive the Dems

even farther to the right, and yes, I did read it.

Basically, Brooks is saying that Obama is too liberal, and if he actually believes that, he's too stupid to be writing a column, but since he writes well and probably isn't stupid, I'll have to assume that he's lying.

[bemildred]

23. Well said. nt

[BlueMTexpat]

24. You have GOT to be kidding!

David Brooks uses grammar and syntax correctly. It's his logic that fails. But if you like the DLC, you will love David.
I like neither.

[sasquatch]

27. And marketing campaign slogans