Ram It Through Mr. President

[babylonsister]

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2010/03/09/ram_it_through_mr_president.html

Ram It Through Mr. President
By Richard Cohen


Googling to my heart's content on a recent eve, I decided to match "health care" with "ram" to see what would happen. What I got was about 9.8 million hits, some of them right on the nose and reflecting the current conservative meme that after more than a year, several votes, countless presidential speeches and having to look upon the face of Harry Reid some 10,000 times, the health care bill is being "rammed" through Congress -- an absurdity that now has currency through sheer repetition. It is not exactly the renowned vaunted Big Lie, just a miserable little one.

snip//

Great presidents lead. In a sense, Lincoln "rammed" through the Emancipation Proclamation just as FDR "rammed" through Lend-Lease, Truman "rammed" through desegregation of the military and Lyndon Johnson "rammed" the Civil Rights Act down the throat of a gagging South. These might be considered more dramatic issues than mundane health care, I grant you -- but grant me an exception for someone putting off doctor visits because he or she can't afford to be sick. To that person, this bill is as dramatic as the difference between sickness and health -- the great divide of mankind.

The baleful fact is that the country suffers from a surfeit of democracy -- a gazillion interest groups, a gazillion blogs, a gazillion talk shows and all of them insisting on transparency so a gazillion eyes peer over the shoulders of politicians. The black but necessary art of politics shies from the sun. Little gets done. Backrooms have been turned into rec rooms and meetings are seminars. We are doomed. Worse, we are bored.

Google does not tell the whole story. It fails to answer what's wrong with the old belief -- a virtual childhood mantra -- that "majority rules"? It was never "supermajority rules," and the presidency was never intended as a weather vane, turning this way and that on the slight breeze of the latest poll. Lead and the people will -- or will not -- follow. Either way, ram the damn thing, Mr. President. Ram it!

[MUAD_DIB]

1. Would he be able to Rahm it through?

[ShortnFiery]

2. and watch on "in horror" as our party sinks like a lead balloon.

Oh wait!?! President Obama, et. al., are RICH and will land on their feet. The rest of working america (95%)? Not so much.

[Jennicut]

3. The thing is, it would not even be reconciliation for the entire bill. If the House

passes the Senate bill then the bill passed. Reconciliation would be done to change a few things. It is a total lie. But that is the media for you.

[girl gone mad]

4. Have the HCR supporters lost all sense of irony?

The time to lead was months ago. Now he's stuck with a junk bill that lobbyists love and the people hate.

He should have rammed through real reform, like his supporters begged him to do. Instead, he spent his political capital defending bankster bonuses and expanding the wars.

[ProSense]

5. "The time to lead was months ago."

Seven sucessful votes later, the time to lead is now.

[babylonsister]

6. I'm one of the 'people' and I'll take it. But you sure have the r/w

talking points down pat.

[Name removed]

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[HughMoran]

7. The bill helps millions

...including my family.

[girl gone mad]

8. This bill will hurt one of my family members very badly.

I don't believe that you know for certain whether this bill will help your family or not, but I know with absolute certainty that it will hurt mine.

[Jester Messiah]

10. What, you got an insurance exec for an uncle? [nt]

[JTFrog]

12. I know for certain it will help mine.

I have three boys between the ages of 19 and 22 that were kicked off my health insurance on their 19th birthdays and do not have health care. All three could be added back to my family plan without any change in premiums as our family plan is the same amount whether it's just a spouse or spouse and kids on the plan.

[FrenchieCat]

16. I just found out my Friend's daughter, who recently turned 19,

was denied coverage on her parents policy, because when she was 16,
she went through Drug Rehab....on their current Insurance policy.
She graduated from the program and is doing great from what I can tell.....
and yet, they are calling the fact that she used drugs at one time
in her life to the point of seeking help as a Pre-Existing condition.

That's exactly what this HCR bill would stop.

[JTFrog]

17. Exactly.

So many people would receive help NOW by getting the ball rolling. I want more and I want it faster, but doing nothing would be catastrophic to my family and so many others in this country.

[freddie mertz]

18. They have indeed.

How about "Rahm" it...?

I'll leave WHERE to "Rahm" it your imagination....:evilgrin:

[Phx_Dem]

11. Yes, ram it, cram it, jam it and shove it through.

Whatever it takes.

[Mike 03]

13. Do it. There is no point in holding back now, because whatever we do, we will be attacked.

Not to proceed doesn't make sense at this point.

[PurityOfEssence]

14. Absolutely. Damn the torpedoes.

Hell, after Obama's excoriation of insurance companies yesterday, he needs to realize that there's no turning back. He's pulled a gun in a biker bar; if he doesn't use it, he won't be able to pass gas or water.

It's an outrage that this heap of dangerous shit is the best we're going to get, but it's time to force the issue.

[ibegurpard]

15. By all means

thirty million plus mandated customers...the Insurance industry thanks you (the windfall should help defray the costs of those pesky regulations)
Oh, and thanks also for institutionalizing for-profit insurance as the lynchpin of healthcare...every other industrialized country in the world got it wrong of course.