Waterloo...by David Frum (!)

[Jennicut]

Waterloo
by David Frum

Conservatives and Republicans today suffered their most crushing legislative defeat since the 1960s.

It’s hard to exaggerate the magnitude of the disaster. Conservatives may cheer themselves that they’ll compensate for today’s expected vote with a big win in the November 2010 elections. But:

(1) It’s a good bet that conservatives are over-optimistic about November – by then the economy will have improved and the immediate goodies in the healthcare bill will be reaching key voting blocs.

(2) So what? Legislative majorities come and go. This healthcare bill is forever. A win in November is very poor compensation for this debacle now.

So far, I think a lot of conservatives will agree with me. Now comes the hard lesson:

A huge part of the blame for today’s disaster attaches to conservatives and Republicans ourselves.

At the beginning of this process we made a strategic decision: unlike, say, Democrats in 2001 when President Bush proposed his first tax cut, we would make no deal with the administration. No negotiations, no compromise, nothing. We were going for all the marbles. This would be Obama’s Waterloo – just as healthcare was Clinton’s in 1994.

Only, the hardliners overlooked a few key facts: Obama was elected with 53% of the vote, not Clinton’s 42%. The liberal block within the Democratic congressional caucus is bigger and stronger than it was in 1993-94. And of course the Democrats also remember their history, and also remember the consequences of their 1994 failure.

This time, when we went for all the marbles, we ended with none.

http://www.stumbleupon.com/su/27MJRN/www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2010/03/healthcare_vote_is_republican.html?ft=1&f=103943429

Rethugs bet on defeating the whole thing instead of trying to work with Obama and co. It is their Waterloo to deal with now. Even a conservative admits it.

[jillan]

1. Wow - Just wow! I wonder if the other pigs will get a clue.

This could be the best post of the nite!

[Cha]

2. "The Democrats also remember their history"..

Good for us the gops don't remember or know anything.

The gops were despicible..not only did they not do anything but lie and say "no:cry:"..they were grossly disrespectful..and it will come back to bite them.

[jillan]

3. We have to never let anyone forget the name calling and the spitting that went on this weekend.

I wonder if any of them went to Confession today in church?

[Cha]

5. I will do my part..that's not going down the memory hole.

[sonias]

4. Waterloo with pictures

Waterloo! Diary at DailyKos



:toast:

[Cha]

7. Thanks! Perfect..

We needed the pics. :D

[sonias]

20. I don't know who did the Photoshop photos

But they are fabulous! :fistbump:

I'm still laughing about them!

[NYC Liberal]

15. OMG! The pose matches his expression perfectly!

:rofl:

[Jennicut]

6. More from this article. Frum nails his own party.

Frum:

No illusions please: This bill will not be repealed. Even if Republicans scored a 1994 style landslide in November, how many votes could we muster to re-open the “doughnut hole” and charge seniors more for prescription drugs? How many votes to re-allow insurers to rescind policies when they discover a pre-existing condition? How many votes to banish 25 year olds from their parents’ insurance coverage? And even if the votes were there – would President Obama sign such a repeal?

We followed the most radical voices in the party and the movement, and they led us to abject and irreversible defeat.

There were leaders who knew better, who would have liked to deal. But they were trapped. Conservative talkers on Fox and talk radio had whipped the Republican voting base into such a frenzy that deal-making was rendered impossible. How do you negotiate with somebody who wants to murder your grandmother? Or – more exactly – with somebody whom your voters have been persuaded to believe wants to murder their grandmother?

I’ve been on a soapbox for months now about the harm that our overheated talk is doing to us. Yes it mobilizes supporters – but by mobilizing them with hysterical accusations and pseudo-information, overheated talk has made it impossible for representatives to represent and elected leaders to lead. The real leaders are on TV and radio, and they have very different imperatives from people in government. Talk radio thrives on confrontation and recrimination. When Rush Limbaugh said that he wanted President Obama to fail, he was intelligently explaining his own interests. What he omitted to say – but what is equally true – is that he also wants Republicans to fail. If Republicans succeed – if they govern successfully in office and negotiate attractive compromises out of office – Rush’s listeners get less angry. And if they are less angry, they listen to the radio less, and hear fewer ads for Sleepnumber beds.

So today’s defeat for free-market economics and Republican values is a huge win for the conservative entertainment industry. Their listeners and viewers will now be even more enraged, even more frustrated, even more disappointed in everybody except the responsibility-free talkers on television and radio. For them, it’s mission accomplished. For the cause they purport to represent, it’s Waterloo all right: ours

[4lbs]

8. If the Repukes would have just agreed to vote YEA on the 80% they claim to be with Obama on, then

they could have campaigned on that.

Now, their only hope is that the economy is still in major suck mode in November and that the majority of voters hate this HCR that will actually do many of them good.

[sonias]

9. I'm glad they played for all the marbles and lost

This may be the first nail in their coffin for November. The "party of no" is a failure!

[jillan]

11. The economy will get better for one reason alone...

With the weather warming up, construction jobs will too.
They will be fixing potholes, doing repairs from this past winter. It will definitely make things look better anyway.

[Liberal_Stalwart71]

10. Mr. Frum--with all due respect--do not lay this at the feet of liberals!!!

Added in response to David Frum:

Don't turn this into a LIBERAL THING! For this reform to be truly liberal, the Congress would have passed a single payer system; or, at the very least, a public option. We couldn't even get a public option. Before the debate even started, single payer was "off the table". And the president, while asserting that he supported a public option, never fought for it. :(

Second, Frum is being disingenuous! Both the House and Senate bent over backwards to get Republican buy-in and support. The Democrats and the President even sold out their base and were able to get the most liberal of all liberals--Dennis Kucinich in the House and Bernie Sanders in the Senate--to sign on to a Republican bill!!

This health care reform bill, while it does some good things, is essentially very conservative. Rather than forcing the Senate to consider a public option provision that was approved in the House, the House was forced--by the President and Rahmbo--to accept a very flawed Senate bill that doesn't amount to comprehensive change.

As my conservative, former Republican friend told me tonight as the votes were being counted, it is amazing that the Democrats were killing themselves trying to force other Democrats to vote for a largely Republican bill...with absolutely NO Republican votes.

OVER 200 REPUBLICAN AMENDMENTS ACCEPTED!!!!

Don't blame the liberals, Mr. Frum. The Democratic Party threw us under the bus long time ago...before the debate even started.... :(

[Jennicut]

13. Frum addresses that. He blames his own party for not compromising on an already compromised bill.

Frum:

Could a deal have been reached? Who knows? But we do know that the gap between this plan and traditional Republican ideas is not very big. The Obama plan has a broad family resemblance to Mitt Romney’s Massachusetts plan. It builds on ideas developed at the Heritage Foundation in the early 1990s that formed the basis for Republican counter-proposals to Clintoncare in 1993-1994.http://www.stumbleupon.com/su/27MJRN/www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2010/03/healthcare_vote_is_republican.html?ft=1&f=103943429

Now, Dems have put forth the foundation for the govt. getting involved in small increments in the health care system. It opens the door. That is why Frum gets that this is a disaster for the Rethugs.

[Liberal_Stalwart71]

17. I understand that line of reasoning, but he seems to be arguing that negotiation would lead to a

political victory in the long run...

The thing that just sickens me and should be repulsive to ALL Americans, no matter the political stripe, is that the Republicans care more about securing their majority . Frum writes/speaks as if he is saddened by the fact that the economy will improve in time for the midterm elections. That, to me, is absolutely deplorable. He doesn't even care about the state of the economy nor the plight of the average American. He seems to be lamenting the fact that even if the Republicans gain seats, it won't be the majority.

Sure he admits that it would have been politically expedient for Republicans to compromise and negotiate with the administration. But the end is always about achieving power rather than for the ultimate well being of the American people.

ABSOLUTELY ABHORRENT, these Republicans!! And anti-American!!

[No DUplicitous DUpe]

12. David Frum makes a lot of good points. Wait, did I just say that?...

he says, "It’s a good bet that conservatives are over-optimistic about November"

I agree. And he states that Rush and Hannity are bad for their party. Wow.

Kick! and thanks for posting this, Jenni.

[besdayz]

14. new game

just by making the republicans run on this issue is a win for the dems...we are finally playing on our turf.

i'm of the school that progressives benefit when the campaign issues are domestic discretionary spending...when it becomes military related, conservatives win.

the 2008 and 2006 elections i think swung our way b/c of ethics issues, deficit spending, and recession more than the war issue....remember 2004, war unpopular, still bush wins.

so while we may lose some seats in 2010, some due to having to defend more open seats and some due to the trend that the minority party picks up seats in midterms..

it won't be as bad as predicted...the house will be razor close...the senate retained by 2 or 3 seats....

[DAMANgoldberg]

16. Suggestion to 1st political "victory" event...

A huge rally in Waterloo, Iowa! Fitting political irony if there ever is.

[Metric System]

18. I still can't believe he's Barbara Frum's son.

[Historic NY]

19. Remember that when the GOP Teabaggers say they are the majority..

the present occupant got 53% of the Vote thats a real majority.