The Anti-Corporatist Movement

[NJmaverick]

Very good DK article discussing one of the big source of friction between some progressives and the Democratic party.

Nevertheless, the Obama approach to reaching near-universality of health care coverage is built on expanding existing government programs, helping more employers offer coverage, and compelling private insurers to accept unprofitable customers in return for mandating that a lot of healthy people buy their coverage. It isn't designed around an ideology that is opposed to private insurance, but around an ideology of making sure people have access to doctors and won't be bankrupted if they get sick. The public option isn't central to this goal in spite of its many benefits. But, for the anti-corporatists, the public option was the key component because it would allow people to opt-out of the private insurance system that they oppose on moral and ideological grounds.

It is this distinction of goals that explains a lot of the disconnect between the Democrats in Congress and the White House, and a large percentage of progressive activists. For anti-corporatist progressives, they wanted the health care debate to advance their view that private health insurance is wrong and immoral, while the Party never agreed to wage that fight. In fact, going back as far as Clinton's 2000 campaign, the leadership of the Party has been focused on building on the private insurance model, but increasing regulation and protecting consumer rights. You may have noticed that Obama starting touting the fact that the health care bills basically include the long-desired Patients' Bill of Rights. Obama is basically fulfilling the path advocated by the Democratic Party ever since they became convinced that universality could not be achieved without working with the system we have. For the Party, the public option was more important as a cost-saver than it was an ideological statement. They'd trade it for Medicare 55+ in a heartbeat because they're focused on providing the most health care for the least money, not on screwing the insurance industry.

How you feel about this probably depends at least in part on your temperament. You may feel that the Party's refusal to fight for the abolition of private health insurance on moral grounds is a result of the campaign contributions they get from the industry (or that they fear their opponents will get). On the other hand, you may see it is more explainable as a strategy to expand coverage that can actually pass through Congress. It doesn't really matter a whole lot which explanation you prefer, so long as you realize that nothing becomes law unless it first passes through Congress. We don't elect party leaders to lose votes in Congress, but to win them and get reforms enacted into law. We elected Obama to do what he is doing, which is reform the health care system, expand coverage, increase regulation, protect customers, and do it in an affordable way. We did not elect him to wage a principled but losing jihad against the private insurance industry. He never promised that.

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2009/12/27/819520/-The-Anti-Corporatist-Movement

[RepublicanElephant]

1. thank you. nt

[TwilightGardener]

2. Good article. I believe there was a big expectation that Obama

and Democrats were going to dismantle, or at least punish, the private insurance industry--and since they didn't, they're "corporate". But there was no way we were going to drive insurance companies out of business. The Democratic Party never had that as a goal, either stated or implicit, as far as I know.

[phleshdef]

5. Exactly, unless Obama nationalized all banks and shut down all insurance, he is a "corporatist"...

...at least in the minds of a lot of people that post here.

[Warren Stupidity]

12. Actually we have pointed out several existing mandate systems

that would be fair and ethical and universal. They all incorporate strict regulation of benefits and costs, limit basic insurance to non-profit and allow supplementary insurance to be for-profit, an guarantee that everyone is in the system. For example Switzerland and Japan. But we are not getting anything resembling those systems. Instead we are getting a boondoggle cash-cow for the for-profit health insurance industry. We are getting this crap because the senate in particular is an almost completely corrupt institution.

[phleshdef]

18. I don't buy it. When the law sais the insurance companies only get 15% for noncare expenses...

...then thats not a "boondoggle cash cow". You people are so busy crying from the rooftops about the lack of regulations and cost controls that you are ignoring all the regulations and cost controls.

[Warren Stupidity]

39. Yeah it is a boondoggle cash cow

First and foremost, the actual cost of transferring money from consumer to provider is around 3%. So the health care access rent scam is baking in 12% as pure profit. That is 12% of the input revenue that will not provide ANY HEALTH CARE AT ALL.

Second, the new 15% rule is a 'cost plus' arrangement. That means that the government has to concurrently and non-corruptly regulate costs or the health care access rent scammers will simply drive up alleged costs in order to make that cost-plus 15% as big a number as possible. There will be a perpetual contest in washington to maximize that number. We, the people, the health care consumers, will be losing that contest on a regular basis. We have nothing comparable in the way of bribes to offer the 100 senators that corporate america offers them on a regular basis. We are not even players in that game.

I am not ignoring 'the regulations and cost controls'. You are naive if you think that we have effective regulation of business activity in washington. We don't. We have corrupt practices. We have the proverbial foxes in the henhouse regulation.

[phleshdef]

59. Everything you said is based on a bunch of "what if"s and has no place in a realistic discussion.

What if the government doesn't properly regulate it? What if they jack up the costs to make up for the losses? What if monkeys fly out of Obama's ass, spreading joy and laughter to all the world?

Get back to me when you are ready to drop the trendy buzzwords and what if scenarios.

[Warren Stupidity]

62. wtf? Try an honest argument.

You are asserting that we will have honest and diligent cost control regulation. You have no evidence to back that up, I have the long and sorry history of corrupt ineffective regulation in washington to back up my counter assertion that honest and diligent cost control regulation is a joke.

Your response indicates an inability to present an honest argument.

[NJmaverick]

90. So the government that is incapable of regulation would be very

capable of running a public option?:crazy:

[niceypoo]

47. Face it

It is the institutionalization of an industry that has been robbing us blind. It is privatization. No amount of lipstick or perfume makes it pretty.

At every step the bill has been frog-marched further and further to the right. We swallowed the bitter pill of the Baucus bill because, 'it will be fixed in the senate.' Well, the senate bill is even farther to the right. DOH! The Baucus bill is now the more progressive of the two bills. Thank God for progressive outrage. It was a wakeup call for Obama and the Democratic congressional majority.

[Tom Rinaldo]

3. Since when has good policy been pigeon holed as "ideological"?

There is an ideological basis to every aspect of our political system. Some ideology reinforces the status quo, some challenges it.

[Armstead]

4. The dominance of corporations is a huge aspect of many problems

And the imposition of corporate interests and values on society is a major reason we have gone so far off the track.

Any enlightened form of capitalism must also balance the interests of the broad publicagainst the natural tendency of the wealthy and ;powetrful to become ever more so by siphoning wealth from everyone else.

Solving the "real problems of real people" in a "pragmatic" way has to start with restoring the balance of power and restoring the basic liberal notion that the public interest and social justice must be asserted to rein in the excesses of the "free market system."

[NJmaverick]

9. The article addessed this issue as well

<<There are merits to the anti-corporatist progressives' critiques and preferred policies, but their analysis and strategies are badly flawed. There is another progressive movement in this country that isn't ideologically wedded to an anti-corporatist agenda. We're wedded to seeing that we get the best possible outcomes and that Obama has a successful presidency. We may share most of the goals of the anti-corporatists, but we place those goals in a different place in the queue. >>

[Armstead]

14. There is a difference between true Free Enterprise Capitalism and Corporatism

Being Anti-Corporate is not the same as Anti-Business.

The concentration of wealth and power in this country through deregulation, mergers and aquisitions and other forms on Monopoly Corporate Capitalism is frightening.

Over the last 20 years, we have seen many industries shrink from a mix of large, mid-sized and small businesses into the hands of a few mega Monopolies. It is a geometric process that is the inevitable result of unregulated capitalism.

The checks and balances were removed. As a result, we have a handful of Corporate States whose power overshadows the government.

The "left" is often accused of being naive. Well those who are really naive are those who placer their faith in unregulated market forces. Without a strong counterbalance of regulations and public programs, Competitive Free Enterprise Capitalism devolves into Monopolistic Corporate Capitalism.

[NJmaverick]

25. You are creating a false frame. There is no one in the progressive movement that doesn't want

strong regulation. Where the difference is in the the desire to destroy corporations rather than simply control and regulate them.

[Warren Stupidity]

63. how would you know what the progressive movement wants?

[Armstead]

68. I think he means the corporate "progressive" movement

You know the DLC who call themselves progressives but dislike "the left" and liberalism as much as they supposedlty oppose the Republicans.

[NJmaverick]

80. It would have been nicer if you addressed my point I raised instad of hurling insults

[Armstead]

104. Well I did address hyour point -- But when you twist positions to "destrioying corporations"...

Then a few choice words are in order

[treestar]

76. Good point

they don't say what they want, they just tear down.

If they got the public option, they'd still be tearing down this reform, mark my words.

The corporations would still exist even with the public option.

[Armstead]

106. Maybe if you bothered to actually read (listen) you might figure it out

Informed disagreement is fine

Ignorant disagreement is just ignorant

[NJmaverick]

79. I am a progressive, not an anti-corporatist like yourself

[Warren Stupidity]

94. you appear to have no idea what we mean by that nt

[AllentownJake]

6. If it was only Health Insurance you'd have a leg to stand on

I'm a little more outraged by tax breaks through rule interpretations to banks who received TARP payments, the banks paying back the TARP payments with the tax breaks, and their executives and share holders getting the benefit of being a tax payer subsidiary without accepting responsibility for their actions that have left million unemployed and without insurance.

But hey, I'm just an anti-business asshole.

[NJmaverick]

8. The article addessed this issue as well

<<The situation with TARP, the Fed, and the banking and mortgage industries are a bit different. The issues raised there were not part of the primaries or integral to Obama's vision for America. The financial meltdown was a problem he had to address, not a promise he wanted to fulfill. But there is a similar disconnect between a segment of the progressive world and the administration. Many progressives wanted to see a nationalization of the banks for ideological reasons. But those reasons preexisted the meltdown. Others want to destroy the independence of the Federal Reserve, but that has been a long-cherished goal and is not really a reaction to our current situation. For a lot of progressives, they saw the financial crisis as an opportunity to accomplish big things that might not come along again if not pursued by Obama at the height of the crisis. So they advocated strongly for those things and grew frustrated when Obama refused to follow along.

Congress is working on a new regulatory framework for the financial, banking, and mortgage industries, and they will try to pass those reforms early next year. It will be that legislation that determines how well Main St. does versus Wall Street going forward. I am sure it will not be as anti-corporatist as most progressives (including me) would like. But, again, it will have to pass Congress or nothing at all will change. And Congress is not progressive. >>

[AllentownJake]

10. I've read the summary of the proposed regulation

It is a giant joke. The same democrats that killed a public option stripped the smallest measures of reform in the banking bill in the house. I expect them to outright make the regulatory situation worse in the Senate, and the President to have a rose garden signing ceremony declaring victory.

When you have people like Larry Summers and Timothy Geithner leading the fight, one who killed regulation in the 1990s and the other who insisted that AIG pay full on their contracts at taxpayer expense despite offers to accept 40 cents on the dollar by even Goldman Sachs, I have little hope in this administration nor with their actions this year, have I bought that they have found religion when they subsidized the repayment of the only leverage the administration had.

[NJmaverick]

11. You know listening to you Jake, you never have a positive thing to say

it seems like the ONLY thing you are looking for is things to complain about. Even when something good is done or happens, you refuse to give credit or even acknowledge it. That simply is not right.

[AllentownJake]

17. Give me something positive to talk about

I swear, I'm not part of the cult of accentuate the positive, I will refuse to call shit Gold, no matter how much you try to spray paint it and sell it to me.

[NJmaverick]

20. One can't give you something that doesn't exist

[ChiciB1]

27. Do they Make Male Pom-Poms??? n/t

[NJmaverick]

28. You know they used to talk about who one would like in a fox hole

you would be the one in the fox hole whining about too many rocks on your side while we are all busy fighting the enemy. Fair weather type as it were.

[ChiciB1]

91. Betcha NOT! I Used To Beat Up All The Boys Who Got In My Face!! n/t

[ipaint]

16. Yes don't you know jake when you point out the obvious massive failings that built

into the foundation of the supposed "change" this administration is ushering that means you have a character flaw. That any and all criticism can be traced to personal human failing in your make up. Don't you know that criticism will only be tolerated when the proper amount of deference and unquestioning obedience is displayed towards our great leader. Anything short of that is a failing on your part.

Get with the program will you. :spank:

[AllentownJake]

21. I know I refuse to acknowledge that even though the emperor's new clothes

Were sown by an imaginary thread by a group of scam artist, he is in fact wearing some fine Calvin Klein underwear.

[NJmaverick]

23. Self deception is the sad to see

[AllentownJake]

113. Go back to the DLC hole you crawled out of nt.

[dave29]

24. We don't have an emperor, Jake.

:(

[NJmaverick]

26. Sadly in his world there is one

[AllentownJake]

116. I'm as every bit as critical of the other "leadership" in the party right now

Your slurs wound me not, for I have seen your kind before, although in a different shade.

[Armstead]

108. We have a whole class of emperors and empresses

There is an oligarchy that benefits greatly at the expense of everyone else. And their power -- in both political parties as well as in governemnt and society -- is far disproportunate to their tiny number.

[treestar]

64. Isn't it just a bit strange to find nothing positive, however?

With a Republican I could understand it but . . .

bitterness is just so unappealing.

[ipaint]

78. He lost me on the cover-up of torture. The look forward meme.

Fairly early on. The "good" stuff is only considered an accomplishment when compared to the massive failures of the recent past. On their own they are the bare minimum that should be expected from a democrat.

His inability to uphold his oath by upholding the constitution is appalling. I don't need to be protected from made by the USA terrorists. I need to be protected from presidents who condone and forgive torture and continue illegal spying on americans.

And I don't trust a single politician and that includes grayson, dean, sanders and kucinich. My father was a democrat union man and he always taught me the lot of them need to be watched like hawks and never trusted. I think that's healthy. It served him well because he saw through the hope and change hype well before I did.

The party has changed, morphed into repub lite, not me.

[treestar]

73. Explain why if goldman sachs were destroyed tomorrow and

Timothy Geitner put in jail we'd have so much better a world.

These memes are taking on a life of their own with no examination. We're "supposed" to have Goldman Sachs, yet some people work there is lower level jobs, probably very many. Explain to them why they should suffer for the revolution.

You're the great campaigner, get the masses to agree to get rid of the life they now have and take great risks to change to - what? a world with no corporations, small farms and small businesses only? Wouldn't that make us something like a small nation in the third world? Or like the 1980s Soviet Union? And why would the politicians be less corrupt?

What world are you actually aiming for here - what is the positive goal sought? Even if you'd gotten the Public Option, Goldman sachs would still be around, so there seems to be more to it than that.

[ipaint]

81. See how it works under their thumb.

Massive criminal abuses are forgiven because, well what would we all do without them.

I guess we will never find out as long as collectively we cherish our chains and fear justice.

[AllentownJake]

115. They will embrace anyting in protection of their pretend saviour

They are no better than the people who would hang pictures of Bush and Jesus next to each other in Indiana when I lived there.

I refuse to embrace their hero worship, so they attack me, yet I was ever part of the movement, if not a bigger part in most cases that swept these men to power. Yet my cries for justice are ignored because they feel it is pragmatic.

[Warren Stupidity]

7. Gee actually 'moral grounds' was just ONE reason.

The other more compelling reason was and is that the health care rent extraction scam drains 30% of input revenue from the health care system without providing any actual health care. That scam is (or soon will be) institutionalized BY LAW, and that is not a moral issue it is an ethical issue. The corruption laid bare by the procession of this bill through the senate is the issue. It is the elephant in the room that 'the establishment', a term long officially discredited but quite relevant, does not want to discuss.

[ipaint]

13. Large corporations can never be trusted with the common good.

Ever. When I was growing up in the 60's and early 70's no one trusted corporations. Everyone knew they were about the accumulation of wealth over people and that they would poison the water, the air and the food you eat even kill you if it meant an extra buck. Unions represented our collective power to push back.

Fast forward after 30 years of non-stop advertising and images hitting us hundreds of times a day about the good corporate citizens with our best interests at heart, benevolent for profit friends who gatekeep our access to energy, food, the cleanliness of our water and air, our health care, our jobs, generously provide us with paychecks, present us out candidates to vote for and basically have inserted themselves in between us and every human need imaginable to sustain life, and we are slaves. Unions are a thing of the past and the bottom two thirds of the population exists to keep the top third comfortable.

Pretty pathetic when there are people who call themselves democrats who continue to try to convince folks that corporations are our best buddies and corporatism is fringe leftist hate speech directed against our fellow "corporate citizens" who mean us no real harm.

We are taught to enslave ourselves and each other. The exact opposite of community.

If the elite money interests in the democratic party want to align themselves with an industry that has no problem with selectively culling hundreds of thousands of the sick and letting them die for increased profit then they shouldn't start bellyaching when those of us who feel the alliance is evil to the core push back.

[NJmaverick]

15. Money is the root of all evil, should we eliminate that as well?

[ipaint]

19. You'll never understand.

Some folks heads are so far up the massive corporate ass they serve that the light of day isn't even a memory anymore.

[NJmaverick]

22. As a pragmatist I understand ideology and the mindset of the ideologues

When I was young and inexperienced I was part of those ranks. YOU on the other hand have no clue what pragmatists think or how their life experiences have brought them to that mind set. So we are a puzzle you can't solve so you dismiss us with self serving and self deceiving comments like "heads up corporate asses".

[ipaint]

32. You understand nothing.

You think pragmatism is the answer, the new buzzword for adult, the shiny new description for levelheadedness. It is nothing but a corporate sponsored advertising term handed to those who like the status quo and who appreciate the benefits of class. Right out of the obama/corporate pr machine, spit out about the same time hope and change were being sold to a beat down populace. Cynicism at it's finest. Taking peoples fears and their suffering and selling them what they think they need.

Now that hope and change are wearing thin we get the pragmatism. The place where those who aren't strong enough to stand on principle, who can't say no to their corporate masters can now look and the mirror and lie to themselves about their superiority, maturity and their oh so adult compromises. Fools.

Pragmatism is the absence of compassion, it is the upper class excuse for repression and it exists in a void that used to contain empathy. Pragmatism enslaves the lower classes but leaves your hands clean once the dirty deed is done.

Your pragmatism excuses torture, fraud and theft on behalf of the monied elite. But I'm sure in your grown up, experienced state of affairs all is tolerable and can rationalized. Principles are for children.

[ibegurpard]

107. you're as big an ideologue as everyone you're trying to discredit

your ideology is the Democratic Party

[dave29]

29. I sure hope you don't

1) Have a television
2) Use a computer
3) Feed your family
4) Drive or travel in a vehicle of any sort
5) Ever use fuel of any sort
6) Live in a house



for starters. I am not condoning the behavior of corporations, just pointing out you might want to take a look up your own ass and see what is up in there from time to time.

[ipaint]

36. Yes I must thank my master for enslaving me with such nice goodies to keep me company.

How could someone who controls my world, my access to everything I need to survive and gives me such nice toys be bad.

You know you just proved my point and you don't even know it.

[dave29]

57. I did not say they were good, ipaint.

In fact I specifically said I was not defending. I am not a "fan" of corporations. But I also recognize they are ingrained in our society. You and I have loved ones whose way of life depends on them. These are not bad people, our loved ones. They are not evil for participating in our Democracy.

I worked for a telephone company for many years and even though I hated my "corporate masters" I took some pride that you and I could call our parents regardless of their location on the planet. I helped make that a reality.

I do not know exactly what you want to happen... "corporations" as a word is a very simple target, one you will not find I disagree with you on much of the time.

I was just getting the impression you did not "get" that they surround us, are filled with people we know and love, and are not the pure evil you suggest on every occassion.

I also do not appreciate being told my head is up anyone's ass, so I thought you might enjoy seeing what it feels like.

[ipaint]

65. I understand that but people have so internalized

their connection to the large corporations that control access to everything that anything bad said about them is automatically also said about those who depend on them.

Workers trade labor for access to life sustaining needs but the key is they have no choice but to do that. That's the difference. Those who defend their own and other's slavery on behalf of the corporations, usually for a bit extra access in some area, are the fools I am referring to when I refer to heads up massive corp. asses. If it wasn't for those who gatekeep dissent against the status quo the corporations wouldn't stand a chance.

So our loved ones are the same as me and you and this isn't a fight among ourselves it's a fight against the status quo, the owners, and their pragmatist gatekeepers who continue to inch us further and further to the right.

[dave29]

75. But they do have a choice

you don't have to use any of those things I talked about. I know it seems like a false choice, because sure, everyone wants access to those things. But the reality is access to those things would not exist without our current form of Government -- as lame as it can be sometimes.

I'm not sure what you mean by pragmatist gatekeepers. If you are talking about lobbyists, they are not pragmatists, they are insects. If you are talking about Obama, he is not a gatekeper, he is trying to tend a garden overrun with insects, and doing his best under the circumstances, in my opinon. If you are talking about bailing out these corporations, rather than letting them fail, I would point out that at the time we had to deal with the reality that many of those people whom are not as bright as you or I may have lost everything due to something as stupid as how the market percieves Government action/inaction. Did we get screwed, of course. Do we need reform, of course. But don't ruin the lives of good people because we aren't willing to take action down the road when it will do less harm to good people.

I understand you believe these actions will not be taken because of whom Obama keeps company with and their actions in the past -- here, we simply disagree. I believe we will see reforms, strong reforms in fact -- and if we do not, I will be screaming as loudly as you.

[ipaint]

83. We do disagree and although I hope I am wrong but I think

I will see you next to me screaming in the not too distant future. But until we know for sure :hi:

[treestar]

72. The labor market isn't that bad even now

If it goes beyond survival into toys, the average voter isn't going to sneeze at it in favor of a socialist worker's paradise. Especially when the attempts to make one haven't gone so well.

[Sebastian Doyle]

96. And there's the difference in corporations

TV's, computers, food, vehicles..... those things were all produced. Sadly, odds are most of them are produced overseas with cheap labor these days, but that's a whole other thread.

GM and Apple Computers (supposedly) make things. What does Gold Mansacks make? What does United Health Care produce?

There's the difference. While the ethics of Microsoft, for example, could certainly be called into question, I'd take Bill Gates and Steve Ballmer any time over the likes of Lloyd Blankfein or Steven Hemsley. Gates might steal you blind but at least he gives you an operating system in the process. Blankfein and Hemsley just steal your money outright. Only now Hemsley has a government mandate to do so.

[treestar]

67. Dad worked for a massive corporation

they did pay him for his work and time. That's why I lived and went to college (plus student loan, paid back by working for small corporations).

So no, they are not evil themselves, and you'd have to be a college student or someone living off the land somehow to think so. The majority aren't going to go along with you any time soon.

We're not going to have a Cuban Revolution here.

[Odin2005]

97. Love of Money (Greed) is the root of all evil.

Healthcare should never be for profit.

[shadesofgray]

33. +1. No matter how many NuPragmatists try to deny this, it is still so true.

[shadesofgray]

30. This meme is so loaded and dishonest. The latest argument is now pragmatism=good/ideology=bad

without the slightest acknowledgment that Obama would not be in the White House without what you trash as "ideology." Such blatant hypocrisy is mind-blogging. If Obama had had to rely on that "pragmatism" that is suddenly being saluted around here, he would not be where he is today.

So you can take your "pragmatism" and stuff it.

[NJmaverick]

31. De Nile, not just a river in Egypt

[shadesofgray]

34. See how that meme keeps workin' for ya in 2012.

[NJmaverick]

35. So you joined the Democratic Underground to work against the Democrats???

[shadesofgray]

37. Oh, look! You've got another shiny meme!

[NJmaverick]

38. You didn't answer the question. Why did you joint the DEMOCRATIC Underground to undermine the dems?

[shadesofgray]

40. YOU with your "Pragmatism" bullshit meme is the one who is undermining the dems - not me.

[NJmaverick]

41. You posted about making the Dems sorry in 2012, please explain

[shadesofgray]

48. No, you are the one who will be making Dems sorry with your "pragmatism" crap.

[NJmaverick]

52. You referred to the dems as "ya" like you are against them and not part of them

[shadesofgray]

54. I'm against PRAGMATISTS. And YOU are trying to destroy the party of unions, civil rights,

and women's rights I grew up with and voted for all my life, with your "pragmatism."

[NJmaverick]

58. Now you couldn't be further afield from the truth if you tried

The difference between us is you want to go down in flames and failure while trying to achieve those things, while I actually want to succeed in achieving those fine goals.

PS- You still have not explained the "good luck in 2012" comments. It sure indicated that you are hoping the Dems fail.

[treestar]

71. If you think there were not pragmatists invovled in those issues

And that they did not take many years to solve, you are not aware of history.

It's too easy to dismiss those past years.

[Warren Stupidity]

42. You forget to add in haters.

You never fail. Even when you seem to try dialog and discourse you just unravel into shrill name calling.

[NJmaverick]

44. That is a purely dishonest statement. YOUR side started with and is the only one engaging

in name calling, but that seems to be the norm. You and your allies love to call anyone remotely supportive of the Dems or Obama "cheer leaders", "corporate shrills", "water carriers" or "DLC sell out". Then you have the nerve to pull the Rovian trick of accusing us of doing what you are guilty of.

[apocalypsehow]

46. The truth stings, especially for those of you who've alinged with the Right-wing.

You folks are wallowing in that reactionary, racist cesspool: it's not our fault that pointing out the slime you've covered yourself with in opposing this sensible reform hurts your widdle feelers.

[Warren Stupidity]

51. "opposing this sensible reform"

This is not sensible reform. If it were we would not be opposing it. Nor are we aligned with the right. The right has nothing much to complain about in this bill, and their protestations, now that all even vaguely socialistic elements have been purged from it, have become weak and lame. The opposition from the non-loon remnants of the republican party at this point is a reflex reaction and not ideological. After all, we just passed RomneyCare.

Nor am I even in the kill bill camp: too late for that. The camp I am in is the one that is not going to shut up and pretend that this stinker is 'sensible'. It isn't. It is corrupt. Despite that corruption it may actually do some good, what it wont do is provide universal affordable quality healthcare to all americans. I thought that was what we were fighting for.

[apocalypsehow]

53. "the right has nothing...to complain about" - Yeah, they just oppose it with every vote & voice at

their disposal....

:eyes:

[treestar]

69. You've reeled on in, NJM!

:yourock:

[treestar]

55. Without pragmatism no one gets anywhere in politics

Obama is there because people were becoming more practical. Bush ran by ideology and people saw that got us into a lot of trouble.

Ideology is fine but it is for the far distant future. Practical is for today.

[ipaint]

56. We've been loyal pragmatists for 30 years.

Unfortunately recent history disproves your theory.

[treestar]

74. That's absurd

You can't have been loyal pragmatists for 30 years and suddenly turned into ideologues who will take nothing less than revolution.

[ipaint]

84. The collective "we".

Thanks to the internet those who have watched the pragmatists destroy democracy now have a voice in the debate.

[NJmaverick]

87. 30 years of what? We have been in charge less than one year

[NJmaverick]

60. Very true!

[Greyhound]

105. One of the top contenders for the coveted "DU Mememeister" award. n/t

[apocalypsehow]

43. Kick, Rec. n/t.

[silverweb]

45. Excellent article.

:kick:

[NJmaverick]

92. Thanks, I think so. It would explain the response it got.

[TheKentuckian]

49. The article runs away from the issue of even if you have no problem preserving the status quo

that things cannot be allowed to go on as they have.

The real concern from any sensible perspective is that if we are going to maintain our present institutions that for them to be sustainable and for the people to not be crushed by them that firm rules of the road must be not only established but enforced, that a premium must be placed on the creation of value over the ability to eek out quick rewards, that systems are in place for the purposes of supporting and unleashing the people not to extract every last piece of copper from them, and at some point the needs of the many outweigh the desires of the wealthy few.

It is not pragmatism to pretend we can slap a bandaid or two and rearrange the deck chairs and all will be well or that toothpaste can be coaxed back into the tube. We are in a place where wholesale systemic changes are in our best interests but where broad, deep, and dramatic adjustments are absolutely critical. The demands of our economy, our environment, and the general well being of our citizens aren't going to wait for a hundred year plan when a twenty year plan might just maybe be barely quick enough.

Leadership is at least fighting the battles on your doorstep. It isn't okay that a year removed from the meltdown that we have nothing at all in place to keep it from happening again, it is not alright to throw the American people into a predatory monopoly and promise to do what is needed to address the issues of the predatory nature and the monopoly status down the line, it isn't acceptable to let the ice cap melt away or turn the seas to acid, it is not sound policy to fork over a trillion plus a year to the middle east for poison until the pumps run dry, its not a good thing to destroy the earning power of a population to create global markets for a few to grow fat from.

We simply cannot have a system that preaches and enforces harsh end of capitalism on the masses but allows the chosen few to gamble with all our money and they get the rewards but the risk is ours.

Obama was elected to effect change. Not change for its own sake but because change is absolutely critical to our general well being. If his solutions don't change the course of the game and fairly dramatically then he can be nothing more than a failure with good intentions. We are talking about the lives of American and the strength and future of our nation as well as it's impact on the world at large here. This isn't a game nor are we on some eternal clock. Our actions and inactions have consequences, many from the past are coming home to roost right now.
At some point there are no comebacks. At some point you lose and the game stays over. Now is our time and if we fail then future generations may not have the option to correct the messes we seem poised try to pretend we address but more kick the can down the road.

THIS IS NOT THE TIME FOR KICKING THE CAN DOWN THE ROAD.

[NJmaverick]

50. HCR and the Finance Reform bill are not about preserving the status quo

it's about improving things and making progress.

[ipaint]

61. Yes it is all about preserving the status quo.

The insurance industry says it to our faces.

"Private insurers lost an estimated 9 million customers between 2000 and 2007. In many cases, people lost coverage because they or their employers could no longer afford it as premium increases outpaced wage growth and inflation.
Recession job losses are adding to the toll. Some economists estimate that every percentage-point increase in the jobless rate adds 1 million people to the ranks of the uninsured.

The industry's real trouble begins in 2011, when 79 million baby boomers begin turning 65. Health insurers stand to lose a huge slice of their commercially insured enrollment (estimated at 162 million to 172 million people) over the next two decades to Medicare, the government-funded health insurance program for seniors.

"The rate of aging far and away exceeds the birth rate," said Sheryl Skolnick, a CRT Capital Group healthcare investment analyst. "That's got to be very scary. . . . This is the biggest fight for survival managed care has ever faced, at least since they went bankrupt in the late '80s."

...Health insurers don't see a public plan "as the nose of the camel under the tent; they see it as the front half of the camel under the tent," said Robert Laszewski, a former insurance company executive and industry consultant.
"They are interested in 45 million new customers," he said, "but the first thing in everybody's mind is preserving their right to do business in a way that can be profitable and meet shareholder needs."

http://articles.latimes.com/2009/jun/07/business/fi-healthcare7?pg=3


Plain as day, out in the open. We are saving them. They need a bailout because their business model is unsustainable if left to the free market.

But for pragmatists day is night and white is black so a bold out in the open statement that the industry faces severe retraction without a mandate is now considered reform that benefits the people.

This is grown-up?

[TheKentuckian]

66. The point is some problems are too big for babysteps

even if you are fundamentally going to leave existing systems in place. You don't get to claim progress when you go through an exhaustive supposedly corrective action but leave the fundamental problems you started with because even if it is progress the house is still going to burn down if more substantial and FAST steps aren't taken.

The clock on some things is not eternal. Real people die, real treasure is exhausted, real pieces of the life web are being eradicated, real destruction is done to the environment, real wealth stolen, real opportunity lost, real years gone by.

Lets not and say we did legislation ain't going to really cut it and in some cases pretending we addressed problems will make matter worse because we can pretend and string along until the trick cigar blows up in our faces.

[treestar]

70. So even more real years should go by because of lack of perfection?

[TheKentuckian]

82. I'll be damned if anyone can point to a single time I have demanded

anything in "perfection's" neighborhood. The meme is not catchall, some solutions are simply barebones mandatory and you know that.

I'm saying that sometimes you have to actually seriously address the issues in a timely manner or you'll never get the chance to correct anything later much less make the increasingly massive shifts the delays create.

Saying more MUST be done other than putting bandaids on severe massive wounds is not crying for perfection, it is saying we have to at least stabilize the patient.

If you want a fair debate without cussing and name calling then you have to be willing to actual have a fair conversation and not twist meanings to get your point across. My demands for reforms have been much less dramatic and focused on public programs than virtually anyone else here. I'm not screaming about ideological concerns, I'm talking about what must be done to actually make a dent in the substance of the dire issues we have to deal with pretty well if we are to at least get out in front of them and give the next generations some actual options.

Don't get me wrong I'd love to upset the apple cart but if we insist on maintaining it then we have to keep the thing operable with it's wheels on the ground and as few of us under it as possible.

[NJmaverick]

77. I was once in a class that talked about dealing with big problems

the analogy used was trying to eat a whole salami. One doesn't try to take the whole thing and start chomping into one end or the middle. Rather one slices it up and eats it a few slices at a time.

I feel that an excellent analogy for dealing with most problems. Slice them up and deal with them one step at a time

[ipaint]

85. It's been thirty years.

When you decide to take a bite let me know. The other sides almost gobbled the whole loaf down while your still looking for a fork. Table manners and all.:eyes:

[NJmaverick]

86. 30 years of what? We have been in charge less than one year

[ipaint]

88. Corporation are partyless.

And nothing if not pragmatic.

Frankly if you don't know the control our party and the official right have allowed corporations to steal from us for the last 30 yrs of "pragmatism in politics" you have no business pretending to be an informed adult.

[NJmaverick]

89. You didn't answer the question. 30 years of what?

[TheKentuckian]

100. 30 years of increasing corporate power spurned on by a complicit government

The clock on these problems didn't start in January and the solutions obviously won't come in a day, a year, or a term but there is a real need to undo what has been done over the past generation not just a subtle rearranging of the deck chairs.

[rockymountaindem]

93. Perfect reply n/t

[Odin2005]

95. The Democratic Party leadership is bring change all right, the WRONG kind of change.

The fact that our arguments were essentially INGNORED is the problem.

[NJmaverick]

101. They never promised to do what you wanted

[Odin2005]

102. They didn't say they would sell out to corporate interests, either.

I expected Obama to act like a real moderate Dem, like Dean (who is pretty moderate in the issues), not a corporatist bootlicker.

[hulka38]

98. The Republicans are undeniably dumb and crazy so

you'd like the Democrat Party to become the new party of Reagan. Wwwellll...it's on its way.

[hulka38]

99. And Hugh Laurie's a dork.

[WeDidIt]

103. The anti-corporatist idealogues have no idea how much they alienate the polity

and much of the rhetoric and lack of pragmatism is actually coutrer-productive to their own agenda.

[NJmaverick]

109. Yes they turn off every citizen who works for a company, has a 401K, mutual funds

, stocks or has friends or family that does.

[ipaint]

111. Back at you from the majority of the country that has nothing. nt

[TheKentuckian]

110. and what about us poor miserable bastards that at least want some controls

over what anyone left of Reagan sees as a run away freight train?

In case you haven't noticed a lot of people do or used to work for corporations before being cut, had value in their 401ks before the riverboat gamblers blew it, paid for coverage before it was denied them, wanted coverage, a home, or a car but could not afford them, or paid their mortgage but are still upside down?

There was no pro-corporatist tide that sweep Democrats and Obama into office. People at least seemed to want real changes not the Lieberman for Lieberman platform. There is also little productive for many folk's agenda no matter where they lie along the political spectrum of increasing corporate power.

The take whatever crumbs are dropped from the dinner table caucus ain't exactly doing anyone any favors either. Its time to stop pretending that standing for anything is being an ideologue, uncompromising, and effectively senseless. People are voicing legit concerns, pointing out actual problems, and want problems addressed in a meaningful way and deserve better than insults and being told to STFU and not rock the boat. Maybe the fucking boat needs rocking. Maybe some of these concerns had better be dealt with or the consequences will outweigh the gains.

Where is the space between kill bill and good bill that says we haven't completed the mission and more must be done? Where is the space for saying that a mandate must come with the destruction of a predatory monopoly? Where is the space for saying an individual mandate with in a market based system must have choice?

This has devolved into pure binary thinking now and so honest discussion is out the window. All we are left with is being brainless cheerleaders or soulless killers of the uninsured. As for me, I want to help the uninsured. Hell, I am uninsured but I still understand that an insurance card I can't afford to utilize is no different than having no coverage. If this bill passes I don't get coverage from my next job then if I make about the same money then I'm not going to be able to afford to use my coverage and I'm not in any special situation. The premiums alone even after the subsidy will be more than I've ever paid before for the lowest level of coverage (70%) I've ever had.

This deal isn't a win, it is simply readjusting the pain and spreading it out more. That is a start perhaps but victory laps and patting each other on the back for supposedly holding insurnace companies accountable is absolute garbage.

The tension would be greatly reduced if we could all come to a place where we honestly accept we have almost as much work to do as we started with AND that we have to pass something or we won't have a chance to do anything else. There is a page I think almost all of us can get on if we all accept reality which is this bill sucks nearly to the point of the status quo and sadly its pretty much all we could do right now.

I also think the mandates should be attached to certain triggers that would make sure reforms work as advertised before we dump our citizens into a meatgrinder and that should be our final effort in this battle while declaring the war is far from over.

[Warren Stupidity]

114. majority of 'the polity' want single payer universal health care

which policy was 'not on the table' in the house or the senate. Why is that?

Your theory that the nearly non-existent left is 'alienating the polity' with their inaudible voice in the media and their handful of representatives in congress is laughable. The polity is alienated largely because it rightly thinks that the system does not represent their interests and never will.

[ClassWarrior]

112. IBTL

NGU.