LOL! Remember when we had the House, Senate AND Presidency and still couldn't get shit done?

[Poll_Blind]

:rofl: :cry: :rofl: :cry:

PB

[dkf]

1. We passed a crappy health care insurance reform bill.

[Poll_Blind]

5. Sadly, there is that. I'm just waiting till that shit kicks in full-swing.

I can only imagine how that's going to go down. I hope for the best on that one, even though it is weaksauce, but I'm not holding my breath.

As an American, it's rape-a-doodle-do 24/7.

PB

[Proles]

53. Maybe if the insurance companies

rack up prices as a result of the bill, people will start demanding a public option?

Or... maybe a repeal, who knows.

[Horse with no Name]

8. That will be undone. Count on it. n/t

[cascadiance]

10. And we had to "use" budget reconciliation for that, which screwed us...

from the standpoint that we would have been far better off to use budget reconciliation to pass a PROPER extension of the tax cuts instead along with a full two year extension of unemployment benefits, and a budget (to keep the right from constantly bitching about that). Maybe we could have done HCR with it too, who knows.

But one wonders why those other issues were ignored when we "used" budget reconciliation earlier, to give Dems the excuse of having to pass that mess which is largely responsible for the size of the deficit now that is giving the Rethugs the rationale to cut that much more!

Bushco was smart when they used budget reconciliation to pass tax cuts originally.

[Recursion]

64. You have to have an intervening budget pass to use reconciliation again

That's probably one of the reasons the GOP has been so dead-set against passing another budget.

[Kolesar]

47. My disabled brother will have subsidies to buy "insurance". What's wrong with that?

Would you prefer that he not have that benefit??

[DesertFlower]

2. WTF happened?

[Autumn]

3. Well now we probably see why.

Same shit, different day.

[mwrguy]

4. How the hell does that happen?

Seriously.

[Horse with no Name]

6. Yet they get EVERYTHING they want AND a jar of Nutella

with a slim majority in the House...

[XemaSab]

35. Mmmm

Nutella...

[d_b]

7. just wait until the gop has control of them

I'm sure they'll run into the same problem.

[Horse with no Name]

9. Oh fuck no. They declare mandates and political capital and issue executive orders

as horrid as it all is....they get their agendas done.

[gateley]

11. If we ever get back on top, God I hope they've learned to stop

fucking around and realize these asshats aren't playing games.

[Zorra]

12. The Senate should have ended the filibuster on Jan. 21, 2009.

Instead, they just kept on getting whupped by republicans.

It was a tragic lack of insight, foresight, and common sense by Senate leadership.

The country may never recover from this mistake.

[joshcryer]

15. Exactly.

[cherokeeprogressive]

42. The country could recover from this mistake any time Congress begins anew. n/t

[kenny blankenship]

13. On the bright side, if the Repukes manage to create a dictatorship of the House

then one day, probably not too long from now, when people are aghast at what Republican stupidity and belligerence has wrought, WE will have the House.

Remember 2006 and 2008? Democrats won big basically by losing to the Republicans for 3 straight elections. The Pukes had a one party government that was very unified ideologically and programatically under Bush the Lesser. They got their way. And because their way is stupid, they fucked things up so hard and fast that by 2008 they looked to be headed for the garbage dump of history on a rocket sled. They lost two elections and ALL the power, and it wasn't because of anything Democrats did to trip them up, nor anything we did to persuade the people we better represented them. The Republicans under Bush had to implement their program simply because nothing stood in their way anymore. They started to enjoy their "permanent Republican majority" and exercised power without inhibitions, and the people eventually realized it was not in their interest.

Next time we get the power, there may be a hell of a lot more power to get, and a hell of a lot fewer excuses to hide behind. And so we had better DO THINGS IN THE PEOPLE'S INTEREST. Instead of dedicating the party to servicing the corporate dong.

[Tx4obama]

14. Do you mean the 49 DAYS that we had a true majority in the Senate?

After Obama was sworn into office there were ONLY 49 days when we had sixty dem votes in the Senate (which as we all know it takes 60 votes to invoke cloture on all bills due to GOP obstruction).

Senator Franken was sworn in July 2009, and Senator Kennedy died in August 2009.

So, yeah - we had total control for 49 days.

[Poll_Blind]

16. If the Repukes had the Triple Crown, they'd fuck the world in an afternoon.

Forty-nine days is not long enough?

:rofl:

PB

[Bonobo]

23. So you have redefined the word "majority" to mean 60% now instead of 51%?

"True majority"? what kind of revisionist crap is that?

[Tx4obama]

24. It takes 60 votes in the Senate to invoke cloture in order to get bills passed.

You can't get shit done with 51 votes.

Haven't you noticed all the GOP obstruction in the Senate the past two and a half years?

60 senate dems = a true majority
51 senate dems = a useless majority

p.s. It was NOT me that redefined the word "majority" to mean 60% now instead of 51% - it was the GOP.

[Bonobo]

25. Actually there is only one definition of majority and

that 60 vote bullshit is extra-constitutional and could have been overcome if the Dems had any balls.

It SHOULD have been and WOULD have been if the Dems didn't still want it there for there own purposes.

[eomer]

29. They could have used the budget reconciliation process, which requires only 50 votes in the Senate.

There are many things they could have done through reconciliation. In the past it has been used to raise taxes, to raise the debt ceiling, to create entire new federal programs, and many major changes.

Rather than use it, Obama and Congressional Democratic leadership tried to pretend it away, to make people believe there was nothing they could do. Much as you're doing now. But it's not true; they could have done lots of things with just 50 votes.

[Obamanaut]

30. Aren't many of the senate rules open to change at the beginning of each

session, and haven't the rules been essentially unchanged for a while, even when the dems have been the 'real' (more than half) majority?

[eomer]

33. They didn't need any rule changes but rather the desire to work for us instead of corporate donors.

They could have done everything we needed on the economic side because it is all budget-related and therefore could have been done in the budget reconciliation process with just 50 votes in the Senate. The rest of what we needed could have been done by the President alone, like ending the wars, not starting new wars, not continuing and extending Bush's state secrets claims, not continuing secret detention sites, not continuing the war on our Constitutional rights, and on it goes...

[liberalmuse]

17. We NEVER had the House, people.

Please. If there had been a comfortable majority, then we would likely have a better health care bill, but it's BS to say we had even close to that.

[Obamanaut]

32. "comfortable" majority? Isn't a majority still pretty much more than

half? If it is, then yes, the dems DID have the House.

And the Senate, and the White House. And recently, too.

[avaistheone1]

39. Yes, the Dems had the majority.

[jeff47]

59. You may want to try counting again. (nt)

[WillyT]

18. Yeah... Their Were Enough Republicrats/Democons To Fuck The Whole Enchilada...

:shrug:

:beer:

:smoke:

[Skittles]

19. that time was wasted

on that piece of fucking GARBAGE health care "reform"

[Bluebear]

20. He needed 60 votes!!!$"

:cry:

[Kolesar]

48. Yeah, that's why the climate bill failed. Are you happy about that, bluebear

You have something to whine and wail about. I know that whining and wailing is worth something to some people.

[sabrina 1]

21. How many of them are there? One thing I've learned from

all this, NOT COMPROMISING WORKS! I hope I never hear the word 'compromise' again, or 'bi-partisanship'.

Another thing I learned this week which was amazing also, Democrats STAND UNITED when they WANT TO.

I hope I never hear that 'you can't herd cats' again either. Apparently you can after all.

[Poll_Blind]

34. +1

What you said. Especially about the "herding cats" bit, which I am beyond sick of.

PB

[Raksha]

51. +1000

[defendandprotect]

22. Right -- now GOP has the House majority ... and they win everything -- !!! What farce!!

[Tx4obama]

28. The GOP is NOT winning 'everything'. n/t

[defendandprotect]

46. Not yet -- !! But Obama's permitted them to take emphasis off economy/jobs and stimulus -- !!

It's the same game-playing we saw with Lieberman -- the Superman who ran all of

Congress and Obama!!

[Proud Liberal Dem]

58. Most of their "winnings" have died in the Senate

which, thankfully, does still have the filibuster so that a bunch of rabid Republicans and a few Blue Dogs can't slink the RW agenda through Congress (though, of course, won't be able to prevent a WH veto). All the House is doing, aside from this current "crisis" over the debt ceiling, is a bunch of symbolic votes that accomplish nothing and set themselves up for the 2012 election. They won't actually be able to get anything signed into law until or unless they get the Senate and WH back under their control in 2012. The questions for us are 1.)Do we want to help or hinder THAT from happening? and 2.)How do we stop that from happening? :shrug:

[McCamy Taylor]

26. You mean 1993? No universal health then either. 1977? What ever happened to the ERA?

The only two times we had clear majorities were in the 1930s with FDR and in the 1960s with LBJ. A whole lot of legislation got passed each time.

The moral is Dems have to work harder. A bare majority is not enough.

And for that matter how did that whole outlawing abortion thing work out for the GOP when they controlled the WH and Congress in 2005?

[JI7]

27. that's because there are many parts of the country where only Conservatives can win

majority was because of blue dogs. republicans won because those blue dogs mostly lost in the last election.

i don't know why people find this so difficult to understand.

but things were still better than with republicans having any control.

for more change and more liberal change you would need to convince the voters in those districts that mostly vote conservative to support liberal policies and therefore vote for more liberal members. but that is hard work so most people don't do it.

[defendandprotect]

54. Doubt there ever was a "Southern Strategy" ... think there has only been Diebold computers ... !!

Southerners couldn't be that stupid!!

[jeff47]

60. No, there are many parts of the country where we only try conservative politics

Nobody knows if a progressive populist would do well, because the DNC and other establishment run in fear of such people.

Polling indicates they'd do quite well in such conservative places.

[RagAss]

31. Ah yes...the good old days !

[Poll_Blind]

36. Indeed. Nomatter who gets elected, we get every turn in the barrel.

PB

[defendandprotect]

55. True -- we might think of giving up the Prez and Senate -- and just control the HOUSE ... !!!

They Democrats could finally run government -- !!!


:evilgrin:


From what I've seen over decades, whenever Democrats have had control, they've

turned the keys to government over to GOP --

That was true as far back as Sen. George Mitchell turning Senate over to Bob Dole!!

And it was true in 1976 when Democrats colluded with the GOP -- while they had full

control over government -- to overturn the tax code for the benefit of the rich!

See Wm. Greider on that one -- "Who Will Tell The People?"

[Brickbat]

37. Seriously. It makes me sick to think about it.

[lonestarnot]

38. Our fucking system is a joke. Puppets all.

[dameocrat67]

40. No. I am only 44.

n/t

[cherokeeprogressive]

41. But we didn't have 200 Senate seats! You can't get anything accomplished unless you control 200

Senate seats!

[katnapped]

43. And only on things where Republicans won't yell

Otherwise you compromise, people!

:sarcasm:

[Poll_Blind]

44. You're right! At a MINIMUM, 200 Senate seats, 900 House seats an BOTH presidencies.

:rofl:

PB

[cherokeeprogressive]

52. That's how you do it. n/t

[treestar]

45. Democrats do not march in lockstep

I see that boast here often.

If you do not have to be in lockstep with the President, then why does every Democrat who gets elected?

[gulliver]

49. Thought experiment

Fifteen people are on a beach. Twelve will try to construct the best sandcastle they can. The other three will try to keep them from doing it. Rules will be like football in terms of physical contact. Both sides get buckets for water and sand.

Hypothesis: The sandcastle will not be very good.

[Poll_Blind]

50. That's an unconvincing and defeatist metaphor.

PB

[defendandprotect]

57. It's more than theory -- violence and aggression will take us backwards every time ...

that's the only way the right wing can rise --

and the only way it has rise over the last 50 years of rw political violence

which not only took JFK, but our people's government, as well -- !!

Easy to destroy -- building something is more difficult!



:)

[mmonk]

56. Yes.

eom

[blkmusclmachine]

61. It's 11-Dimensional Chess. See how well it's worked so far?

:hurts:

[bobdawg]

62. and now a minority of the minority

are calling all the shots.

our government is a sham.

[southerncrone]

63. Pissed away opportunities....will hurt Dems & country for decades.