Given hardening Republican opposition to Congressional health care proposals, Democrats now say they see little chance of the minority’s cooperation in approving any overhaul, and are increasingly focused on drawing support for a final plan from within their own ranks.

Top Democrats said Tuesday that their go-it-alone view was being shaped by what they saw as Republicans’ purposely strident tone against health care legislation during this month’s Congressional recess, as well as remarks by leading Republicans that current proposals were flawed beyond repair.

The White House spokesman, Robert Gibbs, said of Republican lawmakers, “Only a handful seem interested in the type of comprehensive reform that so many people believe is necessary to ensure the principles and the goals that the president has laid out.”

The last time we had a Democratic president, we and he allowed for truly progressive change to be snuffed out in favor of conservative corporate interests. It was good, but it could have been far better.

I hope we don’t give away the farm this time.

In other words, they had a glass jaw.

If the tussle over the public option component of health care reform continues along what seems to be its current trajectory, the Obama administration will have taken a serious punch to the face and the GOP will end up running all over them.

The main problem here is that President Obama seems overly focused on getting some kind of bipartisanship out of Washington, but the problem is he’s going about it using the Tom Daschle method. Many of us will remember the days where Tom Daschle led as minority leader and majority leader as marked by all sorts of ridiculous concessions to the Bush administration and the Republicans – most notably on the Iraq War. In retrospect all that bipartisanship led to was the loss of political power and clout for the Democrats, and more importantly, the near-ruination of the prestige and fiscal supremacy of the United States. That’s all.

In theory, concessions on these things are supposed to lead to votes. Senator X wants this, okay we do it, now we have his vote. Representative Y really wants this to cost this much, okay we do it, now we have her vote. The problem is President Obama and the leadership in the Senate (for now, the House seems to be sticking to their guns) seem to be in a mode of permanent concession that is not going to produce any Republican votes.

The Dems could negotiate health care reform down to a band-aid and a sheet of prayer and the GOP wouldn’t vote for it because the band-aid cost too much. Gotta be “deficit neutral”, you know!

I don’t get this. And while intellectually I sort of understand the various moving parts that have to be juggled around simultaneously, my gut feeling – and I’m sure the same goes for much of the American majority who supported the President and the Congress – is that we have the votes to get things accomplished, so why are even playing this game?

There are 60 votes for cloture in the Senate – at least there should be unless any Democrat is stupid enough to filibuster health care reform for Christ’s sake, and there has got to be at least 51 Dems with the guts to do this thing, or why bother? In the House the margins are even better, with 40 votes of wiggle room for Speaker Pelosi and Majority Leader Hoyer. GET IT DONE.

I’ve often written here about how I think its kind of ridiculous how the religious right invests so much in Republicans expecting things like the outlawing of abortion – their ultimate goal – and instead Republican presidents like Bush refuse to do more than make a phone call to their rallies, let alone enact actual legislation related to their cause.

President Obama and the Democratic Congress risk serious damage with their base over health care, in a way that won’t be papered over like the religious right and abortion. This is not 1992, where a President with less than 50% of the vote won on a moderate platform with very little wiggle room to work with in the congress. Obama won by almost 7%, with more than double the electoral votes of his opponent. His party enjoys considerable majorities in both houses of congress. That is not a mandate to go play pattycake with John Boehner. Its a mandate to get serious stuff done.

Democrats are in power because the electorate trusted them on 3 major items: Economy, National Security, and Health Care. On economy and national security they are on the right path, with a return to some sort of fiscal sanity and regulated markets, combined with a strategic disengagement from Iraq as well as a rededication in Afghanistan to finishing the job that began on 9/11. But while 2/3 will get you into Cooperstown, it won’t help the Dems electorally.

And again, more importantly, it won’t help the country.

Heart Bypass Surgergy: I’ve Seen Too Many

While I haven’t seen the worst of this first-hand, I have seen what our current health care system screws up. I’m lucky, I’m one of those people with a pretty good health benefit from my employer. Other, close, members of my family don’t have that. The costs are too high, they aren’t covered on their jobs, and they have pre-existing conditions. Sure, they are cared for when they need emergency care but I honestly would much rather not have to have people in my family wait until the doctors have to rip arteries out of their chests to get their health care needs adressed. Oh, and the giant bills that ensue.

The Republican party and a few Democrats with their heads shoved up their butts want more people to suffer. They – especially the Republicans – won’t budge and they won’t give an inch. Their ideology and the idea of winning one fight versus a President they seek to kneecap is far more important to them than the members of my family or the millions of others out there. That’s why they insist on mob rule and death panel lies rather than a serious discussion on this.

Their minds were made up on November 4, 2008. There is no sense in engaging with them, let alone conceding anything to them until they decide to bring some honesty to this issue.

The president and congress could make the Washington village types really happy with a milquetoast nothingball package of legislation that doesn’t do a thing and leads to policy and electoral failure. Or they could do the job we put them in place to do.

Yay, Politico named you to a perfectly arbitrary list! Look, I don’t have any serious problems with Rep. Edwards and she has so far demonstrated the kind of values I want to see in my Rep. that we weren’t seeing in Al Wynn. But trumpeting insidery lists from Politico is the path to faildom. Politico, in the larger sense of people in congress working for us, does not matter one bit. In fact, its an impediment to getting things done in congress thanks to the noise it shoots out.

Members of congress shouldn’t be trumpeting it when Politico lauds them. In fact, the less Politico is involved in congress, the better for democracy.

How is this one any different?

Americans overwhelmingly support substantial changes to the health care system and are strongly behind one of the most contentious proposals Congress is considering, a government-run insurance plan to compete with private insurers, according to the latest New York Times/CBS News poll.

The poll found that most Americans would be willing to pay higher taxes so everyone could have health insurance and that they said the government could do a better job of holding down health-care costs than the private sector.

There is no impediment to health care reform other than the courage of Democratic members of congress. They have the votes and a President ready and waiting to sign the bill. Most importantly they have a public out there that wants this reform. The only wind in their faces is wind from insurance companies flapping around their millions of dollars in the breeze.

There are no reasons, no excuses for making this happen.

The Democratic party just won a historic election, taking control of the White House and increasing its margins in the House and Senate – so of course its time for the Dems to do what they do when they get in power: Tear down the leader of the party and leave him open to Republican attack.

Today’s edition of the stupidest game in politics involves some congressional bellyaching about the plan to save the economy, poorly written opposition to a possible appointee, and of course anonymously sourced news stories about supposed discord between the President-elect and the outgoing chairman that’s treated as gospel.

And Obama’s not even president yet! This bodes well as usual. While the Republican party runs around squawking about Twitter in search of a clue, the Dems are already on schedule to kneecap their president.

If Obama was a less capable person I would be even more concerned. Jesus.

In cooperation with two outside organizations, the chairmen of the Democratic Caucus and the Republican Conference have agreed to a series of debates away from Capitol Hill to give some of the policy wonks serving in the House the opportunity to challenge one another over the big issues of the day, beginning with the economy later this month.

Excuse me, gentlemen, but what is the purpose of the U.S. congress?

TO DEBATE ON THE BIG ISSUES OF THE DAY!!!!!!

That’s why congress exists in the first place. How better to show the American people you aren’t doing anything than to form a debating society rather than debating these issues in the venue where it has an actual impact on our lives?

Apparently the DLC is one of the sponsors of this idiocy. Surprised? Me neither.

S-CHIP?

They caved on freaking S-CHIP?

Bring back Newt Gingrich, at least some things made sense back then.

Dear Republicans,

Take some time off, Harry Reid will do your dirty work for you.

Love,

America

The Democrats in congress lost me in 2002 and they’ve lost me again. In the blink of an eye they may be back in the minority, maybe they’ll actually do half of their jobs then.

Even if they’re successful next year, this is a ticking time bomb underneath the liberal coalition.

Either do it or shut up, because your numbers can go lower.

So here’s my question: when we blogosphere types complain about this weak-kneed attitude, are we complaining because (a) we think the centrists are wrong; they could keep their seats in marginal districts even if they toed the progressive line on national security issues. Or (b) because we don’t care; they should do the right thing even if it means losing next November?

I think it’s mostly “A” with a sprinkling of “B”. Folks who have read me for some time know that while I’ve always been vehemently opposed to the war in Iraq since before it was a reality, I was not always in favor of getting out. I bought into the “you broke it, you bought it” groupthink until it became painfully clear that we accomplish nothing by sitting there in Iraq acting as midwife to a democratic wonderland that’s never coming. The Republicans are wrong on national security, and the Democrats have bought into Republican propaganda and media b.s. by following them. The reason the congress has such low approval ratings are because Democrats and Independents voted them in to end the war. The House and Senate respond to Presidential obstruction by saying they can’t do anything and by the way Rush Limbaugh might say mean things about them, and give up blank checks to the president to keep the war going until he’s out of office. Bull.

The moral thing to do has the advantage of also being the politically sound thing to do. Sure, there are Republican dead-enders who think anyone who votes in favor of ending the war is an anti-American traitor, but no matter how you vote those jokers are never going to be Democratic voters in any district. Democrats won in red districts because the Republicans rubber stamped the war.

Mentally, I’m not sure what’s wrong with the Democrats. Its as if they were out of power so long they don’t know how to act like they’re in the majority. Speaker Pelosi allows John Boehner to put whatever the heck he likes on the floor of the House but when she was in the minority leadership she was barely allowed to speak a word out of turn. In the Senate so far, Majority Leader Reid has left behind all his knowledge of procedure he used so well in the minority and has allowed all sorts of nonsense to go on. Right now they almost make Daschle-Gephardt and their rush to approve the Iraq War look downright powerful!

The only saving grace they’ve got is that next year is a presidential election and people understand now more than ever the vital importance of getting a Democratic president in office. But the Democratic congress continues to act like such little whipped sissies that it doesn’t take a great leap of the imagination for 2010 to look a lot like 1994 all over again. And if they keep conceding and conceding and conceding and conceding like they have on the most important issue of our time, they will totally deserve it.

If the Democratic congress has begun to lose loyalists like myself already, they may already be beyond help.

See how easy that was to do?

Most Americans oppose fully funding President Bush’s $190 billion request for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and a sizable majority supports an expansion of a children’s health insurance bill the president has promised to veto, putting Bush and many congressional Republicans on the wrong side of public opinion on upcoming foreign and domestic policy battles.

The new Washington Post-ABC News poll also shows deep dissatisfaction with the president and Congress. Bush’s approval rating stands at 33 percent, equal to his career low in Post-ABC polls. Congressional approval is even lower: Just 29 percent approve of the job the Congress is doing. That is Congress’s lowest approval rating in this poll since November 1995, when Republicans controlled both the House and Senate, and represents a 14-point drop since Democrats took control last January.

Still, the public rates congressional Republicans (29 percent approve) lower than congressional Democrats (38 percent approve). And when the two parties are pitted directly against one another, the public broadly favors Democrats to handle Iraq, health care, the federal budget and the economy. Only on the issue of terrorism are Republicans at parity with Democrats.

Considering the history, parity on terrorism is essentially a win for the Democrats, something the GOP has usually dominated Democrats on. The mandate from America is as clear as glass, if the Democrats started acting like how the people want them to act, we would get some stuff done.

Grow a pair, folks.

President Bush plans to ask Congress next month for up to $50 billion in additional funding for the war in Iraq, a White House official said yesterday, a move that appears to reflect increasing administration confidence that it can fend off congressional calls for a rapid drawdown of U.S. forces.

The request — which would come on top of about $460 billion in the fiscal 2008 defense budget and $147 billion in a pending supplemental bill to fund the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq — is expected to be announced after congressional hearings scheduled for mid-September featuring the two top U.S. officials in Iraq. Army Gen. David H. Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan C. Crocker will assess the state of the war and the effect of the new strategy the U.S. military has pursued this year.

The request is being prepared now in the belief that Congress will be unlikely to balk so soon after hearing the two officials argue that there are promising developments in Iraq but that they need more time to solidify the progress they have made, a congressional aide said.

The Democratic congress has achieved mediocre ratings not because they’ve passed good legislation on the minimum wage, stem cell research, ethics reform and the like but because they have capitulated time and time and time again to the President on the seminal issue of our time. Iraq is a giant suck hole pulling in billions of dollars, thousands of lives, and the security of a nation. This commander in chief is a miserable failure and there is absolutely no sense of any sort in continuing to give him rope with which to hang the American military and public.

The Congress needs to show the American people that it stands for the principles for which it earned its majority or it will sacrifice its morality.

This is all part of the Republican strategy with the White House authored "Petraeus" report containing more of the same swill we have heard for over four years now about "victory" being right around the corner.

Gallup: Approval rating for Congress matches lowest ever recorded

The approval rating for Congress is now “the lowest it has been since Gallup first tracked public opinion of Congress with this measure in 1974,” Jeffrey Jones of the Gallup Poll reports today.

According to Jones: “Just 18% of Americans approve of the job Congress is doing, while 76% disapprove, according to the August 13-16, 2007, Gallup Poll. That 18% job approval rating matches the low recorded in March 1992, when a check-bouncing scandal was one of several scandals besetting Congress.”

Democrats Refocus Message on Iraq After Military Gains

Rep. Jerry McNerney (D-Calif.), who made waves when he returned from Iraq by saying he was willing to be more flexible on troop withdrawal timelines, issued a statement to constituents “setting the record straight.”

“I am firmly in favor of withdrawing troops on a timeline that includes both a definite start date and a definite end date,” he wrote on his Web site.

But in an interview yesterday, McNerney made clear his views have shifted since returning from Iraq. He said Democrats should be willing to negotiate with the generals in Iraq over just how much more time they might need. And, he said, Democrats should move beyond their confrontational approach, away from tough-minded, partisan withdrawal resolutions, to be more conciliatory with Republicans who might also be looking for a way out of the war.

“We should sit down with Republicans, see what would be acceptable to them to end the war and present it to the president, start negotiating from the beginning,” he said, adding, “I don’t know what the [Democratic] leadership is thinking. Sometimes they’ve done things that are beyond me.”

Yes, Rep. McNerney, let’s negotiate with George W. Bush and the Republicans. That has worked very well over the last six years. I’m assuming by “negotiate” you mean giving them everything you want, cutting off your testicles and handing it to them wrapped in a pretty bow. Jesus Christ, you people can be stupid.

These ideas are being pushed from the brilliant minds who, apparently frightened by success in 2006 are back to the halcyon days of the 2002 and 2004 elections where even though they were amazingly wrong, the Republicans listened to their base to the tune of almost 4,000 lives lost.

But yes, let’s negotiate with Bush. Let’s keep the war going. Let’s pretend like the surge is solving anything. What’s another 3,000+ lives in the gulf in order for Democrats to shield themselves from Rush Limbaugh & Co. saying mean things about them?