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That doesn't count because it's off-topic!!!

Now let's discuss why Obama sux.


Waiiiiit....

Way to dodge the topic, you hypocrite!

Okay, back on topic (just to try something different, you understand).

I gave him a B. I gave him some extra credit for having started with a handicap in the form of an imploding economy. I took some of that extra credit away for not taking a harder line in pushing regulation of the securities market. I took some more away for wasting precious weeks trying to court a bipartisan response on health care that clearly wasn't going to happen.

I'll accept that you probably honestly believe this, but I could not disagree more. Not unless your definition of "bi-partisan" means "You do what we want", that is. The GOP has been almost completely shut out of any meaningful discussion or planning of the content of the current health care bills.

Heck. Obama has at least twice now (once very recently) called members of congress in to the White House to discuss issues regarding sticking points on the health care bills. Care to guess how many Republicans he invited? If you really want a bi-partisan bill, wouldn't a good start be to create a law which both parties will support? If the other party is nearly 100% opposed to what you come up with, it's not bi-partisan, is it? You don't get to simply label a bill bi-partisan. It has to actually be something both parties support to be so.

Nonsense. The GOP was involved in the Senate Finance Committee bill which had multiple concessions to GOP interests and which was still completely rejected by them. Not "Well, we can go along with this and this but we'd need to change that" but a flat "This is no good".


At this point, why would he? The GOP tactic was to kill health care reform and thus weaken the president's ability to make domestic policy. DeMint explictly said this was the goal. The time for a bi-partisan bill is long over. The GOP gambled that they could kill it through straight obstructionism and they failed in two aspects: killing the bill and having any chance of shaping the bill.

Yes. Because it was no good.

Look. I know that this is hard to understand, but had the proposed bill actually reformed health care in a way which addressed the problems without adding a whole slew of new ones, both Democrats and Republicans would have supported it. But just because there were members of the GOP in the committee doesn't mean that the result was bi-partisan. They needed to only put enough in there to sway one vote in the committee, and that's exactly what they did. The absolutely minimum to get it out of committee.


That's not bi-partisan. Not by any reasonable definition.




The tactic was to avoid allowing passage of health care reform which would break more than it would fix. You can't blame Republicans for being obstructionists on an issue in which the Democrats refused to budge on a single one of the major points. The whole "public option" vs "insurance co-op" was and is widely understood to simply be a semantic difference. That was not a concession. A true concession would have been eliminating *any* government intervention into the insurance industry. A true concession would have been giving up government regulations mandating insurance levels by employers which ultimately price the coverage out of reach of most working class people. A true concession would have been actually giving up something which the GOP finds to be a deal breaker.


It's not like the GOP didn't tell the Dems what things they considered non-starter for this bill. But the Dems did those things anyway. To blame the GOP for not being bi-partisan is ridiculous.




Um... Only after it became obvious that the entire objective of the Health care process was purely to get any bill past committee so that the Dems could write their own revised version behind closed doors and the call for a vote on it with as little debate as possible. I believe that is the exact context of the statements DeMint and others said about doing whatever they could to stop the process.


It was well past the point of bi-partisanship at that point Joph. And this would just be crazy-talk if this wasn't exactly what the Dems have done so far. They get through the procedural steps by pretending to give concessions to bi-partisanship, then they re-write the bill without any GOP participation and put it to a full floor vote.


After you've used that trick a few times, it's a bit silly to continue to complain that the other party doesn't fall for it anymore...





The Dems never intended to produce anything remotely bi-partisan though Joph. That's the fantasy they keep selling, and maybe it goes over well with the uninformed masses. The GOP realized what the Dems were doing and realized that the only way to prevent it was to block anything they attempted to pass. They didn't start out using that tactic though Joph. It was only after the Dems pulled the bait-and-switch a few times that they did. So don't blame them for the results...

Again, the GOP blew off what could have been a starting point. It's funny that you keep saying "But the Republicans couldn't go along with that!" but the Republicans never once made a honest effort to say "We realize we're the minority party and aren't going to get everything we want but here's a couple things we really need and here's the stuff we're willing to concede to in order to get it."

Yeah, you realize that the GOP is in the minority, right? They don't get to set the terms, they just get to try to negotiate them to something they can live with. They refused. So, fine. Now you got nothing. Hope that was worth it.



Heh... no. He said it back in July well before the bills had really formed up. What he was doing was setting up for the August slash-and-burn campaign that would guarantee that there'd be no GOP support for any bill because they had all sworn up and down to a bunch of town hall people that they'd stop this evil socialist, communist, grandmother-killing, death panel forming, government takeover of you, God and all you hold dear at any price. And now you complain that Obama isn't letting them into his reindeer games? Let them in for what? Seriously... what value would they possibly serve at this point?

The funny thing is that if even a handful of GOP senators had voted to end the filibuster, they'd be in the White House offices right now being treated like royalty. But, again, pure obstructionism is the gamble the GOP took over having a place at the table.


I disagree but... sure. I guess it makes you feel better to think that the GOP didn't massively fuck this one up because -- golly! -- there was never anything they could have done to get in on the process.

Because the Democrats were never ever willing to concede any of the major points the GOP considered deal-breakers Joph. The "starting point" if you honestly want bi-partisanship, is to not include anything the other party will not ever, under any circumstances, accept. Or if you do put it on the table as a bargaining point, you have to be willing to take it off.


The Democrats never entered into this with any intention of the bill being bi-partisan. They only wanted to be able to claim it was bi-partisan. Now, they're all butt hurt because the GOP figured out what they were up to and upset their apple cart. Now, they'll be solely responsible for the disaster that comes as a result. They could have avoided this if they'd only actually made an honest attempt at bi-partisanship.




Absolutely. You're the one complaining that the GOP didn't make this a "bi-partisan" bill Joph. Want to know why? Because now the Dems have no one but themselves to blame for the results. You're correct. They are in the majority. They have the numbers to pass anything they want. So now, we get to see exactly what it is they really want. And it's funny that this prospect scares the Democrats more than anything else...




And well after the Dems had already pulled a couple last minute bait and switch plays. The Dems burned that bridge Joph. They did it to get the second stimulus bill passed, the energy bill passed, and the omnibus bill passed.


That's what riled up the tea-party people Joph. The Dems lit their own house on fire there. It's a little late to blame anyone else for the results. If they'd dealt honestly on those other big bills, there would have been no massive movements to block yet another dirty trick on health care, and we might actually have something that resembles bi-partisan efforts.


The reality is that the Dems have been so focused on doing what they want, no matter what the cost, that they've alienated everyone else. Why be surprised when no one believes you when you say you wont pull the football away "this time"...?



The disaster of health care started long before the final bills started taking shape or anyone actually sat down to vote.



No. I'm saying that had his party approached the GOP honestly and not resorted to dirty tricks, they could have gotten bi-partisan support on something like health care. I'm saying "now", that he screwed the pooch politically as far back as March of last year.

To suggest that Obama bears none of the fault for the lack of partisanship in the current health care bill is absurd. He's supposed to lead his party. He's supposed to set the tone and objectives. And he did, to a degree. But the objectives he set were to pursue as far left of a political agenda as possible, "at any cost". And that cost included alienating a large portion of the country and losing any chance they had at bi-partisan health care reform.


Again, they lost this chance back in the first few months of last year. They might possibly have salvaged it, if they'd presented proposals in committee which had even a possibility of meeting most GOP requirements. They failed to do either, so it's a bit odd to complain about it after the fact.

Bush didn't score so well with his own party either. That 40% number was his high water mark, even with a GOP controlled House & Senate. As the article notes, Obama got programs canceled that Bush had been trying, and failing, to get canceled for years.

Maybe if Bush & the GOP Congress had been hacking at the budget while they were in power, you'd have an argument instead of a whine.

There's also a big difference between a social and a fiscal conservative! Unfortunately, fiscal conservatives are a minority in the (current) minority party.

Don't be naive, Joph. Heh. Um. Er. Heh.

Seeing the other person's point of view is the slipperiest slope of them all. Once you start doing that ****, next thing you know you'll be changing your mind about a closely held (but never, ever examined) belief.