Each painful step, this health care keeps moving forward. As I've written, it is destined given the nature of this issue that every single step will be difficult as hell. Somehow, though, we keep making our way toward getting a bill done.

Harry Reid deserves the lion's share of...

Being into the whole history thing enough to have written a book on it, I tend to take a long view on the big policy battles we fight today. As I wrote the other day, no piece of legislation ever gets to perfection, and on plenty of them...

If you want to stop things from happening, or slow things down to the speed of molasses, being a U.S. Senator is the world's greatest job. And if your entire political party's complete strategy is to kill every single thing proposed, it's a hell of a deal. But ever so...

In January of 1998, the news about Monica Lewinsky exploded in the Washington media world. It was 24-7, and red hot intense. Within 72 hours, Republicans were calling for Clinton's resignation or impeachment, and some Democrats -- even some liberal ones like Paul Wellstone -- were on the verge of...

One of the most fundamental truisms of politics and policy is that old saying about democracy requiring eternal vigilance. In a political system like ours dominated by big money and the lobbyists that money hires, that is especially true, even in years when Democrats control both houses of Congress and...

I thought it might be useful to summarize the big battles ahead, as well as the list of things that are good policy changes that seem likely to be in the final legislation. The battles still ahead include:

1. The shape of the public option. The House public option, while...

I was at a retreat over the weekend with musicians and managers of musicians regarding how to best involve musicians in making social change. The organizer of the event asked me to do a brief overview of what public policy advocacy actually means, so I drew some lines on four...

For some perspective on the wisdom of the Democrats who are opposing health care reform, let's go the elections last Tuesday. New polling analysis from Greenberg Quinlan Rosner and Women's Voices Women's Vote is pretty powerful, and I recommend it to all the Democrats who voted no on...

Health care reform was always going to be tough as hell, as difficult as any issue that could ever be tackled. As I learned from the agony of the 1993-94 Clinton attempt at health care reform, this issue is so massive, so complicated, so unwieldy that it is prone to...

I haven't yet had a chance to digest all the numbers from yesterday's election, but what is coming through loud and clear from all the analysis I have seen is that the biggest difference by far between the 2008 election results and the 2009 results is simply that the two...

Rather than being an overwhelming sweep, most elections are a mix of good and bad news for each political party and the progressive and conservative movements in our country, and the 2009 off-year elections certainly fits into that category.

In the category of the expected, both parties had easy...

This is the one year anniversary of Barack Obama's historic and incredibly exciting election as President of the United States. I was proud of our country that day, that after slavery, Jim Crow, the terrible treatment of Native Americans, and the nasty anti-immigrant laws and rhetoric of our history, that...

McClatchy is out with an incredibly important series on Goldman Sachs, the first two parts of which have gone up already, that raises questions about whether Goldman committed securities fraud at a massive level. I am guessing the next three parts of this series are going to be really...

Many people looking at my headline would immediately assume those two concepts -- centrism, and swing voters -- have a direct and exceedingly close tie to each other. And in some ways, in some elections, at some times, they certainly have. But the connection is growing more and more tenuous,...

With the Republicans becoming locked into being the party of No/Hell, No/Not Ever/Nada/Absolutely Not/Never Ever, Democrats are going to need to seriously consider revising the rules of the Senate at the beginning of next term. The gritty reality of the Senate rules minefield is making the passage of health care...

In the midst of the intense health care battle and the angst about the Afghanistan decision, it's important to remember that there have been some pretty good accomplishments so far this year for progressives. We've moved forward quickly on initiatives like the Lily Ledbetter fair pay act, S-CHIP, a good...

Okay, folks, we progressives got what we wanted. A comprehensive health care reform bill with a reasonably strong public option will be going to the floor as part of leadership bills in both the House and the Senate. We don't yet know whether we will get the best version of...

The intensity is ratcheting ever higher as we move toward the final stages of the health care fight. It's been a good week for reformers overall. Pelosi and Reid are both whipping for strong bills, including a very strong public option (in the House) or a respectable public option (in...

Have you seen the latest stories about the profits and bonuses of the biggest banks on Wall Street? Are they going out of their way to try to piss everyone off? Are they intentionally thumbing their nose at democracy to make it clear that they can and will get away...

One thing that every major policy initiative the Obama administration has taken/has been forced to take on (most of them are in the latter category given the stakes) early in their term have in common is their overwhelming complexity. I am glad we have a president with real brains and...