Lemeritus's Comments (3452)

“Well said, independentcon, and a valuable observation.

I am what Garrison Keillor calls a "home grown Democrat". My mantra might be described this way: Protect the social compact. Defend the powerless. Maintain government as a necessary force for good. I share my life and the roof over my head with a life-long Republican who believes, as you do, in fiscal responsibility, states' rights, and the miracle of American can-do free of government strangulation. Time and again, our aspirations for this country coincide, even when we don't agree on the precise means of accomplishing these hopes. We have both been, for some time now, without a party.

I have thought for some time that right and left with someday meet and agree, if on nothing else, our complete disgust with Washington.”

“Unpleasant things need to be screamed about the Republican Party -- they've become the street gang on the corner, graffiti artists of lies, extortionists and bullies, huckstering the gullible, the bitter, the frustrated and stupid, using God and guns to intimidate and convert, the Elmer Gantrys of politics -- no more devout, no less cynical, hypocritical and poisonous.

Acolytes wear their politics like gang colors, heads be filled with bile and venom, vomiting talking points over and over, every day a new one but always the same, expecting to be taken seriously for a sterling lack of original thought. 20% of our countrymen believe they're the "real" Americans because some bimbo from Alaska rubbed her stilleto shoe up their leg, but they're more like brownshirts every day, an analogy that if you knew anything -- ANTYHING AT ALL -- about history so perfectly describes them that it frightens me.

For McCain, the sad MacBeth of the Republican Party, I have reserved this: B.S. And what's worse, he knows it and says it anyway. Obama may have broken his party in two in an effort to reach out to some mythical other side (presuming, of course, he was not already on that side to begin with), but it was always the Republicans who failed to come to the table... whatever their excuse, however pious and pure they presented their motives, day after day, decade after decade, they have stonewalled anything of help to America. So, B.S., John McCain -- a sad”

“Though well-written and obviously carefully thought out, ESK, the overarching fact is -- without a public option -- the mandate is simply a gun to the head of Americans to buy a product from a private cartel (I like the word "cartel" because that is precisely what we are dealing with: combination of independent business organizations formed to regulate production, pricing, and marketing of goods by the members).

Your argument that widening the coverage pool serves to minimize the risk and lower the cost is compelling BUT ONLY IF health insurance companies operate in good faith either willingly or because the government compels them to do so -- neither of which carrots are on the stick with this legislation. Even the move the eliminate pre-existing condition exclusions may be transitory or illusory if the insurance companies make good use of the fine print, back doors which are everywhere in portions of the bill. Further, this does not create the environment to recalibrate or reconsider R&C, but rather leaves that almost entirely to the corporations that benefit most from it.

Without the public option (to provide the mitigating competition we all hoped for), there is nothing to moderate what insurance companies can charge. Even the subsidies being touted as making health care "accessible" to 30 million Americans is, I fear, just an opportunity for for-profit corporations to steal not just with one hand but with both.”

“Take out the mandate.

There's been a run on Lipton tea bags at my local supermarket.”

“You may be cast adrift, but you're not alone.”

“Obviously -- I presume, to both of us -- there is much in your post with which I disagree. But I am (was) a Democrat who absolutely agrees with the meat of your comment and I will not support this bill because it's a Democratic bill (which is the significant difference between the right and the left, I fear). Forcing people to buy whatever the insurance companies choose to sell is NOT the same as providing access to health insurance.

To the Democrats: remove the mandate and pass whatever's left. Force the mandate on the American people without adequate protection against insurance company greed, and face armageddon at the polling booths.

Btw, ISOLEP, Bush wasn't just bad; he was very, very, very BAD.”

“Is this supposed to be some kind of victory?

Democrats cave to a senator who represents a state with a combined population only negligibly larger than San Diego who insists upon and is given concessions to make it harder for poor women and ultimately for all women to make decisions regarding their own bodies in order to pass a bill that will put a gun to the heads of Americans to buy coverage for private insurers no matter how poor the coverage or expensive the premium? And the Democratic Party now calls that a WIN?????

This is not my Democratic Party! This is shameful!”

“Oh, you're GOOD! Innately undemocratic and always for sale to the highest bidder -- who needs the senate?”

“Moving left?!?!?!

That would be somewhere in the vicinity of Roberta McCain's lost and lamented recollection of the old Republican Party, wouldn't it?”

“Actually, the timing was right -- this had to be undertaken while 08 election enthusiasm was high and before the mid-term elections became a distraction. Unfortunately, the enthusiasm was quickly replaced by dismay. Lack of leadership and miscalculation of how much betrayal his base would tolerate is what got us here.”

“US News & World Report, 12/11:

"Because insurers would have to offer full insurance packages with standard benefits rather than just bits and pieces, the average cost of insurance, in theory, would go up. Most of the people in the nongroup market, however, will qualify for new subsidies, so the CBO found that about 57 percent will pay less than they would have had to without the legislation. The remainder would see a modest increase. But they would also be getting more coverage."

Make of that what you will. There are all sorts of reports out there, commissioned by all sorts of organizations (with all sorts of agendas). There are even multiple CBO reports, done at various stages of the process -- the latest cost estimate is $850 billion OVER TEN YEARS (or $200B more than the Senate spent for TWO YEARS' worth of war toys). We already know the outline of the House bill which contains a public option -- that is estimated to raise more money than it spends, saving $139 billion by 2019. What finally comes out of the Senate is still a dark shadow, but at one point the CBO estimated it would save $130 billion (so I'm assuming it scored the bill when it still contained a public option).

We can never outrun the fact that without regulation or competition, the insurance companies will milk government subsidies and mandated participation for all they can. Passing the Senate bill simply codifies another corporate license to steal.”

“Or maybe if we just tucked a good health care reform bill into a military omnibus bill... or...”

“Well, ain't that just ducky! The Dems manage to circle their wagons to fight off a Republican challenge to spend $626 billion on wars that nobody wants. Hip hip hooray! Democrats win -- if that's your idea of a victory, if that's what you voted for, organized for, spent your time campaigning for. But they can't (or won't) do jack to craft and pass a meaningful health care reform bill which was once supported by 70% of the country. And in their zeal NOT to pass what would cost -- best plan but worst cost scenario -- a mere $170 billion a year, they've managed to lose the labor movement, crush the middle class, and alienate women who've fought for decades to have the right to make decisions about their own bodies.

It's a good day to be a Democrat (NOT).”

“Revenge, as they say, is best served cold, but I say... what the heck... let's eat! Lieberman has been rubbing my fur the wrong way for years.”

“Good for you... I'm sure he feels the love! Most of the rest of us are less than enthusiastic.”

“*roaring*”

“You may have a point... NOW... since there is no public option. However, since the bill still (by some miracle) would provide subsidies for those under 400% of the poverty level (who will be required to buy whatever the insurance companies have to sell, at whatever price, as we all will be), Stupak and Nelson would punish the poorest AND set a precedent for insurance companies (as if they needed one) to curtail coverage overall.”

“We are diversifying ourselves into a left-wing version of the right, what was once Roberta McCain's GOP.

Our "big tent" -- which used to be the subject of some pride -- is collapsing on a good many of us.

Other than that, if there was ever a time for hyperbole, this is it -- pardon me if I mischaracterized our "noble" party overmuch, but Nelson and Stupak have me watching my back for the next knife.”

“Budokan, with all due respect: NONSENSE!”

“"Allowing this effort to fall short now...."

We're not the ones who allowed it to fall short, President Clinton.”

“Third.”

“Welcome to the NEW Democratic Party...

Anti labor.

Anti middle-class.

Anti women's rights.”

“Is it nice where you are? Thank you for sending us postcards from the other side, wishing we were there and all that.

This is NOT the beginning. Once this bill is passed, it will be the end. Our government will force us to buy private insurance at whatever the profit-driven corporations decide to charge. There will be no competition. And we will not revisit it for decades, if ever. People will still die, only more of them will die in the poor house and on the streets.

Thanks for your observation. Your fierce determination of believe what isn't and never was reminds me of Paul Simon lyrics in The Boxer:

"I have squandered my resistance,
For a pocketful of mumbles, such are promises.
All lies and jest.
Still a man hears what he wants to hear
And disregards the rest.."”

“You're being funny, right? Without competition there is not cost containment, and without the public option there is no competition.”

“I see Sparky's a little "tense" today. I, on the other hand, appreciate your point of view... so I guess we'll both be sent to the GOP without our suppers. Hey! Maybe we can do for them what Lieberman did to the Democrats!”