What is BO really up to?

Or perhaps the corruption of the corporate elitists/lobbyists have found their way into that portion of the democratic party, perhaps in the form of...I don't know....cash??

 

I think part of it is that he wants to be re-elected. And, you would have a hard time convincing me that the majority of the US is in step with the Pelosians. The Dems in Congress have, in my opinion, probably overstepped their power and I think they will suffer in the elections. Unfortunately, that means a probable swing back to the other crappy party. But, I think the President is too smart to get in lock step with that. He has another election of his own to worry about down the line.

 

Yes those less fortunate are always shortcomings to their Roman counterparts. God forbid anyone wealthy should have to share their good fortune. Better to take, extract and put your boot in someone elses eye for your own benefit.

 

When did greed and indifference towards your fellow man become defensible in America for some? At what point did money become the measure that decides who deserves compassion? Wasn't having the need alone enough in the recent past to merit compassion from an American?

Today the poor are called lazy. Those suffering from life threatening diseases are mocked openly. Those that are teetering on the edge get a hard push in the back from those that can profit from their fall. This certainly isn't the country we grew up in but it most certainly is the country we live in today. Do they win or is this country worth fighting for? We know what they would make of these questions, the only question now is what do we make of them?

 

How about a little honesty, huh? You didn't "answer" the question, you spun it like a liberal hack. You claim there is no lock-step in the dem party as the reason BO is having to fight, scratch & bribe to get his health care takeover passed. The real reason he can't gain support from his party is simply that, despite the pressure from BO, the speaker & the Senate leader, these people know it is bad for the country & it doesn't have the support of their constituency. Think about it. How much pressure has BO been putting on fellow dems to pass this? How much money has he spent travelling around the country campaigning for it? How much time has he spent (at the expense of other issues) trying to sell it? How much political risk has he taken offering the multitude of bribes & under the table deals..the ones we know about?

 

My comment was directly solely at you, tomc. My hard work & success should not be striped away from me because tomc has chosen the path he has. The country will not prosper by dragging everyone down to your level; only by creating a country that allows everyone to rise up, depending on their individual effort, will we see sustained properity. Those, like tomc, who only want to wallow in self pity & denegrade the achievers have the choice of incresing their effort or continuing to stagnate.

 

Now you have your spin and as you say I have mine. The evidence McConnell offered just this week backs up "my spin" when he announced two weeks before Obama was even in office that no Republican will work with him. Mind you, these are his own words and what we've seen in the last year proves that he gave the Republicans their lock-step marching orders and they have obeyed.

I see nothing that proves your spin. I remain unconvinced of your truthfulness.

 

Okay, let's say for a moment you're right & McConnell has issued his marching orders to the Repubs- "We won't support BO on healthcare reform" and no Repubs support his healtcare plan. How many Repub votes does BO need today?

Why hasn't BO been able to rally the support of his fellow dems before now? Why has he had to resort to payoffs & political pressure if the legislation is really that good?

 

First, let me correct this. McConnell said that he will not support anything whatsoever Obama tries to do. He said that even one Republican would give the appearance of bi-partisanship to any effort by Obama or the Democratic majority. He simply is refusing to participate in governing this country as his constituents elected him to do and has bullied the rest of the Republicans into going along with him. Obama doesn't need the Republicans to pass his agenda on health care but neither does he need the Republicans out there spreading the countless lies about his health care proposal either. You know the half-truths I'm referring to and the outright lies that have been bantered about by both the Republicans and their powerful insurance lobbyists friends, death panels, health insurance for illegals, federal financing for abortions, etc. When you have to spend 10 minutes explaining why something is actually as you have portrayed it and it is only true in the rarest of circumstances, you know that the truth has taken a beating. Clearly with an issue as complicated as health care across a country as large and diverse as this one, the ground is fertile for people with self-serving agendas to pick apart the bill and find instances where an infinitesimally small number of some undeserving group may end up profiting from legislation of this magnitude. But to ignore the millions it will help by focusing on these types of ultra-rare occurrences is in effect lying because a lie of omission is still a lie.

Political pressure and deal making IS our form of government. Look at the legislation that passed Medicare Part D and just how much had to be promised to get that stinking piece of legislation through by the Republicans. The result was a huge burden on the tax payers, an enormous doughnut hole for seniors, and a windfall for the drug companies at the tax payer's expense. Who ended up being help? The drug companies. Oddly enough, the people that least needed the help. Obama HAS rallied a lot of support from his own party. Has he rallied every single Democrat? Of course not but not because they are against this bill, many are convinced that it doesn't go far enough because it has no public option and they promised not to vote for any legislation that didn't contain a public option. Some are against it because they are worried about losing their seats in highly conservative districts not because they don't like the bill. I dislike these people most of all. They are self-serving cowards in my opinion that are more interested in maintaining the perks of their job than doing what is right. This behavior isn't exclusive to either party. So again, your spin verses my spin.

 

I would tend to somwhat agree with you but not in this case. This bill this vote is such a basic, important, core issue to BO's presidency and the liberal leadership (not to mention the elite liberals who sponsored BO in his quest to takeover the WH) that I believe your pleadings are too simplistic.
And I still maintain that the extreme prodecural posturing of the lib leadership is proof of terrible this bill is to the AMerican people.

 

I can't say that I really understand much of what you are trying to communicate here but I can see that the words you choose speak very clearly to your biases. You don't "takeover" the White House, you get elected to it and if I remember right, it was by a sizable margin. The importance of this issue has been a liberal priority for decades all the way back to Teddy Roosevelt who was a Republican. The president ran on this issue and now is fulfilling his campaign promise. I don't know what pleadings are too simplistic or why they would be but regardless of how the bill is passed, tomorrow no one other than the sorest of losers will care about the procedure congress used to pass it. What the American people really want is action on health care and the Republicans have never offered any whatsoever. The status quo has been just fine for them over the last 16 years and then some. If you really, really, truly want to know what this whole issue comes down to? It comes down to Democrats forcing a change through that will have an adverse effect of the Republicans financial supporters. If the Republicans were to force through legislation to prevent law suits, that would also be attacking a base of financial support for the Democrats. I couldn't spell it out more plainly than that. The Republicans in this case are fighting for their biggest donors in this instance.

 

Sure you understand...BO went all in on this deal and when he looked around he realized that not enough of his party (or the public) shared his vision of how America should operate. He has had to wheel & deal, bribe and bully to get even those in his own party to vote for a piece of legislation that you, BO & Pelosi think is so grand. Plus they have had to resort to exploiting Congressional procedure to get a few more votes locked up. Bills passed on Christmas Eve, without enough time for them to be read? Reconciliation? Deem & Pass? Cornhusker Kickback? Louisiana Purchase? Family members being appointed to judgeships in return for a vote? Powerful union members being exempt from taxes that everyone else has to pay? Personal "visits" from BO and Rahm Emanuel? What open to open debate? C'mon, it sounds like the only people supporting this are the ones that are getting deals.
Say what you want, the whole path BO has taken stinks and you know it...the people know it & worst of all many members of the dem party who will vote for it know it.

 

Turns out that none of the exploiting of congressional procedure was even necessary to pass this bill and I am happy to say that it will pass in a few short hours. Wheeling and dealing is done on both sides and you know it. This is no different than anything the Republicans have done again and again in the past. BTW You're wrong about me, I don't think this plan is all that grand. I want either a public option or universal health care. This plan is just a good start. It will get better over time with additions. Deal with it.

 

Not to this degree & not a on a piece of legislation so reviled and of this magnitude.

 

Yes the right has to always set the president. 22 times they've used it..but "not to this level". Hypocritical, self righteous Roman slave traders.

 

You speak as if there is some arbitrary line that once crossed, all must be condemned. Would you mind defining that line for the rest of us? Is it monetary? Like any bill over 100 Billion has to be handled in a way Republicans approve of or else. Is the number of pages in the bill? Like if the bill is more than 50 pages, Republicans declare it too long and it must be passed to their satisfactory standards. Is it a percentage of people polled? Like if Republicans poll people and they don't get at least 55% positive responses, the Republicans say the bill is too big to pass by the very same means they have used repeatedly.

Where are these lines drawn anyway? And as an aside, who do the Republicans think they are to dictate which bills do and do not get passed by their rule book?

 

I think the more important question here is did he get elected by a majority of those who voted? and was one of those election promises Health reform? Now of course the answer to both is Yes (Is it not David?) Yet here are people complaining that they never knew what he was going to do!! So he haggled and did some trading for votes BIG DEAL what is new about that? The bill passed with a nice majority so in all honesty it cant have been that bad can it (again I wait to hear the shout that Democrats follow like sheep LOL)

 

Yep, BO & Pelosi got their wish & have forced government controlled healthcare on the people.
I guess I can only hope, when all the under-the-table deals are exposed, my Reps negotiated a better deal than the other guys & everyone else has to pay for my healthcare rather than me having to pay for theirs, huh? Isn't that the idea? Let "them" foot the bill for "me"?

 

Actually, it's government "regulated" health insurance not by any stretch of the imagination "government controlled health care". The government does not run any public health care facilities like the VA because of this bill. The government does not offer an insurance alternative to private insurance. So how in the world is this bill anything other than health insurance regulation? Choose your words more carefully. When you just become a parrot for your party of choice even after the talking points you are parroting have long since been debunked, you run the risk of just becoming a mumbling crazy person standing on the sidewalk with a dirty paper cup in your hand standing next to your shopping cart.

 

Regulation or control? Merely semantics. When the gov't mandates that I purchase insurance, I don't care if you call it "control" or "regulation", my freedom of choice has just been violated.