Politics
Organizing the Community
I love reading Garrison Keillor. He is everything I am not. He is kindly. He is patient. He is thoughtful. He is, presumably, solvent. Not only that, he writes really well. Must be his education as an English major.
However, in the commentary he published in yesterday’s salon.com, I think he got it entirely wrong. In his article, he praised Senator Harry Reid, D-Nevada. He praised the senator, in essence, for being kind, patient, thoughtful and, presumably, solvent. All of these virtues are just swell. Unfortunately, none of these virtues are very useful if you want to be a political leader in a rough and tumble arena.
I suspect you could assign the same list of virtues to our president. How he could be that way and have survived the politics of Chicago is beyond me but it is increasingly apparent that he did just that.
I think the “let’s us just all get along” philosophy the president has taken toward his domestic detractors is an example of these sterling qualities. I also think this comes across as political incompetence.
Maybe the president or, at least, some of his subordinates recognize this tendency. Maybe that is why, all of a sudden, the U S State Department rose up upon its mighty haunches and made a clear statement of policy about something. Of all things, the department decided to draw a line in the sand over a “free” internet.
Internet freedom, that is, uncensored internet access for everyone, is now official, front burner, U S foreign policy. The State Department has announced a major expanded policy statement by Secretary Clinton declaring that free access to all internet content amounts to a basic human right.
Of course, by “free” the United States does not mean monetarily free. It means free of censorship, once one manages to get on line. Still, this is quite a step. I would like to think it illustrates that the folk in D. C. have figured out that the internet is a major weapon, effective in the fight against lingering pockets of medieval thought.
A Reuters’ report published today in Wired.com claims that Secretary Clinton’s announced address for later today “could be seen as throwing down the gauntlet” to the Chinese. While this observation was not attributed to anyone in particular, it is the sort of behind the scenes statement officials, or their subordinates, leak to the press to fortify the weight of their words without being directly offensive to the target. In this case the Chinese.
There is an awful lot at stake here. Internet based commerce and internet based foreign policy are two spheres, one commercial and the other political, in which the U S believes it has real advantages over the rest of the world. These policy areas are now so important either could be the flash point for larger breakdowns in international commerce and/or national alignment. Yet, knowing the potential dangers, Washington doesn’t really have any choice.
Washington lacks choice because as a weapon to destabilize our enemies, the internet is without peer. It is also mind-bendingly cost efficient. It is virtually free and is fueled by the creative power of the west and the latent creative power of the Middle East and the Far East.
This policy statement could also, eventually, have real impact on domestic politics. As the president continues to dither and blither all his political capital away, Secretary Clinton’s strong technology initiative stands in some considerable contrast.
Of course, the Chinese may not blink. They figure out some way to bring financial pressure on us, perhaps through their ownership of much of our debt, and do so without plunging themselves into political and financial chaos, the secretary’s initiative could begin to look like a liability.
However, if you ignore the possibility of worst case planning, and her initiative does back the Chinese down, this will be a great feather in the Obama administration’s cap and should prove very popular. It could be something to take the focus off the domestic policy fiasco.
And, make no mistake, the president needs all the help he can get about now. It is almost impossible to construct a scenario where his “community organizer” style of leadership is not the primary reason we do not and will not get any meaningful, beneficial health care package out of Congress this year.
The president began this effort less than a year ago. He was armed with overwhelming public support, huge majorities in Congress and a cowed opposition. He then began to piss. He continued to do so throughout the spring, the summer and the fall. A larger, mightier, political bladder has never been seen in our lifetime. Unfortunately, the steady stream ran out in MA this week. The president’s bladder is now dry.
During this political urinary exercise, the president has revealed himself to be both a thorough and timid man whose desire to “find consensus” trumps his will to lead. I once heard it said that to declare for governor of Alabama was the political equivalent of mounting a table in a crowded and rowdy bar and declaring yourself the “toughest, meanest son of a bitch in the place.” Whatever you may say about George Bush, he understood that was true of being president as well. Bill Clinton, as Newt Gingrich discovered on an airplane trip to Israel, understood that also. Barack Obama does not. Jimmy Carter, God bless him, never did either.
Maybe it is possible that the president will learn from the health care debacle. Maybe he will grow up and into the job. I do hope so. However, that is what I hope. What I think is that Jim DeMint got it right. The failure of the health care bill is Obama’s Waterloo. I suspect it is the Democratic Party’s as well.
After watching the pitiful and disgraceful conduct of the Democratic Party Congressional leadership on almost every issue it has faced since they took over in 2006, it is hard to imagine how they will ever have a descension of political testicles. While I have some respect for Speaker Pelosi, I am utterly dismayed at the rest of the passive putters that make up the Senate and House leadership.
Watching the Senate race in MA I am left wondering if, in fact, the Democratic Party has anything left to offer the nation. I am left to wonder if, even given a huge endorsement by the electorate in the last election, is there anything the Democrats stand for, anything at all?
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Mike – I can’t say that I blame you for your disappointments in DC this year. But I do take exception to one of the assumptions. Obama was not armed with a huge majority in the Senate. Before Franken was seated (June) and Specter switched parties (April), he had 58 seats, but only if you include Lieberman. That also included Ted Kennedy only voted a couple of times and Robert Byrd who is 92 (though Byrd doesn’t miss a vote). Then there’s Evan Bayh, Ben Nelson, Tom Carper, Mary Landrieu, Blanche Lincoln, Mark Udall, Michael Bennett, Mark Begich, Kay Hagan, Herb Kohl, Jeanne Shaheen and Mark Warner who are Democrats because they couldn’t get elected as Republicans at the time. And another dozen who are liberal on some narrow issues and moderate to conservative on many many more. This big tent that Dems used to get a majority in the Senate had way too many leaks in it to govern with much power. With an opposing party that only broke ranks (Snow & Collins) a couple of times, their death march to compromise bought them little in results. I fault Harry Reid, first. Rahm Emanuel, second.
I believe the President’s greatest failure last year was the first major initiative: the stimulus bill – leaving it to Congress filled it with pork and signature issues that had less to do with stimulus than payback and became the budget buster that prevented almost anything else major from moving out of committee. Now they’ll spend the rest of their time in office trying to look like they are creating jobs that the stimulus should have while they are trying to make room in the budget for anything important. Add the Afghanistan build-up to keep the war lobby and hawk pundits in line to grab some air for healthcare, and the promised issues that are also waiting on healthcare, an ineffective Senate leader, and, well, I wonder what these clowns are doing in our caucus.
The healthcare bill won’t be Obama’s nor the Dems’ Waterloo. Whether it finally passes (still likely, but stripped) or not, the opposition party is barely viable at less than 20%. The Dems have plenty of time left to succeed as Dems have so often before – incrementalism and tiny ideas that get passed, periodic pandering to the base and more often to the right.
Maybe Harry Reid will retire before he loses in the fall. Maybe we can kick Lieberman out of the caucus. Maybe Obama can find a chief of staff who is less about the deal and more about the law. Maybe the Republicans will get too busy on the campaign trail to keep voting no. Maybe some bills could be introduced that are not sweeping multi-thousand page monstrosities, but are important and can pass, too.
And just maybe, the Democrats will stand for something.
BTW, I think Obama is doing a great job at making government more competent and managing the Bush/Cheney-made crises. My disappointment is that he learned too many lessons from the Clinton’s. He must be more active with Congress. -
Lee,
It isn’t that i disagree with your list of flotsam present in the Senate at the beginning of the administration. Where you and I differ is I believe Obama has illustrated no interest in leading. He seems to believe, as President, he is now the functional equivalent of the Chairman of some powerful Senate Committee.
We just had a President who betrayed no interest in almost anything but had no trouble leading when his pea brain latched on to something. We now have a President with a lively curiosity about virtually everything married to an overwhelming desire to be buddies with everybody.
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Brenden says: You guys need to have a come to Jesus about your Angry Leftism. The aggregate American public abhors the mindless Marxist attacks on the private sector. Obama & pals are waging domestic warefare from autos, to healthcare to banking — and to the entire economy by backdoor deficit spending on worthless pork-barrel stimulus which produce nothing except for state jobs for Democrat political hacks. Attacking doctors and financiers really only works on a small portion of the electorate, the one bent on assuming autocratic control through endless bureaucracy. You’re right to point out that the 10,000-page bills and corrupt vote-buying — Obama, Pelosi & Friends shepherding the worst such examples in modern history — are wildly unpopular. Such efforts totally give the lie to the supposed underlying ideology to “help the people.” The “people” now recognize that these healthcare measures were only designed for the (Democrat) political class to help themselves. And that’s why they need to start over.
But back to your angry leftism. Besides all the blinding neon-hued graft and corruption of ObamaCare, you must recognize the real debate here is about state vs. private allocation of healthcare. I believe most people think the gov’t has a role in all this, but whether they will be the ultimate arbiters determining price levels and consumer choice is where the rubber meets the road in this debate. If you decide to give the gov’t control, doctors will flee the system — especially in areas of advanced specialty. Healthcare quality will decline, and people know it. The U.S. has the greatest healthcare system on the planet because it is the most advanced, yielding the best outcomes to those who can afford to participate within it. The people who can’t afford it get substandard care compared to those who can afford the best — but it is false to say that there people who receive no healthcare whatsoever. The voters realize that giving gov’t control of the healthcare system — particularly THIS gov’t — will ruin it. The gov’t's role must be limited to the periphery, and market forces determine producer costs and where best to allocate capital. When the gov’t does the allocating, as Obama & friends have demonstrated, they tend to allocate it to themselves.
Lee you rightly point out that most Democrats elected to statewide office tend to have a more conservative profile than one would expect from a party whose leaders include Obama and Pelosi. Conservatives disagree about a great many things, but the one thread that unifies the movement is protection of private property and freedom to transact that property. Obama’s policies in healthcare, deficit spending, climate-control and finance greatly offend even the most mildly milquetoast closet conservatives’ fundemental sense of limited gov’t and private property rights. Those of you who think the Constitution was fundementally designed to enforce slavery can surely line up behind the statist autocrats of the current regime, but the rest of us revere its fundemental purpose to limit gov’t power to protect us from hacks like Obama.
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Cliff Green says: A couple of points: the character “Brenden” refers to ObamaCare, which does not exist.
Obama left it up to Congress to write health care reform legislation. That means that every special interest group–insurance companies, bigpharma, hospital groups, medicals associations, etc. etc., was able to stick its finger into the pie. The result is a 3,000-page bill that the left and the right despises.
I find it interesting also that “Brenden” finally admits that medical care in the U.S. states is rationed based on wealth. He writes: “The U.S. has the greatest healthcare system on the planet because it is the most advanced, yielding the best outcomes to those who can afford to participate within it.” Well, duh! Then he goes on to write: “…[I]t is false to say say that there (sic) people who receive no healthcare whatsoever.” That’s a damned lie! -
Brenden says: So you’re saying there are (sic) people who receive no care at all… no emergency rooms… no free clinics… no nothing… Dude, it’s lies like this that discredit the angry leftism movement.
And how would you have a scarce resource like healthcare rationed? By politicians? I guarantee they’ll do a worse job than evil capitalists.
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George says: I have never in my life been so confused and so concerned about our country and our gov’t. I do like reading Brenden’s comments because it gives me a conservative prospective. I just wish it wasn’t so condescending and insulting. Reading his comments one would think the Obama administration is part of an occupying force from another country or planet. I can’t quite get my mind around my exact feelings about the Obama administration, but you guys help. I know that I am not satisfied with his performance so far.
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Brenden says:
I guess I give the wrong impression of Obama sometimes. I see him more sporting a jaunty red beret, riding a rusty bicycle into a pastel sunset a la Cezanne, a baguette protruding from the wicker basket tied to his handlebars in withered cheesecloth. Now he does have that, under-bathed, moldy-cheese smell of European socialism about him — but it’s very terrestrial in nature. And I’m quite comfortable that his leadership was obtained by voter consent, having been bourne pharonically to his post by a supine, militantly incurious media and somewhat moldy political opposition. But certainly Obama deserves the same deference and respect given to his predecessor.
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Cliff Green says:
To the character “Brenden”: It’s difficult for you and yours to see through tinted glass, but people are born, live and die in the United States without ever seeing a doctor.
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Brenden says:
That may be, but don’t tell me individuals in dire circumstances don’t have any access whatsoever to medical care — certainly more access than one otherwise would have in practically all of the countries on this planet.
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Meg Gerrish says: You’re right, Brenden, the vast majority of poor do have access to some level of health care and if you are badly injured in a car accident, you will probably be helped.
But it generally works like this — the poor and increasingly the middle-class poor (too broke for insurance or the co-pay or the thousands in deductibles, not broke enough for public assistance or “free clinics”) can’t afford to go to the doctor for the nail in the foot or the cold that persists or the lump that doesn’t belong. The problems build to crisis levels, so emergency rooms are jammed with people who might have been treated in a doctor’s office, but who are now in the ER where it is far more expensive to treat anything. Or they call fire-rescue!
We citizens pay a lot for health care under the current system already. We pay a lot more in cash and soul than we would if everyone had insurance (or NO ONE had insurance).
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“That may be, but don’t tell me individuals in dire circumstances don’t have any access whatsoever to medical care — certainly more access than one otherwise would have in practically all of the countries on this planet.”
Meg,
As you can see clearly from the above quote, Brenden has politely requested that we not confuse him with reality.
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Brenden says:
No, I am asking that you not delude yourselves with lies about the reality of healthcare in this country. I’m asking that you not perpetuate these lies in order for our corrupt politicians to adopt an offensive prepackaged political bailout for themselves. Well, strike that. I hope the House does adopt the Senate bill actually, because you will see 49 states suing Nebraska, other 49 suing Louisiana and non-union workers suing the federal gov’t — and hopefully then all the backroom payoffs, lies and bribes will be articulated in documents in court before a judge for all of us to see. Then the gov’t healthcare gears will grind to a halt and public outrage will soar. Obama & pals lied boldly when they told us these negotiations would be transparent. It would be nice for the media to remind us of this once in a while.
But as far as healthcare goes, to the extent you want high quality outcomes, you must “grow up” and realize that wealth will always be a key determinant in defining those outcomes. Healthcare, alas, is a business that requires risk, investment and reward. When a gov’t defines the allocation of producers and consumers, you get Cuba, whose political elite fly to Miami or private doctors in Spain when they have “real” problems.
Meg, the problems of cost are because our corrupt politicians allow states to provide monopolies to major carriers. That I cannot buy insurance in Idaho to for Georgia carriers to compete on price and service. The problems of cost are also secularly economic, that is, healthcare outcomes are driven by cutting-edge technology. Investments in cutting-edge technology and highly educated practicioners are extremely expensive. There is no getting around that. Healthcare will always be expensive, and the poor will always struggle to afford it. We should work to help them, but handing over the keys to the gov’t makes everyone worse off.
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Cliff Green says:
To “Brenden” the character: First of all, those of us who disagree with you are not deluded and we don’t perpetuate lies. Second, we do not need to be told by an elitist twerp like you to “grow up.”
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Brenden says:
Cheers to you Cliff, ignoring the argument as usual. Surely you take comfort in the juvenile conspiracy paranoia that underlies the socialist-healthcare position. Evil bankers! Insurance Nazis! Elitist Twerps! The republic is well served by your bravery and reason.
Or maybe you’re an idiot.
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Meg Gerrish says:
Brenden — Regarding the one problem you addressed, I, too, would like a health care system that would allow us to join policies across state lines. On that I think we agree. Hard to say because your arguments tend to run all over the white space, seemingly just for the sake of argument. Edit, Brenden. Edit. A good eraser is a writer’s best friend and will help to clarify your points.
And the”idiot” remark. Really? That’s what you bring to the discussion, to enlighten? (…sigh)
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Brenden says:
I only suggested the possibility that Cliff is an idiot. I am not sure, while he expressed certitude about my elitist twittedness — a matter of pure speculation. And “running over the white space?” If you cannot grasp the underlying premises, don’t blame me for writing above your level of understanding. I lovingly craft my statements with the skill of a professional. Their clarity is unimpeachable.
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Brenden says:
Thank you, Mike — finally I am recognized for my humble contributions.
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Cliff Green says:
Mike & Meg: Please, don’t waste your time composing responses to the character “Brenden.”
“Brenden” does not exist. No human being could possibily express the opinions attributed to this character, “Brenden.”
My guess is that “Brenden” is the creation of a sneaky avant garde playwright running an experiment on this forum to see how long he can keep a tiresome mythomanic on stage before the audience boos him off. -
C Smith says: You have to admit he is persistent.
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Brenden says:
Cliff’s comment reminds me of some ridiculous progressive protest of some corporation or another that I happened to witness, or was compelled to attend. Here were a bunch of flannel clad progressives, protesting some fake noble cause. A passerby stopped and addressed one of the sign-holding hippies, giving a pro-business appeal. The hippy then turns on the guy and starts leading the chant, “Ignore the facist! Ignore the facist!” Then, completely oblvious to their sheet idiocy, a crowd of 100 people start screaming and pointing, “Ignore the facist! Ignore the facist!”
Since I know the irony will be lost on many of you so steeped in your noble progressivism, I will spell it out for you. One hundred or so people screaming and pointing on a busy street corner, “Ignore the facist!” hardly served the point of directing attention away from him.
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I start planning my closet organization by measuring the length and the depth. You will need this information to start figuring out how many shelves and shoe racks you can install.
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Last 5 posts by Mike Copeland
- Misappropriation of the Holy Spirit - June 8th, 2010
- Foreclosure Theater - April 30th, 2010
- The Cure For Progressive Politics - March 19th, 2010
- Gerrymander 101 - March 16th, 2010
- Patent fences and energy independence - March 10th, 2010
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