Bill Kristol did it. No surprise.

Check out this post

http://www.prospect.org/csnc/blogs/tapped_archive?month=11&year=2009&base_name=over_at_talking_points_memo

Smith  believed the Invisible Hand works if it can be protected from the government. And from  businessmen.

 People of the same trade seldom meet together, even for merriment and diversion, but the conversation ends in a conspiracy against the public, or in some contrivance to raise prices.A Smith

Smith understood  that if  greed  causes competitive entrepreneurs to work so hard for themselves that the publilc  benefits , it follows they'll try  to  avoid the compettion that  benefitted the public. .

The Public be dammed.C. Vanderbilt

Which is why  Health Iinsurance is an oxymoron. Particularly when it matters most. With life threatening conditions.

For comparison, think about property insurance. A property insurance company wants to  keep collecting premiums. But there's competition .The customers have a choice ( a word we hear a lot of these days).  They can go elsewhere If the company stiffs them on a claim they'll move on..So greed works. It  causes the company to pay claims. At least little ones.

But the Health Insurance Company ain't gonna collect any future premiums from the customer with a fatal disease.There's no competition.So the Insurer will refuse to pay for the same reason that Smith's businessmen will conspire against the public:greed. To make money.

 Except in this case no conspiracy is needed.  The customer  has no choice. No other company is going to insure  a terminal or near terminal patient. Exit Invisibile Hand   Greed causes the private Health Insurance industry not to pay ..

The Public Option will pay. Because it will has no choice.We run it. We'll make it.

Which means .

o It will have an incentive to " bend the cost curve".

o And the Health Insurance Industry will have to do the same. It it has to :honor claims instead of stiffing them it will have to join in bending the cost curve . Become part of the solution instead of merely being (a big)part of the problem.

Which is why the Republicans have been  whining. Not  because  the Public Option will introduce unfair competition.Forget unair. Because it will introduce l competition where there is none.

Somewhere in the Great Market in the Sky Adam Smith will be smiling. And if he were in congress, he'd vote Aye.  

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Harry Reid produced a miracle last Saturday. It'll take another to get Health Care Reform onto Obama's desk. Which will then be greeted with derision here.

Oscar Wilde described fox hunting as the Unspeakable in pursuit of the Uneatable. Which doesn't exactly the status of the Health Care debate but I feel like using it.

Can we stipulate that.....:

o The American Political System is broken,and

o Mr. Market is incompatible with Health Care?  

        we can't . OK . One more time.Let's try again.

American democracy suffered its first near- mortal wound in September 1960 when Nixon lost the election because he wasn't made up for his debate with JFK. If they hadn't gotten it before, that was the point at which the  political strategists of the world grasped that TV trumps policy.  He who has the bucks to buy the most air time get's to go to Washington.

The second came with Dump the Hump, the 1968 election when the PSs of the world  grasped that there were issues more important to large blocks  of voters than having their party win.C.f. Nader 2000 and single issue politics in general And a fair portion of the discussion here...

That first illumination in  1960 handed the legislative process almost entirely over to K Street. The lobbyists with the bucks to pay for airtime. "Almost"  because the one counterveiling force is the power of those  single issue voters whether that single issue is Choice or Gun Rights. ( One person's  noble crusade is another's short sighted over- emphasis - or as we used to say "It all depends on whose ox is gored" ).   

So today's would- be D. Websters get to Washington on the wings of corporate $s (however disguised as PACs) and stay there based on their calculus of  their exposure to the particular competing single- issue blocks that are currently playing best in their Peoria.

Legislation anyone?

Now on to the Market and Health Care. They're incompatible.Need I say more?

 I do? OK.

When Steve or Sally Citizen needs a vital operation everything else falls away in comparison. They'll pay whatever it takes which is usually whatever they have. . Unless they haven't enough. In which case they die.

Why does it take that much ? And why don't they have it? Because the Market is incompatible with Health Care.

All right ,all right I'm about to explain that.Take notes.

The Rotary Club version of the Market is lots of keen sellers competing to offer their wares to the discriminating buyer. The reality of Steve& Sally's situation is , forget discrimination they'll pay anything.  And the not- so- keen sellers with whom they have to bargain are an underfunded hospital trying to cover its losses in the ER and a surgeon who went hundreds of thousands of dollars into debt before she saw her first patient and whose motto now is First Do No Operation For Which You Aren't Well Paid..

That's called Fee for Service.

But ,hey, how about distributing the risk. If we each contributed a bit there'd be enough money for S&S when they needed it. ( Well , maybe , depends on the cost, strike that, price of the procedure.) But if we all, say , buy health insurance surely Kevin the kind CEO of Flavius Insurance Co. will take care of us . He can salt our money away in some rewarding investment like credit default swaps and when S&S get the bad diagnosis he'll bargain with the docs to get an economic price which he'll pay from his ever flowing granary of wise investments.

Except that Flavius Insurance  is a public co,with shareholders who want to see a steady increase in the share price.so they can buy that  time- share in Vail. Or maybe pay for an operation. 

And a steady increase in share price requires a steady increase in EPS. And  that requires  FIC to spend less on paying docs than on it collects from the S&Ss and from those CDSs (AOBTW they haven't done so great lately, or did you notice?) .There are various ways of accomplishing this but the Tried and True solution is reject the claim.And if the customer sues, wait it out. He'll die soon.

Kind Kevin got promoted to his job because the Board liked the "cut of his jib" Translation: his ability to find reasons not to pay  claims . And he'll stay in his job just so long as he rejects enough claims so that each quarter's EPS is up a penny.

At every stage the market is a perverse instrument for providing health care.

So both of you readers who made it this far,  we have a Potemkin Political System addressing the problem of a fundamental incompatibility between Market Capitalism and Health Care.

Various studies put out annual deaths due to our (lack of ) Health Care non system at something between forty and a hundred thousand per year..Will the bill Obama signs on Jan 15th end fee for service? . Will it eliminate  the insurance industry? Pigs could fly.Whatever political skills Harry, Nancy and Barak have- and they have great skills, they aren't that great.

What the bill  do is to cut thousand off that obscene total of unnecessary deaths. It will probably elect a republican House as well. But we'll have moved the ball a little way down the field and at some future point another Congress can move it further.. But most important there'll be some thousands of people every year who won't die

It'll be criticized roundly here because of failing to achieve the impossible. But I'll take it.

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Olympia Snowe and Suzan Collins are going to vote for the bill that finally passes in late January.

Because otherwise there ain't gonna be no health care bill.

Last night was the high water of  democratic votes.  That train has left the station and now Reid and Pelosi are going to have to compromise sufficiently to get the two Mainers aboard. Which  also means Liebernan and maybe even Grassley. Voinevich ? .

And they will. Because they're serious politicians and they know how to count the house.

Any effort we make here on the left to attempt to prevent them doing that will be at best ineffective, more likely counter productive. We can spend the next eight weeks insisting on the impossible and then the 10 months after that whining because we didn't get our way. And then foolishly sit out the election.

Or we can fact the facts that there aren't 60 senate votes for what we want so we have to start wanting what there are 60 senate votes for

.If you want to make it to Dawson you need eight huskies to pull the sled.. And a puppy dog to throw to the wolves

but we ought to do it according to Martin Wolf in today's FT. Because this time it really is different.

The bankers got their bonuses  because their banks made money . But the banks only made money because the government bailed them out either directly or by its handling of the economy,

Says Wolf "'ordinary people can accept that riisk takers receive huge rewards. But such rewards for those who have been rescued by the state and bear substantial responsibility for the crisis of surely intolerable"

 Here's the link.

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/f9d3132c-d55b-11de-81ee-00144feabdc0.html

First because he was just, well , right. We have disgraced ourselves for year after year by abandoning any pretence of compliance with our own traditions not just of  fairness but of decency. And we've finally stopped. Just in time.

And also because at this last moment he has justified those, all over the world, who sympathized with us on 9/ll. Remember? .. Over the intervening 8 years we have shamed them, casually thrown away most of that reservoir of good will. Rather than being  a "City on the Hill", we've been just another run of the mill  country which jettisons its principles precisely when it is time for them to come into play.  

A process which we would have completed if we had tried these 9/ll accused in a military forum.

Why is it I'm reminded of the first words of my first OCS class on the military legal system?

The first thing you must understand gentlemen, is that this is not a class in military justice , It's a class in military law.

 Thank God.And Eric Holder, we're finally going to do this right.

The solution to what ?

Well, almost everthing.

o Investment bankers are motivated to take excessive risks.

  Tax every dollar earned over $1,000,000 at 90%. They'll be a lot less tempted.

o Entertainment figures earn as much in a year as Joe the plumber does in a life time

  See above

o We can't afford health care/decent schools/you name it

Collect the money from those who have the money..

o The increase in the deficit is undermining the dollar

   Increase revenues the old fashioned way. By taxing those who can afford it

o The tax code is an offence to the human race.

  Eliminate the serried rows of special arrangements  so that any citizen can compute his taxes without assistance.

o Voters have lost interest interest in  exercising  control over spending

. See above. Not only should every tax payer sign their return. They should certify that they computed it without assistance. That'll catch their attention.

o The alternative minimum tax is unfairly affecting those who should not be subject to it.

No need for it if the tax code is progressive

o We need incentives in the tax code to encourage desirable projects

Collect the $s through taxation. Then if we want to encourage something do it the old fashioned way:let Congress vote to pay for it. Somehow I think fewer projects will seem desirable.

o Lobbyists will distort the tax system in ways the voters can't understand.

See above

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So OK , we agree but the tax code is so complicated that it is literally impossible to unravel.

Uh,uh, We have a perfectly good code. It was in existence on Jan 1 1953. Just get it out of the files.

was impressive. Relaxed and self assured ,talking in a near conversational tone and clearly in full  command of his material and himself he was a real life talking and walking example of why the Republicans' ideas are irrelevant in the debate on health care.

And on most other issues.

Turning the pages of the bill , with amused sarcasm he recited case after case of things  the health care  tzar will supervise.Clearly expecting that we , like him, will be appalled that the Government will actually do something. As opposed to the deeply held conservative position that it should do nothing, merely stand by wringing its hands and hoping for the best.

Today's Times magazine describes the vastly improved results a Colorado medical practice obtains by actually telling doctors what to do. That would no doubt elecit  a chuckle from Boehner. Whose idea for controlling medical costs(and outcomes) like  his idea for controlling the banking system bears an uncanny resemblence to the(naturally) least effective treatment for prostate cancer:watchfull waiting. Otherwise known as "do nothing and hope the cancer will cure itself ".

It is Adam Smith gone mad. Make no plans, give no directions, hope for the best.

It's not how Boehner conducts his own life. He prepared for his  remarks last night. Someone had gone through the bill and selected the pages containing the dire threat that if Health Care passes, the Government will actually take an interest in what the Medical Professions is doing. He didn't just open the bill at random, he had a plan.

In case you wondered why New Orleans and the occupation of Iraq were such disasters look no further. They were the necessary consequences of a philosophy which advocates  dealing with all problems  by "watchful waiting"..

Culture came to Main Street but not escapism.

When things got complicated in the third act they also got up to date.. The Chinese interrogators  wanted information. The lovely Liu refused to tell them what they wanted.

Puccini's operatic solution: they would threaten her with torture.' We have ways of making you talk'. The Milan audience perhaps smiled indulgently. That Puccini !. An operatic solution to move the plot along.

Waterboarding , I thought but Liu beat them to the punch.

What's happened to us?  How did we get to a place where the highest levels of our government approve something that ten years ago we'd have scorned as a medeival practice or hokey theatrical plot device?  And criticism is classified  at best as a sign of almost culpable  immaturity and more likely as unpatriotic indifference to the welfare of  our troops overseas.

In years of living abroad where, frankly, things were often better run , I could still think fondly of our government as one that was fundamentally decent. Today that seems mostly to depend on which torturer is in charge of the Office of Legal Counsel

Even Puccini couldn't have dreamed up John Yoo.

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in which John Houseman , on behalf of some Wall Street firm,growled "We make money the old fashioned way. We work for it." 

The Galleon case  and more , the media's treatment of it recalls that piece of hypocricy. The old  fashioned  work that firm, and Galleon , and all of Wall Streets analysts do is obtaining corporate profit forecasts so they can recommend a buy or sell of a particular stock. That's it. The columns of statistics that typically accompany that key sentence are window dressing and treated as such by the readers.

On those few occasions when they can't obtain it directly from the company, a couple of nights spent at the bar nearest to corporate headquarters will produce it from one or another of the  50 people present that night who know it.

Every firm which issues investment advice and every reporter  who covers that activity knows that. When a Galleon case comes along the question is not :Are they guilty.?Of course they are. The question is Why was this particular case  brought ?

Obviously I don't refer to the official forecasts published under  SEC pressure. I refer to the  forecasts in which  the company actually believes. And which  guide its actions.

 Rather than try to restrict such disclolsure  the SEC should  prohibit any sanction for the disclosurers. All those influential  analysts would be freed to go into some legitimate employment as bar tenders or palm readers. . 

The columns of statistics which often accompany that key sentence are window dressing and treated as such by the readers.

Every firm which issues investment advice and every reporter  who covers that activity knows that. When a Galleon case comes along the question is not :Are they guilty.?Of course they are. The question is Why was this particular case  brought ?

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Obama slew the last one. Remember the Recession? And what people thought about his handling of it?

Here's John Authers in today's  FT

This rally ..is now arguably the biggest such turnaround in the past hundred years.

The common assumption ...was that the crisis could not end until the biggest US banks were nationalized......Many were unimpressed by the Obama administrations debut

Then the government's much derided "stress tests" .....restored confidence.

 And not only the capitalist press  but , I sort of remember, even in this  TPM  non- bastion of capitalism,Obama's selection of Geithner and Summers was greeted with muted applause.

Guess what? Obama succeeded. He didn't do what was wanted by  the Authers of the world or by a sizeable TPM contingent. But it worked.He was smart enough not to do what a lot of us wanted.To see that what he needed at that time , to deal with that problem ,was Geithner and Summers. Horses for courses.

So since he got that right, what makes us think he's not also smart enough to see that when it's time to deal with the next problem, say income inequality, he won't see that what he needs is some else?

Two months ago Dragon #2 was breathing fire according to media's health experts and political bloviators. Guess what ?. The reports of  the death of Health Care Reform seem to have been much exaggerated .Can't say the same for Dragon #2  last seen emitting tepid puffs.

And when it comes to Afghanistan what makes us think that because he knew that McChrystal was the Geithner of an anti insurgent campaign he'll fail to see that he needs a non- McChrystal for the non- anti- insurgent  campaign to which I expect/hope he's going to shift ?I forsee four scaly legs in the air and a cold droopy tail switching its last.

Hey, it's fun winning a few. Relay and enjoy it.

Not even evil.Neither was Sharon. Nor Arafat. Nor Gerry Adams.  Nor Curtis LeMay. Nor Mohammed Atta. Nor,  dare I say it, Osama Bin Laden..

They were all responsible for doing terrible things to other human beings: torturing them, incinerating them in a Birmingham pub , vaporizing a hundred thousand of them with one bomb . Or 9/11. But not because they are evil. They all thought they were doing  good; defending their own people by attacking their enemy.

We can deplore their choices. I do. Mostly.I Agreed with Hiroshima. But  to characterize them as criminals  is to adopt another  version of their own  behavior :ceasing to see them as  human beings , just cardboard characters in the long running morality play in our own heads. Enter the devil, Stage Left.  

Criticize them for faulty strategies. Or for employing means that are disproportionate to their ends.But not for being motiveless villains.

And stop clamoring for a War Crimes Tribunal. Or a Congressional hearing. Or execution. For someone who has done the same sort of cruel thing that all leaders have always done. .

Olberman's hour long comment last night (Oct 7) made all the right arguments  convincingly and with appropropriate emotion.

It must be possible to find it someplace on the net. Don't miss it.

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I wish he weren't  But he is.

What happened in Gaza and in Siderot was not a War Crime. It was  war. There are no war criminals in the IDF. Or in Hamas.Or flying the Enola Gay. Or ordering GIs in 1944 "take these prisoners back the HQ (10 miles away) and be back in 5 minutes."

Just warriors.

In wars, warriors do things like dispatching a peace mission while the fleet's en route to Pearl Harbor, Or saturation bombing of Coventry or  Dresden. Or  dropping atom bombs on Hiroshima ; firing rockets at Siderot ; bombing a UN school filled with Gaza civilians.If it kills any one on the other side , it's not a War Crime. It's war. 

And that all too definitely includes killing civilians-what else were Bomber Harris and Curtis Lemay doing in 1944.

If not absolutely  in all wars at all times, in so many you might as well say all,  military leaders have believed, correctly,that killing civilians is probably the most effective strategy, And certainly the one that best spares its own citizens. Denying that is Cant. Or invincible ignorence..

As Prince Andre argued (and Sherman practiced) ensuring the current war inflicts grievous harm on civilians is the best way to lengthen the interval  before a new generation learns for itself the same old lessorn that War is Hell.

Killing civilians only becomes a War Crime when it decreases the chance of winning like Eichman commandering Hungarian rail roads to transport Jews to the Camps.. Not when Hitler, or Roosevelt or Stalin or Arafat or Golda Meir killed any of the enemy, civilian or military. Preferably as horribly as possible. That was just  War.

:Which enemy of the free market said the following about   bankers?

o"it's only a mild exaggeration to say that European rogue traders serve relatively short jail sentences before taking to the lecture circuit

o "the return of a "business as usual" ethos in relation to bank bonuses suggests the shame gene has gone missing in the financial system

o "a possibly unique feature of the financial business is that traders are often applauded.for eviscerating their clients

o"A similar ethical deficit has been evident in the subprime.market

 o"When incentives are pushing people in a direction that is at odds with ethical behavior customers will be ripped off.

o Some central bankers, like rogue traders lack a shame gene.

And the author was

Dean Baker _________

Barney Frank__________

William Grieder__________

Paul Krugmann___________

Dennis Kucinich_________

Ralph Nader_____________

Bernie Sanders_______________

Al Sharpton_______________

Savanarola__________________

None of the above.______________

For the correct answer see my comment below. And be a little more tolerant of bankers. It's a dirty job but ,hey, at least they're not standing at traffic lights rubbing a dirty rag over your windshield

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