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Health Care Debate: Democrats Grow A Pair?
Carol Anne: "They're here..." - Poltergeist, 1982
I wrote in a May 23rd blog; Framing The Health Care Debate:
On Wednesday, Republicans armed with their Luntz Special 45 Caliber Talking Points descended on to the OK Corral of the United States Senate only to be met by freshman Oregon Democrat, Jeff Merkley, armed to the rhetorical teeth.
Brandishing a thin set of papers, Merkley called out, Luntz, and the Republicans, point-by-point, deception-by-deception: (Video below)
One can only hope the Democrats take the attack on the Luntz/Republican talking points to cable news and the Sunday chat shows. This loyal liberal is sick and tired of having rhetorical sand kicked in his face. It would be nice if Democrats showed some political cajones.
Word to Democrats, we got your back. "Barack is in the White House."
I wrote in a May 23rd blog; Framing The Health Care Debate:
Democratic strategist Paul Begala has written a brilliant point-by-point rebuttal of GOP consultant Frank Luntz's widely circulated strategy memo on health care.Well, it's here.
Begala urges Democrats to push back hard against "Republican Orwellian rhetoric." He has written a blueprint for us all to help win one of the most important debates of our lifetime.
On Wednesday, Republicans armed with their Luntz Special 45 Caliber Talking Points descended on to the OK Corral of the United States Senate only to be met by freshman Oregon Democrat, Jeff Merkley, armed to the rhetorical teeth.
Brandishing a thin set of papers, Merkley called out, Luntz, and the Republicans, point-by-point, deception-by-deception: (Video below)
Now, you may think that I'm raising this document before you, this -- this plan for how to kill health care, and that maybe it doesn't have any bearing on the real debate, but it absolutely does. These talking points are being echoed in this very chamber in order to kill health care.Knowing a political slobberknocker when they see one, Senate Democratic leadership attacked Luntz at their weekly press conference, Thursday, "mocking Republicans for taking their health care advice from the man Majority Whip Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) repeatedly dubbed "Dr. Frank I. Luntz."": (Ryan Grim; Dems' Bogeyman Luntz Schooled Reid, Other Dems On Messaging)
Here we go. Frank Luntz's memo, that's his memo on how to kill health care, came out in April. It says - talking point number five - "Health denial care horror stories in Canada and other countires do resonate, but you have to humanize them. You notice we recommend the phrase 'government takeover' rather than 'government run' or 'government control.'" Why? Because government takeover sounds even scarier.
So what did we hear in the chamber from our minority leader just recently? I quote - "Americans are concerned about a government takeover of health care and for good reason." And it goes on. So recognize that that is a point that's coming from a document about how to kill health care, not a responsible debate about the plan we have in front of us.
"What we're hearing from the Republican leadership on the floor of the Senate is vaguely familiar. Dr. Frank I. Luntz issued this plan," said Durbin, waving a copy of a memo that Luntz wrote several months ago, outlining rhetorical tactics to oppose health care reform.
Durbin highlighted arguments made by Republican leadership: "They tell horror stories about health care stories in other countries. That would be Dr. Frank Luntz's talking point number five." And on he went, referring over and over to the talking points outlined in the Luntz memo.
Grim goes on to describe how Senate Democrats had been previously exposed to Luntz's "mendacious methods:"
By calling out Luntz the Democrats may have found a way to take the offensive in what is gearing up to be a very insalubrious health care debate. By framing the debate around the Luntz/Republican talking points they could position the Republicans as to who, and what they are, the friends of big health businesses, and the party of, "No, no, no."Luntz himself had briefed them at a Democratic retreat earlier this year. His co-panelist: Paul Begala.
Since that January retreat, he has also briefed Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) personally, a Reid aide confirmed. The message to the leader and to the Senate Democratic caucus was the same: Words matter.
One can only hope the Democrats take the attack on the Luntz/Republican talking points to cable news and the Sunday chat shows. This loyal liberal is sick and tired of having rhetorical sand kicked in his face. It would be nice if Democrats showed some political cajones.
Word to Democrats, we got your back. "Barack is in the White House."
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Wow steve.
This rawks. Thanks so much.
June 12, 2009 10:02 PM | Reply | Permalink
Right Bwak at cha'!
June 13, 2009 12:11 PM | Reply | Permalink
Now jughead on mornin joke is saying the glass is 4/5 full. And so another repub shows up on Ed and says 80% of Americans are really happy with health care the way it is!!!
17% jumps every year MEANS DOUBLE IN FIVE YEARS.
THESE PEOPLE ARE NUTS.
Sorry for that Miguel. just getting something off my chest.
Great Cartoon.
Great Post.
June 12, 2009 11:01 PM | Reply | Permalink
happy with health care the way it is
I'd like to meet a few--everyone I know is always on the short end of a three hour conference call to get authorization for an enema.
June 13, 2009 12:56 AM | Reply | Permalink
Amen. I've spent 7 hours on the phone with Aetna, trying to confirm that I was covered for an MRI. I spoke to 5 different people, got conflicting answers from all of them. Factor that kind of waste into the cost savings of single payer.
June 13, 2009 1:02 AM | Reply | Permalink
Aetna
And Aetna is generally considered cadillac coverage (you will probably be hugely relieved to learn this...)
June 13, 2009 1:27 AM | Reply | Permalink
cadillac coverage
Ha-ha...I made a funny...was cadillac coverage before cadillac went Chap. 11 (not what you want in your health carrier...)
June 13, 2009 1:29 AM | Reply | Permalink
ha! nice!
June 13, 2009 1:40 AM | Reply | Permalink
"three hour conference call to get authorization for an enema."
Have you tried Craig's List?
June 13, 2009 12:17 PM | Reply | Permalink
Still watchen "mornin joke," eh. Come clean you got the hots for mynah bird Mika, don't ya'. Must be her affected/effected speech patterns, "I just slipped on the ping pong ball..."
June 13, 2009 12:16 PM | Reply | Permalink
Yes, they are pushing back a little but they haven't grown a pair. Not by a long shot. The entire debate is being conducted as a rear guard action from the right! We ought to be debating single payer and forcing them to pull the policy to the right. Instead, the pussified Democrats have utterly eliminated the entire left side of the policy options leaving us with a limited number of choices for inferior plans, all of which are designed to keep the insurance parasites in business instead of keeping the American people healthy. The reason all this bullshit costs so much is because we're still having to pay vastly more than necessary to keep the insurance and drug companies wildly profitable and their executives obscenely wealthy. The best we can hope for is some form of a "public option" which the Democrats are considering enacting but in such a weak version it is almost destined to fail And what does that get us? The same kind of bullshit the Democrats have been delivering for a long, long time. It's time for a change. Instead of all this compromising and capitulating in advance, how about we try fighting for what we say we believe in for once? Just sayin...
June 13, 2009 12:30 AM | Reply | Permalink
We ought to be debating single payer
!!
June 13, 2009 12:54 AM | Reply | Permalink
Hear hear,
So here we have the mighty Dems. And who is stepping up to attack the repo talking points. What great leader is hearlding the new progressive era of common sense health care?
Its Merkeley... a freshman senator from a state with a superliberal city with hardcore activists (bush senior called us little beruit) building his early credibility with the base with his vicious attack rhetoric now. (please wait to year 4 on, when he 'moderates' to appeal to the rest of the state.
Where's the leadership. Why isn't Pelosi, Kerry, Reid calling out the minority leader? Where is the 'one', our great progressive hope? Why isn't he using his freshman 70% favorability ratings to press the case for working, fair, and efficient health care plan?
Jesus- Everybody hates HMOs in this country now. And this is the best we got? A moderate freshman who barely squeaked in on the bush protest vote trying to appease his unsure base. Wow. what balls!
I don't want to be a cynic about this debate but I don't much care what the mice say. I want to hear some lions step up and roar- We need an entire new system not just some muddled crappy patch to keep a few health care admins and adjusters employed.
I hope I am wrong.
June 13, 2009 1:39 AM | Reply | Permalink
Yes, we ought to be debating single-payer, but alas someone took a poll and you know we can't be motivated by ideals we must be reactive to polls, however narrowly they define the debate.
Someone polled that "cost" appeals and "compassion" does not. So, out with the compassion and out with the passion. You could make a passionate, ideal-driven, committed rallying cry for genuinely universal healthcare.
Instead, we have chosen the beancounter ballad. Cost, cost, cost. Who but an accountant gets passionate about cost?
So there we are leaving all the passion in the debate to the Republicans and if there's one thing their base does not lack, it is passion. So they'll raise every emotion driven word they can find up the flag poll and wage a crusade for your freedom to choose!!
Sheesh, they might even convince me. The nuanced, underfunded, timid, contingent, loopholed, pork laden and corporate friendly monstrosity we're likely to get instead may well make things worse. If nothing else, it will probably kill reform till I get to Medicare if it doesn't also kill Medicare undermining as it does the whole concept of single-payer.
June 13, 2009 11:30 AM | Reply | Permalink
Not only will what they come up with make things worse, but the mess they create will be the primary argument against "government" run health care in the future. I hate to say this because of the source, but the label is accurate, the Democrats of Washington, DC are nothing but a bunch of pussillanimous pussyfooters.
June 13, 2009 12:30 PM | Reply | Permalink
Plus, the relentless mantra of cost cutting is likely to turn out to be the right-wing's dream come true. After all it's a pure right wing message. And you know who those costs are that are going to be cut -- the most vulnerable Americans. Once this whole mess is focused on the ONE goal of CUTTING COSTS universal healthcare has just been driven over and killed.
I don't oppose cutting costs but if that is your only goal then your metrics will be designed to measure that goal and any bureaucrat worth his beancutting hat will find a way to cut those costs and to hell with who gets hurt in the cost cuts.
I can't wait till my Governor Cost Cut Pawlenty decides to run for President with the very same end goal as Obama CUT COSTS at all costs.
June 13, 2009 1:14 PM | Reply | Permalink
Cost cutting - Single Payer Universal Care = less coverage and more death. Change I do not believe in.
June 13, 2009 1:57 PM | Reply | Permalink
Actually, our national death rate, including infant mortality is higher than other countries that do have single-payer. You might want to stop pulling stuff out of your ass; it doesn't fly here.
June 13, 2009 2:25 PM | Reply | Permalink
I think you misunderstood my formula. I was saying simply cutting costs, minus the enormous cost savings that single payer would bring, is the wrong way to go. Trusting the insurance companies to cut $2-3 trillion without rationing (i.e. slashing) care is fool's errand. Its actually criminal. Instead, put them out of business with single payer.
However, Obama, most Dems and all the Repukes are all in bed with big insurance. Obama continues the Bush/Paulson bailout to the finance "industry", bankrupting the country. So we are broke and screwed.
June 13, 2009 3:15 PM | Reply | Permalink
Check. Got it! Sorry about the "ass" comment!
June 13, 2009 3:45 PM | Reply | Permalink
No problem. Been called worse.
June 13, 2009 3:54 PM | Reply | Permalink
I'm with you oleeb, that why I put the question mark... Alas, this wuss is a member of the party of wusses. Wait, Barack's in the White House...
June 13, 2009 12:20 PM | Reply | Permalink
Great comment! And, exactly right. We are stuck debating about a "public option" which is highly likely to have no effect on health care costs even if the best version of that option is chosen. The Democratic Party, especially under Obama's leadership, has yet to understand that you always fight for what you really want, and only compromise when it is time to do so. Obama prefers to compromise first, under the weird impression that Republican's will be so grateful they will accept the compromise. My hope is that Obama is a fast learner.
June 13, 2009 3:02 PM | Reply | Permalink
Unfortunately Hoppy, I think Obama is fighting for what he is for. He is a rich guy after all. Let's not forget that.
It's been a long time since he's been one of the masses even though he is young for a President. Over time the reality of what being a commoner is like fades in the memory of most people even of those who grew up without great luxury. He's no different. He has no fear of ever "needing" anything for himself or his family. That makes a huge difference in one's perspective and also can serve to convey a person who used to be in touch with regular people to a place that is not so in touch with regular life.
I think he is thinks it is perfectly fine to tweak things a little, keep the big boys happy and be popular amongst them so his long post-Presidency is well rewarded. I know people won't like hearing that, but I think that plays a big role in this guys thinking. He thinks we oughtta be happy with his milque toast reform proposals. He doesn't realize that people are sick and tired of the whole scheme of taking care of the rich while saying you're interested in the common people. It won't take too terribly long before the public realizes what he's all about and then they will be vengeful and angry. Change was a great marketing tool that has now lost it's usefulness to Obama so it is forgotten. He is the the penultimate Washingtonian and he loves it. I'm still glad he's President vs McCain, but the baby steps he is taking on reforms of all kinds combined with his lies on open government and transparency are not the change that anyone voted for. He bamboozled everybody just for the sake of winning. Now he brings us all the worst characteristics of the Congressional Democratic mindset without championing any substantive reforms of anything. It's all middle of the road mush meal.
June 13, 2009 4:01 PM | Reply | Permalink
I don't agree. Obama made his wealth by writing a couple of very good books. That didn't really pay off for him before the past 4 years or so, so he is hardly converted to a wealthy people mindset now.
A much more credible explanation for his methods is that he learned them as a community organizer in Chicago, where gaining ground required that he always work for incremental improvement. He is applying what he learned there to his new office, and hasn't yet realized that it doesn't work that way.
Having read his two books, especially "The Audacity of Hope" I can easily see how he formed his techniques. Part of the reason for my loss of enthusiasm for him as he fought for the nomination was the realization that he would not be a left of center Democrat, but another centrist willing to settle for less and less just to gain another increment. That wasn't my preference. I still have hopes that as he learns his new job he will move further left.
June 13, 2009 6:09 PM | Reply | Permalink
I hope you're right, but I think you've bought into the official line too much. What do you think Michelle was doing all those years? She was making big bucks for most of them. They haven't been hurting at all for a very long time.
June 13, 2009 7:06 PM | Reply | Permalink
Yes, Michelle was earning big bucks. How big, compared to their living costs, I have no idea. In any case, it is a given that anyone who runs for President is relatively wealthy. No one else could afford to do so. I don't hold that against the Obamas. But, if he doesn't learn quickly to do the job he was elected to do, and stop the kumbaya nonsense, I will soon hold that against them.
June 13, 2009 9:38 PM | Reply | Permalink
Now, this - this is golden:
“I don’t favor a public option, and I don’t favor a public option because I think there’s plenty of competition in the private insurance market"... “Let’s get something done instead of having a debate,”
Guess who? Our favorite Democrat.
http://thinkprogress.org/2009/06/13/lieberman-on-obama-presidency/
Let's get something done instead of having a debate. Shut up proles! Your leaders have chosen for you.
June 13, 2009 11:58 AM | Reply | Permalink
Good find, BB. Every family has a "black sheep," he's ours... Oh to have 61 Senate votes...
June 13, 2009 12:24 PM | Reply | Permalink
"There's plenty of competition in the private insurance market."
Spoken like a true champion of Purdue Pharma L.P., one of Lieberman's top corporate campaign contributors.
June 13, 2009 2:42 PM | Reply | Permalink
If everyone would just stop exercising, we would be able to contain our health care costs!
In case anyone missed it, that is the latest genius statement from the blubbery lips of Rush himself!
June 13, 2009 1:01 PM | Reply | Permalink
Wasn't that a riot? Those with sports injuries causing more stress on the healthcare system than all of the overweight, sedentary people...coming out of HIS face?
June 13, 2009 1:14 PM | Reply | Permalink
No.
June 13, 2009 1:52 PM | Reply | Permalink
Ahh yes, the Audacity of Ignorance, always Unmitigated by the facts.
June 13, 2009 2:50 PM | Reply | Permalink
I was saying "Democrats grow a pair? No." You wanna argue with that? Yeah, sure, there are a few good Dems on the margins. Not nearly enough to bring in single payer. Obama's "reform" of health care is a sell out to big insurance and big finance. It will make things worse, not better. Just sayin'.
June 13, 2009 3:19 PM | Reply | Permalink
I suppose I conflated your comments. Apologies if I misinterpeted your sentiments, they are not particularly clear. Please elucidate.
June 13, 2009 3:23 PM | Reply | Permalink
Re-posted from above:
I think you misunderstood my formula. I was saying simply cutting costs, minus the enormous cost savings that single payer would bring, is the wrong way to go. Trusting the insurance companies to cut $2-3 trillion without rationing (i.e. slashing) care is fool's errand. Its actually criminal. Instead, put them out of business with single payer.
However, Obama, most Dems and all the Repukes are all in bed with big insurance. Obama continues the Bush/Paulson bailout to the finance "industry", bankrupting the country. So we are broke and screwed.
June 13, 2009 3:36 PM | Reply | Permalink
With all due respect, you did not have a formula, but what appeared to be an asinine comment. I responded in kind. However, since we seem to be on the same side after all, I offer my apologies.
June 13, 2009 3:42 PM | Reply | Permalink
Not a problem. Guess I wasn't too clear.
June 13, 2009 3:58 PM | Reply | Permalink
It will be impossible to tell whether we're ahead of the game or not until the whole thing is a done deal. I'll put my money with the worse off than before crowd. Seniors are already worse off than before.
Obama just today announced further cuts to Medicare. All together, the prior cuts with today's announced cuts, the amount they are going to *save* comes close to $1 tn. He has offered very few specifics. Mostly he's going to cut reimbursements to hospitals and doctors. (How smart is that when you're trying to get cooperation from the medical profession?)
This will mean three things for seniors: a) a downgrade in health *care* and/or b) higher advantage insurance or supplemental insurance fees and c) fewer providers from which to choose. I am now officially pissed at Obama.
June 13, 2009 3:37 PM | Reply | Permalink
Me too. I had hoped Barack would grow to be another FDR. That really is our only hope as a country. He's looking a lot more like Bill Clinton; a Republican in sheep's clothing. OK, neither Clinton or Obama are as bad as the Repukes. So, we go to hell a little slower than we would with McCain. But we still go to hell, is the point. Obama has better PR spin, is handsome and articulate, he is NOT BUSH. Huzzahs for that. Fundamentally tho, he is continuing most of the worst policies of Bush. It is so disheartening, so depressing.
June 13, 2009 3:53 PM | Reply | Permalink
We need to keep pressure on Obama, write letters to the editor, continue to support much more progressive action by the government, and let the Democratic Party know that a centrist (GOP Lite) administration isn't going to raise enough campaign contributions to be reelected in 2012, nor even to maintain the Democratic majorities in 2010. Not getting reelected is the worst nightmare any party faces.
June 13, 2009 6:16 PM | Reply | Permalink
Loved reading the essay, loved reading the comments, and laughed so hard at the cartoon I scared my cats.
Keep the pressure on everyone. One of the problems with living in Rhode Island is that I only get to preach to the choir in terms of our Congressional delegation. But I'm thinking of doing something I've never done before: go to the local office and preach to their staff directly. Have to get on that before my bus pass runs out.
June 13, 2009 7:21 PM | Reply | Permalink