The Health Care Bill Mess

A lot of blame is being thrown at Senator Joseph Lieberman over the gutting of just about every bit of reform in the health care legislation, a waste of time as I had stated over and over on this blog when time, money, and effort should have focused on job creation, but the real blame rests squarely on the president.

Although I have little use for Senator Russ Feingold, he puts the blame where it belongs:

Sen. Russ Feingold (D-Wis.), among the most vocal supporters of the public option, said it would be unfair to blame Lieberman for its apparent demise. Feingold said that responsibility ultimately rests with President Barack Obama and he could have insisted on a higher standard for the legislation.

“This bill appears to be legislation that the president wanted in the first place, so I don’t think focusing it on Lieberman really hits the truth,” said Feingold. “I think they could have been higher. I certainly think a stronger bill would have been better in every respect.”

But Feingold added there are “obviously good things in the bill” and focusing on an individual member is not an “accurate portrayal of what happened.”

Obama, being a neoliberal, is doing exactly what he wants. It isn't all of a sudden he has been held hostage to Wall Street and corporate interests; he has ALWAYS been a neoliberal. It isn't my fault and the fault of other people out there that we always saw what he was and didn't want him as our presidential nominee.

I fully expect Obama to start targeting Social Security next.

Isn't this something? Neoliberalism or Friedmanism has been completely debunked by history, yet these people still persist in pushing these ruinous policies on the public. It's like they are captives of a cult.

News Briefs

This is the latest about the search for the two missing Mount Hood climbers:

The massive search effort to locate a pair of stranded climbers high on Mount Hood stretches into its fourth day today with no sign or clue of the young man and woman.

Volunteer searchers are convening about 7 a.m. for their first meeting of the day. They are expected to review the weather forecast for the mountain and decide whether to dispatch search and rescue crews up the mountain to find Katie Nolan, 29, of Southeast Portland; and Anthony Vietti, 25, of Longview, Wash., who headed toward the summit early Friday morning and were never seen again.

Unlike the past three days, when the Black Iron Grill in the Wy’East Day Lodge was filled with mountain rescuers, this morning it is empty. Outside a steady snow continues to fall at Timberline Lodge. The lack of activity marks a significant change from the past few days.

Officials with Portland Mountain Rescue and the Clackamas County Sheriff’s Office are expected to make an announcement at 10 a.m. about future search efforts.

Suffice it to say it doesn't look good.
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What kind of deal, if any, was cut for Senator Lieberman to do a complete turnaround regarding expanding Medicare coverage for those 55 and over?

And if a deal is cut, then there is no doubt at all it will benefit the Republican Party, which yours truly has NEVER written off as irrelevant or on the fringe. A bad penny always returns, you know.
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Whether or not Obama cheated on his own report card, my grade for his first year is hovering around a C-minus overall, and a flat-out "F" for education.
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There's been a big deal made out of a case of a frustrated teacher who cut a first-grader's braid after the girl was playing around with it.

The teacher will be disciplined by the school district, but no, there will be no criminal charges brought.

She was fined $175 for disorderly conduct.

More is here.

Paul Krugman Asks a Good Question

about reining in Wall Street excesses, but remember, we are dealing with this worthless piece of shit called the United States Senate, so don't expect any miracles coming out of that body.

Speaking of the Senate, it appears Senator Lieberman has succeeded in hijacking what little reform there is in the proposed health care legislation.

More about him here.

The Health Care Mess

The senator from Aetna, as Ralph Nader once lovingly called Joe Lieberman, says any health care reform must occur in teeny-tiny steps so as to not offend the big donors from the medical industrial complex. The uninsured can wait until they die or the recession ends, whichever comes first, before Lieberman and the Blue Dogs will give them crumbs.

Or, more likely, the GOP takes control of Congress again, and there will never again be health care reform except to destroy Medicare and Medicaid.

Yep, I Have Been Slacking Off

writing much on this blog. A lot depends on the news, but I get so depressed reading about our worsening economy and now the apparent attempt by so-called Democrats to basically scuttle true health care reform for decades I can hardly stand it.

Health care is a right, not a privilege, but tell that to our congresspeople who are bought and paid for by the medical-industrial complex of for-profit hospitals, Big Pharma, health insurance companies, and powerful medical associations.

While President Obama is trying, I guess, to reform health care or rather health insurance by promoting a public alternative ala John Edwards' plan from last election, there are piles of congressional opposition, including that from Joseph Lieberman, senator from Aetna, as Ralph Nader once wittily called him. You know anything Obama proposes will be watered down in the first place, but even a watered down public health care plan which isn't even single-payer, is too much for our cretins in Congress. They feel this would be the first step towards single-payer, and that can't be allowed to happen.

And of course we have interest groups like the American Medical Association, which no longer represents the vast majority of physicians in this country but is fully aligned with Big Pharma and the like, trying to flex its muscle just as it did when Medicare and Medicaid were put into place, but Obama is now saying this country can't wait for health care reform.

It's all about increasing profits for the health care industry, which shouldn't be an "industry" to begin with but a service. While all of this political gamesmanship goes on, more people are thrown out of work, more people cannot get health care except when they are practically dying and have to use expensive hospital emergency care, and more people's life expectancy in this country goes down the drain.

Health care is a major scandal in this country, and it never had to be this way in the first place.

Obama went to the heart of the lion's den today.