In late 2007, when he was campaigning against Sen. Hillary Clinton for the Democrat nomination for president, Sen. Barack Obama said Sen. Clinton would be unable to build bipartisan support for major legislation if she became president. She could eke out only bare majorities, he said, and that is no way to govern.
Contrasting his own consensus-building skills with Sen. Clinton's, he said, "We're not going to pass universal health care with a 50-plus-one strategy. We're not going to have a serious bold energy policy of the sort that I proposed yesterday unless you build a working majority."
Asked in the same interview whether he was a better candidate than Sen. Clinton because he could attract broad support for major bills, he replied, "Yes."
Fast-forward two and a half years. President Obama has abandoned even the pretense of seeking bipartisan support for his trillion-dollar-plus ObamaCare socialized medical care proposal. He is eagerly pursuing a "50-plus-one" strategy to get ObamaCare passed despite practically zero Republican support -- and grave doubts among quite a few in his own party.
Comparing the president's past statements with his current strategy, The Associated Press reported, "He now wants congressional Democrats to move ahead without Republican support and pass the legislation with a bare majority in the Senate instead of the broader majority he favored as a presidential candidate."
But while Congress' support for ObamaCare is wobbly, support by the public at large has faded even faster -- down to only 25 percent, according to a recent CNN poll. Almost everyone else surveyed wanted Congress to come up with a new and different proposal or to halt reform altogether.
President Obama used to say he believed in consensus. It is hard to square that today with his continued support for a terribly unpopular health care reform plan.
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The belief that the US needs health care reform is nearly unanimous (96%). Unfortunately,we differ on what needs to be done.
With universal coverage the congressman gets the same care as the single mom,the barber the same as the banker,the teacher the same as the pupil. The very rich would still buy special access,but that would not be the norm. But universal coverage is not on the table.
The status quo has failed. The bill before Congress is argueably somewhat better than nothing. If we don't pass it,no politician will have the courage to touch health care for the foreseeable future. Do we wait for the present system to implode or do we suffer with this new bill?
It will probably pass and lead to a fairly prompt re-reform. Just my guess.
I was with you right up to "the congressman gets the same care as the single mom..." Friend, if you believe that would happen, I am sorry to say you must be deluded on some level. Congresspeople live in a different world and will not be subject to the same coverage they subject those who elect them to be under. It sounds good but I dare say that will not happen under any circumstance!
Livn
I don't know if I'm deluded,but I am a shameless shill for universal health care. In my heart of hearts,I know the US would be a better,stronger country with universal health care.
Having said that,I'm not very hopeful that it might happen anytime soon. My best guess would be that the existing system will put so much stress on businesses that insurance as we know it will collapse. At that point some new structure will no doubt emerge. We can all hope that it will be fair and workable for all.
More proof of those who espouse an ideology and in this case "health" care reform, not even knowing the details or actually bothering to do their homework, much less having a 'solution'.
The latest out besides the continual lying going on regarding the enormous cost, is that even those who work within the CBO office are saying that adding HC to the deficit is going into very dangerous territory for the US. Even the CBO has its hands tied with cost projections (the real ones) because they can only deal with the figures that are put before them on the table.
Trouble is the Dems, led by Pelosi, Reid and Obama have kept the details not only from the Repubs but from the American public. Everyone knows by now of the backroom deals, the desperate threats, the subterfuge in packaging these bills, etc. Now, it appears the whole "reconciliation" plan is another ruse to deceive the public into thinking that once the bill is signed by the Pres, they can "incrementally" reform the bill as they go along. Nothing could be further from the truth. Once the bill is signed, it becomes law. Once law, it will be difficult, no impossible to do away with or change as proven with other, huge pieces of legislation.
Another Gov't Actuary raised the alarm recently that the US will lose its international AAA rating and fall even further into Depression if this bill passes. It's just too much debt for us to deal with, without any real jobs in the private sector created and sustained. Right now he says, we are hanging from the precipice, ready to fall off.
The Repubs were right on the first HC bill and they're right about this last one. It stinks, it's a monster in the making and we need to start over when things have stabilized and really work at a bipartisan solution to rising health care costs. That will not happen as long as the Dems in power and the Obama Admin stubbornly refuse to respect, reach out and offer true bipartisanship WITH the American people first, and then with their Reps in Gov't. As long as the corruption and ego stroking continues, no deal will be struck.
When we all heard recently of yet another corrupt, perverted gov't official (Rep Eric Massa, Democrat), playing "tickling games" with young men and staff members, some of whom he shared a house in Washington with; and one young fella who was sent to him from Barney Frank's stable, it made me think of just who we are paying our lifes blood to in Washington. These perverts and corrupt ones are playing and carousing on our dime.
Some Americans are too 'nice' and cowardly to get outraged about the vast sums of our money being wasted by these Schmucks. They bring to mind, historically, the courts of old England and Europe where the dissipated, decayed perverts who ruled over their subjects wasted away the peoples riches and even had them killed if they protested about the corruption. Guillotined, hanged, shot. These Princes, Kings and Queens we have elected? Same ole same ole. Pity for us.