Most people not unlucky enough to be film or TV critics believe that the main “product” of studios and networks are their movies and shows. In reality, they’re just the means to an end. The “products” isn’t the films or the series — it’s the amount of eyeballs that they bring in. That’s what the theatre chains that buy the movies, the ad agencies that buy commercials, and the cable companies that charge their subscribers are paying for.
Amidst all the posing pomp and self-conscious symbolatry of the Healthcare Summit, in today’s Washington, the dominant view seems to no longer be that the Congress is a group of individual members meant to stand in for and represent their constituents and their interests. Instead, the US Congress is now in danger of being reduced merely to twin armies of foot-soldiers in a politically theatrical, made-for-TV war between the forces of Barack “Yes We Can” Obama on one side, and the Rush-Ann-Sarah-Glenn mafia on the other.
Even Chris Matthews, who believes that passing the bill — no matter what bill, no matter how bad, no matter what it does — is the only “way out of this trap”, was shocked by Obama’s payback for “You lie!” and Samuel Alito’s mouth that roared. Calling senior Congressmen by their first names, pointedly reading his notes during testimony by Senators like John McCain, and openly making fun of Eric Cantor and John Barrasso…. This seems all the more disconcerting to both conservatives and liberals alike when contrasted with Obama’s passive leadership on health care six months or a year ago. He hoped in vain that if he remained on the sidelines, the Tea Party and “birther” radicals would go so far with their overheated rhetoric that they would hang themselves, and leave him with a free hand.
In my next piece, I’ll be talking further about how Obama seems to be following all too well the playbook that Newsweek laid out for him the week of his inaugural — to undo the right-wing reaction of the Cheney era by…. following Dick Cheney’s recipe for the high-handed, elite, imperial executive to the letter.
Meanwhile, the American people have spoken — some might say that, after Scott Brown’s election, they’ve almost screamed, “We want JOBS.” But instead, the Obama White House has made it clear that they aren’t going to budge their massively unpopular health care program from the No. 1 priority slot, until they’ve budged it past the finish line.
Instead of accountability, the Obama White House’s strategy is to encourage members of Congress to exult in their brute power to force unpopular, divisive legislation down the helpless public’s throat.
The most egregious abuse of language is the plan to “extend coverage” to 30 million uninsured. The means of doing this is, of course, an “individual mandate” that makes a criminal of anyone too middle-class to afford health insurance to begin with. President Obama is quite right when he says that people who work for a small business or are self-employed “can’t get health care”. Yet the Senate’s beau ideal requires that families and the self-employed making in the $60-80,000 range before taxes to spend 10 to 15% of their income to “greedy” health insurers before they receive a subsidy — with NO tax credit for the difference.
One thing is clear — for better or worse, the current debate on health care reform has passed the point of no return. This no longer has anything to do with such proletarian concerns as “what’s good for the American people” — and everything to do with a battle over whether Obama will be able to unfurl the flags and marching-band cues, the quill inkwell pen, and a beaming Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, and Joe Biden over his shoulder, ready to charge into the next New Frontier — or whether Glenn and Rush will have “We WON!” flashing on the chyron on their next TV show. The American people — and their wallets — are in danger of becoming merely the collateral damage.
SpartacusIsNotDead // Mar 1, 2010 at 2:26 pm
JeninCT wrote: “The CBO scores are dishonest NOT because of the office of the CBO, but becuase they bill they scored used double counting tricks to supposedly bring down the deficit.”
The CBO’s task is to examine the proposed legislation and determine the financial impact if it gets implemented as proposed. If there are double counting tricks or any other kinds of tricks in the legislation, the CBO must determine the impact those “tricks” would have if the legislation is passed. The CBO examined the Senate proposal and determined it would cut the deficit by $132 billion. This is an unalterable fact and, aside from a single statement by GOP Rep. Ryan who is deadset against reform, you cannot find any credible person that challenges the CBO’s findings.
Forgive me, but I think I will take the findings of the neutral, highly-respected non-partisan CBO over your and Rep. Ryan’s findings.
JeninCT // Mar 1, 2010 at 4:13 pm
It’s not just Paul Ryan who has a problem with the numbers, history has a problem with the numbers. Government-run programs historically cost much more than their estimates. So, time will tell who’s right.
GOProud // Mar 2, 2010 at 9:29 am
SpIN’D puts it this way: “The CBO’s task is to examine the proposed legislation and determine the financial impact if it gets implemented as proposed. If there are double counting tricks or any other kinds of tricks in the legislation, the CBO must determine the impact those “tricks” would have if the legislation is passed. The CBO examined the Senate proposal and determined it would cut the deficit by $132 billion. This is an unalterable fact and, aside from a single statement by GOP Rep. Ryan who is deadset against reform, you cannot find any credible person that challenges the CBO’s findings.”
Well, the CBOs reputation –built on the ample shoulders of former Dir Doug Holtz-Eakin– for impartiality and non-partisan analysis has taken a huge hit during the Obama Health sCare battles. But I can understand how desperate any Dem is to keep the fiction of impartiality alive.
First, we had the CBO Dir called to the woodshed by the Messiah after CBO dared score the first draft of Obama Health sCare poorly. Now, we get the CBO saying they can’t score the latest Obama Health sCare plan –all 11 pages of it– without more information. Nice checkmate.
Good news for the Obami Cult. No adverse findings coming anytime soon from a group many in the MSM still think impartial, non partisan. But the truth is, the CBO scores ONLY the govt programs included in Obama Health sCare and not those actions or elements that effect the private sector –except to the extent of projecting tax revenues.
The truth is that the CBO has been living off the reputation it built back in the Holtz-Eakin days and before. It doesn’t have a good track record on its health care projections… and it’s far from “impartial” anymore.
It is highly partisan and beginning to look more like the White House OMB than an unbiased analysis group. The Dem Senate and House leaders, as well as ranking House and Senate Dem budget committee leaders and staff all have an informal say in who becomes CBO Director. The last CBO Dir is now a true Obami believer, seated deep inside the White House apparati in a choice seat of unparalleled partisan power.
The current CBO Dir, officially “chosen” by NancyP and Robert Byrd –after the advice and input from Democrats throughout Congress– is a career economist who has been most effective playing both sides of the aisle for advantage and now stands astride an organization that could be an effective tool to bolster the Democrat agenda, if he can be seduced properly… which, unfortunately, looks entirely possible for the sum of a cup of coffee with Obama Messiah.
CBO is about as impartial as MS-NBC. It’s current Director’s comments should be treated like coming from someone slightly better informed than Keith Olbermann. And in Washington, CBO’s stock is falling faster than Obama’s or Gore’s… and that’s saying a lot!
Back in 2005, the CBO was one of the success stories of our modern Congressional system. But that reputation has been frittered away by an imperial Prez (Obama) intent on winning-at-any-cost and Democrat Congressional leaders who care not for institutional impartiality or straight-shooting… they want parrots and puppets in that spot.
Kanzeon // Mar 2, 2010 at 3:59 pm
A detailed discussion of the CBO report and its critics:
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/ezra-klein/2010/03/paul_ryan_and_the_true_cost_of.html
JeninCT // Mar 2, 2010 at 5:04 pm
Ezra Klein wrote:” The SGR problem predates health-care reform and exists irrespective of health-care reform’s fate. Attempts to lash the two together are nonsensical.”
The way I see it, unless you address the SGR problem at the same time as you do healthcare reform, it’s not true healthcare reform.
GOProud // Mar 2, 2010 at 7:22 pm
Kanzeon, in the Washington Post? Come on… why not just have us read Obama’s speeches. Gheesh. I bet you still think the CBO is impartial… been using that Obami pixie dust I see.
balconesfault // Mar 2, 2010 at 11:57 pm
Kanzeon, in the Washington Post? Come on… why not just have us read Obama’s speeches.
Anyone who thinks that the Fred Hiatt Washington Post is liberal probably thinks that Linsdsey Graham is a liberal.
The way I see it, unless you address the SGR problem at the same time as you do healthcare reform, it’s not true healthcare reform.
What exactly is the SGR problem? That doctors want to make more money?
If physicians in the US haven’t noticed, there was a pretty good run up in the unemployment rate in the last couple years, a lot of people who are employed are making 50-60% of what they were before the bust, and oh yeah … if government gets out of the healthcare business altogether (and what the heck – eliminates the special tax status for cadillac healthcare policies) there is going to be a LOT less money flowing into healthcare … enough that they may have to choose between keeping the weekend place at the lake or the condo in Aspen.
The US spends about 3% of our GDP on doctors salaries. The OECD median usually varies between 1.1 and 1.4%. As with defense spending, I see this as one of those long term questions – can the US continue to spend this much more of our GDP than our global economic competitors?
In short – if the government quit spending taxpayer dollars on Medicare and Medicaid tomorrow … doctors might have slightly smaller tax bills, but their revenues would drop astronomically. They should be careful what they wish for.