It’s late, but I can’t sleep. It’s a bit like Christmas Eve and maybe I should retire so Santa Claus won’t bypass my house. I still don’t know for certain that that the Democrats have the votes to pass health care reform this afternoon. I assume they do, but I haven’t seen any iron-clad evidence that they do. What I do know, is that friends of Nancy Pelosi have made sure that she gets the lion’s share of the credit if the reforms pass…and that Rahm Emanuel gets none. The first draft of the history of this effort has been told tonight in the New York Times and Politico, and it says that Nancy Pelosi put the steel in Obama’s spine to push this effort over the top while Emanuel was arguing for a virtual capitulation.
Both articles are careful to say that Obama only did what he was inclined to do anyway, but they also argue that it was only through Pelosi’s determination and toughness that Obama was convinced it was achievable.
It’s become cliche to say that Pelosi is the strongest Speaker of the House in living memory, but I think it might actually be true. It was Pelosi who passed a public option when the White House was hedging its bets, and it was Pelosi who revived these reforms from the dead after the Scott Brown victory in Massachusetts. She still has to pass the bill, but if she does, they’re going to have to name an office building after her. She’ll be that good.
Don’t get me wrong. I know that these articles are planted by Pelosi’s lieutenants. I don’t take the story they tell as gospel. I know they cast Pelosi as the hero and Emanuel as the villain, and that the truth is probably more nuanced. But I also know that it was Pelosi who fought for the most progressive possible bill, and Pelosi who has this on the precipice of being the single most progressive accomplishment in my lifetime.
Is the bill a piece of shit? In one sense, yes, yes it is. It’s far short of what we’d do if we had no opposition. We probably could have done modestly better with some more smarts and a little luck. But ‘progressive’ means ‘incremental.’ You make progress, you don’t get everything you want in one fell swoop.
We tend to compress history. FDR and LBJ’s reforms didn’t look so great when the first drafts were passed. They look legendary now. If this reform passes tomorrow, Obama will instantly place himself in the company of the last century’s greatest presidents: the two Roosevelts and Lyndon Baines Johnson. No doubt. And Speaker Pelosi will have no rival to the claim that she is the most effective Speaker in living memory.
Good post.
Additionally for me, I find myself still debating whether to watch the vote, or to watch basketball. I’m pretty sure that makes me a horrible person.
Either way you’ll probably get really pissed off. (Not at the outcome, but at the game play.) I wonder what it would be like to watch the voting stoned? Too scary or enraging to endure, maybe.
And Electric Kool-Ade would be totally out of the question. Major freak-out.
I am too nervous to sleep right now. I am a nervous wreck.
The fact that the bill does absolutely nothing for me personally makes it easier to sleep, but I agree that this HAS to pass if there’s to be any chance of anything good ever coming from the Obama Administration other than Sonia Sotomayor.
I’m now to the point of using the same argument on myself that I used to use on disenchanted Hillary supporters in 2008. If for no other reason than the Supreme Court, a democrat HAS to be in the White House. For that reason I will walk a block and half to vote for Obama in 2012, but if he thinks he’s going to get another $2,000 and another year of campaign work out of me, he’s been smoking way too many of Rahm’s funny cigarettes.
Two major mysteries: why Emanuel was ever hired and even more ridiculously, why he hasn’t been fired.
Obama rode to the presidency on a wave of unprecedented hope and enthusiasm. In one year he’s willfully stomped out all every ember.
Man, you would put a pin in a five year old’s balloon at his birthday party.
Obsessed, as Bill Clinton would say, I feel your pain. (And I mean that sincerely, not sarcastically.)
Having said that, let’s be clear (even if most political pundits won’t be) that it’s Mitch McConnell, John Boehner and their followers who have willfully attempted to stomp out every ember of hope. They’ve been boasting about their “Party of No” strategy to the NY Times and others in recent weeks. You don’t have to like or agree with Rahm Emmanuel to recognize that he’s been a key member of the most successful Democratic year in Washington in decades.
One lesson that Saul Alinsky’s successors (among them, the organizers who hired and trained a young Barack Obama in the 1980s) carried forward was the importance of building powerful community organizations with a “charismatic collective of leaders”—as opposed to organizations with one charismatic leader.
Obama’s received criticism both for some of the leaders he’s hired (e.g., Emmanuel) and for pulling so many leaders out of their own power bases and into his administration (e.g., Napolitano and Sibelius).
Whether you agree with Obama’s strategy or not, he’s been fairly consistent throughout his career. He goes after and tries to persuade the most talented, most powerful people around to be part of his team. (He did that when hiring much of Dick Gephardt’s and Tom Daschle’s old staffs when elected to the US Senate in 2004.)
And he’s confident, in the end, of two things:
Again, the House still has to vote today, and the Senate later this week. However, if health care reform passes, then we’re looking at an Administration and Congress that have:
*passed the most significant social legislation in 45 years;
*passed the most significant deficit reduction legislation in 17 years;
*reduced by 2/3 the US troop presence in Iraq;
*stopped the Great Recession (and prevented it from becoming a full-blown Depression);
*saved college students and taxpayers billions of dollars annually by reforming the federal student loan program;
*dramatically increased federal spending on education while reforming the worst aspects of “No Child Left Behind”;
*invested, through the Recovery Act, billions of dollars in energy efficiency, clean energy and high speed rail;
*reversed the worst (not all, but the worst) of the Constitutional abuses of the Bush administration’s “war on terror”, while still waging two wars;
*dramatically repaired America’s relationships with nations around the world.
We wouldn’t be progressives (or liberals, or whatever we want to call ourselves) if we were satisfied. But we’d be poor strategists not to claim the victories we’ve won, and then use those victories as evidence for the need to keep moving forward.
Despite overall agreement, must take issue with this:
Aren’t the worst abuses the crimes committed by the highest officials? How many have been called to account?
thanks massappeal. I am SO tired of the blame Obama first meme.
The key here, of course, is to make sure we get this bill passed. Following are the list of Congresspeople who we should keep calling to make sure that we win this historic victory on Sunday!
Brian Baird – Washington (Vancouver, Olympia) – (202) 225-3536
Paul Kanjorski – Pennsylvania (Wilkes-Barre, Scranton, Mount Pocono) – 202-225-6511
John Tanner – Tennessee (Union City, Jackson, Millington) – 202-225-4714
Earl Pomeroy – North Dakota (Bismarck, Fargo) – (202) 225-2611
Lincoln Davis – Tennessee (Columbia, Jamestown, Rockwood) – 202.225.6831
Marcy Kaptur – Ohio (Toledo) – (202) 225-4146
Mike Michaud – Maine (Bangor, Lewiston, Presque Isle, Waterville) – 202-225-6306
Bill Foster – Illinois (Batavia, Dixon, Geneseo) – (202) 225-2976
Kathy Dahlkemper – Pennsylvania (Erie) – (202) 225-5406
Chris Carney – Pennsylvania (Clarks Summit, Shamokin, Williamsport) – (202) 225-3731
Steve Driehaus – Ohio (Cincinnati) – (202) 225-2216
Stephen Lynch – Massachusetts (Brockton, Boston) – 202-225-8273
Rick Boucher – Virginia (Abingdon, Pulaski, Big Stone Gap) – 202-225-3861
Loretta Sanchez – California (Garden Grove) – (202) 225-2965
Dan Lipinski – Illinois (LaGrange, Oak Lawn, Chicago’s southwest side) – (202) 225 – 5701
Joe Donnelly – Indiana (South Bend, LaPorte, Michigan City, Kokomo) – (202) 225-3915
Marion Berry – Arkansas (Jonesboro, Cabot, Mountain Home) – (202) 225-4076
Jerry Costello – Illinois (Carbondale, Belleville, E. St. Louis, Granite City, Chester) – (202) 225-5661
Nick Rahall – West Virginia (Beckley, Bluefield, Huntington, Logan) – (202) 225-3452
Solomon Ortiz – Texas (Corpus Christi, Brownsville) – (202) 225-7742
Alan Mollohan – West Virginia (Morgantown, Wheeling, Clarksburg, Parkersburg) – (202) 225-4172
I watched Obama’s pep-talk to the House Dem Caucus today and I haven’t felt so proud of these people in quite some time. Now let’s get this thing done and watch the Republicans squeal like pigs.
I’ve really enjoyed watching Pelosi come into her own since Obama’s election. I think I – and many progressives – will always question whether the Democratic Congress in 2007-08 could have done more to oppose the Bush administration.
But since Obama’s election, Pelosi has shown her strength and been a real leader in getting the most from her caucus. I’ve gone from wincing to smiling when I see her face in the news. I appreciated her work on the public option, I’m in awe of her counting ability, and I’m delighted she’s getting some credit.
And I can’t resist adding – if her lieutenants have Rahm in their sights, that tells me all I need to know.
I’m not sure I agree with Boo about how good Pelosi is, but it’s undeniable to me that Pelosi is a damned fine Speaker.
Good posting, but too much use of the word “progressive”. I’m a liberal. I know the Republicans made “liberal” a four-letter word, but do we have to buy into their framework. Reminds me of how ashamed I was of Hillary Clinton in one of the primary debates where she described herself as a “progressive” – she couldn’t bring herself to use the word “liberal”. And now the Republicans are working on making “progressive” a four-letter word …
For me it’s a bit of a dilemma. “Liberal” doesn’t quite fit because it puts me in the same box as Geraldine Ferraro or Joe Lieberman, etc. “Progressive” feels uncomfortable because I’m not sure that I believe in progress as a concept — seems like at the ultimate level it’s more about balancing out than real movement. “Leftist” would suit, but is too ambiguous. To myself, I’m a Libertarian Socialist, but try having to attempt to explain that.
I do think there’s some validity to making “progressive” a more left-inclined subset of “liberal”. But it seems unlikely that that’s what Hillary meant by it.
I long ago made peace with my political descriptor…
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(OpenLeft) – Some, including Republican members of Congress, are speculating that the recent “no” announcements from Space, Matheson, and Nye are indications that Democrats have the votes, and are releasing members they do not need. Others speculate that since Pelosi did not schedule more votes tonight, then she did not need to keep members on the floor for more arm-twisting. All of that is pure speculation.
No matter the speculation, the above numbers show that passing #hcr is impossible without those four folds from the Stupak bloc. Whoever those Reps actually are, and whether they have actually folded, remains unclear. But, if all ten were to remain in the bloc, then the “no” votes both Dayen and the New York Times agree upon rise to 217. That would be enough to prevent passage.
11:45 PM ET — The vote is set.
Negotiations led by Rep. Mike Doyle (D-Penn.) are expected to continue “deep into the night,” according to Politico.
“Kiddie care,” Pelosi called the scaled-down plan, derisively.
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."What time is the vote?
and where on the tubes to watch?
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C-SPAN will have gavel-to-gavel coverage of the House health care debate starting at 1pm ET. Preview program starts at noon ET.
http://www.c-span.org/
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."thanks
is that the vote will probably get pushed back to early evening EDT or perhaps later.
In spite of it’s shortcomings.
Then comes the interesting part.
Republicans are scared shitless that Americans across the political spectrum will come to see that the bill does not cost them more money or leave them dying by the roadside with doctor’s whizzing past them to go treat a welfare recipient. The question is: How long will it take to implement this thing so that all this becomes clear? November is only 8 months away.
I thought it wouldn’t take effect until 2013/14. No, I’m not kidding. I could be wrong.
Politifact has some info on that:
http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2010/mar/19/todd-tiahrt/tiahrt-health-care-bill-w
ill-collect-10-years-taxe/
From Obama’s speech at George Mason U in VA:
You can read the whole thing here. I happened to watch the speech on Cspan, and it was masterful. Couldn’t find the video, though.
Give Madame Speaker Nancy Pelos her due. She’s been running the Democratic House Show for quite a while during difficult times. Now we have to all be thankful to some guy named Rahm Emanuel who goes around saying unpleasant things about progressives or liberals or whatevery we/you/me may be called.
The important thing to notice. These articles are listening to Pelosi’s lieutenants instead of to a “senior White House adviser”. That shows a smidgen of a shift of power between the White House “senior staff adviser” and Congress.
Not to detract even a molecule from Pelosi’s brilliant leadership in the House, but claiming that she “put the steel in Obama’s spine” is way over the top. He certainly needed her to round up the votes and lead the congressional charge, but he’s not doing what he wouldn’t have done anyway. Once again we fall into the trap of confusing strategic/tactical decisions with intention and purpose.
As to credit, it will indeed be Pelosi and Obama who win an honored place in history if this thing passes. And maybe even Reid? Chiefs of staff have never achieved such recognition, far as I know. We really need to get over the Rahm obsession and move on to important stuff.
I think the bill, flawed and thin as it is, marks a breakthrough in perception about the role of government in healthcare. Given the rightwing noise that blankets this country, that perceptual shift is both an astonishing accomplishment and a necessary precondition for using the legislation as a platform for a much better set of reforms. Personally I think the exchanges and the community health clinics offer huge opportunities to empower nonprofit providers to become dominant in healthcare, and that might be an even better outcome than single payer — but that’s for further discussion after the thing passes.
crossing fingers and toes, Booman
you are right about Pelosi