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November 22, 2009 07:20 PM UTC

Bennet makes the CNN political ticker

  • 67 Comments
  • by: DavidThi808

(Added video clip – promoted by Colorado Pols)

Passing health care reform worth losing my seat

“If you get to the final point and you are a critical vote for health care reform and every piece of evidence tells you if you support the bill you will lose your job, would you cast the vote and lose your job?” CNN’s John King asked Sen. Michael Bennet of Colorado on Sunday’s State of the Union.

“Yes,” Bennet bluntly and simply replied.

Granted, that’s the “correct” answer. But there were also a lot of more politically safe ways to answer this. Bennet clearly is stepping up to be effective in Washington.

Kudos to him.

Comments

67 thoughts on “Bennet makes the CNN political ticker

  1. Very few pols are capable, under any circumstances, of just saying yes or no.  Never mind this is a very unlikely hypothetical. Most instinctively do some dancing out of sheer habit.

    Of course Bennet doesn’t have a career pol background which seems to be what so many say they find refreshing except when they are citing political experience and skill as a reason to continue to stick with Romanoff.

    And about that political skill… who really knows how much Romanoff possesses when push comes to shove in an election?  He never had to get elected in a very competitive district, did he?  

    1. I think it’s natural as they want to have everyone happy with them. When you give a very clear answer, you know some people will be unhappy.

      I do think this will help him. Voters who are undecided tend to prefer candidates with a clear plan and strong beliefs over someone who is vague but probably agrees with them more. That’s one of the big advantages Bush had over Kerry.

      1. After a year of taking no positions and having Romanoff challenge him, he is now being forced to take positions inconsistent with the electorates desires.

        Bennet – Obama Economy – Ritter – Tax Hikes – Job Loses – Bennet is not polling well.

          1. http://www.rasmussenreports.co

            Just 38% of voters now favor the health care plan proposed by President Obama and congressional Democrats.

            [snip]

            The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that 56% now oppose the plan.

            [snip]

            Prior to this [Saturday night Senate vote], support for the plan had never fallen below 41%. Last week, support for the plan was at 47%. Two weeks ago, the effort was supported by 45% of voters.

            Intensity remains stronger among those who oppose the push to change the nation’s health care system: 21% Strongly Favor the plan while 43% are Strongly Opposed.

            [snip]

            Only 16% now believe passage of the plan will lead to lower health care costs. Nearly four times as many (60%) believe the plan will increase health care costs. Most (54%) also believe passage of the plan will hurt the quality of care.

            As has been the case for months, Democrats favor the plan while Republicans and voters not affiliated with either major party are opposed. The latest numbers show support from 73% of those in the president’s party. The plan is opposed by 83% of Republicans and 70% of unaffiliated voters.

            [snipo]

            Among the nation’s senior citizens, 34% favor the health care plan and 60% are opposed. A majority of those under 30 favor the plan, but a majority of all other age groups are opposed (Premium Members can see full demographic crosstabs).

            Support for health care has declined along with President Obama’s approval ratings. For the first time in the Obama era, the Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Approval Index has been in negative double digits for nine straight days.

            http://www.rasmussenreports.co

            1. “Republicans mentioned a new Quinnipiac poll indicating that while a healthy majority of Americans – 61% – are eager to see major changes in the health system, only 1 in 5 believes President Obama when he says that he can do it without raising their taxes.

              What the GOP Senators failed to note was that the same poll showed 59% faulting the Republican Party for not working in good faith with the Democrats to produce a bill.

              http://www.quinnipiac.edu/x129

              So, again, you’re full of…fiber bars. The stats say people want health care reform, and they will blame the GOP if they manage to sabotage it.

            2. The poll that is consistantly a right leaning outlier on opinion on just about everything? The only thing they have credibility on is election polls, not opinion polls.

              For a different view try this 11/18/09

              WASHINGTON-More Americans support creation of a new government-run health insurance plan to compete with the private insurance market, a new Associated Press poll finds, but the level of enthusiasm depends on how the question is asked.

              Tell people that letting the government sell insurance would be cheaper for them, and a majority is in favor.

              see  whole article at http://www.denverpost.com/nati… It explains how asking the question in different ways effects answers.  You can bet Rasmussen always asks in ways calculated to support rightie views.  Averages of a range of polls, not just one, especially a Rasmussen opinion poll, are the way to go.  

              1. The most important thing it showed was less than 17% of Americans understand the reforms being proposed.

                Support it? Support what? I can’t even understand it. Hell- I once had to get a birth certificate and it was no problem. Why can’t the president get his? He can’t produce his own birth certificate and he thinks he can fix healthcare?If you believe that I got a used rv I’d like to sell you….Zeus.

        1. Romanoff challenged because he wasn’t appointed Lt Gov.

          The Republicans really support just a 2 class system: the upper 1%, and everybody else. That would be Republican heaven.

  2. He can vote “Yes” while Lieberman votes “No,” and then we can replace him, and we don’t even have to live with the consequences of his vote.  This is turning out to be a win-win situation.

    1. Every poll I’ve seen (both public and private) show being pro health care reform is a marginal positive in Colorado. Which is why Sen Bennet said what he said. That is because (warning, politics 101 here) the vast vast VAST majority — perhaps all — of the people protesting health reform would never vote for Michael Bennet anyway.

      You all are perilously close to completely leaving reality. And the best thing we Democrats have going right now!

    2. You’re right, BR.  If health care reform fails due to Lieberman or one of the others in the Dem caucus voting NO, (shoot, we certainly can’t hold the 40 GOP Senators accountable, now can we?) 45,000 each year won’t have to live with the consequences either.  

      They’ll be dead.

      1. And that 45,000 number is completely bogus, and contrary to what the article claims, didn’t come from a Harvard study.  It was produced by Physicians for a National Health Program, which proudly calls itself “the only national physician organization…dedicatedly exclusively to implementing a single-payer national health program.”

        So try again.

        1. Harvard.edu

          New study finds 45,000 deaths annually linked to lack of health coverage

          Uninsured, working-age Americans have 40 percent higher death risk than privately insured counterparts

          The study, conducted at Harvard Medical School and Cambridge Health Alliance, found that uninsured, working-age Americans have a 40 percent higher risk of death than their privately insured counterparts, up from a 25 percent excess death rate found in 1993.

          1. Or you could look at…the facts.

            Two authors of the Harvard study, Himmelstein and Dr. Steffie Woolhandler are co-founders of the Physicians for a National Health Program, which supports government-backed “single-payer” health coverage.

            1. blowing back and forth–like your claims yesterday that most of the voter fraud in the US was perpetuated by ACORN, without providing one iota of evidence.  I understand that might work on RedState, but it doesn’t carry weight here.

              Above you say

              contrary to what the article claims, didn’t come from a Harvard study

              Then AS posts a source saying it is a Harvard Study and you say

              Two authors of the Harvard study, Himmelstein and Dr. Steffie Woolhandler are co-founders of the Physicians for a National Health Program, which supports government-backed “single-payer” health coverage.

              So, Harvard Study?  You say no–article says yes.  Your position becomes….well, two of the authors belong to a group that supports single-payer, so I won’t believe it…

              Like shooting fish in a barrel.

              1. …at Harvard.  But yes, you sum up my position quite nicely.  The authors FOUNDED (not belong to) a group that supports single-payer, and therefore I wont believe it unless and until it is backed up with a study from a credible source.

              2. …I probably shouldn’t have used the term “most” without having concrete numbers, but it’s pretty apparent that they are involved in far too many instances of voter registration fraud.

                And you claim my arguments are unfounded, while you and others claim things like, for example, that the committee that came out with the suggestion to stop mammograms and self-testing for women in their 40s were appointed by Bush.  And that the health care bills before congress are deficit neutral.  Both equally flawed.

            2. The quote you are trying to use to say that this isn’t a Harvard study calls this a Harvard study.

              By the way, it was done at Harvard by Harvard Associate Professor Dr.David Himmelstein and Harvard Assistant Proffessor Dr. Karen Lasser and Harvard Assistant Proffessor Dr. Danny McCormick and Harvard Medical School Researcher Dr. David Bohr and Harvard Associate Proffessor Steffie Woolhandler… who is, by the way, the co-director of the Harvard Medical School General Internal Medicine Fellowship program.

                1. It’s NOT a Harvard study because…

                  It’s conclusion disagrees with BR’s opinion, therefore it cannot–by (BR’s) definition–be credible; therefore it cannot be from a University or other credible source.  It’s quite simple, really.

                  1. BR considered the Harvard Medical School faculty members who authored the study discredited by their support of universal single-payer health care, rather than realizing that, to the extent that they credit or discredit anything (which is substantial), they discredit BR for not supporting universal single-payer health care. He, like his so many of his ilk, just can’t wrap his head around the fact that Harvard studies, and scholarly work in general, are inherently inclined to contradict positions such as those held by BR et. al.

                    1. since BoulderRepublican previously claimed the political opinion of one Harvard professor was important when it agreed with him, but the scientific evidence from six Harvard professors is unimportant because it doesn’t.

        2. Newsflash: The human world is made up of individuals who occupy a “social field,” sharing (or not) proximity with others along various dimensions. “The Dems” (in Congress) share proximity with one another along the dimension of party affiliation, which generally implies some balance of proximities among the composite dimensions of that affiliation, but with almost so many exceptions as to swallow the rule.

          The Republicans in Congress, meanwhile, share proximity in that social field with all of the Dems in Congress, in that they are all members of Congress.

          Passing legislation involves a complex web of social interactions and pressures, self-interests, ideological commitments, all spread not only among members of Congress, but among their constituents and lobbyists also, all trying to affect the outcome, and having variable amounts of influence in doing so.

          The notion that “blame” for not passing this bill, if it were not to pass, belongs entirely to “the Dems,” because “the Dems have the votes all by themselves,” is just more of that incredibly sloppy, purely partisan and otherwise mindless crap you serve up here almost every time you post.

          If you want to have a discussion about complex issues and how to move this country in a direction which serves the long term interests of its citizens and of humanity, then let’s have that discussion. If you want to beat your little Republican chest and howl like a monkey, hey, that’s fine too, but don’t expect to get any respect out of the deal.

          1. I would heap praise on anyone who votes against cloture on the motion to proceed to a vote.  Lots of praise.  And money for the next election cycle.  I give some leeway to Joseph Cao, but no other Republican or moderate has any good reason or excuse to vote for either version of this bill.  But even if they manage to get beyond the fact that the senate doesn’t want any part of the so-called “millionaires tax” that is a key source of funding in the House bill, there are still deep fractures among the Dem caucus with regards to abortion funding and the public option, both of which are bill-killers.  So we could stop arguing and you can just tip your hat to me when health care “reform” fails…

          2. In all the discussions of the 10 year cost projections for health care reform, no one has made an issue of the nearly 500,000 lives that will be lost if current practices are allowed to continue over the same timeframe.

            Since when is having a healthier, more productive workforce bad for the economy?  

            Kinda makes you think this bill is self-funding, if not one of the best ROI’s we could get for our tax dollars.

              1. isn’t an issue that should be politicized. It’s a problem to be solved with a manufacturing/industrial policy vigorously and speedily implemented.

                That would be “taking care of Main Street”. Something we’ll see in 2010 with the Obama administration…..none too soon IMO.

                1. if you’re inferring that I politicized the issue, I must insist you are wrong.

                  I was speaking to the political fact that Republicans in Congress want no improvement in health of the workforce because HCR would accrue positively to the Democrats. It follows that a bad economy follows from their intent and wishes.

                  Not a great response to the question, but in the ballpark at least.

            1. I would also add that current healthcare practices pay for the most profitable treatments not the most effective. Within the medical industrial complex there are those only concerned with their profits not the well being of the patient.  Many are maimed and die as a result of either toxic drugs or medical devices that either fail or result in severe infections (like what happened to Jay Marvin). In addition those who really need treatment like those exposed to mold or those with Lyme disease are told they are not sick and don’t medical care. And treatments or new technology that would lower the revenue streams of powerful medical providers, medical manufacturers and pharmaceutical companies are suppressed. Billions could be saved if they only corrected these issues.

      1. you captured it exactly.

        Reasonable people of good will either are preogressives, or are simply caught in their own ideological inertia, because an understanding of the systems (social, technological, and natural) that envelope and comprise our lives, combined with a commitment to humanity, leads to a zealous determination to work intelligently within the context of those systems to improve the quality of our lives. That’s what it means to be a progressive: To eschew the bigotries and dysfunctional arbitrary beliefs that have accumulated over time, and select instead a well-conceived path into the future.

        But, on top of the challenges of designing good and fair policies, we confront the more daunting obstacles of widespread blind ideologies, aggressively defended, that disregard the best analyses applied to the most reliable information in pursuit of the most effective policies in creating an ever more robust, sustainable, and fair social institutional framework.

        It is courageous to refuse to kow-tow to those blind ideologies, and to stand up and say, “I’m going to do what’s right, rather than what’s politically expedient.”

  3.    And that’s rare in a pol.  Even though my preference in the Senate race is Romo, I will have no problem voting for Bennet in Nov. if he’s the nominee.

      The Dems are fortunate in having two excellent choices in the Senate race.  Pitty the Repubs who will be forced to support Jane once Wiens and Buck are driven out of the race like Ryan Frazier was.

    1. “Why is this promoted and not mine. (sic)”

      a) He can.

      b) Your “analysis” is just as efficient;y posted as a reply to this thread.

      c) He wanted to.

      I’m shocked, shocked I tell you that, David was watching CNN and thought our Senator commenting on the hot topic of the moment was worth comment.

  4. I am undecided on the Romanoff/Bennet race, though leaning to Romanoff.  But I commend Bennet for a rare act of political courage.

    Better to stand for something than just blow with the wind.  If the Democrats don’t address the national scandal that is our health care non-system, then they don’t deserve to hold power.  As the Romans said: “Let justice be done, though the heavens fall!”

    That said, Bennet’s vote won’t hurt him, either in the primary or later.  But you can take a stand for principle and have it recognized as such even if it is politically to your credit.  He could, have others have pointed out, made the usual Dickey-doo dance with 84 qualifications.  Instead, he just said “Yes.”

    Good for Bennet.

  5. Decided to take a look at the Post comments on this subject.  What a cesspool!  The reasonable people who ventured into that mess deserve medals.  Thank heaven for the Pols!

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