CO-04 (Special Election)
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(R) Greg Lopez
(R) Trisha Calvarese
90%
10%
President (To Win Colorado)
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(D) Joe Biden*
(R) Donald Trump
80%
20%↓
CO-01 (Denver)
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(D) Diana DeGette*
90%
CO-02 (Boulder-ish)
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(D) Joe Neguse*
90%
CO-03 (West & Southern CO)
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(D) Adam Frisch
(R) Jeff Hurd
(R) Ron Hanks
40%
30%
20%
CO-04 (Northeast-ish Colorado)
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(R) Lauren Boebert
(R) Deborah Flora
(R) J. Sonnenberg
30%↑
15%↑
10%↓
CO-05 (Colorado Springs)
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(R) Dave Williams
(R) Jeff Crank
50%↓
50%↑
CO-06 (Aurora)
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(D) Jason Crow*
90%
CO-07 (Jefferson County)
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(D) Brittany Pettersen
85%↑
CO-08 (Northern Colo.)
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(D) Yadira Caraveo
(R) Gabe Evans
(R) Janak Joshi
60%↑
35%↓
30%↑
State Senate Majority
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DEMOCRATS
REPUBLICANS
80%
20%
State House Majority
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DEMOCRATS
REPUBLICANS
95%
5%
December 19, 2009 04:04 PM UTC
44 Comments
as reported by wsj.com
http://online.wsj.com/article/…
This “deal” will be waved by POTUS upon his return for the CNN cameras, but no serious Whitehouse press conference will be given.
The climate deal reached between U.S, China, SA, Brasil and India is a vague, hastily hatched and non-binding concept that allows temps to increase 3 degrees celcius.
President Obama isn’t even sure he’ll be required to sign it. “You know, it raises an interesting question as to whether technically there’s actually a signature… It’s not a legally binding agreement, I don’t know what the protocols are,” said the red-eyed Obama as he jumped AF1 for the late night trip back to D.C.
“It’s a catastrophe,” said Dan Joergensen, a European delege. “We’re so far away from the criteria that was set up in order to call it a success, and those weren’t really that ambitious to start with.”
The fact that it’s messy, there’s lots of drama, and everyone is screaming “not enough” is a good sign that we may have something real.
we could have expected under the non-leadership of the last unilateralist administration. Too bad Obama doesn’t have the same interest in leading in support of any of his own alleged principles on health care. I guess international acclaim is more to his taste.
At this rate , they’ll never get to 60. After Lieberman and Nelson are seen to so easily bully Obama and the leadership out of their lunch money, the leadership will have to play whack-a-mole with everyone and anyone who wants anything and sees how easy it is to strong-arm these powder puffs.
This is Chicago style hardball? And nice move, sending out the aides to call those of us who fought for him door to door and want to see some fight in return a bunch of idiots in PJs.
They did get to 60 with a piece of crap that won’t lower costs to individuals because there will be no competition and will just transfer huge sums of our taxes directly to the private insurers who will have to cover us for pre-existing conditions but still get to charge huge sums to do so. They’ll be more profitable than ever.
Only the 30 million more this will cover will get anything out of this and it will all be at the expense of the rest of us with no inconvenience to the insurers. In fact, they’ll be more bloated and powerful than ever.
There’s some hope we can take the battle for a little something for hard working Americans to the House. Pelosi, after all, has more balls in her little finger than Obama, Reid and Emanuel combined have in their balls, but I wouldn’t bet on it since Obama is dedicated to rolling over for our overlords in the private insurance and pharma industries and has handed the reins on this issue to their boy Lieberman. And they will crow about this piece of crap as a great victory. Wake me when it’s over.
Time to start phoning our Representatives and tell them what needs to happen–especially if they imagine a Democratic majority in 2011.
A look-back at Colorado’s experience is a great place to start. Amendment 37’s 10% clean energy standard was said to be “too much” by industry [they wanted zero] and not enough by some in the environmental community. But, since it’s passage and with a policy framework in place we went from nothing in 2004 to doubling the standard to 20% in the Governor’s freshman year; [Xcel met it’s 2015 obligation way early and supported the doubling] Now there’s talk of a 30% standard not only a possibility – but a technical reality…all done in nearly the same timeframe as the original “10% by 2015” constitutional amendment. I would argue that had we started with nothing [or arguably something weak] to drive policy and industry decisions…we’d never be where we are today. If we had tried to push a 30% standard in 2004 we would have failed and we’d still be arguing with the minority party under the dome how we were going to find a starting point.
…if the goal had been 50% –or even 75%–clean energy in 10 years?
Resistance at first, yes. But with that sort of goal, the scale of thinking would have been quite different, the scale of the investment would have been different, and, yes, public perception would have been different. Harder sales job, perhaps, but perhaps not. “Ten percent” doesn’t usually inspire anyone to make major changes since it doesn’t imply a serious existential challenge to the status quo. It is the latter that is the real failure of public and private energy policy to date.
“Fifty percent” has a different ring to it altogether, and might well be a much easier sales job! “Fuck OPEC” could stir me to action; “kiss OPEC on the cheek in the backseat for an hour” doesn’t. (With apologies for rather a mixed metaphor, to say the least!)
I would argue that major changes (the kind called “revolutionary”) are seldom made by itsy-bitsy increments. Such changes need an entire change in mind-set, and when that comes (if it comes), the scope of the change can meet the current challenge. To bring that about, a society needs strong leaders in the political realm. We haven’t had any of the sort that can inspire change for a very, very long time (since JFK, with LBJ to ram his ideas through the Senate). I had thought Obama fit the bill; I’m beginning to wonder, with his performance on health care to date.
The fact that the dual challenges of environmental degradation and dependence on unreliable foreign sources of petroleum have resulted in a failure by the United States to take meaningful steps to achieve independence from petroleum in the past 30 years–a full generation–suggests a pretty depressing picture of our society’s ability to rise to big challenges, especially if they require change in behavior or sacrifice on any scale.
Why?
Because everyone hates it. That’s pretty much a necessary criteria for a compromise on something this major.
I would be too if I got everything I wanted.
….of which I cannot find online. But this quote summarizes it all:
“A good compromise leaves everybody mad.”
…or at least from WAY back. Paraphrased, of course.
The insurance companies aren’t unhappy; they got exactly what they wanted: a lot more customers, no restrictions on rates. What’s not to like?
The pharmaceutical companies got what they want: no reimport, no targeted efforts to drive down costs per WH deal.
FACT is that the so-called “reform” bill is in fact the “status quo” bill, except with mandates for people to spend money for insurance and some tax credits to help those who can’t afford to do so! NO meaningful cost reductions! NO guarantees of coverage–just mandates to buy insurance!
Required of all, provided by the private sector, so-so regulation of pricing, etc. Yet that seems to work ok.
The truth is none of us truly knows what is best or how any given plan will work out. It’s a giant leap in the dark. We’ll have to see…
There is no requirement to drive or own a car.
There is a requirement (more or less) to live and breathe.
auto insurance to pay for routine maintenance, and nor do we pay automotive repair workers sufficiently to pay off enormous debt from medical school.
The point remains the majority of adults have a car and purchase auto insurance. And the system works well.
“It’s actually quite similar to auto insurance”
It’s not similar at all. If your examples aren’t equivalent, they’re pointless.
But I don’t think I’ll be able to sway you.
If we’re looking for a different insurance pool to compare it to, the analogy to auto insurance is more apt than to any other insurance pool I can think of. Is there a better one to compare it to? Natural disaster insurance? No, it has a huge correlated risk problem that health insurance doesn’t have. Investment insurance? No, that pool isn’t broadly distributed enough. Terrorism insurance? That’s basically the same as natural disaster insurance.
OMG!?!
There is a vague notion floating around that “a solution no one likes is the best solution” when it’s the result of negotiation.
The current legislation does not fit that description at all (even if that cliche were true, which I also would dispute, but never mind).
This legislation is JUST what the doctor, and the insurance company and Pharma, ordered. NOT at all what the consumer needs to make health insurance a right in the way that education is a right, and police/fire protection is a right.
Apart from the fact that ALL the compromises in the current bill came from ONE side–the consumers’ side–the bill perpetuates yet another fallacy: that employment should be the source of health coverage. A topic perhaps worthy of a separate diary, but in short: people should not make employment decisions (to take a job, to leave a job, to stay in a job instead of launching a venture) on the basis of health insurance. The latter has nothing to do with any of the former. The link was a quirk of post-WW2 wage and price controls. Those went away, but the link between jobs and health insurance didn’t. The more’s the pity, especially since the nature of “life-time employment” was closer to the norm then that now, by a long shot!
I look at this post and your post above about increasing our use of renewable energy. A compromise is not something that is 95% what you want. You have to realize that you are probably to the left of the median in the Democratic party. Add in the people in the middle – who gave us out majority in this last election, and you are way left.
A compromise that is crafted merely to the voters who elected Obama you will find unacceptable. Yet that is where we sit politically. And from that position we got pulled a bit more to the center due to the mechanics of the Senate.
But this bill is a major game changer. The insurance companies prefer it to what could have happened. But they prefer the status-quo to what’s coming.
Keep pushing for more, but don’t make your view of perfect the enemy of forward movement.
And yet, that is what we have in the health care bill–95% of what Big Medicine wanted, 95% of what Big Pharma wanted, and 95% of what Big Insurance wanted! They–and especially Big Insurance–gave up absolutely nothing! Pre-existing conditions? Charge what they want! And in exchange for any concessions, they got the Jackpot: mandatory purchase of their product by everyone. The fact that government may help some come up with the dough ain’t exactly a compromise by Big Insurance! Au contraire!
Disagree? Show me (as I used to say driving across Missouri) what any of these three gave up.
As for where the median lies, I would say: (a) Depends on who you’re talking about. People in Colorado? In Massachuetts? In Mississippi? In Sweden, France, or Britain? (b) Being “in the middle,” or being perceived to be in the middle, may sound like a virtue to some; it doesn’t mean a person has a sound perception of how best to solve a problem–a long way of saying “so what?”
And lastly: Attacking what I say about health insurance by commenting on what I say about alternative energy, and then characterizing my position as to the left of most, is a bit feeble, don’t you think? Much more about you than about me or my arguments. Can’t argue the merits of the case? So attack the advocate on grounds of where you/he/he/she/they will perceive him/her to be relative to some mythological center of some mythological road. Sounds like some “advice for life” by a sedated preacher man who’s been dipping into the communion wine: “Be moderate in all things.” (Also sounds a bit like Polonius who, btw, is intended as a fool, although fools often imagine his advice to Laertes is meant to be taken seriously–a kind of joke within the joke, one that many HS English teachers don’t really get, I think.) I could equally argue that most new ideas start out being perceived as “extreme,” or “unreasonable,” etc. If anything, your characterization suggests that I’m right–whether you think so or not is neither here nor there (but mostly there).
You are correct that we should argue each item on its merits. I brought up where the moderate middle lies more (at least my intent was) to speak to the fact that what we ended up with is not that far from the middle.
It would have been nice to have the medicare buy-in and/or the public option. And a different result in CN would have given us that.
But also keep in mind that we are at this point with zero extra votes. And only have 60 because Specter switched (thank you Club for Growth). So if things had been a bit different we would have had no health-care bill.
Under the rules of the Senate, the problem may well be as you say:
Possible “solutions”:
1. Compromise the bill beyond recognition in order to acquire votes of Republicans-in-Democrats’-clothing (the solution chosen by Reid & Obama), of whom there are many. Indeed, that is a falsehood that lies at the core of the failure to reform health care.
2. Employ available parliamentarian tools in the Senate (the word escapes me–reconciliation?). Why wasn’t this done? Why didn’t the Democrats use their majority–51 votes instead of 60–without giving faux Democrats effective one-man veto power and pass a bill with meaningful reform, in line with the wishes of more than 60% of the public? This key question seems to have sunk ‘neath the waves without ever generating an answer, any answer, from Reid of Nevada.
3. Lay out a clear, coherent, rational approach to delivering health care as a right and sell it on its merits. Make it the issue of the election of 2010. Recognize from the get-go that such a solution will reduce “health care insurance” to the role of selling supplemental policies, rather like supplemental Medicare policies, OR go into competition with a public health services scheme, much as private schools compete with public schools among a thin slice of the population.
Some sort of bill will be passed. It will be described by its backers as “health care reform,” but it will be no such thing. The dual faults at its core–tying health care to employment, and financing care via insurance (that pays for, and only for, medical services delivered instead of around medical care designed around keeping patients healthy)–will be left untouched. As long as the incentive is to deliver more and more services, the overall cost of medical care continues to soar, and people without corporate employment will continue to suffer financially. Both features are built into the system.
Passing the current bill precludes fixing the problem. Describing it as “health care reform” is a sham and a hoax. Politicians who try to sell it as such tell us much more about themselves than about health care.
Hi JO. Last September, RogueStaffer actually explored the Reconciliation option and explained in great detail why it wasn’t a practical option:
http://www.coloradopols.com/di…
And while no one has raised the question about the mechanics of a Senate filibuster lately, I can’t resist including RS’s other diary on the topic: http://www.coloradopols.com/di…
Wish s/he would weigh in more often at this site.
It’s easy for all of us in the peanut gallery to criticize the motives/actions/results/competence of our leaders. Mike Littwin’s column this morning expresses the disappointment with Obama in particular pretty well:
All things considered, it could be a lot worse.
If Reid were so inclined, he could separate the public option or Medicare buy-in from the rest of the bill and pass it using reconciliation. It fits much better with the Byrd rule than something like premium caps or rescission or pre-existing conditions, since it relates directly to the budget.
Maybe you’re right about the public option and/or Medicare buy-in via reconciliation. But it would have diluted the effort to get the rest of the attempted reform (denial of coverage, etc.) passed.
I do think getting over this hurdle will lead to more legislative action, not less, making real reform an on-going process, not a once-per-generation exercise in futility.
Perhaps, as with all things, it’s a question of “bright side/dark side.” But I’m not so sure in the case of how the United States goes about supply health care.
There are some issues that require fixing. Example: adding African-Americans and farm workers to Social Security coverage after it was first passed without them. Basically a good idea, improved.
Health care services have evolved into a fundamentally broken system, as I’ve said before. Can it be fixed with band-aids? The problem with doing so is exactly the problem put forward by advocates of passing the current bill. Accepting failure to address the core problem(s) now likely will be used as an excuse not to address this problem for years to come, whereas failure to pass the current bill could equally be used as a reason to take it up again, and again, and again.
There seems to be a consensus that if the current flawed bill isn’t passed, Congress won’t take it up again anytime soon. Why should this be? Why should voters let it be? I suspect this argument unveils yet another problem at the core of our system of government as it has evolved: people have become so detached from the mechanisms of government that those mechanisms have been handed over to narrow corporate interests, and people feel they are helpless to change this. The issue isn’t the state of government; it’s the attitude of people towards their own sense of powerlessness, as argued on this very site and many other places.
Forms of government may remain the same, but the essence of the American democratic experiment–one vote for every man and woman, power in the hands of the populace, not in the hands of property-owners–gives every sign of having dissipated to the point of being on the verge of disappearing. The health care debate, such as it has been, fueled by corporate donations, is one symptom. I’d predict that the forthcoming debate over regulating the financial services industry is in line to become another colossal failure. How many more such failures can we tolerate?
As many as it takes until we fundamentally change the way money and special interests control our political process.
But I suspect quite a few people persuaded themselves that the 2008 election was the start of that fundamental change. What a difference a year makes!
So, back to the drawing table, or should I say, back to the caucus. It’s not so much that the health care bill isn’t perfect that’s disillusioning; it’s that when push came to shove, Obama didn’t really direct his powers, whatever those might be, to fight for something that would at least lay the ground for future improvements. Evidence suggests quite the contrary! The “one step at a time” argument is being made now, but I don’t see any concrete basis for it besides the rhetoric.
I am, however, open to concrete examples of where I’m wrong and what I’m missing. I’m less open to attacks on my attitude, where I seem to be driving down the road, etc.
You’re absolutely right. That’s where I plan to be next year, and the next election after that, and on and on…
As a nation, we’re only as strong as the candidates we encourage to run, and succeed in electing.
That they all share the common flaw of being mere mortals is disappointing, but currently without an alternative solution.
“…if the current flawed bill isn’t passed, Congress won’t take it up again anytime soon. Why should this be? Why should voters let it be?”
Uhh, because they probably won’t have the votes to do anything differently.
The House will probably retain a D majority- but plenty of districts are on the bubble.
The Senate will preserve a D majority, but probably not gain.
So the leadership won’t want to take it up again before they have the votes to do it different. You and I might wish it would be different, but you know that thing about wishes and horses, right?
Drive down the road however you see fit. Why do you not apparently see that the plurality of the voters are not with you? Rail away if you want. Don’t cost nothin’.
But I’d rather you run. Get elected if you can and do the job the way you want.
Serious? Only objective measure that I know of what the plutality of voters want is public opinion polls, which clearly show a majority of voters want a public option (under which falls expanded Medicare eligibility).
The issue determining the outcome of the health care debate is Senate rules–not laws, not Constitutional terms–as applied by the minority party to require 60 votes to even have a vote! That’s it. (I won’t bother going into the number of voters represented by Ben Nelson versus, say, Barbara Boxer, to say nothing of voters represented by the Senators from WY vs Senators from NY.)
I “don’t see that the plurality of voters aren’t with me” because that isn’t the case–which I say based on public opinion polls. Do you have some other objective measure of public opinion contrary to that? Let’s not confuse votes in the Senate with plurality of voters.
Incidentally, as for “not having the votes,” I’m referring to the months before the 2010 election, when the balance in Congress will be as it is now. My point being to make passage of a real reform bill THE issue in the election–NOT whether or not Harry Reid could obtain cloture before Xmas.
ANd many other features in the bill.
I should have made the comparison to Senators.
Anyone who got the Merry Christmas/Happy Holidays email from any of the candidates for Governor, Senate, and/or CD-4 – can you please forward it to me (david@thielen.com).
I have a couple but I’m curious to compare them all (and yes I may write a diary on the subject).
thanks – dave
I’ve disabled images and pop-ups. And I don’t feel any need to view an image of a holiday-related request for campaign contributions.
I think that’s who it was, anyway it was some Republican committee. They wanted me to know that the Senate had cleared the way to the final vote on the government takeover of health care, and they wanted me to go to their online petition to tell Senator Bennet to vote against it.
I guess I need to call Bennet and Udall and tell them to please, in the name of everything holy, vote for it.
Get me some popcorn.
Hasan is about to attempt a 30 meter dive into an empty pool.
2010 would be a quiet year!
Hasan will last as long in this race as a snowball in Hell. Even with all of Daddy’s money.
Just my $0.02.
Hey, he challenged that assertion — every penny of the $350,000 he spent on his statehouse race came from money he earned as a cable TV commentator.