This Is Really So Pathetic
From TheHill.com:
White House press secretary Robert Gibbs said the administration remains committed to drawing Republican support for the bill, particularly in the Senate.
“I don’t know why we would short-circuit that now,” Gibbs told reporters.
He said the White House believes some Republicans on the Senate Finance Committee “are still working in a constructive way to get reform through the Senate and ultimately to the president’s desk.”
Some Republicans, like who? Chuck Grassley, who told TheHill.com today, without a trace of irony, that he is still interested in “working together” with Democrats to get health care reform passed?
“I’ve said all year that something as big and important as health care legislation should have broad-based support,” Grassley said in a statement to The Hill.
“So far, no one has developed that kind of support, either in Congress or at the White House. That doesn’t mean we should quit. It means we should keep working until we can put something together that gets that widespread support.”
Steve Benen is incredulous:
This would be hilarious if it weren’t so sad. The more Democrats offer Republicans concessions and compromises, the more the GOP says, “We don’t care.” The more Dems try to find “broad-based support,” the more obvious it is Republicans don’t support health care reform. Policymakers “should keep working”? If the 60-vote caucus wants reform, the 40-vote minority doesn’t, and reform can pass without GOP obstructionism, there’s no point in keeping the charade going.
This is especially rich coming from Grassley. He’s defended the “death panel” garbage; he’s prepared to vote against his own compromise legislation, no matter what’s in it; and he’s pulled common-sense measures with bipartisan support from the negotiating table. That’s just from the last six days.
And perhaps most importantly, while Grassley wants lawmakers to keep looking for something that can get “widespread support,” a member of his own leadership — Senate Minority Whip Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.) — said yesterday that “almost all Republicans” are likely to oppose reform, even if it’s the result of a bipartisan compromise.
Matthew Yglesias wonders “whether the White House is really so naive that they didn’t realize this would happen,” or whether “the plan was simply to give the GOP enough time and rope for them to make it clear that the White House really and truly did make an effort to put a bipartisan process together, but the Republicans were just more interested in obstruction.”
At the moment, I am leaning toward the first explanation. Judging by the official response today to the talk about Democrats “going it alone,” the White House does not appear to even believe that Republicans in Congress do plan to oppose health care reform en masse. Here, again, is that quote that I used at the top of this post:
White House press secretary Robert Gibbs said the administration remains committed to drawing Republican support for the bill, particularly in the Senate.
“I don’t know why we would short-circuit that now,” Gibbs told reporters.
He said the White House believes some Republicans on the Senate Finance Committee “are still working in a constructive way to get reform through the Senate and ultimately to the president’s desk.”
Gibbs was reacting to a story in The New York Times that said Democrats were moving toward going it alone on healthcare given Republican opposition to healthcare reform.
I don’t know — maybe there’s some master strategy behind Gibbs’ seemingly blithe unawareness, but it sure looks like deer in the headlights to me.
9 Responses to “This Is Really So Pathetic”
The polls say the public wants bipartisanship.
The polls also say the public largely blames the republicans for the lack of bipartisanship.
Why not keep the door open while you are preparing to pass a bill that is your own personal wish list of proposals. If they do not sign on or negotiate in a “meaningful way”, which they won't or they will not keep their seats, the public will likely continue to blame them while the dems pass whatever in the hell they want. The funny part is the more extreme the repub polls act and talk and spin the public at large is not on their side, instead they are fractured into many camps disdaining many things but a large number of them have a dislike for the repubs they are just getting pissed at the dems now as well. Meanwhile I think the White House has been playing little games of rope a dope with a good many people but in the end I think we will get a public plan or at least an extremely muscular version of coops. As things stand a growing sense is mounting that he can't work with repubs because they have been outed as wanting to do nothing but obstruct. If the repubs are not really careful and they do force a public backlash on themselves the bill in the house for single payer may just get a boost. I doubt it but they are beginning to skip down that path from my view.
It's the middle of August. The administration gains nothing by threatening Republicans in the Senate at this point. Everything right now is the preliminary moves in a chess match. Checkmate occurs in mid September so there are alot of moves to go. Let the administration talk bi-partisanship for as long as they need to so the Republicans can hang themselves. Because of Reconciliation the Democrats really don't need Republican votes to get to 50+ Biden.
Grassley will be given an option on September 14th at midnight. Come to an agreement that he will vote for and sell to the Republicans or face reconciliation. End of story.
What good does it do to have a majority, when an extremely rich few can subvert the majority vote?
Face it, our nation is a Corporate Republic. First of it’s kind.
“The more Democrats offer Republicans concessions and compromises, the more the GOP says, “We don’t care.” The more Dems try to find “broad-based support,” the more obvious it is Republicans don’t support health care reform.”
Yes. Isn't this a repeat of what we saw with one of the first pieces of legislation put together (I think it was the financial bailout). Didn't the Democrats give the GOP everything (or almost everything) the GOP wanted, and yet only three Senators (as I recall) voted for it.
It's fine to oppose the legislation, but if you (Republican Senator) get the amendment you want in it, then you should vote for it. If you vote against it then your amendment should be taken out.
I mean… what's the point of giving the Republicans what they want if they're not going to vote for it anyway? I think the GOP is just trying to score political points with each other.
By the way, I believe that Obama is frustrated that he can't get more bipartisan support. I don't think he's naive. I think he is trying to live up to a campaign promise and work with the GOP, who, if they were doing their jobs, would be representing their constituents and negotiating in good faith.
So tell your Dems to pass anything they want. They are supposed to have the votes aren't they? I mean if they are supposedly doing such good for all of us then why wouldn't they want 100% ownership? Why do they need Republican cover? Maybe because some of the crap being shoved through isn't as good as they say it is? What are they afraid of?
I have to admit, I sort of enjoy all this liberal self-pity. But if we can suspend the self-flagellation for a moment, perhaps we can consider the politics? Before the August recess, Democrats couldn't even get a reform bill through a House they control by a large majority. The problem isn't that the White House or the Hill leadership is naively waiting for Republicans to sign up. They can't even persuade their own troops they have a bill worth voting for.
So instead of blaming the President or his press secretary, how about some more attacks on the Blue Dogs? Help drive moderate districts back into the GOP's arms!
“Maybe because some of the crap being shoved through isn't as good as they say it is? What are they afraid of?”
Some of them, no doubt, are afraid now of their re-election prospects, as well as realizing that more and more people, all but the lunatic militant fringe, oppose or reject this slipshod, stupidly rushed effort.
Since the start of this year, the Dems, especially the farther-left dippy Dems in the House and notoriously with the rise of the idiotic climate bill (which generated the first strong, broad public rejection), Obama, too, have been overreaching more and more, stumbling more and more, and it's coming to something of a decisive moment now as the health care effort is so widely rejected by the public (for so many very good reasons), and what we now see is what?
We see the most dishonest, scummy attacks on the opposition (the mainstream, the public at large, those who know and are better about this effort) by the supporters, continuing to dwindle to nothing but the most diseased hard-core people insisting on this destructive lunacy and ineptitude by Washington.
It's just an outlet for these childish militants' resentment and occasional-to-frequent tantrums in addition to their nearly incessent childish little whining (Kathy!).
Say they remain commited to bipartisanship (remain? since when have they acted bipartisan on this?) with one face and threaten the nuclear option with the other, LOL.
Father Time, I believe that the Venetian “republic” was really the first corporate republic. Of course, they didn't have political parties, the oligarchs ruled everything, but they kept the people fed, clothed and successfully defended for a long time.