Standing up for who's principle, exactly?

So John McCain has tweeted an indignant message about how poor old

"Joe Lieberman -- standing up for his principles on health care is being viciously attacked by the liberal left...what a disgrace!"

Well color me puzzled! Which of "his principles" is Joe supposedly standing up for here? The principle that he stood for just 3 months ago was that allowing older people to buy in to Medicare would be a really good idea!

“What I was proposing was that they have an option to buy into Medicare early and again on the premise that that would be less expensive than the enormous cost. If you’re 55 or 60 and you’re without health insurance and you go in to try to buy it, because you’re older … you’re rated as a risk so you pay a lot of money.”

Watch for yourself:




Now, Joe's principles say the allowing older people to buy into Medicare is such a dangerous idea that he'd rather scupper the whole legislation, allowing millions to remain uninsured, before he'd even vote to allow for a vote on it.

If Joe Lieberman were standing up for his principles, I'd say fair play to him!

In Which I Throw up my Hands and Shout "These People are Crazy!"

So as you will know, I have recently been writing and thinking about how it may be OK for progressives to give up some things they really care about in the service of pushing forward a health care reform that will make the whole system better.

I was willing to swallow a hideously anti-woman provision on abortion.

I was willing to argue against my fellow progressives in pointing out that there may be other ways to achieve cost savings apart from the (preffered) approach of pursuing the public option.

I have been urging progressives to recognise that so many people will die (about 150,000, by a conservative estimate, apparently) without healthcare reform, and so many more will be financially ruined, that it was worth an awful lot of pain and sacrifice to get it through. I have been arguing that the passage of this bill will make so many people's lives so much better - even considering that (in the case of the Stupak amendment) a lot of lives would actually be made worse - that the only responsible thing to do is to push hard for the best deal we can and then pass whatever that winds up looking like.

But it turns out, that I have been the problem, all along. Because Joe Lieberman reads the willingness of myself and fellow progressives to make this bill happen as a sign that clearly it can't be a good one. So clearly, I ought to have kicked and screamed and called the medicare buy in proposal a "shameless corporate sell out" (even though it's... ya know... NOT) because that would have signalled to Lieberman that this compromise represents reasonable centrism. Note, by the way, that this signal is apparently not sent by actual FACTS or analysis - he has chosen not to wait for the CBO report which he last week cited as being essential to making up his mind - on the grounds that, as Ezra Says, "the CBO is expected to say it will [neither increase the deficit nor harm Medicare solvency]. Someone must have given Lieberman a heads-up on that, as he's decided to make his move in advance of the CBO score, the better to ensure the facts of the policy couldn't impede his opposition to it."


As Steve Benen aptly puts it:

Just for the sake of discussion, what if Weiner, Dean, and Sanders had all expressed disappointment with the Medicare buy-in compromise? Would Lieberman -- who not only ran on a Medicare buy-in platform in 2000, but also signaled some preliminary support for the idea last week -- be willing to kill reform over the idea now?


Obviously, this presumes that Joe Lieberman is a small, bitter man, who puts foolish vendettas over the interests of his constituents and his country. Given the circumstances, that doesn't strike me as an outrageous stretch.

I'm not crazy about the "Joe Lieberman is a jerk" theory of political failure - I want to believe that there's some rational explanation for why he might suddenly oppose health care reform that he has supported all his life and would seem to take great delight in waiting until Democrats seemingly have a deal then pulling the rug out from under them. But I can't really think of one.

Note: I'm not saying that I can't think of a rational explanation for opposing health care reform - there are some rational, if not IMHO very good reasons to do so. Ben Nelson strongly opposes abortion. Olympia Snowe is subject to pressure from the Republican caucus. Blanche Lincolne and Mary Landrieu have their own elections to worry about. These are all rational concerns - although I don't think they're good reasons for letting our health care system crash around our ears.

But Joe is just... being a jerk. Tell me how to look at it any other way?

Harry Reid, The Opt Out Public Option, and Joe Lieberman

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid - who by the way has just about the toughest job in Washington right now, and is facing a vicious re-election battle at the same time, poor guy - has announced that he will bring to the floor of the Senate a health reform bill that will include a version of the "public option." Specifically the opt out public option. Any questions?

Opt out what?

The public option, as you probably know already, refers to the opportunity of choosing to purchase health insurance that is government managed. Under most versions of the bill, including the one Reid is likely to propose, the public option would only be made available to a small number of people - specifically those who do not have or who lose their employer provided health insurance.

It would be not for profit, but is not intended to lose money - in face most estimates say it would reduce the government's health care expenditure. These consumers will have the option of chosing from a range of health insurance options across a national exchange, most of which would be privately managed for-profit alternatives, but one of which would be public.

The what public option?

Opt out. The opt out version of the public option means that all states will be automatically enrolled, allowing them to offer the public option in their exchange. But some people (Republicans, mainly, but some nervous Democrats as well) are making a big fuss about their preference for removing the public option as a choice.

Under the plan now proposed, any state that for whatever reason doesn't want to offer this option can choose not to offer it. States will be automatically IN the program, in other words, but if they don't want to offer people in their state the alternative of purchasing health care in this way, then they can choose to prevent people from doing buying it.

Why would they do this?

Beats the heck out of me. But then I'm not the one who's going around complaining about the supposed budget busting effects of this privision, which the CBO and almost all experts agree would actually REDUCE the cost of health care and the Federal Government's liabilities in this area.

Who is doing that?

Well, for a start - Joe Lieberman.

What's Joe saying?

Tonight he came out with a statement that he would would support a Republican filibuster of the bill as it currently stands.

And that's bad?

Well, it's certainly frustrating considering that:

1) The reasons he says he won't support the public option are not actually factually true.
2) Voting to support the filibuster is not the same thing as voting against the bill. Leaving aside the stupidity of his opposition, he could easily choose to vote against the final bill without endangering its passage. But voting with the Republicans in support of a filibuster prevents the bill from even being voted on - this is a far higher standard.
3) Democrats are barely in control of the requisite number to end a filibuster, so it's unclear whether any bill could be passed if Joe and his ilk really dig in their heels on this procedural issue.

Why would Joe Lieberman do this?

Dunno? Cuz he's kind of a schmuck?

Attention Joe Lieberman....

I am pro-America.

Also, I am a Democrat.

You appear to be neither of these things.

Thank you.