When he signed the 1964 Civil Rights Act into law, President Lyndon Johnson famously stated to an aide "I fear that we have lost the South for a generation." He was afraid--and history has borne out his fears--that the Democrats support of civil rights would alienate the southern states. Guess what? The law passed Congress and Johnson signed it anyway. Why? Because sometimes leading means putting politics aside and doing the right thing.
I don't see health care reform as any less important. The simple fact of the matter is that people die every day in this country who wouldn't have to given a different set of circumstances, and it is within our power to provide those circumstances to them. People want to argue that the market will take care of the problem, to which I must point out: It hasn't done so yet. It hasn't even taken steps in that direction. In fact, we're seeing just the opposite. The problem's getting worse every year, while the health care system builds a fatter and fatter bankroll at the expense of the people it is supposed to serve.
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February 17, 2010
February 15, 2010
February 5, 2010
Politics Has Lost Its Power. That’s Why There’s Gridlock
Everybody's beating their breasts about Washington gridlock.
Let's defend gridlock for a moment. The opposite of gridlock was a halcyon time when Lyndon Johnson ran the Senate. But it is worth pointing out that for most of that time and a few decades before, Congress couldn't pass a civil rights law because the Democratic Party was, itself, on this issue, gridlocked. But pay no attention to that. The larger point is that during Lyndon's time politicians had a rapport with each other that could help overcome their ideological differences. Indeed, congressional politicians, as a separate professional class, most living far from their constituents, were much more beholden to each other for their future advancement than they were to the voters. You gotta go along to get along, or some such, was the forever-and ever Speaker of the House Sam Rayburn's fond admonishment.
More...
Let's defend gridlock for a moment. The opposite of gridlock was a halcyon time when Lyndon Johnson ran the Senate. But it is worth pointing out that for most of that time and a few decades before, Congress couldn't pass a civil rights law because the Democratic Party was, itself, on this issue, gridlocked. But pay no attention to that. The larger point is that during Lyndon's time politicians had a rapport with each other that could help overcome their ideological differences. Indeed, congressional politicians, as a separate professional class, most living far from their constituents, were much more beholden to each other for their future advancement than they were to the voters. You gotta go along to get along, or some such, was the forever-and ever Speaker of the House Sam Rayburn's fond admonishment.
More...
January 29, 2010
January 20, 2010
December 29, 2009
How Former U.S. Presidents Spent Their New Year’s Eve
When the White House let it be known, recently, that the Obama's will be spending New Year's Eve and New Year's Day under the warm blue skies in Hawaii surrounded by white sandy beaches, it got me to thinking how other U.S. presidents spent New Year's Eve
I wondered, for example, whether some presidents welcomed in the New Year with a lamp shade over their head, swinging from the chandeliers in the East Room of the White House after absorbing too much of the bubbly.
No such luck.
The spiciest evening spent at the White House on a New Year's Eve probably came on December 31, 1995, when President Bill Clinton indulged in his third rendezvous with White House intern Monica Lewinsky in his private study. This tryst reportedly took place during the early afternoon; later that evening, the President flew off with his family to Hilton Head, S.C., for their traditional family retreat, called "Renaissance Weekend'', where they celebrated with a 1,000 of their closest friends. On New Year's Day, the First Family attended a seminar on "personal growth and family values."
Compared with "Slick Willy", most U.S. presidents had rather sedate New Year's Eve celebrations.
In fact, for some presidents, New Year's Eve was business as usual. President Jimmy Carter was in Tehran December 31, 1977, where he praised the Shah's nation for being "an island of stability"; and in 1992, President H.W. Bush welcomed the New Year with U.S. troops in Somolia.
And let's not forget, 147 years ago, President Abraham Lincoln was getting ready to deliver the final Emancipation Proclamation on January 1, 1863, as the nation was heading into to its third year of a bloody civil war in which he claimed all slaves in the eyes of the federal government were considered free.
But not all presidents were so hard-working on New Year's Eve.
In 1971, with a thick snow battering the nation's capital, the normally cantankerous Richard Nixon surprised members of the press corps on New Year's Eve by inviting them to the White House for cocktails and conversation, while mixing up what he described as his "special formula martini."
Little would the press corps know that three years later, members of a jury would be escorted back to their hotel room on New Year's Eve by a federal marshal after failing to reach a verdict during the second day of deliberations of the Watergate cover-up trial, involving White House staff members being charged with conspiracy to obstruct justice. Judge John J. Sirica gave strict orders to federal marshals that "there will be no special New Year's Eve celebration" for jurors.
Lyndon Johnson usually liked to sneak away to his ranch in Texas for the Christmas holidays, including New Year's Eve and prepare his State of the Union address.
On New Year's Eve 1964, LBJ left Lady Bird at the ranch to watch a movie, while he engaged in some party hopping; first by attending a private reception at the University of Texas in Austin; later he headed to a private club, the "40 Acres" not far from the college campus. After about an hour there-he dashed off to the home of Frank Irwin, former Chairman of the Board of Regents of the University of Texas and a close friend of the president, before heading to the Driskill Hotel for a New Year's Eve bash attended by the White House press corps.
Both John F. Kennedy and Ronald Reagan usually could be found in Palm Springs on New Year's Eve; Kennedy in Florida; Reagan in California.
On New Year's Eve 1961, President Kennedy and Press Secretary Pierre Salinger popped into the Palm Beach Country Club; while in 1987, the Reagan's stayed at the estate of Walter Annenberg, former publisher and United States Ambassador to the United Kingdom, which included guests: Bob and Delores Hope, Dinah Shore and Frances Bergen, an American actress and wife of ventriloquist Edgar Bergen.
Harry Truman spent New Year's Eve at a stag party aboard his presidential yacht. "Williamsburg" (anchored in the Potomac off Quantico Va.,) in 1945, which included a makeshift band of players from the ships officers, including Corp David Mann, playing the piano, Corp Clemens J. Salber on the accordion, George W. Duvall plucking the banjo, with the president's group singing ``Auld Lang Syne'', "The Caissons Go Rollin' Along" and "Deep in the Heart of Texas", among other ditties.
Before it became fashionable for U.S. Presidents to leave the White House for the Christmas holidays, First Families used to greet the general public on New Year's Day in the Blue Room. John and Abigail Adams, in fact, began this time-honored tradition on January 1, 1801 at a time when the White House still wasn't fully furnished.
During President Tyler's New Year's Day greeting, along with greeting the general public, N.P. Willis, poet and popular magazine writer was in line to meet the president and even composed a poem about the day.
In 1928, President Coolidge and First Lady, Grace Coolidge, met the general public on New Year's Day, including diplomats from 58 nations, every branch of the U.S. government, Cabinet officers, and officers from the U.S. armed forces, who were entertained on a biting cold morning with sounds of "Hail to the Chief", compliments of the U.S. Marine Band, exploding through the air.
More than 6, 300 members of the general public queued up to meet President Herbert Hoover on New Year's Day 1930, a day in which The New York Times reported that "women and children of all classes and colors passed along to grasp the hands of the president and his wife."
President Hoover is believed to have been the last U.S. President to greet members of the general public on New Year's Day.
President Franklin Roosevelt and First Lady Eleanor, however, did have some unexpected guests on New Year's Eve, 1938, when a 16-year-old high school student named Joe Measell, his date Beatrice White; and his 14-year-old brother, Donald, managed to slip past the Secret Service and walk right up to the room where the First Family where entertaining guests, including Henry Morgenthau Jr., Secretary of the Treasury, Bishop Atwood and Mr. Endicott Peabody, the Rector of Groton School, while watching the movie, "Pygmalion" As soon as the lights went on after the movie, Measel entered the room, walked up to the president and said "Excuse me, Your Honor, but I'm here on a dare from a party and would like to have your autograph." The President, amused, obliged as did Mrs Roosevelt, but not before the First Lady scolded the youths for entering White House grounds uninvited.
So with President Obama in Hawaii, with wife Michelle, children, Sasha and Malia, along with Marian Robinson, his mother-in-law never far away, I guess he'll be on his best behavior; which means, of course, we'll have to wait for a few more administrations before we hear about any presidents with lamp shades over their head on New Year's Eve.
I wondered, for example, whether some presidents welcomed in the New Year with a lamp shade over their head, swinging from the chandeliers in the East Room of the White House after absorbing too much of the bubbly.
No such luck.
The spiciest evening spent at the White House on a New Year's Eve probably came on December 31, 1995, when President Bill Clinton indulged in his third rendezvous with White House intern Monica Lewinsky in his private study. This tryst reportedly took place during the early afternoon; later that evening, the President flew off with his family to Hilton Head, S.C., for their traditional family retreat, called "Renaissance Weekend'', where they celebrated with a 1,000 of their closest friends. On New Year's Day, the First Family attended a seminar on "personal growth and family values."
Compared with "Slick Willy", most U.S. presidents had rather sedate New Year's Eve celebrations.
In fact, for some presidents, New Year's Eve was business as usual. President Jimmy Carter was in Tehran December 31, 1977, where he praised the Shah's nation for being "an island of stability"; and in 1992, President H.W. Bush welcomed the New Year with U.S. troops in Somolia.
And let's not forget, 147 years ago, President Abraham Lincoln was getting ready to deliver the final Emancipation Proclamation on January 1, 1863, as the nation was heading into to its third year of a bloody civil war in which he claimed all slaves in the eyes of the federal government were considered free.
But not all presidents were so hard-working on New Year's Eve.
In 1971, with a thick snow battering the nation's capital, the normally cantankerous Richard Nixon surprised members of the press corps on New Year's Eve by inviting them to the White House for cocktails and conversation, while mixing up what he described as his "special formula martini."
Little would the press corps know that three years later, members of a jury would be escorted back to their hotel room on New Year's Eve by a federal marshal after failing to reach a verdict during the second day of deliberations of the Watergate cover-up trial, involving White House staff members being charged with conspiracy to obstruct justice. Judge John J. Sirica gave strict orders to federal marshals that "there will be no special New Year's Eve celebration" for jurors.
Lyndon Johnson usually liked to sneak away to his ranch in Texas for the Christmas holidays, including New Year's Eve and prepare his State of the Union address.
On New Year's Eve 1964, LBJ left Lady Bird at the ranch to watch a movie, while he engaged in some party hopping; first by attending a private reception at the University of Texas in Austin; later he headed to a private club, the "40 Acres" not far from the college campus. After about an hour there-he dashed off to the home of Frank Irwin, former Chairman of the Board of Regents of the University of Texas and a close friend of the president, before heading to the Driskill Hotel for a New Year's Eve bash attended by the White House press corps.
Both John F. Kennedy and Ronald Reagan usually could be found in Palm Springs on New Year's Eve; Kennedy in Florida; Reagan in California.
On New Year's Eve 1961, President Kennedy and Press Secretary Pierre Salinger popped into the Palm Beach Country Club; while in 1987, the Reagan's stayed at the estate of Walter Annenberg, former publisher and United States Ambassador to the United Kingdom, which included guests: Bob and Delores Hope, Dinah Shore and Frances Bergen, an American actress and wife of ventriloquist Edgar Bergen.
Harry Truman spent New Year's Eve at a stag party aboard his presidential yacht. "Williamsburg" (anchored in the Potomac off Quantico Va.,) in 1945, which included a makeshift band of players from the ships officers, including Corp David Mann, playing the piano, Corp Clemens J. Salber on the accordion, George W. Duvall plucking the banjo, with the president's group singing ``Auld Lang Syne'', "The Caissons Go Rollin' Along" and "Deep in the Heart of Texas", among other ditties.
Before it became fashionable for U.S. Presidents to leave the White House for the Christmas holidays, First Families used to greet the general public on New Year's Day in the Blue Room. John and Abigail Adams, in fact, began this time-honored tradition on January 1, 1801 at a time when the White House still wasn't fully furnished.
During President Tyler's New Year's Day greeting, along with greeting the general public, N.P. Willis, poet and popular magazine writer was in line to meet the president and even composed a poem about the day.
In 1928, President Coolidge and First Lady, Grace Coolidge, met the general public on New Year's Day, including diplomats from 58 nations, every branch of the U.S. government, Cabinet officers, and officers from the U.S. armed forces, who were entertained on a biting cold morning with sounds of "Hail to the Chief", compliments of the U.S. Marine Band, exploding through the air.
More than 6, 300 members of the general public queued up to meet President Herbert Hoover on New Year's Day 1930, a day in which The New York Times reported that "women and children of all classes and colors passed along to grasp the hands of the president and his wife."
President Hoover is believed to have been the last U.S. President to greet members of the general public on New Year's Day.
President Franklin Roosevelt and First Lady Eleanor, however, did have some unexpected guests on New Year's Eve, 1938, when a 16-year-old high school student named Joe Measell, his date Beatrice White; and his 14-year-old brother, Donald, managed to slip past the Secret Service and walk right up to the room where the First Family where entertaining guests, including Henry Morgenthau Jr., Secretary of the Treasury, Bishop Atwood and Mr. Endicott Peabody, the Rector of Groton School, while watching the movie, "Pygmalion" As soon as the lights went on after the movie, Measel entered the room, walked up to the president and said "Excuse me, Your Honor, but I'm here on a dare from a party and would like to have your autograph." The President, amused, obliged as did Mrs Roosevelt, but not before the First Lady scolded the youths for entering White House grounds uninvited.
So with President Obama in Hawaii, with wife Michelle, children, Sasha and Malia, along with Marian Robinson, his mother-in-law never far away, I guess he'll be on his best behavior; which means, of course, we'll have to wait for a few more administrations before we hear about any presidents with lamp shades over their head on New Year's Eve.
December 21, 2009
Learning from Lieberman
Should progressives in Congress hold their noses and vote for a badly bowdlerized health bill? Or should they vote down this bill, teach the corporate Democrats a lesson, spare the administration the voter backlash from an unpopular bill that has no public option and that raises taxes on decent worker health plans -- and fight another day?
What an excruciating dilemma! Some of my friends argue that this flawed, incremental reform will lead inexorably to more reform. It does, after all, increase regulation of the insurance industry and prohibits denials based on pre-existing conditions, as well as providing coverage to over 30 million uninsured. Others contend that it tightens the drug and insurance industry's grip and leads to the wrong kind of cost containment, as the basic inefficiency of the system is preserved and costs are gradually shifted to families mainly through higher deductibles and co-pays. It's no accident that insurance stocks soared as word of the Senate deal spread.
I debated this issue on Bill Moyers' show Friday with Matt Taibbi. I came down narrowly on the side of hold-your-nose-and-vote-for-the-bill. But the real fight will be in House-Senate conference, and the Senate should not be allowed to dictate the terms of the measure.
My main reason for saying that I hoped that even a flawed bill would pass was that both the Republicans and the White House have framed this as a make-or-break vote for the Obama administration. If the bill goes down, the far right will add another notch to their belt, the media will paint Obama as a loser, and Obama will be even more cautious and pro-corporate going forward. If he wins, maybe he'll be a little bolder and maybe progressives can call in some IOUs.
But that doesn't mean progressives in the House should just roll over and back the Senate bill. For starters, they should get rid of the taxation of workers' collectively bargained health insurance benefits. These plans are misleadingly termed "Cadillac Plans," but in fact they are Chevrolets with high sticker prices that cost a lot because of the system's broader inefficiency. This proposed tax violates Obama's pledge not to raise taxes on working families.
Some 180 House Democrats have signed a letter organized by Rep. Gerry Connolly of suburban Virginia (a fiscally conservative Blue Dog, incidentally) insisting that this provision be dropped, and they should hang tough. (How would you like to run for re-election in 2010 and defend a vote to tax workers' health premiums?) The House bill, by contrast, raises the same amount of money with a highly progressive income surtax, of 5.4 percent of income exceeding $1 million for couples and $500,000 for individuals.
The bill should also demand that employers who fail to offer decent health coverage pay more than a token tax, as in the House version. And more of its provisions should take effect before 2013. The tax increases take effect before the benefits -- mainly to reduce the short term budget impact. Politically, how stupid can you get?! Lyndon Johnson's far more sweeping Medicare law was delivering benefits within a year.
The way the issue played out on the Senate, any single senator could get his or her way by threatening to defeat the entire bill. So Joe Lieberman got to block (an already enfeebled) public option; Ben Nelson got more abortion restrictions; Mary Landrieu got more money for Louisiana Medicaid, and so on. Why can't progressives play this game, too?
The health bill passed the House November 7 by just five votes. Today, Democratic progressives are in a really sour mood not just because Obama got rolled on the Senate bill, but because the White House and the Treasury are doing nothing to promote a jobs bill, and were mostly on the wrong side of key amendments on the recently enacted financial reform bill. That bill narrowly passed the House earlier this month, but some progressive Democrats, such as Marcy Kaptur and Dennis Kucinich, were so disgusted that they voted no.
Progressive House Democrats would be wise to learn from the Senate's centrists. Certain provisions should be non-negotiable -- and progressives shouldn't limit their leverage to health care. They might come in with a whole package of needed reforms that the president should commit to work for -- not just with empty rhetoric as in his carefully staged moment of tough talk about bankers on CBS's Sixty Minutes, but by walking the talk and working Congress hands on.
For instance, where was Obama last week when the House barely passed a $154 billion jobs bill, by a margin of 217-212, and many centrist Democrats deserted it out of fear of attack from deficit hawks? Answer: the White House was playing footsie with the fear-mongers and signaling support for a budget commission that would almost certainly lead to a gutting of Social Security and Medicare.
How about mortgage relief? Eight million Americans stand to lose their homes. Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner and HUD Secretary Shaun Donovan have been boasting that 750,000 homeowners have received "trial modifications" averaging monthly savings of $550 under the Obama administration's voluntary program for mortgage relief, but the Treasury's own December numbers reveal that fewer than 32,000 homeowners got permanent reductions. Independent experts say most of these trial modifications go back into default.
At his recent testimony before the Congressional Oversight Panel, Geithner resisted a call for reductions in principal and interest, citing "fairness." Funny, but fairness didn't come up when Treasury funneled hundreds of billions to big banks.
What the mortgage program lacks is authority for a bankruptcy judge to order reductions in principal and interest. Back when the program was enacted, the White House nominally supported that measure, but cynically let key Democratic legislators know that it wasn't a priority and 12 Senate Democrats voted against the measure.
So House progressives need to play the same kind of legislative hardball as turncoats like Joe Lieberman. And if the final conference bill comes back lacking key provisions, don't kill it but trade support for a badly flawed bill for ironclad commitments on other progressive goals and future improvements to the health plan. Obama might even find that helping regular people rather than bankers and insurance executives is winning politics.
Robert Kuttner is co-editor of The American Prospect and a senior fellow at Demos. His recent book is Obama's Challenge: America's Economic Crisis and the Power of a Transformative Presidency.
What an excruciating dilemma! Some of my friends argue that this flawed, incremental reform will lead inexorably to more reform. It does, after all, increase regulation of the insurance industry and prohibits denials based on pre-existing conditions, as well as providing coverage to over 30 million uninsured. Others contend that it tightens the drug and insurance industry's grip and leads to the wrong kind of cost containment, as the basic inefficiency of the system is preserved and costs are gradually shifted to families mainly through higher deductibles and co-pays. It's no accident that insurance stocks soared as word of the Senate deal spread.
I debated this issue on Bill Moyers' show Friday with Matt Taibbi. I came down narrowly on the side of hold-your-nose-and-vote-for-the-bill. But the real fight will be in House-Senate conference, and the Senate should not be allowed to dictate the terms of the measure.
My main reason for saying that I hoped that even a flawed bill would pass was that both the Republicans and the White House have framed this as a make-or-break vote for the Obama administration. If the bill goes down, the far right will add another notch to their belt, the media will paint Obama as a loser, and Obama will be even more cautious and pro-corporate going forward. If he wins, maybe he'll be a little bolder and maybe progressives can call in some IOUs.
But that doesn't mean progressives in the House should just roll over and back the Senate bill. For starters, they should get rid of the taxation of workers' collectively bargained health insurance benefits. These plans are misleadingly termed "Cadillac Plans," but in fact they are Chevrolets with high sticker prices that cost a lot because of the system's broader inefficiency. This proposed tax violates Obama's pledge not to raise taxes on working families.
Some 180 House Democrats have signed a letter organized by Rep. Gerry Connolly of suburban Virginia (a fiscally conservative Blue Dog, incidentally) insisting that this provision be dropped, and they should hang tough. (How would you like to run for re-election in 2010 and defend a vote to tax workers' health premiums?) The House bill, by contrast, raises the same amount of money with a highly progressive income surtax, of 5.4 percent of income exceeding $1 million for couples and $500,000 for individuals.
The bill should also demand that employers who fail to offer decent health coverage pay more than a token tax, as in the House version. And more of its provisions should take effect before 2013. The tax increases take effect before the benefits -- mainly to reduce the short term budget impact. Politically, how stupid can you get?! Lyndon Johnson's far more sweeping Medicare law was delivering benefits within a year.
The way the issue played out on the Senate, any single senator could get his or her way by threatening to defeat the entire bill. So Joe Lieberman got to block (an already enfeebled) public option; Ben Nelson got more abortion restrictions; Mary Landrieu got more money for Louisiana Medicaid, and so on. Why can't progressives play this game, too?
The health bill passed the House November 7 by just five votes. Today, Democratic progressives are in a really sour mood not just because Obama got rolled on the Senate bill, but because the White House and the Treasury are doing nothing to promote a jobs bill, and were mostly on the wrong side of key amendments on the recently enacted financial reform bill. That bill narrowly passed the House earlier this month, but some progressive Democrats, such as Marcy Kaptur and Dennis Kucinich, were so disgusted that they voted no.
Progressive House Democrats would be wise to learn from the Senate's centrists. Certain provisions should be non-negotiable -- and progressives shouldn't limit their leverage to health care. They might come in with a whole package of needed reforms that the president should commit to work for -- not just with empty rhetoric as in his carefully staged moment of tough talk about bankers on CBS's Sixty Minutes, but by walking the talk and working Congress hands on.
For instance, where was Obama last week when the House barely passed a $154 billion jobs bill, by a margin of 217-212, and many centrist Democrats deserted it out of fear of attack from deficit hawks? Answer: the White House was playing footsie with the fear-mongers and signaling support for a budget commission that would almost certainly lead to a gutting of Social Security and Medicare.
How about mortgage relief? Eight million Americans stand to lose their homes. Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner and HUD Secretary Shaun Donovan have been boasting that 750,000 homeowners have received "trial modifications" averaging monthly savings of $550 under the Obama administration's voluntary program for mortgage relief, but the Treasury's own December numbers reveal that fewer than 32,000 homeowners got permanent reductions. Independent experts say most of these trial modifications go back into default.
At his recent testimony before the Congressional Oversight Panel, Geithner resisted a call for reductions in principal and interest, citing "fairness." Funny, but fairness didn't come up when Treasury funneled hundreds of billions to big banks.
What the mortgage program lacks is authority for a bankruptcy judge to order reductions in principal and interest. Back when the program was enacted, the White House nominally supported that measure, but cynically let key Democratic legislators know that it wasn't a priority and 12 Senate Democrats voted against the measure.
So House progressives need to play the same kind of legislative hardball as turncoats like Joe Lieberman. And if the final conference bill comes back lacking key provisions, don't kill it but trade support for a badly flawed bill for ironclad commitments on other progressive goals and future improvements to the health plan. Obama might even find that helping regular people rather than bankers and insurance executives is winning politics.
Robert Kuttner is co-editor of The American Prospect and a senior fellow at Demos. His recent book is Obama's Challenge: America's Economic Crisis and the Power of a Transformative Presidency.
December 20, 2009
‘Twas the Night Before Christmas and the Senate Was in Session
Cross-posted with the Morning Delivery.
Neither sleet, nor snow, nor punishing winds, nor blinding white blizzard conditions could stop members of the Senate from slogging to the Capitol on an early Saturday morning to take care of crucial business.
In some skillful 11th hour rewording, which restricts insurance coverage for abortions even further, the Senate's health care bill has won the support of Sen. Ben Nelson of Nebraska, the one remaining holdout that gave Democrats' the 60 votes needed to end debate and bring the bill to a full vote on Christmas Eve. A procedural vote will take place on Monday before Thursday's vote.
Yes, you heard right; Congress will be spending Christmas Eve in the nation's Capitol, not in their home states sipping egg nog and listening to Bing Crosby while putting the final decorations on their Christmas trees.
So has the Senate ever been in session on Christmas Eve before? Yes.
Is it rare? Yes.
Actually, it didn't use to be so rare. According to U.S. Senate Historical Office, prior to 1850, the Senate would regularly meet on December 24th and reconvene on December 26th, the day after Christmas.
Records show the Senate met on December 24th seven times before the 20th century: 1855, 1860, 1861, 1883, 1884, 1890, and 1895. The reason for the sessions was nothing more than tending to miscellaneous matters and other executive business measures.
In 1963, the last time the Senate met on Christmas Eve, it was for the purpose of authorizing $3.6 billion of military and economic aid at the request of President Lyndon Johnson. Soon after meeting, however, the Senate decided to postpone the vote.
Over in the House, many members had already made their way home, only to be summoned back to Washington at the urging of the Democratic leadership.
One disgruntled member wasn't shy about voicing his anger over having to meet on the day before Christmas. Otto E. Passings, Democrat of Louisiana, a harsh critic of foreign aid, told the New York Times, "Maybe I should come in here on Christmas Eve in my Santa Claus suit and offer a bill distributing all this money to all those countries.''
In addition to voting on a foreign aid bill and authorizing wheat to the Soviet Union, the House of Representatives on Christmas Eve (1963) swore in newly elected Congressman J.J. (Jake) Pickle of Texas.
A major reason that Congress met so frequently on Christmas Eve in the 19th Century had little to do with the urgency of the legislation before their respective bodies, but was due instead to the time involved in their long journeys back home.
A Washington Post article from 1913 reports that before the frequency of passenger trains, members of Congress traveled to Washington by stagecoach, requiring months of bumpy travel. Since going back and forth to the Capitol required so much effort, Congress would frequently wait until the day after Christmas before recessing and traveling home. This often became the practice for New Year as well. Only when passenger trains become popular did it become customary for Congress to recess in enough time to travel back home for Christmas.
When stuck in Washington in 1963, the White House reportedly held a spur-of-the-moment Christmas party for members of Congress to help lift their spirits. No word, yet, if the Obama administration will hold any such party for members of the Senate at the end of the week.
But given the historic magnitude of this legislation, Christmas parties or even missing Christmas back home will be far from the minds of members of the Senate.
Even if the Senate bill passes on Christmas Eve, work still needs to be done; including reconciling it with the House bill, which passed last month 220-215, and includes a public option.
But having come this far in realizing the hope of insuring 31 million Americans over a 10-year period, expanding Medicare, prohibiting insurers from denying children coverage due to pre-existing conditions, and creating two (at least two) national health insurance plans modeled after the plan offered to federal workers, this bill in all likelihood will become a reality, giving Obama the conquest he practically bet his whole presidency on: to be the first president to successfully shepherd through a national health care plan, a dream never realized by his liberal predecessors: FDR, Harry Truman, and Lyndon Johnson.
Neither sleet, nor snow, nor punishing winds, nor blinding white blizzard conditions could stop members of the Senate from slogging to the Capitol on an early Saturday morning to take care of crucial business.
In some skillful 11th hour rewording, which restricts insurance coverage for abortions even further, the Senate's health care bill has won the support of Sen. Ben Nelson of Nebraska, the one remaining holdout that gave Democrats' the 60 votes needed to end debate and bring the bill to a full vote on Christmas Eve. A procedural vote will take place on Monday before Thursday's vote.
Yes, you heard right; Congress will be spending Christmas Eve in the nation's Capitol, not in their home states sipping egg nog and listening to Bing Crosby while putting the final decorations on their Christmas trees.
So has the Senate ever been in session on Christmas Eve before? Yes.
Is it rare? Yes.
Actually, it didn't use to be so rare. According to U.S. Senate Historical Office, prior to 1850, the Senate would regularly meet on December 24th and reconvene on December 26th, the day after Christmas.
Records show the Senate met on December 24th seven times before the 20th century: 1855, 1860, 1861, 1883, 1884, 1890, and 1895. The reason for the sessions was nothing more than tending to miscellaneous matters and other executive business measures.
In 1963, the last time the Senate met on Christmas Eve, it was for the purpose of authorizing $3.6 billion of military and economic aid at the request of President Lyndon Johnson. Soon after meeting, however, the Senate decided to postpone the vote.
Over in the House, many members had already made their way home, only to be summoned back to Washington at the urging of the Democratic leadership.
One disgruntled member wasn't shy about voicing his anger over having to meet on the day before Christmas. Otto E. Passings, Democrat of Louisiana, a harsh critic of foreign aid, told the New York Times, "Maybe I should come in here on Christmas Eve in my Santa Claus suit and offer a bill distributing all this money to all those countries.''
In addition to voting on a foreign aid bill and authorizing wheat to the Soviet Union, the House of Representatives on Christmas Eve (1963) swore in newly elected Congressman J.J. (Jake) Pickle of Texas.
A major reason that Congress met so frequently on Christmas Eve in the 19th Century had little to do with the urgency of the legislation before their respective bodies, but was due instead to the time involved in their long journeys back home.
A Washington Post article from 1913 reports that before the frequency of passenger trains, members of Congress traveled to Washington by stagecoach, requiring months of bumpy travel. Since going back and forth to the Capitol required so much effort, Congress would frequently wait until the day after Christmas before recessing and traveling home. This often became the practice for New Year as well. Only when passenger trains become popular did it become customary for Congress to recess in enough time to travel back home for Christmas.
When stuck in Washington in 1963, the White House reportedly held a spur-of-the-moment Christmas party for members of Congress to help lift their spirits. No word, yet, if the Obama administration will hold any such party for members of the Senate at the end of the week.
But given the historic magnitude of this legislation, Christmas parties or even missing Christmas back home will be far from the minds of members of the Senate.
Even if the Senate bill passes on Christmas Eve, work still needs to be done; including reconciling it with the House bill, which passed last month 220-215, and includes a public option.
But having come this far in realizing the hope of insuring 31 million Americans over a 10-year period, expanding Medicare, prohibiting insurers from denying children coverage due to pre-existing conditions, and creating two (at least two) national health insurance plans modeled after the plan offered to federal workers, this bill in all likelihood will become a reality, giving Obama the conquest he practically bet his whole presidency on: to be the first president to successfully shepherd through a national health care plan, a dream never realized by his liberal predecessors: FDR, Harry Truman, and Lyndon Johnson.
December 7, 2009
The Best and Brightest of the Obama Administration
Okay, the "Best and The Brightest" of President Obama's administration in 2009 is better and smarter than the "Best and The Brightest" of Lyndon Johnson's, and if we believe the rhetoric, the American people would be foolish to compare LBJ's Vietnam conflict with Obama's war in Afghanistan.
President Obama described those who make a parallel between his escalation of the war in Afghanistan as engaging in a "false reading of history." In his address to the cadets at West Point, he said:
"There are those who suggest that Afghanistan is another Vietnam. They argue that it cannot be stabilized, and we are better off cutting our losses and rapidly withdrawing. Yet this argument depends upon a false reading of history. Unlike Vietnam, we are joined by a broad coalition of 43 nations that recognizes the legitimacy of our action. Unlike Vietnam, we are not facing a broad-based popular insurgency. And most importantly, unlike Vietnam, the American people were viciously attacked from Afghanistan, and remain a target for those same extremists who are plotting along its border. To abandon this area now -- and to rely only on efforts against al Qaeda from a distance -- would significantly hamper our ability to keep the pressure on al Qaeda, and create an unacceptable risk of additional attacks on our homeland and our allies."
Really? As I recall, the Diem government in Vietnam was as corrupt, although in different ways, as the Kharzi government is in Afghanistan. The style of corruption may differ, but the overall effect is the same. And even if there currently is not a "broad-based popular insurgency" opposing us (an arguable point) it is more likely than not that the increased presence of American troops will foster such an insurgency.
Moreover, we must consider the wise analysis of Professor Hugh Gusterson of George Mason University, who writes in "Afghanistan: Vietnam All Over Again":
"The weight of U.S. force won't crush the insurgency but displace it -- just as all of those U.S. resources devoted to eradicating cocaine trafficking in Latin America have only succeeded in displacing cocaine cultivation and production from one province or country to another. Second, the more U.S. troops there are in Afghanistan, the more provocative incidents and resentment there will be, and this will help the Taliban to recruit. More U.S. troops equals more Taliban recruits. And that equation leads to this escalatory arithmetic: More Taliban looking for people to shoot plus more U.S. troops to be shot at equals more body bags at Dover Air Force Base. This won't look like victory to the U.S. people."
The West Point audience was made up of gung-ho military careerists. I do say this pejoratively. The Vietnam War, though, was sustained by a draft. Do the Joint Chiefs of Staff and General Stanley McChrystal believe an all volunteer military can support the intermediate and long term needs of a U.S. troop presence in Afghanistan? How much military troop participation can we expect from our "allies"? It is unlikely that Americans can expect European and Asian allies to assume a greater proportion of troops on the ground. Just the contrary. An article in Slate.com by Fred Kaplan noted "the American share of allied troops in Afghanistan is rising to 70% from under 50% at the time George Bush left office."
Frank Rich raised a similar question in his recent column in this past Sunday's New York Times.
"If the enemy in Afghanistan today threatens the American homeland as the Vietcong never did, we should be all in, according to Obama's logic. So why aren't we? The answer is not merely that Afghans don't want us as occupiers. It's that such a mission would require a commensurate national sacrifice. One big difference between the war in Vietnam and the war in Afghanistan that president conspicuously left unmentioned on Tuesday is the draft. Given that conscription is not about to be revived, we have to spend lots of money, lots more money, to recruit the troops needed for the full effort Obama's own argument calls for."
Lyndon Johnson thought that he too could have both "guns and butter." He instituted Medicare, the "War on Poverty" and several other social/economic programs. But he couldn't win his war. Obama similarly believes he can also have his guns and butter in the form of major health care reform, the creation of jobs, stemming of foreclosures, revamping the banking system, saving the automobile industry, implementing programs to arrest global warming, restructuring and funding our national education system, fighting HIV and the HIV/AIDs virus, refurbishing our domestic infrastructure, developing new sources of energy and annually paying the interest on our nation debt to China and other creditors. If history is any indication, at best this is an either/or proposition for our current leader.
In a few days President Obama will travel to Oslo, Norway to accept the Nobel Prize that was bestowed upon him earlier this year. One cannot help but feel, on the heels of this new Afghanistan stance, that he'll be coming into town for his peace prize with guns blazing.
When he commenced his campaign on the steps of the capital in Springfield, Illinois, Obama said he was running to be elected President of the United States because of the "fierce urgency of now." He quoted the words of Martin Luther King, Jr., another Nobel Peace Prize winner. Dr. King used the words in the 6th paragraph of his 1963 "I Have A Dream" speech and in the last part of his speech on April 4th, 1967, "Time To Break The Silence," publicly opposing the continuation of the war in Vietnam.
However, in both instances Dr. King spoke those words to call our nation to moral imperatives. In '63, to end racial segregation: "We have come to this hallowed spot to remind America of the fierce urgency of now . This is no time to engage in the luxury of cooling off or take the tranquilizing drug of gradualism. Now is the time to make real the promises of democracy..." In '67 to a halt in the war in Vietnam, he said, "We are now faced with the fact that tomorrow is today. We are confronted with the fierce urgency of now. In this unfolding conundrum of life and history there is such a thing as being too late. Procrastination is still the thief of time ... We have a choice today; non-violent coexistence or violent co-annihilation."
What an irony of history. Obama travels and speaks to accept a Nobel Peace Prize after initiating an escalation of military force in Afghanistan, even though one of the reasons cited by the Nobel Committee for awarding the prize was his new kind of world leadership as President of the United States.
Ultimately, Obama and his advisors must ask themselves, how does he want history to judge and define his legacy? As the first bi-racial African-American elected President of the United States? Or as another American president whose one-term administration was defined by an unpopular, unwinnable war that squandered resources needed to solve critical domestic issues such as joblessness, education, and a crippled economy.
President Obama described those who make a parallel between his escalation of the war in Afghanistan as engaging in a "false reading of history." In his address to the cadets at West Point, he said:
"There are those who suggest that Afghanistan is another Vietnam. They argue that it cannot be stabilized, and we are better off cutting our losses and rapidly withdrawing. Yet this argument depends upon a false reading of history. Unlike Vietnam, we are joined by a broad coalition of 43 nations that recognizes the legitimacy of our action. Unlike Vietnam, we are not facing a broad-based popular insurgency. And most importantly, unlike Vietnam, the American people were viciously attacked from Afghanistan, and remain a target for those same extremists who are plotting along its border. To abandon this area now -- and to rely only on efforts against al Qaeda from a distance -- would significantly hamper our ability to keep the pressure on al Qaeda, and create an unacceptable risk of additional attacks on our homeland and our allies."
Really? As I recall, the Diem government in Vietnam was as corrupt, although in different ways, as the Kharzi government is in Afghanistan. The style of corruption may differ, but the overall effect is the same. And even if there currently is not a "broad-based popular insurgency" opposing us (an arguable point) it is more likely than not that the increased presence of American troops will foster such an insurgency.
Moreover, we must consider the wise analysis of Professor Hugh Gusterson of George Mason University, who writes in "Afghanistan: Vietnam All Over Again":
"The weight of U.S. force won't crush the insurgency but displace it -- just as all of those U.S. resources devoted to eradicating cocaine trafficking in Latin America have only succeeded in displacing cocaine cultivation and production from one province or country to another. Second, the more U.S. troops there are in Afghanistan, the more provocative incidents and resentment there will be, and this will help the Taliban to recruit. More U.S. troops equals more Taliban recruits. And that equation leads to this escalatory arithmetic: More Taliban looking for people to shoot plus more U.S. troops to be shot at equals more body bags at Dover Air Force Base. This won't look like victory to the U.S. people."
The West Point audience was made up of gung-ho military careerists. I do say this pejoratively. The Vietnam War, though, was sustained by a draft. Do the Joint Chiefs of Staff and General Stanley McChrystal believe an all volunteer military can support the intermediate and long term needs of a U.S. troop presence in Afghanistan? How much military troop participation can we expect from our "allies"? It is unlikely that Americans can expect European and Asian allies to assume a greater proportion of troops on the ground. Just the contrary. An article in Slate.com by Fred Kaplan noted "the American share of allied troops in Afghanistan is rising to 70% from under 50% at the time George Bush left office."
Frank Rich raised a similar question in his recent column in this past Sunday's New York Times.
"If the enemy in Afghanistan today threatens the American homeland as the Vietcong never did, we should be all in, according to Obama's logic. So why aren't we? The answer is not merely that Afghans don't want us as occupiers. It's that such a mission would require a commensurate national sacrifice. One big difference between the war in Vietnam and the war in Afghanistan that president conspicuously left unmentioned on Tuesday is the draft. Given that conscription is not about to be revived, we have to spend lots of money, lots more money, to recruit the troops needed for the full effort Obama's own argument calls for."
Lyndon Johnson thought that he too could have both "guns and butter." He instituted Medicare, the "War on Poverty" and several other social/economic programs. But he couldn't win his war. Obama similarly believes he can also have his guns and butter in the form of major health care reform, the creation of jobs, stemming of foreclosures, revamping the banking system, saving the automobile industry, implementing programs to arrest global warming, restructuring and funding our national education system, fighting HIV and the HIV/AIDs virus, refurbishing our domestic infrastructure, developing new sources of energy and annually paying the interest on our nation debt to China and other creditors. If history is any indication, at best this is an either/or proposition for our current leader.
In a few days President Obama will travel to Oslo, Norway to accept the Nobel Prize that was bestowed upon him earlier this year. One cannot help but feel, on the heels of this new Afghanistan stance, that he'll be coming into town for his peace prize with guns blazing.
When he commenced his campaign on the steps of the capital in Springfield, Illinois, Obama said he was running to be elected President of the United States because of the "fierce urgency of now." He quoted the words of Martin Luther King, Jr., another Nobel Peace Prize winner. Dr. King used the words in the 6th paragraph of his 1963 "I Have A Dream" speech and in the last part of his speech on April 4th, 1967, "Time To Break The Silence," publicly opposing the continuation of the war in Vietnam.
However, in both instances Dr. King spoke those words to call our nation to moral imperatives. In '63, to end racial segregation: "We have come to this hallowed spot to remind America of the fierce urgency of now . This is no time to engage in the luxury of cooling off or take the tranquilizing drug of gradualism. Now is the time to make real the promises of democracy..." In '67 to a halt in the war in Vietnam, he said, "We are now faced with the fact that tomorrow is today. We are confronted with the fierce urgency of now. In this unfolding conundrum of life and history there is such a thing as being too late. Procrastination is still the thief of time ... We have a choice today; non-violent coexistence or violent co-annihilation."
What an irony of history. Obama travels and speaks to accept a Nobel Peace Prize after initiating an escalation of military force in Afghanistan, even though one of the reasons cited by the Nobel Committee for awarding the prize was his new kind of world leadership as President of the United States.
Ultimately, Obama and his advisors must ask themselves, how does he want history to judge and define his legacy? As the first bi-racial African-American elected President of the United States? Or as another American president whose one-term administration was defined by an unpopular, unwinnable war that squandered resources needed to solve critical domestic issues such as joblessness, education, and a crippled economy.
Health Care Reform: The End Is Nigh
Lost progressive causes don't die -- they just fade away with barely a sigh marking their expiration. Health care reform has been terminally ill ever since Barack Obama exhausted his shallow pool of conviction about a serious recasting of America's patchwork of arrangements that we generously call a 'system.' Discriminatory, unethical and ruinously expensive, its very existence has been an affront to those with a capacity for moral outrage or a sense of social responsibility. Lacking either one or the other in sufficient quantity, Obama early on abandoned his pledges to his voters. Instead, he substituted a calculated strategy of devolving the job of doing something (or anything) onto the very people in government and outside it who had a stake in protecting the status quo. Floating above the fray, Obama contented himself with vague platitudes that left friend and foe alike persuaded that his sole concern was to have a signing ceremony. To this day, he has not pronounced exactly what he wants.
Symptoms of the invalid's painful and debilitating decline have punctuated the path to its demise. It hasn't been a pretty picture. Empowerment of the Gang of Six from Nowheresville, America; the coronation of Queen Olympia; the mindless relegation of the public option to a "sliver" in the master builder's not so grand design; the open-White House welcome to 545 visits by health industry lobbyists counter-posed to one belated invitation to progressive Democrats from the House; the underhanded maneuverings by Rahm Emmanuel that Obama never dared either endorse or disown in public; the wanderlust that never quite left time to make the powerful ethical case for meaningful reform; the readiness to slash home care for the disabled elderly so as to trim a few bucks from the bill; the shameless placing of the burden to marshal Senate Democrats on the slight shoulders of Harry Reid. If Lyndon Johnson had been as diffident and lackadaisical in dealing with civil rights legislation, the Obama family might still be sitting in the back of the bus whenever they ventured south of the Mason-Dixon line.
So now health care reform lies prostrate -- a shadow of its once promising self. Its distorted features compose the face of its near antithesis. Big Pharma, the semi-monopolistic insurance giants, and the privileged providers still rule the roost. Under the table deals instead of transparent regulation and true competition. Mandates without options that will swell the income of the vested interests. A permission slip to compensate for an end to the pre-existing condition scandal by charging heavy premiums on policies written for those who most need health care. Yes, there are very small subsidies for the working very poor -- to be paid for not by levies on the rich but by imposing 40% excise taxes on many policies of the middle class. A woman earning $48,000 may find herself tapped for a couple of thousand in taxes because she is fortunate enough to have an employer who provides genuine health insurance rather than the barebones version that leaves patients to the mercies of profit driven HMOs.
This hodge-podge of disconnected measures will do nothing to reduce the health industry's drain on the country's finances. Currently at 16% of GDP, it can only go up. That is the simple arithmetic of adding the 50 million uninsured to the ranks of the insured -- and care seeking. The only prospective cost-cutting changes are those that will implicitly ration care for those who buy their own insurance or will receive lower Medicare benefits (by roughly $450 billion) once the Finance Committee's plan to empower a benefit/price setting oversight board kicks in. All the rest goes on as before: the legions of pointless paper pushers, the profiteers, the overwhelmed government agencies barely able to keep track of whom they are paying what. Budget neutral? Unlikely. National cost neutral? Impossible. Taxing middle income earners to cover the costs of doing a bit for the poor? For sure. A perfect Republican formula.
The skewed costs and benefits help to explain why most provisions won't take hold until 2113, 2117 or 2119. A decade. That's how long it took Alexander to conquer all the known world, and then lose back a large chunk of it. By then, our two term former president will be into the second year of a 30 year comfortable retirement doing what alumni of the White House do: shuttling among snazzy golf clubs; presiding over his Obama Foundation for Responsible Change; raking in big bucks for uplifting speeches; and being toasted all across the non-Muslim world. Meeting the health needs of Americans without bankrupting the economy will be left awaiting the next Saviour somewhere over the horizon.
Who cares? Who dares care?
Symptoms of the invalid's painful and debilitating decline have punctuated the path to its demise. It hasn't been a pretty picture. Empowerment of the Gang of Six from Nowheresville, America; the coronation of Queen Olympia; the mindless relegation of the public option to a "sliver" in the master builder's not so grand design; the open-White House welcome to 545 visits by health industry lobbyists counter-posed to one belated invitation to progressive Democrats from the House; the underhanded maneuverings by Rahm Emmanuel that Obama never dared either endorse or disown in public; the wanderlust that never quite left time to make the powerful ethical case for meaningful reform; the readiness to slash home care for the disabled elderly so as to trim a few bucks from the bill; the shameless placing of the burden to marshal Senate Democrats on the slight shoulders of Harry Reid. If Lyndon Johnson had been as diffident and lackadaisical in dealing with civil rights legislation, the Obama family might still be sitting in the back of the bus whenever they ventured south of the Mason-Dixon line.
So now health care reform lies prostrate -- a shadow of its once promising self. Its distorted features compose the face of its near antithesis. Big Pharma, the semi-monopolistic insurance giants, and the privileged providers still rule the roost. Under the table deals instead of transparent regulation and true competition. Mandates without options that will swell the income of the vested interests. A permission slip to compensate for an end to the pre-existing condition scandal by charging heavy premiums on policies written for those who most need health care. Yes, there are very small subsidies for the working very poor -- to be paid for not by levies on the rich but by imposing 40% excise taxes on many policies of the middle class. A woman earning $48,000 may find herself tapped for a couple of thousand in taxes because she is fortunate enough to have an employer who provides genuine health insurance rather than the barebones version that leaves patients to the mercies of profit driven HMOs.
This hodge-podge of disconnected measures will do nothing to reduce the health industry's drain on the country's finances. Currently at 16% of GDP, it can only go up. That is the simple arithmetic of adding the 50 million uninsured to the ranks of the insured -- and care seeking. The only prospective cost-cutting changes are those that will implicitly ration care for those who buy their own insurance or will receive lower Medicare benefits (by roughly $450 billion) once the Finance Committee's plan to empower a benefit/price setting oversight board kicks in. All the rest goes on as before: the legions of pointless paper pushers, the profiteers, the overwhelmed government agencies barely able to keep track of whom they are paying what. Budget neutral? Unlikely. National cost neutral? Impossible. Taxing middle income earners to cover the costs of doing a bit for the poor? For sure. A perfect Republican formula.
The skewed costs and benefits help to explain why most provisions won't take hold until 2113, 2117 or 2119. A decade. That's how long it took Alexander to conquer all the known world, and then lose back a large chunk of it. By then, our two term former president will be into the second year of a 30 year comfortable retirement doing what alumni of the White House do: shuttling among snazzy golf clubs; presiding over his Obama Foundation for Responsible Change; raking in big bucks for uplifting speeches; and being toasted all across the non-Muslim world. Meeting the health needs of Americans without bankrupting the economy will be left awaiting the next Saviour somewhere over the horizon.
Who cares? Who dares care?