Public Option Dead: Lieberman to Filibuster

[TeePee4Prez]

Him and Arlen Specter.  Doing whatever's convenient.  Screw them both.  And no I'm not against Jewish Senators in fact Russ Feingold is arguably my favorite.

Arlen Specter has actually been a vocal supporter of the public option since Sestak announced his challenge. Sure, he's shameless, but at least he's shamelessly on the good side on this one.

Still shameless and I'm not gonna waive on Sestak as you can tell.  He was also a vocal Bush and Santorum supporter pre-2004 primary, but oh wait... he suddenly moderated to win over Philadelphia suburban voters.  Yeah... I'm done with him as were the GOP.

[Torie]

I love Joe.  Give them hell, Joe. You really are a free agent, because you probably won't be re-elected, so just do what you think is right, and F the politics. You are liberated man. Doesn't that feel great?

[© tweed]

lol

[Sbane]

I love Joe.  Give them hell, Joe. You really are a free agent, because you probably won't be re-elected, so just do what you think is right, and F the politics. You are liberated man. Doesn't that feel great?

I highly doubt he is doing this because he thinks it is right. Rather he is most likely what is known as an attention whore. But who knows I may be wrong. He could at least listen to the CBO report that this particular bill would be deficit neutral at worst.

[Queen Mum Inks.LWC]

Well not voting for cloture is essentially the same as filibustering, i.e. the bill won't come to a vote.

But he's not doing an old-fashioned "I'm going to talk out of the phonebook until I collapse" deal.

That's because those don't even exist anymore.  With the creation of the procedural filibuster, the phonebook method is obsolete and unnecessary (I think we should go back to it, but that' just me).

[Torie]

I love Joe.  Give them hell, Joe. You really are a free agent, because you probably won't be re-elected, so just do what you think is right, and F the politics. You are liberated man. Doesn't that feel great?

I highly doubt he is doing this because he thinks it is right. Rather he is most likely what is known as an attention whore. But who knows I may be wrong. He could at least listen to the CBO report that this particular bill would be deficit neutral at worst.

Sbane, do you really think the books will be balanced by slashing medicare spending by a third?  The whole thing is smoke and mirrors. The dirty little secret is that we are slowly working hopefully to spending more money on health care for younger folks and less for the "olds." And we need to make a policy choice as to whether we want  to spend much more on serious drug research, which will largely stop the way we are going. That is a close issue. What do you think? The better the drugs, so far, the more costly the medical treatment choices are.

[Sbane]

I love Joe.  Give them hell, Joe. You really are a free agent, because you probably won't be re-elected, so just do what you think is right, and F the politics. You are liberated man. Doesn't that feel great?

I highly doubt he is doing this because he thinks it is right. Rather he is most likely what is known as an attention whore. But who knows I may be wrong. He could at least listen to the CBO report that this particular bill would be deficit neutral at worst.

Sbane, do you really think the books will be balanced by slashing medicare spending by a third?  The whole thing is smoke and mirrors. The dirty little secret is that we are slowly working hopefully to spending more money on health care for younger folks and less for the "olds." And we need to make a policy choice as to whether we want  to spend much more on serious drug research, which will largely stop the way we are going. That is a close issue. What do you think? The better the drugs, so far, the more costly the medical treatment choices are.

There is a lot of waste in our health system (private as well as government) due to excessive use of paper leading to a lot of redundant tests, procedures, medication etc being thrust upon the patient. And the threat of lawsuits is always in the back of the mind of doctors, rather than how to practice medicine in the most efficient manner possible. Anyways modernization of our healthcare bureaucracy has bipartisan support and will lead to lower costs, but the 1/3rd figure seems like bull. To really reduce costs, and costs need to be reduced if you compare our healthcare costs to our competitors, tough choices will need to be made. Who gets affected is the question. I hope more care is given to young folks, specifically children, but I don't think spending should be cut for "olds". It wouldn't be politically feasible and neither is it morally feasible in my opinion.

The over-funding of drug research by the United States needs to be stopped. We just can't afford it. The other developed nations need to stand up and share the burden. This may lead to less research for more "trivial" diseases such as restless leg syndrome, but research into Cancer, HIV, Diabetes and Heart Disease medication will continue.

[○∙◄☻¥tπ[╪AV┼cVê└]

I actually thought his position was fairly reasonable. The health care industry creates lots of jobs in his state, a public option COULD hurt said companies, therefore it's in his constituent's best interests to oppose the bill.

Now, his rhetoric isn't good, but many politicians say what will get covered by the media, not what they think. Besides, he's a lot better than generic Democrat x that would be in his seat otherwise.

What if Reid offers Connecticut a stream of pork barrel funding projects to make up for his estimate of the damage to the pharmaceutical industry?

Connecticut should get screwed for being so stupid.

[Landslide Lyndon]

I know it'a a little off topic, but...

Would you agree if PO was stripped from the bill and in exchange Snowe and the so-called conservative Democrats supported Ron Wyden's choice amendment and Schumer's attempt to stop the health insurance companies exemption from antitrust laws?

[Lunar]

To all those "Democrats" who supported Lieberman, you fail, shut up and go away forever.

I can only think of at most two Democrats on the entire board that can even remotely support Lieberman.  I wouldn't have voted for him in '06 but in '08, I supported him maintaining his chairmanship, but I think it's fair for the caucus to expect their chairmen to be with the caucus on procedural votes for non-controversial issues....even Baucus would refuse to be the one Democrat to switch sides on a threshold procedural vote on ideologically moderate lesgislation, and let's not pretend that Chafee could have held an important chairmanship in the GOP caucus if he was the lone member to kill a piece of legislation.  I presumed that Lieberman wasn't politically suicidal and simply wanted to maintain importance on security issues, but I was wrong and apparently he's started caring about reversing his past healthcare advocacies to maximize the spotlight on him.

I mean, all politicians are egotistical, but I expect them to generally be < Kanye West. 

[Mr. Morden]

I presumed that Lieberman wasn't politically suicidal and simply wanted to maintain importance on security issues, but I was wrong....

Again, for at least a year now, I've assumed that Lieberman has burned enough bridges that he's not going to run again in 2012.  If he's not going to run again, then why should he care about doing what's politically safe?

[Lunar]

I remember you saying that earlier in response to one of my other posts [I have yet to respond to that one, for what it's worth].

I don't think it was presumptuous to think that Lieberman still intended to have a political career after the 2008 election by how much he sucked up to the Democratic leadership to be able to maintain his chairmanship

[opebo]

I love Joe.  Give them hell, Joe. You really are a free agent, because you probably won't be re-elected, so just do what you think is right, and F the politics. You are liberated man. Doesn't that feel great?

You can't really say a man is 'liberated' or a 'free agent' just because he does exactly what his masters tell him to do, Torie.

[Franzl]

I love Joe.  Give them hell, Joe. You really are a free agent, because you probably won't be re-elected, so just do what you think is right, and F the politics. You are liberated man. Doesn't that feel great?

You can't really say a man is 'liberated' or a 'free agent' just because he does exactly what his masters tell him to do, Torie.

But why does it matter what his "masters" tell him to do if he doesn't plan on seeking re-election?

[Vepres]

Did a little research, Lieberman is corrupt

But at least he's on the right side of the issue, if for all the worst reasons

I know it'a a little off topic, but...

Would you agree if PO was stripped from the bill and in exchange Snowe and the so-called conservative Democrats supported Ron Wyden's choice amendment and Schumer's attempt to stop the health insurance companies exemption from antitrust laws?

That would be a great bill in my opinion, particularly the latter idea. However, I still resent the individual mandate, but you can't get everything you want I guess.

[Landslide Lyndon]

Did a little research, Lieberman is corrupt

But at least he's on the right side of the issue, if for all the worst reasons

I know it'a a little off topic, but...

Would you agree if PO was stripped from the bill and in exchange Snowe and the so-called conservative Democrats supported Ron Wyden's choice amendment and Schumer's attempt to stop the health insurance companies exemption from antitrust laws?

That would be a great bill in my opinion, particularly the latter idea. However, I still resent the individual mandate, but you can't get everything you want I guess.

1)Make what you want of it, but Nate Silver, in the article quoted a couple of pages ago, says that Lieberman has actually taken much fewer campaign contributions from the insurance industry than most of his colleagues.

I said it at the beginning and most seem to agree. He is just hogging the spotlight and pissing the liberal wing of his party. That's what gets him off.

2)I have read a lot of progressives arguing that Wyden's amendment will actually do much more to lower costs than the PO. But curiously nobody in the blogosphere seems to care. They have focused like a laser beam on the PO and it's contours and they have ignored almost everything else.
Even Snowe hasn't articulated any position on that matter, or the elimination of the anti-trust exemption.

And BTW, Reid's bill actually doesn't contain an individual mandate. It has the so-called "free-rider" provision.  

P.S. The Public Option is so dead, than now Jon Kyl of all people says that he would support an opt-in provision.

http://thehill.com/homenews/senate/65103-kyl-prefers-opt-in-over-opt-out-

[they don't love you like i love you]

The funny thing is Connecticut actually is setting up its own public option that was passed last year (Governor Rell vetoed it, but the legislature overrode it.) Lieberman is just attention whoring as usual. Wake up ben.

[JSojourner]

“I’ve told Sen. Reid that if the bill stays as it is now I will vote against cloture,” he said.

“I can’t see a way in which I could vote for cloture on any bill that contained a creation of a government-operated-run insurance company,” Lieberman added. “It’s just asking for trouble – in the end, the taxpayers are going to pay and probably all people will have health insurance are going to see their premiums go up because there’s going to be cost shifting as there has been for Medicare and Medicaid.”

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1009/28788.html

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1009/28788.html

Oh Joe, it's hard when you're not the bride at a wedding or the corpse at the funeral, isn't it?

[Хahar 🤔]

I love Joe.  Give them hell, Joe. You really are a free agent, because you probably won't be re-elected, so just do what you think is right, and F the politics. You are liberated man. Doesn't that feel great?

You can't really say a man is 'liberated' or a 'free agent' just because he does exactly what his masters tell him to do, Torie.

But why does it matter what his "masters" tell him to do if he doesn't plan on seeking re-election?

Because he was elected?

[Kaine for Senate '18]

Wake up ben.

Like I said, if Lieberman is one of 41 who vote against cloture, then I donate to his opponent.  I don't really care about this (even though it is annoying), but I do care if he votes to prevent cloture.

[○∙◄☻¥tπ[╪AV┼cVê└]

To all those "Democrats" who supported Lieberman, you fail, shut up and go away forever.

I can only think of at most two Democrats on the entire board that can even remotely support Lieberman.  I wouldn't have voted for him in '06 but in '08, I supported him maintaining his chairmanship, but I think it's fair for the caucus to expect their chairmen to be with the caucus on procedural votes for non-controversial issues....even Baucus would refuse to be the one Democrat to switch sides on a threshold procedural vote on ideologically moderate lesgislation, and let's not pretend that Chafee could have held an important chairmanship in the GOP caucus if he was the lone member to kill a piece of legislation.  I presumed that Lieberman wasn't politically suicidal and simply wanted to maintain importance on security issues, but I was wrong and apparently he's started caring about reversing his past healthcare advocacies to maximize the spotlight on him.

I mean, all politicians are egotistical, but I expect them to generally be < Kanye West. 

There were something like 6 "Democratic" Senators who supported him after he lost the primary. Of course all the major players came out big for him in his primary, even people like Senator Boxer.

[© tweed]

anyone who expects anything more than 'a gazunteit after a sneeze' from the Democrats needs his head examined.

[Vepres]

Did a little research, Lieberman is corrupt

But at least he's on the right side of the issue, if for all the worst reasons

I know it'a a little off topic, but...

Would you agree if PO was stripped from the bill and in exchange Snowe and the so-called conservative Democrats supported Ron Wyden's choice amendment and Schumer's attempt to stop the health insurance companies exemption from antitrust laws?

That would be a great bill in my opinion, particularly the latter idea. However, I still resent the individual mandate, but you can't get everything you want I guess.

1)Make what you want of it, but Nate Silver, in the article quoted a couple of pages ago, says that Lieberman has actually taken much fewer campaign contributions from the insurance industry than most of his colleagues.

I said it at the beginning and most seem to agree. He is just hogging the spotlight and pissing the liberal wing of his party. That's what gets him off.

2)I have read a lot of progressives arguing that Wyden's amendment will actually do much more to lower costs than the PO. But curiously nobody in the blogosphere seems to care. They have focused like a laser beam on the PO and it's contours and they have ignored almost everything else.
Even Snowe hasn't articulated any position on that matter, or the elimination of the anti-trust exemption.

And BTW, Reid's bill actually doesn't contain an individual mandate. It has the so-called "free-rider" provision.  

P.S. The Public Option is so dead, than now Jon Kyl of all people says that he would support an opt-in provision.

http://thehill.com/homenews/senate/65103-kyl-prefers-opt-in-over-opt-out-

In any case, I'm happy he's on my side

[opebo]

I love Joe.  Give them hell, Joe. You really are a free agent, because you probably won't be re-elected, so just do what you think is right, and F the politics. You are liberated man. Doesn't that feel great?

You can't really say a man is 'liberated' or a 'free agent' just because he does exactly what his masters tell him to do, Torie.

But why does it matter what his "masters" tell him to do if he doesn't plan on seeking re-election?

Because he was elected?

We've no idea what he plans to do, but in any case I don't think the power of the medical mafia to control their tools is entirely contingent upon assisting them with re-election.

[Brittain33]

But why does it matter what his "masters" tell him to do if he doesn't plan on seeking re-election?

In this case, the "masters" would be health care lobbyists who would provide bountiful employment for him and his family after his electoral mandate has expired.