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http://www.salon.com/pol...9/08/14/obama/index.html

I'm sorry, Flo, but that is a load of crap. If he were willing to be a one term president to get the stuff that needs to be done actually done, he wouldn't have lit a match to the Constitution instead of fixing it, and he would have put single payer on the table and ... well, I could go on and on. Three or four times now some Democratic Party official or other comes out and says the "public option" is not a hard and fast demand, and we freak every time, and they retract it every time, and the bullshit coming out of the Republican Party gets louder and uglier every time. They're just trying to wear us down until we are so sick of it we cease to care so much.

I think his term should be over right now... not even bother to replace him. Since the money bags are running everything, why bother having a figurehead who somehow can be at Town Halls and at National Parks at the same time, who keeps getting excused for how much he has on his plate, but never misses a chance to waste his time smooth talking instead of producing and keeps ample time for family, too, when anyone without ice water in their veins would barely be able to bring themselves to sleep before this stuff was handled.....

I thought Nader was doing, on DemocracyNow, on Aug.14, 2009 was what Nader does best: consumer
rights. The transcript is online if you prefer reading to video www.democracynow.org.

I object to use of "crazy" "crazies" and all variations on the word to refer to political extremists and/or political opponents. Although used for too many years (it even appears in the
Lincoln campaign as reported by Herbert David Donald in his 2003 "We Are Lincoln Men"), it further stereotypes the mentally ill/mentally disabled. The mentally disabled already catch enough grief in this society. There are better ways to "put down" your oppponent.

I have to agree with 99 on this one, Floridiot. Obama's talk about one-term, like so much that he says, is empty rhetoric.

The issue is not what Obama "says" but what "we" are going to do.

Check out "Nader was Right: Liberals are Going Nowhere with Obama" by Chris Hedges:

Our task is to build movements that can act as a counterweight to the corporate rape of America. We must opt out of the mainstream. We must articulate and stand behind a viable and uncompromising socialism, one that is firmly and unequivocally on the side of working men and women. We must give up the self-delusion that we can influence the power elite from the inside…. If we remain passive as we undergo the largest transference of wealth upward in American history, our open society will die.

My immediate purpose in writing this piece was to expose the betrayal. (In that regard, I would hope that you and other regulars at The Brad Blog would weigh in at Digg & Reddit so that this vital news spreads.)

But I was also serious when I wrote that I intend to pay greater attention to Nader.

The problem I've had with Nader has never been his substance. It pertains to tactics. If he were to join Progressive Democrats of America, helping to recapture a Democratic Party which has been co-opted by the corporatists --- seeking to replace sell-outs like Jane Harmon with true progressives like Marcy Winograd in 2010; if he then declared that he would run against Obama in the 2012 Democratic primaries, I think he could change the entire dynamic in which Nader's independent status enabled the corporatist "don't throw away your vote" strategy.

Most of us, myself included, were so distraught over the eight disastrous years of the Bush/Cheney regime, so desirous of change, any change, that we carelessly failed to adequately parse what I would readily concede was Obama's greatest strength --- brilliant, spell-binding oration.

But Obama has since proven that he is but kinder, gentler face for Empire and the corporate security state.

NYCartist: You and I will have to agree to disagree on the use of "crazies," even though I think you make a valid point.

When you consider the group think that emerged in the aftermath of 9/11, the ease with which fear was parlayed into the dehumanization of all things Arab and Muslim and a never-ending "global war on terror," when you consider the ease with which the Bush/Cheney regime drummed up support for the murderous imperial conquest of Iraq and an all out assault on civil liberties at home, the concept of collective insanity gains traction. When self-serving wing-nuts "leaders" can create pseudo-controversies like the "birther" movement; when they make up imaginary "death panels" and get so many people to not only buy into them but to carryout brown-shirt like disruptions --- well, NYC, I just think "that" is insane. Perhaps not in the technical, clinical sense, but insanity nevertheless.

Oh yeah, I think he'll be replaced alright...with Palin.
This country is soo messed up r from the corporatist having control of it forever.

IMO what O is doing is no different than what I used to do, except I was the quasi-dictator, taking over multi-million dollar electrical jobs from someone didn't know what he was doing, ran into the red and had to try and pull them out of the hole in a month or so.
You can't possibly blow the whole thing up and start over, you have to try everything to see if the person you were taking over for ideas worked first, if not try something different.

The mess he has I could give him four years and that still wouldn't be enough time after 30 years+ of bullshit. Whatever, it's pretty easy to sit back and criticize, I used to get that too from the workers that were already there when I'd show up.

If I were him I'd get the fuck out after four.

I think there's every possibility you are right about replacing him with Palin, Flo, but I just don't think it will make any actual difference except be more embarrassing for us to have that freak as our figurehead.

And, I bet when you were dictator, even if you didn't tear everything down and start over, you worked your butt off to make sure the broken stuff got fixed, NOT strengthened in its brokentude... didn't run off soaping the customers that the broken mess was really going to be fine now that you were there to double-talk them out of worrying anymore. I could get behind a dictator like you. Dictators would not be so awful if they actually had our benefit in mind while doing their dictatorial thing.

And it isn't just delivering on healthcare reform that all this craziness is distracting us from! We've now got evidence that Obama backed the Honduran coup. He's asked Congress to let the Pentagon post 400,000 troops on American soil. He doesn't want to prosecute war criminals and traitors from the last administration, even though it is his legal duty to make sure it happens. Letting big coal continue to blow off mountain tops. Appointing scads of dirty industry lobbyists to head government departments. All kinds of awful stuff.

Nope. He is blatantly not acting in good faith. He's just hiding behind that eloquent pie hole of his.

It does not at all look to me as though he is trying to improve things for anyone on earth but the same fat cats * and Fudd were so determinedly fattening. If there were one solid instance where I could unequivocally say he's done the right thing, I might be able to have a little ray of faith, but I can't find one, and I've been looking hard.

We would do well to keep listening to Dennis....

We would do well to start listening to John Pilger for a damn change....

Thanks 99 for two excellent links, especially John Pilger's "Obama is a Corporate Marketing Creation."

Powerful stuff!

Maybe if the representatives exposing themselves to the body politic had actually read or had some sort of clue as to what they were supposed to be standing for they would not have come under such heavy fire at all those unscripted town hall meetings.

Tunga is not highly educated nor has he ever been in the military but he does know one thing every American veteran should know: "it's a REPUBLIC stupid!"

Senator Patty Murray responded to a friend's inquiry on healthcare reform, and another friend made some brilliant point by point analyses which I am sharing here:

Sen. Patty Murray wrote:

Dear Ms. XXXXX, Ph.D.:
Thank you for writing me regarding the need for reform in our health care system. It is good to hear from you.

As you know, health care reform is one of the most critical issues currently facing our nation. Our current health care system is unstable and unsustainable.

XXXX's analysis of Murray's position.

Wrong. It is perfectly feasible and overwhelmingly likely, at this point, that the "current health care system" will continue. It is stable. Leaving medical care to private industry is the default condition in underdeveloped countries, and of humanity since antiquity--- those who can pay, get care; those who cannot pay, die. This is evil, but, it's stable.

By using the word "Unstable" in the healthcare debate, Murray builds subconscious affinity for the idea of stability, and subconscious aversion to the idea of "Instability". She would love to hear a million healthcare advocates, giving speeches, criticizing "Instability". This is how we lose the game, folks.

Too many Americans with insurance worry that they might lose health insurance due to rising costs, changing or losing jobs or even getting sick. Too many business owners want to cover their employees, but cannot because it is simply too expensive. And millions of Americans are uninsured and the cost of their care is passed on to those with coverage in the form of higher premiums.

Gee, thanks Patty Murray, for repeating the fears. By repeating them, you have our attention riveted on these issues.

Why didn't Patty Murray say, instead: "By adopting universal coverage, Americans will be freed from their fear of losing coverage"? Obviously, she does not support broadening coverage at all-- her real goals are obvious, and they coincide with the Insurance Lobby.

Health care reform efforts should strive to ensure that affordable, high-quality, and meaningful health coverage options are available to all Americans. I believe it should be a top priority to ensure Americans have access to coverage that allows them to see a doctor when they need to. People should not be forced to receive their coverage in hospital emergency rooms.

Obviously Patty wants more customers for the health insurance industry.

Emergency rooms? The medical industry wants to be released from the requirement to give life-saving care at emergency rooms, regardless whether the sick and dying can pay.

After months of hearings and over 50 hours of public markups, I was pleased that on July 15th, the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) Committee passed the Affordable Health Choices Act. The Affordable Health Choices Act lays out policy changes for health care reform in America. This package works to rein in health care costs with a goal of lowering them in the long term and ensure that all Americans have access to high quality, affordable health care coverage. It allows those who like their health insurance to keep it and provides options to those who do not have access to health insurance coverage.

Of course. It protects the high income, political donor class from any reduction in their access to medical services. Isn't that the whole point? It protects them from having to pay for healthcare to the people who don't have money, because they stole all the money from them fair and square. Most of all it prevents the poor from getting access to the good equipment, the good doctors, the private hospital rooms. Because there are not enough to go around.

The rich are playing for keeps. They're not going to concede any territory without a holy war.

This bill includes provisions to implement several key health insurance reforms. For example, insurance companies would no longer be able to refuse coverage to individuals due to preexisting conditions, patients' out-of-pocket expenses would be limited and all annual and lifetime caps on insurance coverage would be eliminated.

Translation--- ALL the insurance companies will be forced to obey some new conditions-- this is a cartel-protecting measure, resulting from regulatory capture, that threatens none of them, so they're happy. Meanwhile, healthy people won't be able to get cheap health insurance anymore, from carriers who specialize in healthy people.. we will all have to pay our share of the new welfare measures for the chronically ill, etc. Get it? It's a modest expansion of public welfare, but the administration is privatized out of the government to the health insurance industry. (Their overhead is 20%. The overhead of the medicare system is 3%)

I am absolutely disgusted and sickened by Patty Murray, and ready for a Republican senator. How would that be any worse? She is one of the most active senators supporting the military complex, Israel, weapons industries and bases, corporate globalization, trade agreements and the banking sector, How could a Republican be any worse?

As a senior member of the HELP Committee, I am particularly proud that this bill includes provisions that would increase the number of Americans going into health care professions. These programs will ensure our system has enough workers to provide much-needed medical care.

I hope all is well in Shoreline.

Any time, Ernie. Here's Pilger's whole speech. [32 Minutes]

Wow, the wing nuts are out. Funny but all I saw was Americans protesting something they feel strongly about.

As far as Obama betraying you goes all I can say is you get what you deserve, another LBJ. A piece of advice for you next time you get to vote; don't listen to what they say, READ what they have done over the past several years. If you "over educated" wonders had done that you wouldn't be crying now....

Actually upon reflection I think Obama is going to have a lot of Jimmy Carter in him as well. Good news for Jimmy, he now has a chance of loosing the handle of "worst president in the past 100 years"

Oh "me," oh my! Carter "the handle of 'worst president in the past 100 years"? Sorry, my right wing friend, but amongst those who would be far worse were Nixon, Ford, Reagan, and both Bushes, Jr. no doubt qualifying as the dumbest MF to ever occupy the WH.

I think we're entering into a whole new dimension in the goodness and badness of presidents thing. I'm stuck. If Obama is doing a better job of being as bad as Junior, does that make him better or worse?

And, whatever else you can say about Carter, he was probably the nicest, most decent human to ever hold the office of President of the United States. If it were not for that fiend Brzezinski, he might have ended up as the greatest president in our history.... Funny how we've got that fiend back now....

One measure, 99, is a difference in philosophy reflected by these quotes:

“The test of our progress is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much; it is whether we provide enough for those who have too little.”
--Franklin D. Roosevelt

“The greatest challenge we face is the growing gap between the rich and poor people on earth.”
--Jimmy Carter

“More than anything else, I want to see the United States remain a country where someone can get rich.”
--Ronald Reagan

Man, you said it! I hated Reagan from the moment he cut Medi-Cal benefits to the elderly as Governor of California. That filthy son of a bitch! I was a senior in high school and working as a nurse's aide at a convalescent hospital. Inside a week, ten of our patients were dead... all of them on Medi-Cal... all dependent on those funds to stay alive. Even if, personally, I would not want to be alive if the only way to stay that way was to be stuck in a hole like that, receiving "care" without which I would be dead, that demonstrated with precision how many real lives hang in the balance when these rat bastards go along their merry get-rich-quick, pay-less-taxes ways.

Income taxes are not legal. Income taxes are actually un-Constitutional, but not all taxing is bad, or wrong. We can goddam find ways to pay for a decent standard of living and care for EVERYBODY, "provide for the common welfare", as our hero Soul Rebel reminds us, without giving in to these immortally greedy fascist fucks!

As Nader says, we are not at the Bangladesh level in terms of passivity, but we are getting there. And that so totally is the wrong way to be trending. It's getting to the point where I'm fascinated by the right wing vertebral integrity, even as I hate the moronic tricks being used to rile them up this badly.

I can't say I agree with all the criticism of Obama over this.

Of course, getting a crap reform out of the whole malarkey is 'not a good thing'. But what on earth do the critics expect? Last time anyone even tried to achieve reform it was defeated, right?

Why pretend that all Obama need do is put some brilliant plan together? It doesn't work like that. The disappointment from those wanting more substantial reform has to be gauged against the absolute fury - and power - of those resisting it. What good is putting up a reform that will defeated? Even a very moderate reform, which the disappointed are excoriating Obama over, is raising hell amongst the opponents of reform. How in hell does anyone seriously expect serious and wide reaching reform to be approved by Senate and Congress - let alone the power-brokers and the American people themselves?

You have to recognise the stiff and very serious opposition to the least thing Obama attempts. Not crucify him because of the opposition's intransigence and power to prevent reform.

The least thing Obama tries is greeted with incredible opposition - how do you expect substantial reform? Yeah - sad - but.....why act as if Obama is selling people out? He can't click his fingers and transform the entire american political landscape, its system of entrenched power, the whole american culture.

Why not focus your fire where its more deserved rather than criticise Obama for betraying a socialism he never promised - something which if he had promised would never have seem him elected.

The main betrayal will be from Obama's supporters on the left, failing to support him achieving the possible - in lieu of their impossible dreams. People imagining America is crying out for socialism are dreaming. Don't mistake your own views as being those of the country at large?

Not crucify him because of the opposition's intransigence and power to prevent reform.

The opposition's intransigence and power is a lot of sound and fury signifying nothing but some duped and pissed off so-called conservatives who have been set to action and covered obsessively by the media precisely to HELP Obama get the political cover not to deliver on universal health care. We're getting a fascist-friendly mandatory coverage bill instead of a people-friendly healthcare system because the fat cats want it that way, and Obama wants to do whatever they pay him to do. That's dirt obvious by now. So quit crowing about the power of the opposition because you sound like a Democrat when you do that.

Besides, it's also dirt obvious that the public at large wants universal healthcare... as long as you look at the real stats and not the circus on tv.

We're not total dopes around here, you know.

...duped and pissed off so-called conservatives who have been set to action and covered obsessively by the media precisely to HELP Obama get the political cover not to deliver on universal health care.

What's your evidence that Obama is willingly and purposefully engaged in such a deception? Why imagine it thus - as opposed to him being merely realistic in what he can even expect to achieve?

The reforms are hardly radical, yet look at the opposition? I think you're dreaming to expect greater reform. Work for more, by all means....try to push Obama further left. Try to build some support for more radical reform? Build and reinforce a condensus - but what you seem to miss is that portraying Obama as wilfully engaged in betrayal does not achieve that - it does the opposite. Then you'll complain he isn't achieving anything - and you were right all along.

But how is he supposed to achieve anything with no support? Seriously - how?

You even admit yourself that 'the media are obsessively covering' the boot-boy opposition.

You think that comes out of nowhere? The boot-boys and the media...? You think the power nexus that reflects can just be magicked out of existence? It represents something real. Of course the boot-boys aren't reflective of the public at large - but they've been mobilised by who and what? And the media coverage is directed by who and what interests does it serve? That's genuine, deep seated, powerful opposition.

So, where's the betrayal if it's actually you helping swell their ranks?

We're getting a fascist-friendly mandatory coverage bill....

Yeah, sure.

But again - you implicitly recognise there are power groups whom have interests - and are already viciously opposed and mobilising all the opposition they can. They exist - they're real, right?

the fat cats want it that way, and Obama wants to do whatever they pay him to do.

How do you know? how do you know that isn't your warped view? How do you know it isn't Obama facing political reality? Politics is the art of the possible, isn't it? So.....you can dream.....but you have to build support, not parrot the same lines as the boot-boys you complain the media are obsessing over.

Just 9 months after Bush......and (an admittedly moderate) healthcare reform is betrayal? Of course, Bush had a much better healthcare reform on the table, right? It think you're dreaming.

And.....whilst opinion polls have consistently shown big majorities for healthcare reform....WHERE ARE THEY RIGHT NOW? What are they doing to give Obama support? Is there a huge groundswell of opinion and activism to support Obama, or to even demand a push leftwards? Is there? I don't sense it at all - I sense fear over costs, and the usual suspicion over "socialism". We're talking about Washington, not the Socialist Workers' Party.

They voted for him, Haystacks, they voted for him, and they voted in the majorities he'd need to get it done. Period.

And that is, in a real democratic republic, all that is needed. It's when fascists step in with their money, their "lobbyists" that there is a problem. Still, that is not excuse enough to do things like break the constitution and betray your constituents, but they make it do, and especially with the help of apologists like you, and the media they own and the clowns they can dupe.

The big majorities want single payer, walk in to whatever doctor you want and get the help you need. That's actual, and there's not a damn thing but plutocrats, and those they own, standing in the way.

I hope the Brown Shirts do start a revolution so we can kick their asses and get our country back.

So no evidence then? Thought not.

They voted for him, Haystacks, they voted for him, and they voted in the majorities he'd need to get it done. Period.

And that is, in a real democratic republic, all that is needed.

You want elected dictatorship only when it suits you? Nice....

The big majorities want single payer, walk in to whatever doctor you want and get the help you need. That's actual, and there's not a damn thing but plutocrats, and those they own, standing in the way.

Well, so you say. Quite how you know isn't clear.

But even if that is so - where is the support? How is it going to happen in the face of such rabid opposition when even supposed supporters of reform like yourself are crying "betrayal" and accusing him of doing 'whatever [the fat-cats] pay him to do'?

You suggest there are powerful forces at play - fat-cats and 'fascists' - but you don't seem to recognise they form formidable opposition to reform. They exist as all-powerful one moment - when you suggest Obama is their willing stooge - but they disappear off the political stage the moment you seek to suggest Obama is failing to deliver.

Do they exist or not? Are they an opposition or not? Yes - clearly they are an opposition - and a very powerful one. It's a political reality - but one you seemingly only recognise so long as you can portray Obama being in hoc to it.

Why is that?

What about recognising it as a power implacably opposed to Obama and healthcare refrom? What about recognising it as a power you effectively support when you suggest Obama's a willing actor in some deception designed to fleece american people and protect the status quo?

Do you really want to protect the status quo? Based on your (seemingly groundless) assumption that Obama works for "them"?

Seemingly because you fear you won't achieve everything you want you'll add to the opposition! Hmmm.

You don't even support income tax, so how you can crow about a failure to move towards a more socialised healthcare seems odd to say the least.

I hope the Brown Shirts do start a revolution so we can kick their asses and get our country back.

Wow - careful what you wish for......?

"Wing-Nut Mobs Provide Cover for Obama/Baucus Health Care Betrayal"

How about "Faux Obama Supporters Backstab and Betray Reform"?

Disappearing Fat Cats?
Someone needs to visit open secrets ;o)

http://www.opensecrets.o...Health+Issues&year=a

With such money, health care will never be universal in the USA.

In reality, there is little difference between the Republicans and Democrats, once the window dressing is removed.

Obamacare will cost this nation thousands of jobs. In my industry, medical sales, we have already lost over 20,000 medical device sales jobs.

Wed, Aug, 19th, 5 PM EST. Join in the call. Submit your question or request. Have your voice heard. Be positive. Want single payer? Let them know.--There may still be time to achieve real reform. Kindra

AN INVITATION TO ATTEND NATIONAL FAITH COMMUNITY CALL TO ACTION ABOUT NATIONAL HEALTH CARE REFORM

To listen in on the nationwide phone call, log on to www.faithforhealth.org at the time of the call. Or you may dial 347-996-5501 (no passcode, long-distance charges may apply). Because of the large volume of attendees expected, listening online is the preferred method. The event is expected to last about 40 minutes.

To submit a question for the speakers and to RSVP that you'll be on the call, go to: www.faithforhealth.org/join-the-call.
The National Faith Community “Call to Action” scheduled for this Wednesday evening (August 19th) at 5:00 PM EST is a national call-in and audio webcast on health care reform scheduled to include over thirty faith based organizations including the African Methodist Church, Catholics United, the Evangelical Lutheran Church, the Episcopal Church and the Unitarian Universalist Association. The goal of the call is to connect and energize the millions of people of faith across the country who are concerned about health care and who want to be part of the solution.

The event is expected to last about 40 minutes.

This is a critical time in our nation’s health care reform debate: we are witnessing cynical demagoguery that plays on fear in order to defend privilege. Good people can and do disagree on health care policy, but we must all join together to demand open, respectful debate.

Comment #13 by "me"

"Wow, the wing nuts are out. Funny but all I saw was Americans protesting something they feel strongly about."
_____________________________

I don't doubt for a minute the passion of many of the wing-nutters. Many no doubt actually believe the right-wing lies about such things as "death panels" or the government interfering with Medicare, just as many of these same wing-nutters bought into the "birther" nonsense.

(For those still uninformed, Medicare is a government run, single-payer health care system similar to what is provided in Canada, France etc. Medicare doctors are in private practice; the government is the only payer. This contrasts with the UK system in which the physicians and hospitals are government employees --- the same as our VA provides for veterans. The cost of health care in the UK, per patient, is 40% of the per patient cost in the U.S. France is ranked #1 in health care services. The U.S. ranks 37th.)

There are two types of wing-nuts invading the town halls --- the deceived and the deceivers. The deceivers are the ones organizing these pseudo-grass roots protests --- people with their fingers dipped deep inside the health care insurance money pots. Their only passion is to be found in their bank statements.

The rest are decidedly uninformed lemmings --- "useful idiots" as Lenin would say.

Kindra Muntz: I appreciate your call to get past "cynical demagoguery." However, I question whether the faith-based community provides the ideal forum. My own preference is the scientific community, such as Physicians for a National Health Program. (PNHP)

If you go to that link, you will find a wealth of objective information --- all of which demonstrates that the only "reform" is "single-payer" --- everything else is a scam designed to preserve our corrupt, dysfunctional and deadly multi-payer system.

If the National Faith Community really wants to "connect and energize millions of people of faith...concerned about health care and who want to be part of the solution," they would do well to contact the PNHP to see if it can furnish physician-speakers for its events. (They might also do well to include a session showing Michael Moore's Sicko!)

Novak croaks

Not gonna laugh, but sure as shit ain't gonna cry. A liar and a shill for thieves.

...but you don't seem to recognise they form formidable opposition to reform....

I recognize they are un-American, greedy, self-satisfied, war pigs with no regard for humanity or even the planet, the sort who always rise to this level of wealth and power because their avarice knows that no-scruples wins out over good faith most of the time. In fact, one can raise it to an art form. One can spin a complete lack of scruples to stupid people, emotionally involved people, blindly patriotic people, religious people and extremely vain people, and make unscrupulousness seem like the uppermost in probity... until it is too late to do anything about it. I mean, hell, just ask the guy paying you to come here and spread all these talking points in the classic "concern troll" mode if you have any doubts about the veracity of my assertion here.

I'm not falling for this crap about "formidable opposition" to cover for not producing what virtually everyone in the country wants. The triumph of the corporate imperative over the common welfare [your "formidable opposition"] is known as fascism, and this is how Americans feel about that.

Agent99: I mean, hell, just ask the guy paying you to come here and spread all these talking points in the classic "concern troll" mode if you have any doubts about the veracity of my assertion here.

You're a fool - and into conspiracy theory. Hmm.

From the article:

These provide the perfect cover. They permit the more gifted corporate Democrats, for example Barack Obama, to seduce the great masses of working stiffs who make up the American electorate with soaring, but ultimately deceptive, rhetoric; producing brief euphoria on the eve of the last election, followed by no real substantive change.

Like agent99, the author seems to assume that failure to implement a policy means purposeful betrayal. There seems no appreciation of even the possibility that failure can arise from opposition from well known, powerful, deep-seated interests. There's no debate those forces exist, the author asserts them - but there's an assumption if those forces aren't overcome such failure must be a purposeful betrayal.

It isn't a dictatorship, you know?

[quote]The problem I've had with Nader has never been his substance. It pertains to tactics. If he were to join Progressive Democrats of America, helping to recapture a Democratic Party which has been co-opted by the corporatists --- seeking to replace sell-outs like Jane Harmon with true progressives like Marcy Winograd in 2010; if he then declared that he would run against Obama in the 2012 Democratic primaries, I think he could change the entire dynamic in which Nader's independent status enabled the corporatist "don't throw away your vote" strategy.[/quote]

Ron Paul tried this for the fiscal conservatives and libertarians. He tried to change the repugnant party by working from within it.

Guess how much he was able to change the dynamic of the repugnant party? They tried to laugh him off the stage in the debates, the media gave him very little coverage, even though his remarks were dead on the most rational remarks out of any GOP candidate's mouth. Ultimately its hard to say that he had any effect on the party even though he had support in the millions, and raised almost 40 million dollars.

It isn't a dictatorship, you know?

When the executive can issue signing statements announcing what portions of a bill he will abide by and which he will not, that's a dictatorship. When the executive isn't impeached for high crimes and misdemeanors, that's a dictatorship. When the executive can prevent the lawful prosecution of war criminals, traitors and felons, that's a dictatorship. Wake up and smell the coffee.

When the executive can foist health insurance expansion off on the public as "healthcare reform", that too is dictatorship, even if it's as much the fault of the rubes as the executive.

You ignore that the president and the legislature have the mandate for single payer. You just keep ignoring that, trying to make this sound like some exercise in realpolitik. So many numbskulls have been conditioned to excuse stuff on that filthy basis. It doesn't make it excusable.

And it is not the pejorative conspiracy theorizing when the conspirators are doing it right out in the open, when even you can see and cite the conspiracy. I'm pretty sure that has to rise to the level of conspiracy fact, even in your world view.

[And, unlike the cursed 43, 44 isn't a dolt, knows perfectly well what he's doing, and so it is mild to characterize this as "betrayal".]

It is difficult, Giant Haystacks, to engage in meaningful dialogue with the willfully under-informed.

From the content of your posts, it is painfully obvious that you did not bother to watch Ralph Nader's powerful critique on Democracy Now. It is also clear that you did not follow Agent 99's link (comment #8) to John Pilger's "Obama is a Corporate Marketing Creation."

Nader's observations were more charitable than Pilger's:

RALPH NADER: What is emerging here is what was being planned by the Obama White House all along, which is they would...only demand legislation that was accepted by the big drug companies and the big health insurance companies.

You can see this emerging over the last few months. President Obama has met with the heads of the drug companies and the health insurance companies. Some executives have met with President Obama four to five times in the White House in the last few months. He has never met with the longtime leaders of the “Full Medicare for Everybody” movement..."

(Not much of a dialogue over health care when those representing a reform --- single-payer --- favored by 60% of the American electorate can't even get an audience with the President.)

The people who voted for Obama, and that was a decisive majority, were not looking for capitulation to the Bush agenda. They were certainly not seeking bi-partisanship at any price. To the contrary, people expected Obama's deeds to match his soaring campaign rhetoric. But what we've received, so far, is the very thing Obama pinned on McCain --- "more of the same."

Your "formidable opposition" argument ignores the true power of the Presidency as a bully pulpit.

Nader spelled out what Obama could have done if he truly desired to do what was right.

"The big mistake that the Obama administration made was they did not have continual public congressional hearings documenting the greed, the fraud, the $250 billion in billing fraud and abuse alone that the GAO years ago has documented. They didn’t document the $350 billion of waste, the overhead of Aetna and UnitedHealthcare and other health insurance companies with their massive executive salaries and bureaucracies. They did not document the deaths, the injuries, the sickness that hundreds of thousands of Americans go through every year because they can’t afford health care. And by not doing that, by playing this behind-the-scenes game with these executives from the big health-industrial complex, they were vulnerable to the split in their own party…."

Had Obama chosen to use the bully pulpit to advance what 60% of the American electorate already supported --- single-payer --- had he taken the opportunity to expose the true "opposition" to be but a few greedy insurance carrier CEOs & their Wall Street investors; had he painted the full and honest picture of the corrupt, dysfunctional and deadly multi-payer system as one that places profits over the health and very lives of our people, your "formidable opposition" would have disbursed, searching for a good place to hide.

The fundamental mistake so many have made is to assume that Obama actually desired what is best for the American people. If that were the case, he would have pressed for what he favored when he was an Illinois state senator --- single-payer, which, even now, Obama concedes is the only system that would provide full coverage for every American.

Recognizing that this would have shut the door to the massive corporate campaign contributions, which have become a vital component for coverage by a corporate-owned, mainstream media.

Candidates who do not play the corporate contribution game, amassing the millions to spend on 30-second, deceptive spot TV ads, like Kucinich, are marginalized by the corporate media. As part of a self-fulfilling prophesy the corporate media justifies non-coverage, claiming the candidate is "not viable." In truth, it is the failure of the corporate media to cover the substantive issues candidates like Kucinich represent that renders them not viable.

During the campaign, Obama chose to play it fast & loose with a vague "universal coverage" plan that could involve an undefined "public option" --- an option he was prepared to abandon from day one.

As I noted in the article, "the effort to satisfy both corporate greed and the health care needs of our people is a fool's errand." Such an effort, even if sincere, is destined to fail.

Pilger's astute analysis reveals that the effort was never sincere.

[ed note: Comment by previously banned commenter deleted. --99]

"As the corporate media misdirects focus on brown shirt-like disruptions at the town halls, the real "death panels" --- the corporate profiteers and their bought-and-paid-for politicians"

Everyone's learning! The corporate media's job is to speak for the few wealthiest, corporations, the military industrial complex, and politicians who back THEM and not US!

They set 'em up by filming the protesters (astroturf), and knock 'em down by subsequently running headlines "public option is dead because of the protesters we're filming".

The mainstream media is a well-constructed infomercial for the folks I mentioned above. It's THEIR infomercial.

"What we are seeing is a classic case of perception management by the corporate-owned, mainstream media. The same media, which inundates prime time news hours with wing-nut, town hall protests, failed to so much as mention that, in the span of one week, thirteen single-payer advocates were arrested for protesting their exclusion from the discussions of health care "reform" taking place in the Baucus-led Senate Finance Committee."

"By extensive coverage of wing-nuts, the corporate media skewed reality. The "opposition" to a "public option" comes from a tiny but very vocal minority."

WOW! You're good! I can't argue with you! That's a first!

"By extensive coverage of wing-nuts, the corporate media skewed reality. The "opposition" to a "public option" comes from a tiny but very vocal minority."

You forgot to add "on purpose". They skewed it on purpose. There, I got my critical comment in!

Comment 30: And you should hear the "liberal media" clips about how great Novak was, you know, like they did with Buckley. Rewriting history.

Then we'll see the FINAL stage of the MSM infomercial:

"DEMOCRATS CAVE IN"

http://www.google.com/#h...;aq=f&fp=1&cad=b

Instead of "the infomercial worked", thanks once again - Edward Bernays!

Start dusting off the "DEMOCRATS CAVE IN" skeleton headlines!

The funny thing is, a lot of those headlines I have in the google search, are the Democrats "caving in" to Bush. So, they "cave in" to everyone? Themselves, even when they have the majority?

The "CAVE IN" party!

Phil will like this video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3aoazoZPrlI

Google "democrats cave in"... "cave in" = Democrats are Republicans:

Democrats Cave in to Bush Economic "Stimulus" Package

Democrats' cave-in on Bush spying bill

Democrats cave in to big business as Card check provision dropped ...

The Democrats Cave to Bush

Democrats Cave on Health Care

Democrats cave in to Big Pharma

Democrats Cave on Surveillance Bill

Senate Democrats Cave - Agree To Give Bush More Power To Spy On ...

Senate Democrats Cave to Dick Cheney

Democrats Cave on CAFTA

Democrats cave to GOP on spying act

They better not use the word "CAVE IN" on health care: YOU CAN'T "CAVE IN" IF YOU HAVE THE MAJORITY! YOU ARE COMPLICIT!

These are real cut/pastes from google:

Democrats cave on Iraq

Democrats cave on Iran

Democrats Wiretap Bill: Cave-in

Democrats Cave on Offshore Drilling

Democrats' cave-in on warrantless wiretapping

Senate Democrats cave, endorse new spy powers

Democrats cave in on torture

Democrats cave to GOP on spying act

Democrats To Cave - Once Again - On FISA

Democrats cave and put kids in danger

Democrats Cave to Bush on Spying

Democrats cave in on abortion rights

Democrats cave in to funding Iraq war

Democrats Cave-In To Bush Veto Threat

Democrats Cave In to Rich Donors' Demands

Do they ever NOT "cave in"???????

[ed note: Stays banned no matter how many proxies he uses. --99]

NOTICE: THERE IS A MENTALLY DERANGED PERSON WHO HAS BEEN BANNED FROM THE BRAD BLOG FOR A LONG TIME, CONTINUING TO COME IN OFF A NUMBER OF PROXY SERVERS FROM ALL OVER THE WORLD AND USING A NUMBER OF DIFFERENT SCREEN NAMES. SO IF YOU SEE COMMENTS WHINING ABOUT "A FIRST-TIME POSTER" BEING BANNED FOR DISAGREEING WITH US, ETC. JUST DISAPPEARING, THAT IS WHY.

SORRY.

Since everything is so obviously connected to everything else in the political scheme of the United States, it seems to me that if our government is going to work for the general good, then, all reform depends on campaign finance reform. Because isn’t it true that all attempts at reform--on whatever front--come up against a moneyed wall, thrown up by the very wealthy, who employ members of our government as masons?
If I'm right, then all the efforts--the blood, sweat and tears and money--expended on health care, the environment, the economy, etc. represents a massive diffusion of energy, and therefore dissipates the force or impact of each individual attempt at reform. I wonder what it would look like if all this diffused energy was focused on the single issue of getting corporate money out of politics, accepting that it is the first order of business for any sort of meaningful positive change. Everyone has a dog in this fight. Maybe if we knocked down the wall blocking campaign finance reform, then we could get single-payer health care, less war, better media, schools, and we might even survive as a race for the foreseeable future. Wouldn’t this kind of single focus be the best strategy for making reform of every kind possible? Isn’t campaign finance reform a kind of pre-condition for all other reform?

Here's the rub: how and where can you get a collalition of reformers to come together and take this, the quinetessential issue on? Is it possible?

Actually, Dr. Bob, there can be no meaningful campaign finance reform without a fundamental change in media.

The problem is that 95% of what we see and hear is controlled by a handful of huge media conglomerates. Corporations are anti-democratic institutions. Noam Chomsky describes them as the functional equivalent to a totalitarian state.

Because knowledge is vital to meaningful democratic participation, it was a monumental mistake to permit these undemocratic institutions, who derive enormous sums from the existing institutionalized corruption, which we refer to as the "campaign contribution, to not only control access to candidates and information but to spread disinformation and propaganda.

I intend to make this a topic of a future post.

[ed note: Comment deleted. Banned commenter, using another name. --99]