Well well, I hope he is right and this definitely sets the end game for HCR which is hardly a game at all. Obviously President Obama is all in on HCR. I admire his persistence and toughness which his critics always underestimate. If Congressional Democrats want to block HCR now they are the ones who lost the battle of Waterloo by letting their General down. I just cannot understate how important it is to get HCR started, which is what this is. If the first iteration does pass the Democrats will have something to build on just like they did with the first iteration of Social Security. Every year the budget comes around Democrats in the Senate can add to the bill with a simple majority. Now even if Democrats in the Senate are not near the magic “super majority” they can make changes to the legislation.
You can read the whole story at the link by clicking here.
White House spokesman Robert Gibbs stopped pulling punches when he was asked if health care reform legislation would pass the Congress and be signed by the president incoming days.
By next Sunday (March 21), Gibbs said on Fox News Sunday (March14), the new system outlined in the reform legislation “will be the law of the land.”
There may be a measure of bravado in that declaration, but it confirms that the debate about health care reform is finally getting real.
Sign a farewell care to Rush L
http://www.dccc.org/page/s/rushfarewell
KQuark I hope you enjoy this….
http://giv.to/OfLw#
Nate Silver did a phenomenally unique analysis of the latest Gallup poll on how people felt about the HCR bills in Congress those opposed 48% and those for 45%, but that was hardly the whole story. Gallup also asked people to describe why they felt the way they did and Nate’s story explains it much better but the top three words people used by who were against it were.
1) Government
2) Cost
3) People
For the pro the top three words people used were.
1) People
2) Insurance
3) Need
Nate has a tremendous graphic shows it much more clearly in his article.
http://www.fivethirtyeight.com/2010/03/two-pictures-tell-story-on-health-care.html
As you write, the president is “all in” on this. Midterm elections are now less than half a year away, and what happens with this legislation is going to seriously impact their outcome.
I doubt that Robert Gibbs would make a statement as powerful and as confident as this without the full backing of the WH and Congress. This is the most positive thing I’ve heard since the HCR “summit” when I realized that the President had had enough of compromise with the gathered Repubs there.
The people who will benefit is of course my number one consideration, the slap in the face and ultimate failure for the fear mongering campaign by the GOP and insurance companies since the summer recess last year, will be the icing on the cake. For their lack of concern for all who were not covered, I will be delighted to see the money they spent on ad campaigns, drain down the sewers. It will be better than the strongest pick-me-up tonic, it will be a pleasure to see these greedy buggers fail, flail and crash on their fat arses.
My number one consideration as well. That’s why I mocked myself for regurgitating the “end game” line. This is no game at all for tens of millions of Americans.
http://www.familiesusa.org/resources/newsroom/press-releases/2009-press-releases/one-of-three-uninsured.html
at any time during a given year, there are as many as 87 million people without access to affordable, legal health care.
87 million.
Nothing would please me more…
jvaz,
I would hope that Gibbs (which by the way reminds me of Mark Harmon and NCIS), yet not as sexually stimulating — lucky Pam Dawber — eh? Is better informed and more in touch with the truth and not the speculation. 🙂
I read that too. This is what the house majority whip actually said FYI.
I think the white house is trying to set a tone of inevitability. It puts more pressure on all Dems because if it doesn’t happen people will hold them accountable.
That’s how I interpreted it.
I expect a lot of bridges and culvert projects to get funding this week …
Yep. His comment meant that they were still making deals.
Organizing for America has been doing an outstanding job getting people mobilized on this. All last week, I got email messages urging me to call my Rep. — and they even told me who my Rep is (although I knew)–and provided her phone number. They did this EVERY day. From David Plouffe, I get text messages on my phone too, and all I have to do is press the phone number they provide and I am connected to my Rep. They give the gist of what to say as well.
Today, I spent the morning at a local Dem’s house on a phone bank, organized by O for A. They will be holding these again on March 18, throughout California and probably all 50 states. I am very impressed with this effort– it would take a lot of determination NOT to participate!
For anyone who thinks Obama is not putting his all into HCR, they must not be someone who was active during the Presidential campaign– those lists of volunteers have not gone to waste!
I have been getting them as well. I love the emails that just have a number in the subject. Then they put in huge font a number that represents the number of people that lose coverage each day or something like that. Those messages are very effective.
When they said they were retooling the message to go grass root again I was pretty cynical about it at first but they’ve done a great job.
I hope Gibbs is right. A HCR victory would slap the living hell out of the insurance lobbyists.
I never understood coming from the left that some people view this as a “corporate giveaway”. If it was such a big giveaway to private insurance they would not be trying to kill it so desperately. The president’s plan is not a “government takeover” or “corporate giveaway”. It truly is something in the middle with some very liberal things like subsidies for premiums to help middle class families, near universal coverage and a premium rate approval process and some things that are moderate like setting up market exchanges. The point is even viewed more correctly as insurance reform, it’s a big start.
KQ, it goes to show how much money the ins.cos. make by denying coverage and by recision. Yes, they will get more subscribers through the mandates–millions more. But I guess that’s not enough to offset what they will lose once they are forced to accept pre-existing conditions and to actually provide insurance to those who get sick once they already have a policy! That’s astounding–how much more they rake in through their unethical practices.
Also, this must mean they recognize that it’s only a matter of time before some form of expanded Medicare happens.
Exactly and people also forget part of the legislation is making insurance companies pay a certain percentage of premiums towards claims. It’s not like the premiums that young and/or healthy people will pay is pure profit. That money will go to pay for people like me with preexisting conditions who cannot possible pay for all our care ourselves. It’s called spreading the risk and is the only fundamental element of all universal healthcare systems around the world. The fact is how that coverage takes place is truly secondary. Like I said before most systems are hybrids where people buy private insurance and have some level of government coverage. Right now government actually pays more to providers than all insurance companies combined so we have a hybrid system already. When people say single payer only they fail to realize that even countries like France and Germany have large private insurance components.
I should say you know what I’m saying anyway but I just like to say it. 😉
Funny you brought up lobbyists.
Wow! 😀
Just a beginning, though. We can’t forget that.
Only one large domestic program ever contracted, welfare. Let’s face it “welfare reform” only happened because Americans had the false impression that more minorities were on the welfare rolls that whites. When it’s a benefit that affects most Americans it’s coverage always expanse like SS, Medicare and SCHIP. That is not to say what the government spends will expand on healthcare. In fact this bill will try to contract spending over time. In this case most of the expansion will likely be in the way insurance is distributed and more people will be covered.
I’m also surprised how little liberals mention how these bills will not only close the prescription “doughnut hole” but also effectively find a way to end Medicare Advantage, two Bush league mistakes.