Boehner's Dilemma

You just can't get there from here, Mr. Boehner.

You say the first thing you want to do in 2011 is have the Republican controlled House of Representatives cut $100 billion in spending from the federal budget. When asked for specific areas he plans to cut, he says he will start with the budget of Congress -- in other words, the legislative branch. So here's what you need to know. If he succeeded in cutting out the entire legislative branch, that is, fire all 535 members of Congress and their staffs, and all the people who work for them at the Library of Congress and turn off all the lights, he would barely save $4 billion. So, John, you have only $96 billion more to eliminate in order to fulfill your pledge. YOU CAN'T GET THERE FROM HERE, JOHN, SO PLEASE QUIT TRYING TO SELL THIS CLAPTRAP TO THE AMERICAN PEOPLE.

Until members of Congress tell you that are seriously ready to address the entitlement programs of Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid and that old sacred cow, Defense Spending, there will not be a serious attempt to get federal spending under control. He knows it, his Republican members know it, and now you know it. When are we going to stand up in Town Hall Meetings and tell these people we are NOT BUYING ANY MORE of their empty politically expedient promises?

And when are we going to tell them to quit trying to return us to the time of Washington and Jefferson, a time when we had the interests of only 4 million citizens to consider. Today we have nearly 309 million citizens, according to the latest Census, and their interests are diverse, their problems complex, and our nation's role on the international stage has changed.

Mr. Boehner, do you really want to help?

Get off the stage and take your little tea party with you.

Let some grown ups, willing to take the political heat take your place, do the hard work, make the difficult decisions and get our nation's house in order. That's what Thomas Jefferson and George Washington would want you to do.

Watching the Debate and Vote on Health Care

As I watched the debate last night preceding the historic vote on health care reform in the House of Representatives, I played a game: I substituted social security every time one of the Republicans said health care, thereby giving me a chance to step back in time to 1935 to catch a soundbite from the historic Social Security debate. I gained a new respect for those courageous legislative pioneers of 75 years ago who set the stage for Sunday night's vote.


And when the dust settles, the loud clamor against health care reform will fade into the background quickly. No one is going to succeed in challenging the constitutionality of the process. Are you kidding? Congress can pass any bill any way it wants to. It is one of the co-equal branches of government. But the Republicans would know that if they read the US Constitution. The Courts will have nothing to say about "the process" used. That is clearly the prerogative of the Congress as set forth in the Constitution. Nor will any other attempts to roll back the vote be anything but a waste of energy.


I regret the R's chose to roll the dice this way. I wish they had been willing to do as Repubs have done in the past: compromise on the issue so they could go home and tell their constituents they "won" something for them. Soon, it will be evident to all Americans, including the Repubs, that the minority party does not wish to advance the American cause; they just want to govern for the sake of perpetuating their position in power. So sad.


Watch for the growth in an Independent Party movement if the two major parties do not learn how to govern together. We are not far from such a victory and that may be the best thing for America. It will get us back on a track closer to what the Founding Fathers had in mind. They did not have the current "process" in mind, that is, where one party says "NO" and the other says, "I guess we got to do this without you." That's not representative democracy. In a true representative republic, the two sides are expected to work together for the good of all.

Why health care reform WILL become law this year

As the debate on health care reform approaches the day of final reckoning in the Congress, health insurance companies continue to increase their premiums -- even for federal employees -- in double digits. Last week, I heard from a federal employee whose agency announced proudly that it had been able to negotiate a lower rate with BCBS Carefirst of the National Capital Area. Now, instead of a 25 percent increase in premiums for 2010, federal employees under the plan would only pay an increase of 9.5 percent. Mind you, our nation's inflation rate has been less than 2 percent for the past year. Gall? No. Nerve? No. There is another name for it.


Health insurance companies have for the past 20 years imposed ever increasing premiums on a public that generally has paid little attention because they don't pay the premiums, "my agency (or my company) pays them." Of course, you and I know that is not true. Indeed we all pay. Because products and services for all other sectors of our economy must go up to feed the appetite of the health insurance industry....and sooner or later, those goods and services become non competitive with those produced by others, e.g., Mexicans, Chinese, Koreans, etc. And jobs go overseas to produce those things we need.


Meanwhile, back home, we just continue to complain about it all and keep on paying the higher and higher premiums which have nothing to do with the laws of supply and demand. They have everything to do with .....greed. Republicans who want to protect such a system are either ignorant of how the capitalist system works or are intentionally turning a blind eye to the problem. I choose to think they are ignorant rather than intentionally acquiescing to those who keep their campaign coffers full.


And so, to the health insurance companies, work with your government, get costs under control, because if you don't, to paraphrase the words of Arnold Schwarzenegger, "The government will be back." Would you like me to tell you what comes next IF the current version of health care reform doesn't pass? I didn't think so.


Thank you for your attention. You may now return to counting the deposits your health insurance company will make in the bank today.

A Perfect Health Care Reform Bill???

Congress will never achieve the perfect bill in seeking to enact true health care reform for the benefit of all Americans. But that will be OK.

Indeed, that will be just fine.

When the 1787 Constitutional Convention was in its last day, and still there remained deep divides among the delegates Benjamin Franklin penned these words and, too weak to actually deliver the speech, asked fellow Pennsylvanian James Wilson to deliver his words. Here are selected lines from his speech:

"Mr. President –

I confess that there are several parts of this constitution which I do not at present approve, but I am not sure I shall never approve them: For having lived long, I have experienced many instances of being obliged by better information, or fuller consideration, to change opinions even on important subjects, which I once thought right, but found to be otherwise. ..

It is therefore that the older I grow, the more apt I am to doubt my own judgment, and to pay more respect to the judgment of others. Most men indeed as well as most sects, think themselves in possession of all truth, and that wherever others differ from them it is so far error.

...I agree to this Constitution with all its faults, if they are such; because I think a general Government necessary for us…

…I doubt, too, whether any other Convention we can obtain, may be able to make a better Constitution. For when you assemble a number of men to have the advantage of their joint wisdom, you inevitably assemble with those men, all their prejudices, their passions, their errors of opinion, their local interests, and their selfish views. From such an assembly can a perfect production be expected?

…It, therefore, astonishes me, Sir, to find this system approaching so near to perfection as it does; and I think it will astonish our enemies, who are waiting with confidence to hear that our councils are confounded like those of the Builders of Babel; and that our States are on the point of separation, only to meet hereafter for the purpose of cutting one another's throats.

Thus I consent, Sir, to this Constitution because I expect no better, and because I am not sure, that it is not the best…"

It is my hope that at least one representative in Congress will rise this fall to repeat Mr. Franklin’s words for the benefit of all his colleagues…and that each will bear Mr. Franklin’s words in mind as he casts a vote in favor of health care reform.

Emotion...or Power

A friend asked me today if the current health care debate was the most emotional issue since the civil rights debate of the 1960s.

I told him this debate has nothing to do with emotion; it has everything to do with power. For the people, it is an emotional issue. For the country's elected leaders, it is ONLY about power.

For the Republicans, it is about their very existence. If they lose their all out battle to defeat ANY health care reform, they believe viscerally that the people will like what the government gives them (just as they like Medicare today, "don't you mess with my Medicare"), and they believe the people will not be inclined to replace Dems with Repubs at that point. That means Rs lose power big time and will likely be relegated to minority status for a long, long time.

They are rolling the dice on this one. If they can defeat Obama, they know they have a chance to regain control of the Congress and soon thereafter, the White House. If they lose this fight, they lose whatever small amount of power they have left....and must be content to be the powerless naysayers in the corner for a long time. That is why the battle is so bloody, and why the Rs are attempting to make it the most emotional you have ever seen ("don't want no death panel telling me when I can die," "don't want my country to become another Russia," "don't want no socialized medicine in America.")

The right wing is fomenting much of the irrational comment AND behavior. The racists and the crazies are coming out of the woodwork. This is going to be a tough fall.

I don't know if the Dems in Congress have the spine to stick with what is right for America. Nearly everyone agrees we need to rein in private insurance companies and get premiums under control; we need to accept all applicants for healthcare regardless of pre-existing conditions; we need to guarantee a minimum package of benefits for everyone. Frankly, I can find no one on Capitol Hill who disagrees on two basic elements of reform: the need to reform of health insurance markets, and the need to expand healthcare coverage, with federal subsidies for some. Even Repubs recognize consensus can be reached in these areas...........BUT, right now, they are fighting all -- I repeat -- ALL efforts at reform, because they fear risking the lost of that true mother's milk of politics -- POWER.