Obama is now at 41% approval, though this is a rolling 3 day average that included his nasty partisan speech. Im wondering if his negative and combative speech is the reason.....

http://www.gallup.com/poll/147140/Ob...Tying-Low.aspx

If the Republicans lose control of the house next November, this vote will likely be the reason why.

Originally Posted by Washington Post

“All the polling tells us the same thing,” Israel said. “Voting to terminate Medicare is a bad idea politically in every district.. Republicans oppose it. Democrats oppose it. And Independents oppose it.”

***

“We’re creating a national framework on choices,” Israel said. “The choice I hope our members talk about at home is a budget that gives you a $100,000 tax cut if you earn over $1 million a year, and a $12,000 cost increase if you’re a senior on Medicare. That contrast is very compelling.”

***

UPDATE: It’s worth noting that non-partisan observer Charlie Cook recently came close to endorsing Israel’s view, claiming that undertaking a major overhaul of Medicare could be “little short of suicidal” for the GOP. And Republican strategists have also expressed serious worry about the political risks involved.

Vouchers instead of Medicare. As if the first 64 years of your life aren't going to look like a preexisting condition to the insurance industry.

Originally Posted by herbal tee

If the Republicans lose control of the house next November, this vote will likely be the reason why.




Vouchers instead of Medicare. As if the first 64 years of your life aren't going to look like a preexisting condition to the insurance industry.

People who are 55 and over will get the same system we have now......

Originally Posted by herbal tee

If the Republicans lose control of the house next November, this vote will likely be the reason why.



Vouchers instead of Medicare. As if the first 64 years of your life aren't going to look like a preexisting condition to the insurance industry.

We should put all citizens in the same national insurance pool and allow no exceptions for the insurance providers. They should be required to insure all who apply or not be allowed to participate as US health insurance providers.

Originally Posted by Weave

People who are 55 and over will get the same system we have now......

And as usual, when a system is unsustainable they propose to fuck all the younger folks and protect the AARP generation no matter what their need for public assistance.

Originally Posted by Weave

Obama is now at 41% approval, though this is a rolling 3 day average that included his nasty partisan speech. Im wondering if his negative and combative speech is the reason.....

http://www.gallup.com/poll/147140/Ob...Tying-Low.aspx

For someone who supports the verbal rock-throwing by the right, "partisan" is a word you should avoid.

Originally Posted by Weave

People who are 55 and over will get the same system we have now......

That means I get to say: I got mine; screw you! Wonderful! We actually had a currently retired senior make that argument in the local paper. I'm awaiting the blow-back.

Originally Posted by radind

We should put all citizens in the same national insurance pool and allow no exceptions for the insurance providers. They should be required to insure all who apply or not be allowed to participate as US health insurance providers.

No, we should have Medicare starting at age zero. Alternately, we could expand the VA system to cover everyone. Either choice would be better and cheaper than the current system ... except for those on Cadillac plans. They get care at someone else's expense, so why worry.

Originally Posted by Marx & Lennon

No, we should have Medicare starting at age zero. Alternately, we could expand the VA system to cover everyone. Either choice would be better and cheaper than the current system ... except for those on Cadillac plans. They get care at someone else's expense, so why worry.

Whatever we do needs a strong national consensus. It looks like a long period of stalemate to me.

Originally Posted by Weave

People who are 55 and over will get the same system we have now......

Yeah, because the current GOP house majority knows who voted them into power last year.

So are you over 55 ?

And what is everyone born after 1956 supposed to do, bathe in the reflected glow of a humane system being turned into another corporate welfare system?

Rather you realize it or not bucko your party will lose the joneser vote over this. As a group we tend to be somewhat GOP oriented but we're old enough now that we pay attention to this kind of issue. We're nobodies fools, we know when someone is trying to screw us.

The "Cadillac plans" like Medicare Advantage include dental insurance and vision insurance. Ordinary Medicare does not. I'd far rather it did. However, if you don't mind seeing blind and toothless seniors on every street corner, who am I to say you nay?

Pass the oatmeal, please? That's right, I won't ask you to put it in my hand a second time ... I'll just fumble for it until I feel it.

However, you can console yourself with the fact that those of us who are sliding in under the wire (as S&H put it so cogently) are in that demographic that will soon be departing. Probably, if you believe Dante and S&H together, for Hell's waiting room.

Most House Democrats Reject Obama's Austerity Deal With GOP

Congress has approved the deal that Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders says "moves America in exactly the wrong direction. It cuts programs for struggling working families, the elderly, children and the poor while preserving tax breaks for millionaires and billionaires." But Sanders and a majority of House Democrats opposed it.

More: http://www.thenation.com/blog/159967...udget-deal-gop

Originally Posted by radind

Whatever we do needs a strong national consensus. It looks like a long period of stalemate to me.

I agree that we're hell and gone from anything like general consensus, but the impending collapse of the current system (the ACA not withstanding) will create the needed focus. The rest is still up for grabs.

Originally Posted by The Grey Badger

The "Cadillac plans" like Medicare Advantage include dental insurance and vision insurance. Ordinary Medicare does not. I'd far rather it did. However, if you don't mind seeing blind and toothless seniors on every street corner, who am I to say you nay?

Pass the oatmeal, please? That's right, I won't ask you to put it in my hand a second time ... I'll just fumble for it until I feel it.

However, you can console yourself with the fact that those of us who are sliding in under the wire (as S&H put it so cogently) are in that demographic that will soon be departing. Probably, if you believe Dante and S&H together, for Hell's waiting room.

Dental is typically included in the supplemental part of the plan, which can be obtained outside the Advantage plan and linked to standard Medicare. Medicare Advantage is merely repackaged and restructured Medicare with a higher cost. If you get dental in the base plan, you lose something else.

This is as good a place for this as any since I can't find our partisanship thread.

You may be hearing/reading about Obama getting "testy" in an interview with a Texas reporter. I was sufficiently interested to watch it. It's a complete crock. He is extremely polite to an evidently hostile questioner, and I saw Bush get much, much angrier than that at several reporters.

Originally Posted by KaiserD2

This is as good a place for this as any since I can't find our partisanship thread.

You may be hearing/reading about Obama getting "testy" in an interview with a Texas reporter. I was sufficiently interested to watch it. It's a complete crock. He is extremely polite to an evidently hostile questioner, and I saw Bush get much, much angrier than that at several reporters.

Good link. The President showed himself an adult, didn't get angry

OBAMA: I lost Texas by a few points last time.
B. WATSON (WFAA): It was more like ten points.

The truth: Texas was one of the closer states that he lost -- after Missouri, Montana, Georgia, Arizona, South Carolina, and both Dakotas. He did far better than either Kerry or Gore in the Lone Star State. He did little campaigning in Texas in 2008 after the primary and the Obama campaign advertised little in Texas.

Texas has lots of House seats up for grabs, reflecting the population growth -- much of it economic refugees from the North and Louisiana, and much of it the fast-growing Mexican-American vote. There will be an open Senate seat and it is less to be ruled out than some others.

How Do We Bring Obama Home?
How to Respond to Obama

And, who even wants to?

By Bill Fletcher, Jr.
Progressive America Rising via BlackCommentator.com

Rather than dwell on the question of whether we can bring Obama home, whether he ever was home, etc., I want to refocus on this question of how to respond to him, particularly as we start to think about 2012.

First, what do we now say about 2008? Contrary to those who have thrown up their hands and feel betrayed by what the Obama administration has not done, I start in a different place. I continue to assert that Obama was knowable in 2008. He was a charismatic, smart candidate who made the right call on the Iraq War and stepped out on the issue when it was necessary. He was also, as I said at the time, someone who could appear to be different things to different people. The problem was that too many of his supporters saw what they wanted to see rather than what existed.

What existed? Well, from the beginning he was a corporate candidate. We knew that. The question was not whether he was one but the extent to which his views could be shifted in order to take progressive, non-corporate stands. Second, he was a candidate who was going to avoid race as you or I would avoid a plague ship. He went out of his way to prove that he was not an ‘angry black man’ and that race was not going to be an issue that he would harp on. Third, he was clear that he wanted to change the image of the USA around the world, but it was not clear to what extent he wanted to change the substance of the relationship of the USA to the rest of the world.

Raising these and other issues in 2008 was exceedingly difficult. Raising concerns regarding Obama and his views in 2008, even when one offered critical support to the campaign (as did I), was often met with accusations of throwing a wet towel on a fire, and other such metaphors. Of course, there were those who denounced Obama all the way, but they offered very little as an alternative, with the exception of what we must frankly characterize as symbolic political action. What these fierce critics failed to address was how to account for and speak with the masses of people from various social movements who were gravitating toward Obama’s campaign, individuals and groups looking to create something very different in the USA (and around the world). In fact, it was because of these masses of people, incorrectly described as a “movement” by some but certainly an energized base, and the potential of that base to become a transformative force, that it was correct to critically support the Obama campaign, despite the limitations of the campaign and the candidate.

What did we learn? We learned immediately that it was a mistake to give any elected official, but particularly someone reflecting more ‘center’ politics, a honeymoon. Virtually every social movement and organization stepped back in the interest of providing Obama space. It did not work. There was space, alright, but the political Right seized it.

We also should have learned that it is not about the ‘man’ but it is about the administration. We, African Americans, tend to focus too much on Obama-the-man. We like his speeches. He is smart and seems to have a great family. He sounds so sincere. He understands and appreciates our culture. That is all well and good, but Obama-the-man is not as important as Obama-the-administration. This became all too clear during the Honduras coup in 2009. A democratically elected government was overthrown in a coup. Obama initially condemned this but then did nothing to unseat the ‘coup people’ (a term made famous by President George H.W. Bush in 1991, describing those who overthrew President Gorbachov in the then Soviet Union). Not only that, his administration took steps to keep the democratically elected president out of office and came up with a so-called compromise that resulted in the forces of the wealthy elite returning to power. In that sense, it does not matter whether we like Obama as a person; it is a matter of what we say about the policies of his administration.

Of course, we had a more recent example of this when no one from the administration could quite explain why the return of Haitian President Aristide from South Africa was being opposed by the US government. Does Obama like or hate Aristide? It does not matter; what matters are the actions of the Obama administration.

What should we do? First, we have to focus on policies rather than intent. Those who uncritically supported Obama in 2008 should not feel ashamed but neither should they now flip into despair or abstentionism. We have to keep in mind that this administration, as all administrations, is affected by pressure. This administration SEEMS to be more affected by pressure from the political Right than pressure from progressives and those on the Left but that is largely because the left and progressives have failed to offer sustained pressure on the administration. At each moment that many left and progressives stand up to the administration, they are more often than not met with bared teeth and a growl, which then results in silence on our part. The political Right understands that pressure is not about barking. It is about biting.

So, in this sense, it is not about bringing Obama home. It is about pressuring him to do not only what he has promised but to go beyond what he has promised. This will not come about through email exchanges or social media, but it will come about through building mass pressure. What could this look like?

1. Forget running a candidate against Obama in 2012. That would be a sure way to alienate much of his black and Latin base. Instead, there needs to be a progressive strategy focused on Congressional races. That means identifying key races to run genuine progressive candidates against conservative Democrats and/or Republicans.

2. We need to build an electoral organization that can run such candidates. There are examples of these around the country but we need to expand, ultimately building something at the national level that rivals the vision of the National Rainbow Coalition from the late 1980s. It needs to be an organization that has a mass base and can run candidates inside and outside the Democratic Party.

3. We desperately need mass action. Wisconsin was wonderful for many reasons but one important one was the sustained presence in the capitol. A protest movement focused on power needs to be prepared to break the law, not through the actions of a few individuals, but much as happened in Wisconsin, as well as in the Civil Rights movement, with masses of people making a situation untenable. But we have to also develop key strategic targets for our actions where we are clear on what we want them to do. This will largely happen at the local level at first, but it can also happen at the national level, such as through selective boycotts.

4. We have to think and act globally and locally. We must link with social movements around the world challenging US foreign policy, providing such movements with whatever level of support we can. We cannot allow more Honduras coup situations, and we have to make it clear that US policy in Afghanistan is a disaster.

None of these “to dos” had Obama’s name on them. That is because we are not simply confronting or attempting to influence an individual. We are up against an empire and the spokesperson for that empire happens to be someone in whom many people placed excessive hope. The hope should have rested with the millions who supported him and were seeking a better day. Those are the people upon whom we need to focus so that we can go beyond the Obama moment and move in a progressive direction.

[BlackCommentator.com Editorial Board member, Bill Fletcher, Jr., is a Senior Scholar with the Institute for Policy Studies, the immediate past president ofTransAfrica Forum and co-author of Solidarity Divided: The Crisis in Organized Labor and a New Path toward Social Justice(University of California Press), which examines the crisis of organized labor in the USA. ]

Good article from cnbc about how we have reached a tipping point in fuel and food prices. They point out:

With gas prices now standing at about $3.90 a gallon, energy costs have now passed 6 percent of spending—a level that Johnson says is a "tipping point" for consumers.
"Energy is not quite as essential as food and water, but is a necessity in today's economy, and when gasoline costs more than bottled water—like now—then it takes a huge bite out of disposable spending," he said, in a research note.
Of the six US recessions since 1970, all but the "9-11 year 2001 recession" have been linked to—of not triggered by—energy prices that crossed the 6 percent of personal consumption expenditures, he said. (During the shallow 2001 recession, energy prices had risen to about 5 percent of spending, which is higher than the long-term 4 percent share.)

You can read the entire article here: http://www.cnbc.com/id/42704213

can you say double dip??? If that happens Obama will be in real trouble for '12...

Originally Posted by Weave

\
can you say double dip??? If that happens Obama will be in real trouble for '12...

So will America. In the midst of all of this premature gloating and celebrating, I don't suppose you'd care to offer a suggestion as to what to actually, you know, DO about any of this stuff?

Politics isn't a spectator sport. It's not about who's team wins, but about what policies become implemented, and as such about who wins and who loses (among the people, not the politicians) and in what ways. Suggestion: toss the parties, toss the candidates, deep-six the elections, and START with policy. What should be implemented? On the basis of that, figure out which parties/candidates are closest to this, and how they can be moved closer still (and elected, of course).

That would be worthy of a discussion. Otherwise, all that will be accomplished is mutual annoyance.

Originally Posted by Weave

Good article from cnbc about how we have reached a tipping point in fuel and food prices. They point out:

With gas prices now standing at about $3.90 a gallon, energy costs have now passed 6 percent of spending—a level that Johnson says is a "tipping point" for consumers.
"Energy is not quite as essential as food and water, but is a necessity in today's economy, and when gasoline costs more than bottled water—like now—then it takes a huge bite out of disposable spending," he said, in a research note.
Of the six US recessions since 1970, all but the "9-11 year 2001 recession" have been linked to—of not triggered by—energy prices that crossed the 6 percent of personal consumption expenditures, he said. (During the shallow 2001 recession, energy prices had risen to about 5 percent of spending, which is higher than the long-term 4 percent share.)

You can read the entire article here: http://www.cnbc.com/id/42704213

can you say double dip??? If that happens Obama will be in real trouble for '12...

Only if he is seen culpable.

Face it -- two Republican Governors (Scott, Florida; Walker, Wisconsin) now in hot water for other things did their dutiful service to the international oil cartel by rejecting high-speed rail as a cure for dependency upon oil-fueled automobiles. Remember: the GOP majority in Congress is completely reliable to the oil industry. That majority has done everything asked of it -- casting fault on President Obama for the Deepwater Horizon gusher.

The cheap oil that we used to know may be at a permanent end. So what do we do? Become more dependent upon it? Such makes about as much sense as smoking as an anodyne for emphysema.

Originally Posted by Weave

People who are 55 and over will get the same system we have now......

Ah, an excellent example of screwing over Jonesers. Believe me, I prefer the Medicare my parents have over the shitty treatment I get from health care companies!
1. If you're over 64, most likely you'll have pre existing conditions.
2. If you think the Medicare bureaucracy is bad, just try appealing a "claim denied", from some insurance company.
3. Of course, things would be better if medical insurance companies were REQUIRED to compete across state lines, ignore pre-existing conditions, have a standard coding system, etc. Right now, they don't and I just f*ing hate them.
4, Just like anyone else, I'll be voting my pocket book. Free Markets? Yeah right.

Originally Posted by pbrower2a

Only if he is seen culpable.

Face it -- two Republican Governors (Scott, Florida; Walker, Wisconsin) now in hot water for other things did their dutiful service to the international oil cartel by rejecting high-speed rail as a cure for dependency upon oil-fueled automobiles. Remember: the GOP majority in Congress is completely reliable to the oil industry. That majority has done everything asked of it -- casting fault on President Obama for the Deepwater Horizon gusher.

The cheap oil that we used to know may be at a permanent end. So what do we do? Become more dependent upon it? Such makes about as much sense as smoking as an anodyne for emphysema.

An addendum: it's a good idea to know how we get our energy and what we spend to get it. Most energy is fungible, and if we took a good look at waste, we would find some remarkable realities:



Take a good use at all the waste heat used in motor vehicles (transportation) and the generation of electrical power. Much of the waste heat in electrical-power generation appears as steam dissipated into the atmosphere. Steam used to be a common means of heating buildings, although it has gone out of vogue because the steam radiators are ugly and they could painfully and superficially burn people who touched them. Tough! Kitchen stoves and ovens dangerous if you mishandle them. When electric power generation had waste steam it often sold it as steam heat for residential, commercial, and industrial use. Indeed, commerce and industry seem some of the most efficient users of power, as shown by their nearly-negligible waste of energy. That's the free market at work: waste not, and want not. Ford Motor Company (when Henry Ford was the absolute power within it), as a prime illustration, built its own power plant so that it could be efficient in the use of power.



The use of petroleum as a motor fuel proves terribly inefficient.

I wish that this would make a difference. But I doubt that it will.

Originally Posted by Weave

Good article from cnbc about how we have reached a tipping point in fuel and food prices. They point out:

With gas prices now standing at about $3.90 a gallon, energy costs have now passed 6 percent of spending—a level that Johnson says is a "tipping point" for consumers.
"Energy is not quite as essential as food and water, but is a necessity in today's economy, and when gasoline costs more than bottled water—like now—then it takes a huge bite out of disposable spending," he said, in a research note.
Of the six US recessions since 1970, all but the "9-11 year 2001 recession" have been linked to—of not triggered by—energy prices that crossed the 6 percent of personal consumption expenditures, he said. (During the shallow 2001 recession, energy prices had risen to about 5 percent of spending, which is higher than the long-term 4 percent share.)

You can read the entire article here: http://www.cnbc.com/id/42704213

can you say double dip??? If that happens Obama will be in real trouble for '12...

Originally Posted by pbrower2a

Only if he is seen culpable.

Face it -- two Republican Governors (Scott, Florida; Walker, Wisconsin) now in hot water for other things did their dutiful service to the international oil cartel by rejecting high-speed rail as a cure for dependency upon oil-fueled automobiles. Remember: the GOP majority in Congress is completely reliable to the oil industry. That majority has done everything asked of it -- casting fault on President Obama for the Deepwater Horizon gusher.

The cheap oil that we used to know may be at a permanent end. So what do we do? Become more dependent upon it? Such makes about as much sense as smoking as an anodyne for emphysema.

Food and fuel prices were going to go up no matter who was in office, what they did, or who is in the supporting cast. I cannot believe why a partisan label should even be addressed to resource based problems such as these.

Running through these posts. . . . . .

We all know we have to start spending less on health care. We have no alternative. Here are two relatively extreme ways to deal with the situation.

1. Go to single-payer, and do substantial research, out in the open, on what treatments work and what don't, and reach some decisions, on a national basis, on what is worth paying for, particularly in the latter stages of life. Also make some sensible decisions as to how often certain tests (prostate antigen, mammograms for instance) should be given. In short, do cost-bendfit on just about everything the medical profession does and base treatment on the results. Also, start a public health care company to work on vaccines and drugs that will do a lot of good without making a lot of money.

2. Let the insurance companies decide who to insure, how prohibitive to make the cost, and what to treat.

(2) is the Ryan plan. Let's be blunt: it's another form of death panel. The Ryan Plan has passed the House of Representatives. The terrible thing is that no one is speaking up for (1).