This is easy... look at the campaign contribution leaders of the committee chairman. there are websites that track these things. Whenever a big issue comes up you see the money flowing into those chairman and the list dominated by the people who need those chairman to vote their way. Here is another one... The dems could have easily had single payer as Obamacare never got any Republican votes. But we got the crap we got... because the insurance companies (who are owned by Buffett and wall street) told the dems there would be no single payer and that individuals would be forced to pay them money. No person on earth... other than an insurance company lobbyist thinks obamacare is better than single payer. How did it happen... big money. How did Bush decide to give away drugs to seniors instead of saving the govt money and negotiating volume discounts... same lobby. -- How do trillions get wasted (not every dollar but a larger part) on homeland security and defense when in reality we could have fences and safer borders and pull back from spending all over the world like Ron Paul argues... big money. -- how do our public lands get drilled and mined and the govt not get massive income off it so we could lower taxes ... big money. -- how is it that the govt borrows money that it has the soverign right to print... pay interest on the money and even big fees to the banks who sell the bonds.... I will let you figure that out yourself. -- How is it on almost every big issue the majority of the people are pissed... big money lobbyists. Our congress whores itself out for big money. http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/obamasdeal/view/ "The stakes couldn't be much higher," former Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle (D-S.D.) tells FRONTLINE about what was involved in the landmark health care legislation. "We're talking about almost 20 percent of our gross domestic product today, $2.5 trillion. Literally tens, hundreds of millions of dollars are spent on lobbying. Every special interest has their oar in the water." To navigate the process of health reform, President Obama turned to his chief of staff, Rahm Emanuel, a consummate deal maker, who helped stock the West Wing with an all-star lineup of congressional insiders. But almost immediately, a key member of the team was forced to step down, and the country's greatest champion of health reform, Sen. Ted Kennedy (D-Mass.), was sidelined with incurable brain cancer. The administration's hopes for reform rested with Sen. Max Baucus (D-Mont.), the powerful head of the Senate Finance Committee, who also happened to be one of the Senate's top recipients of special interest money from the health care industry. The White House encouraged Baucus to quietly negotiate deals with the insurance lobby, drug companies and other special interest groups, despite promises to run a different kind of White House. "The president said that having people at the table is better than having them throw stuff at the table," White House Communications Director Dan Pfeiffer tells FRONTLINE. But the deals were often controversial. FRONTLINE investigates how, near the start of the health care reform process, Baucus and the White House negotiated a secret $80 billion deal with Billy Tauzin, the former Louisiana congressman who had become the pharmaceutical industry's top lobbyist. "People who thought that the pharmaceutical industry was still reaping profits that were excessive were unhappy with that deal and were particularly unhappy that it got cut behind closed doors," says the co-chair of Obama's transition team, John Podesta. The pact with Tauzin was only the beginning of a series of deals designed to win over potential opponents. The most notorious agreement, known as the "Cornhusker Kickback," was concluded only days before a vote on the health care bill in the Senate. In exchange for the support of Sen. Ben Nelson (D-Neb.), the White House and Senate leaders agreed to spend $100 million to benefit Nebraska. The administration argued the deals were necessary to secure health reform. But the deals backfired. "It's not a pretty process," says David Gergen, who's been an adviser to four different presidents, both Republican and Democratic, over the last several decades. "There is deal making -- that's the way it's been done for a long time. But those deals done in your front parlor can be pretty smelly. The public was already up to here with what they were seeing in Washington, and I think it just put them over the side." The backlash grew across the country. The president's approval ratings sunk, the Democrats lost control of Ted Kennedy's Senate seat, and the push for health care reform was suddenly in peril. "The grassroots of America had turned against this," Sen. Charles Grassley (R-Iowa) tells FRONTLINE. "Health care was kind of the straw that broke the camel's back."
It's a weak comparison Maverick74, The shit Bush got us into is beyond comparison with recent presidents. Bush is the king of fuck up presidents. I know they ALL lie and are underhanded even the righteous Ronnie. But the magnitude of the Bush mistakes has to be addressed and remembered. The only good thing from the Bush war is it will probably or at least it should make presidents in the near future think twice before getting us into something like Iraq, but you would thought that Vietnam would still be on the minds of the politicians and military leaders, guess not. Now watch us get into another war with Iran.
Actually the Iraq war was a pittance compared to WWII and Vietnam. And ironically, it was the war both parties wanted. WWII was highly controversial and America had ZERO interest in stopping Germany. We were doing business with Hitler for the most part and Americans at the time were VERY anti-Semitic. Saving the Jews was not anything American had any interest in doing. And sending allied troops to Britain was highly controversial. Vietnam, the same. In fact it was Barry Goldwater that ran on the promise to not make the same mistakes Kennedy made on foreign policy both with Vietnam and the Bay of Pigs. Iraq on the other hand was deeply supported by almost everyone and only after the fact did democrats try to spin away from it. But Al Gore in the late 90's said Saddam must be stopped as did Bill Clinton. And Tony Blair, the furthest one can get from being a war hawk was deeply supportive of the invasion. The mistake on Bush's part is that he was deeply insecure in his ability to lead and make choices and when arriving at the crossroads, he buckled under pressure to act, and to act quickly and hastily. I don't blame him much for that as I think most people make terrible decisions under pressure and this country has a history of deciding to attack when the choice is 50/50. The real criticisms of Bush should be how he handled the financial crisis which was a disaster. He turned into a big government liberal and firmly became a member of the left wing central planning society. But the war? Nah, our foreign policy is deeply flawed in this country and has been since Woodrow Wilson. The variation between presidents has been small. But to say Bush is the king of fuck ups is a completely emotional over reaction. Bill Clinton in 1998 launched a 4 day bombing campaign of Iraq in the mist of the Lewinsky scandal to get that crap of the front page headlines. In case you forgot, the missile attack, dubbed operation Iraqi Freedom. Sound familiar? Was to liberate Iraq from Saddam and stop the production of WMD. Bill Clinton signed the Iraq Liberation Act into law in Oct of 1998. This set the stage for Bush after 9/11. The policy was already in place and had already been implemented. In fact, all the knowledge from the attack came from the Clinton administration. This missile attack was indeed an act of War on behalf of the US. And it served as a precursor to an American educated and former ally of the US to set into plan the attack on 9/11. These things are all connected. Does our foreign policy need to change? It sure does. Is Obama going to change it? Nope, he has escalated it. Is any one guy more responsible then the other? Nope. None of these wars or attacks exist in a vacuum. They are almost always in response to an action taken by a previous president.
Very well said Maverick, though I do believe that the Bush response to 911 was the most misguided and disastrous action of any U.S. president and has led to the most dire consequences; consequences that may plague us for the rest of our existence as a republic, which may not be that many more years.
That's my point, it was NOT a response. It was a continuation of the 1998 missile attacks on Iraq for the same purpose. Did the Bush administration not sell the goods as well as Clinton did? Absolutely, Powell, Bush and Cheney were awful salesmen compared to Bill Clinton, Madeline Albright and William Cohen. Let's not forget about Operation "Infinite Reach". Yet another missile attack on the eve of the Lewinsky scandal where we launched missiles into Sudan and Afghanistan going after terrorists. This attack actually happened exactly as the evening news was going to air the breaking news on the Lewinsky scandal. He pre-empted them! Brilliant. And not so brilliant. These attacks motivated a group of young Saudi's to escalate their hate against America and give their lives to stop the evil aggressor in America. It's ALL connected.
Jem, regarding your soliloquy above. I agree. Well done young man. But you should rethink this one: "how is it that the govt borrows money that it has the soverign right to print... pay interest on the money and even big fees to the banks who sell the bonds...." Believe me, Jem, You don't want your government just printing money to pay its bills! You want it to borrow. The former is what Zimbabwe does, or did. (And that's actually the classical meaning in economics of "printing," and it is why, I think, when Bernanke was accused of "printing," he said he wasn't. And he was right. Yes QE is creating money that wasn't there before, but that money is linked to new debt that wasn't there before. "On 16 February 2006, the governor of the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe, Gideon Gono, announced that the government had printed ZW$20.5 trillion in order to buy foreign currency to pay off IMF arrears."
Oh, I see what you are getting at. OK. You're saying it was a diversion -- he could do it because when you are president you get to kill whoever you want, your patriotic duty so to speak. So we were all misled to think somehow Bush was connecting Iraq to 911 -- and we were puzzled because we did not see the connection either, not then anyway.. Unfortunate timing I suppose. Apparently he was so dense as to not realize that it was very much connected-- just not in an obvious way! On the other hand, when I say consequences of his actions following 911 that will plague us, I am referring to consequences that go far beyond the unfortunate Iraq war. I haven't made myself especially clear. But I do understand your point.
P.S. personally, I have always thought little Bush went into Iraq to take out Saddam because Saddam had tried to kill his daddy, and too his daddy had been criticized for not finishing the job in the gulf war. [Of course Bush the elder had way more sense than Junior. That's a given.] I still believe that, and it makes a lot of sense to me because Cheney was also threatened and would have, for that reason, and others, been an enthusiastic cheerleader and happy to volunteer to browbeat the CIA into cooperating. Nevermind that your going to murder >100,000 innocents, escalate terrorist anti-US sentiments around the globe, and commit the Treasury to 3-4 Trillion that it did not have. When your a war criminal you have to always be looking over your shoulder. This is something to think about for those in positions to start wars. Nice folks that Cheney and Bush family!
While those feelings may have been present, it is a stretch to think that someone with the faith Bush has would go to such lengths to see so many die just to get revenge. One would have to be Satanic to operate with that logic. That's not who George Bush is. You should know that. The fact that even Democratic leaders agreed that the war was warranted shows there were other compelling beliefs driving the action.