republicans played poker on health care reform. they went all in on "NO". they refused to even participate. they lost: David Frum, former speechwriter to President George W. Bush: Conservatives and Republicans today suffered their most crushing legislative defeat since the 1960s. Itâs hard to exaggerate the magnitude of the disaster. Conservatives may cheer themselves that theyâll compensate for todayâs expected vote with a big win in the November 2010 elections. [...] No illusions please: This bill will not be repealed. Even if Republicans scored a 1994 style landslide in November, how many votes could we muster to re-open the âdoughnut holeâ and charge seniors more for prescription drugs? How many votes to re-allow insurers to rescind policies when they discover a pre-existing condition? How many votes to banish 25 year olds from their parentsâ insurance coverage? And even if the votes were there â would President Obama sign such a repeal? We followed the most radical voices in the party and the movement, and they led us to abject and irreversible defeat. [...] So todayâs defeat for free-market economics and Republican values is a huge win for the conservative entertainment industry. Their listeners and viewers will now be even more enraged, even more frustrated, even more disappointed in everybody except the responsibility-free talkers on television and radio. For them, itâs mission accomplished. For the cause they purport to represent, itâs Waterloo all right: ours.
While this isn't a "disaster" for the republicans in terms of party power and political victories (it is bad news for the country and the economy), this part of the article is spot on. One does not roll back entitlement programs. Once they are established, they are sacred cows that only get fatter and breed calves.
Is that why the republican fight these programs, and then after they are in place are terrified to stand up against them? Where is the principle in that? If it was bad for America from the republicans perspective, isn't it still bad? Aren't you a member of the party that was against Social Security, Medicare, and now health care reform? Why not continue to fight against what you call the sacred cows? Or is it that the real governing principle for the right just to say anything to regain power, even pander to the senior citizens talking about the dangers to medicare and social security...which is something the conservatives would secretly like to see fail or destroyed? The modern day republican is all about a return to a two class system of the "good old days" of the middle ages. Why the working class republicans think that they have any shot of being part of that ruling class is purely the product of a warped imagination...
Guys like Frum who want to wave the white flag at the first sign of the enemy are the problem. Republicans should be able to take this mess and destroy the democrats in november, if they have the guts, which is highly doubtful. They should target the so-called conservative or moderate dems and point out to voters this is what happens when you vote for dems who falsely claim to be conservative. At crunch time, they will backstab you. While the bill is insanely complex, that complexity is there for a reason, namely to obscure what it really does. Republicans can make that clear in a single sentence. Democrats want to take funds way from vulnerable seniors to give coverage to the 40 million illegal aliens they plan to grant citizenship to. That is what this battle is all about. They give it away when they wring their hands about all the money that is spent on care during the last year of elderly peoples' lives. The thing is, you have no way of knowing it's their last year or if they will die or live. Obama will take care of that, he'll just deny them lifesaving care, except fo course for politicians, the well-connected and VIPS.
There you go again, attacking the messenger and making up stories to make your case. I can claim Rush Limbaugh is cloning a 40 million-strong army of albinos to replenish the Republican party, but that doesn't make it true. The fact is that the Republicans offered no solutions in the health care reform debate while the Democrats can point to a six year old with a preexisting medical condition and say to the American people that this six year old can't be denied insurance coverage. BTW, cheers. The market seems to think so.