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Lieberman and the Decline of Liberal Unity

Submitted by I.Heart.Krauthammer on Tue, 12/15/2009 - 17:32
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"Well, God bless Joe Lieberman...." -Senator John Thune

Who would have thought that the one to commence the crumbling of liberal health care reform would be Joe Lieberman? While courting Olympia Snowe has been all over the news, everyone forgot about Joe.

And now health care reform is crumbling right before our very eyes, and Joe Lieberman, not a conservative Republican was the catalyst.

 Interesting.  Very interesting.

 Senator Thune eloquently points out the discrepancies of health care reform here.

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Now they are resorting to threats - Either Nelson votes yes or

Submitted by Wayne from Jere... on Tue, 12/15/2009 - 17:40.

... the White House is now threatening to put Nebraska's Offutt Air Force Base on the BRAC list if Nelson doesn't fall into line.

Offutt Air Force Base employs some 10,000 military and federal employees in Southeastern Nebraska. As our source put it, this is a "naked effort by Rahm Emanuel and the White House to extort Nelson's vote." They are "threatening to close a base vital to national security for what?" asked the Senate staffer.

Indeed, Offutt is the headquarters for US Strategic Command, the successor to Strategic Air Command, and not by accident. STRATCOM was located in the middle of the country for strategic reasons. Its closure would be a massive blow to the economy of the state of Nebraska, but it would also be another example of this administration playing politics with our national security.

http://www.weeklystandard.com/weblogs/TWSFP/2009/12/source_dems_threaten_nelson_in_1.asp

If there's any truth to that

Submitted by classicliberal2 on Tue, 12/15/2009 - 19:45.

If there's any truth to that (and, to put it bluntly, that it's coming from you and your cited source makes that extremely questionable), good for the Demos. Next up should be Lieberman. Strip him of not only his chairmanship (which he shouldn't have been given in the first place), but throw his ass out of all committee assignments, freeze him out of the governing process entirely, then tell him that any further shenanigans will result in his being subjected to an ethics investigation over his lobbyist wife's activities, one so thorough that prison gang rape will seem pleasant by comparison, and make it very, very clear to him that, on top of that, the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee will be looking to raise, say, $100 million solely for the purpose of defeating him in 2012 if he votes to filibuster, gets in their way, or even opens his f*cking trap again. That's how Repubs have always handled these sorts of matters. It's about time the Demos figure it out.

And I don't want the health care bill now under consideration to pass. This is just a matter of setting right something in the Senate that's been wrong for far too long.

RE: Lieberman and the Decline of Liberal Unity

Submitted by mlindroo on Tue, 12/15/2009 - 19:00.

Joe Lieberman, not a conservative Republican was the catalyst. Interesting. Very interesting.

Is it? Everyone knows the GOP has been completely powerless and irrelevant to the health care debate...everyone knows 38 or so GOP Senators will oppose health care reform no matter what the Dems propose. Whatever concessions have been made, are entirely thanks to moderate Democrats from rural states. I personally think it's mostly a good thing, BTW -- no party can "enjoy" (if that is the correct word) a 60-40 majority without quite a few apostates, spoilers, mavericks and independents on their side of the aisle. Politics is the art of the possible. This reform is well worth doing regardless of whether there is a public option or not. The Dems' current majority will undoubtedly shrink next year, but these reforms will be as difficult to reverse as those of the early 1930s or Medicare/Medicaid in 1964. MARCU$

Who would have thought that

Submitted by classicliberal2 on Tue, 12/15/2009 - 19:37.

Who would have thought that the one to commence the crumbling of liberal health care reform would be Joe Lieberman?

Actually, liberal health care reform--that is, single payer--was never even put on the table in this "debate." It didn't have to "crumble"--it wsa never allowed to be an option. That's a consequence of massive bribes by the health care industry, the same Big Money sources that own Joe Lieberman and dictate his current antics. They're the reason the public option--the only real reform measure that was ever even considered--may well be dead now. They're also the reason a proposed effort to reform health care was quickly converted into yet another right-wing handout to corporate America (which is all it is now).