Making Sense of Politics and Events, So the Media Doesn't Have To http://www.northdecoder.com Thu, 02 Jul 2009 17:47:38 +0100 FeedCreator 1.7.2 http://www.northdecoder.com/images/M_images/joomla_rss.png http://www.northdecoder.com Making Sense of Politics and Events, So the Media Doesn't Have To http://www.northdecoder.com/index.php/Senator-Al-Franken.html The Minnesota Supreme Court, today, rejected Norm Coleman's frivolous arguments in his desparate attempt to derail the will of a majority of North Dakota's neighbors in Minnesota. Here's the important part:For all of the foregoing reasons, we affirm the decision of the trial court that Al Franken received the highest number of votes legally cast and is entitled under Minn. Stat. § 204C.40 (2008) to receive the certificate of election as United States Senator from the State of Minnesota.Minnesota Supreme Court (http://www.mncourts.gov/opinions/sc/current/OPA090697-6030.pdf) I still don't have confidence in Pawlenty to certify the results. And even if he does, I'd bet the NRSC and its money people would bankroll another frivolous appeal by Coleman. I could give you 60 reasons why you should... Stay tuned. News - Latest Tue, 30 Jun 2009 13:37:26 +0100 http://www.northdecoder.com/index.php/Saturday-Tribute-Michael-Jackson.html Someone in the DarkThis seems like the best song to remember Michael to.It is truly sad to see a person with such an influential career fall so far from grace in the way that he did. He was taken from his fans too soon. News - Diversions Sat, 27 Jun 2009 01:00:00 +0100 http://www.northdecoder.com/index.php/Where-Are-North-Dakota-s-Senators-On-The-Public-Option-Part-II.html As you know, I submitted four questions to Senator Kent Conrad and to Senator Byron Dorgan relating to healthcare reform. I posted Senator Conrad's answers (index.php/Where-Are-North-Dakota-s-Senators-On-The-Public-Option.html) earlier this week. Here are Senator Dorgan's answers: Q) Do you support a public healthcare option as part of healthcare reform? Yes I do. First of all, I think it’s important that people who are satisfied with the health plan they have know that they can keep that coverage. We also need to have a public option that serves as a backstop—offering protection and coverage to many Americans who cannot get healthcare now—but what that plan will look like remains to be seen. It is important to remember that millions of people do not qualify for employee-based health programs and can’t afford to buy their own insurance. Uninsured Americans have almost no access to health care, except in emergency situations. This in turn raises the costs for all Americans. But providing coverage is only part of the solution. Health care costs account for nearly 17 percent of GDP, which is unsustainable. The increasing cost is hurting not only our families, but also our businesses and governments. As we take steps to expand coverage, we must also work to bring down costs – or else we’re just going to keep spending a lot of money without addressing the underlying problem. Q) If so, do you support a public healthcare option that is available on day one? Again, the legislation coming out of these committees has yet to be seen. But I do believe that some sort of public option needs to be part of the proposal, along with a focus on bringing down health care costs and prevention. Q) Do you support a public healthcare option that can bargain for rates from providers and big drug companies? In offering insurance, yes, I do believe that a public option should negotiate for rates and drug prices, just as insurance companies do now. I have also been supportive of efforts to allow Medicare to negotiate better prescription drug prices. However, that is not enough to bring down the costs of the entire system for everyone. That is why health care reform must address all the different problems that raise costs and affect coverage, not just rely on one proposal to be a cure-all for the system. With respect to prescription drugs, there are steps we can take now to lower prices. I have introduced the bi-partisan Pharmaceutical Market Access and Drug Safety Act, which allows for the importation of prescription drugs produced in FDA approved plants in other countries. We pay more than any other country for drugs. People are being forced to choose between food or medicine and putting their health at risk. By allowing for the importation of FDA approved drugs and inserting some competition into the market, it will offer access to the same FDA-approved drugs sold at a fraction of the cost in other countries, and also force the drug companies to lower their prices in the long run. Q) Do you support a public healthcare option that is national, available everywhere, and accountable to Congress? This option should be available nation-wide in order to be the most effective. It should be subject to effective regulations like our existing programs. Bam! It sounds like Senator Dorgan is unequivocally on board with the public option. (I figured his answers would roughly what they are, as I had seen Dorgan's interview on MyDD.com (http://www.mydd.com/story/2009/6/22/133115/137)). I think that's great.Dorgan is right. There needs to be strong, meaningful, aggressive and competitive negotiations with pharmaceutical companies over drug prices. That will never happen for so long as the doctors, hospitals, insurance companies and pharmaceutical companies are all in bed together, and they all are now. We also need to break up non-competitive relationships between the insurance companies and providers. I think the public option can push us in that direction.I haven't submitted the healthcare questions to Congressman Pomeroy yet. I suppose I should do that. (I see Congressman Pomeroy is voting against (http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/N/ND_CLIMATE_BILL_POMEROY_NDOL-?SITE=NDWIL SECTION=HOME TEMPLATE=DEFAULT) the American Clean Energy and Security Act today, though the word is it will likely pass even without his vote (http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5iqcr7nMnCiZYVHW_iQ1hbxHWuIBQ). I know it's not popular with King Coal and its people, but I think it's a good bill and wish Pomeroy would change his mind before the vote. My position on cap and trade can be summarized as follows: If you care about anybody who has lung problems, or if you have children or plan to ever have children, you should want them to have clean air to breathe. We have some of the dirtiest air in America right here in Bismarck. I wish our political leaders all felt the same way.) [Update: Getting some national recognition for this effort from OpenLeft.com (http://www.openleft.com/diary/13941/senator-dorgan-supports-the-public-option). Thanks guys.] News - Latest Fri, 26 Jun 2009 11:43:21 +0100 http://www.northdecoder.com/index.php/Hoeven-v.-Sanford-A-Comparison.html I don't much care about the political carnage going on in South Carolina right now, except when I think about North Dakota, North Dakota's Governor and the media in North Dakota. I've been thinking about how a similar story might play out in North Dakota. In thinking about it, I've come up with some questions I think we should all ask ourselves. We should also ask these questions of each other, and of the reporters in North Dakota's media:Q1. If North Dakota Governor John Hoeven disappeared for five days, how would we know? If he disappeared for five weeks, how would we know? If he disappeared for five months, how would we know? A1. Let's be honest about this; we wouldn't know. Or, if we found out, we wouldn't find out for a long, long time. You know how we'd eventually find out?!? There would be a groundbreaking ceremony for some federally-funded project brought to us by Conrad, Dorgan and/or Pomeroy, and Hoeven would be absent from all the pictures. Hoeven wouldn't be standing at the podium taking credit for a project he had little or nothing to do with. That's when most of us would start asking questions. That's when I'd start getting worried about who was running North Dakota's executive branch. Q2. If North Dakota Governor John Hoeven ran off for five days to Argentina (or Arnegard) to have an affair, not telling anybody or leaving contact information, how would we know?A2. Again, let's be honest; we wouldn't know. You look at the situation in South Carolina, and you see what it takes to get the media to even start looking into a story like the Sanford debacle. South Carolina's largest newspaper -- The State -- had scandalous e-mails between Sanford and his mistress for six months and wrote nothing about it because they didn't have the intellectual firepower necessary to confirm the validity of the emails. It took a major national story on all the networks about his disappearance for a couple reporters at The State to finally try to do something. That would never happen here in North Dakota. Think about it; Which North Dakota reporters would follow up on a story like that? Seriously. And if they did, which newspaper would publish the story? None. Q3. If North Dakota's Governor John Hoeven did what Mark Sanford did, which intrepid North Dakota investigative reporter would do the type of work done by Gina Smith in South Carolina to break the story of Mark Sanford's whereabouts?A3. First, I should probably tell you who Gina Smith is. The best way to do that is probably to have you watch Rachel Maddow's interview with Ms. Smith last night. Here's the interview (she shows up at about 3:30 in the recording):Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News (http://www.msnbc.msn.com), World News (http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3032507), and News about the Economy (http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3032072)Did you hear that? After six months of having those e-mails [and doesn't Sanford say this was something his family had been dealing with for five months ? The emails seem to suggest quite a bit of this developed more than six month ago.], Smith drove three and a half hours to Atlanta, Georgia, to wait at the international terminal where she had deduced that Sanford MIGHT arrive IF, in fact, he was returning from Argentina. Which spitfire North Dakota reporter would have the journalistic drive, gumption and savvy to even start doing the legwork done by Smith? And wouldn't you agree that, on some level, Smith just got lucky. She had a cohort at another airport waiting for Sanford. Sanford might have come in on a later flight. To some extent, she just got lucky. But she wouldn't even have been in a position to get lucky if she hadn't put in the time and a little effort. There's no chance a North Dakota reporter would ever do that kind of legwork, hoping to just get lucky. None. Why? First, North Dakota would have to have a journalist who'd notice Hoeven was missing. Wouldn't happen. Second, North Dakota would have to have a journalist who'd recognize that it's a newsworthy story when a state's governor has gone missing. Wouldn't happen. Third, North Dakota would have to have a journalist who'd know there might be tasks and research and follow-up that needed to get done in order to work up the story. Wouldn't happen. Fourth, North Dakota would need to have a journalist with the smarts to figure out what those things are. Not gonna happen. And lastly, we'd have to have a journalist that could write a decent investigative piece based upon all of the above, and some legwork and a little luck. I don't think we have an investigative journalist in North Dakota with one of these powers of observation, research and skill, let alone most or all of them in one reporter. And even if we did, that reporter would probably be shut down by an editor, publisher or producer who lived next door to the Governor or who was best friends with the Governor's dad. Our governor could have an extramarital affair, lie about it to his staff (or not), use state funds and resources to pay his expenses and nobody would ever know about it. Ever. The Sanford story isn't a story about a governor who had an affair; It's a story about the dumb luck of one rare newspaper reporter in South Carolina, after she and her employer sat on salacious, incriminating emails for six months. I suspect most people didn't want to hear the details of Gov. Sanford's sins. That story is a story about monumental (though typical) Republican party of family values hypocrisy. Democrats can never have a story like this, because they've never claimed to be the party of family values. We -- Democrats -- don't talk like that because we don't think we're any better or any worse, morally, than Republicans. (We think we're all equal. You know, like the constitution says we are.) You do this to yourself when you invent and then wear the family values crown. People would hardly care about this story but for the fact Sanford ran family values ads during his campaign, voted to impeach Clinton and called for resignations from virtually any married man that so much as glanced at a pretty girl in Washington D.C. Sanford is the king of the glass house stone throwers. But like many news stories, the Sanford meltdown does little more and little less than shine the spotlight on what's wrong with mainstream media news in America; especially local media and especially North Dakota's media. The reason people are becoming less and less willing to pay for news anymore is that we don't get the news even when we pay for it. We don't get the news ESPECIALLY when we pay for it. A big part of this Sanford story is that it shines a white-hot spotlight on the overall, general failures of the media. They don't get the story because of hard investigative journalism; they get the story because of anonymous tipsters -- probably a blogger in this case (or maybe Sanford's wife, or a friend of hers -- and plain. old. dumb. luck. I think the media should view this story as an opportunity to take a long, hard look at itself and its flaws. Not Sanford's. News - Latest Thu, 25 Jun 2009 10:18:48 +0100 http://www.northdecoder.com/index.php/Where-Are-North-Dakota-s-Senators-On-The-Public-Option.html There seems to be some confusion as to whether Senator Kent Conrad's position on the public option is in flux. Some --like Ryan Grim at the HuffingtonPost (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/06/22/conrad-moves-closer-to-pu_n_219266.html) -- are suggesting Senator Conrad is changing his position on the public option and is moving closer to Public Health Care after yesterday's negotiations. Others say Grim is full of whooey (http://www.dailykos.com/story/2009/6/23/745783/-Sen.-Conrad-Is-NOT-Moving-In-Favor-of-Public-Option!) and doesn't know what he's talking about. It's an interesting discussion (http://mcjoan.dailykos.com/storyonly/2009/6/23/745918/-Schumer-v.-Conrad,-Whos-Moving-Whom) . Last week I sent four questions to Senator Conrad specifically relating to the public option. Here are my questions and Senator Conrad's answers, received this afternoon: Q) Do you support a public healthcare option as part of healthcare reform? The skyrocketing cost of health care in the U.S. has put our economy on a course that threatens both our national and economic security. With 46 million Americans without health insurance and another 25 million underinsured, maintaining the status quo is no longer an option. We need a plan that will result in better health care outcomes for North Dakotans while beginning to bend the cost curve – that is, beginning to rein in the runaway cost to treat America’s patients. Depending on how it is structured, a public plan option might be able to do that. But if it is done the wrong way, it could cause serious problems in our state, because existing Medicare formulas significantly under reimburse our providers. If tying public plan payments to these outdated Medicare formulas causes hospitals in our state to go bankrupt that would leave North Dakotans without access to health care at any price. So we need to look at other ways of getting to the same goal, keeping in mind that we need a bill that can pass the Senate or we will not get health reform. That is why I have proposed my co-op option, which would create not-for-profit insurance plans owned and directed by consumers -- by the public -- with a mission of getting the best value for consumers, not maximizing profits for shareholders. Q) If so, do you support a public healthcare option that is available on day one? I think the sooner we can put a new plan in place, the better. I'm not convinced that so-called trigger proposals would make much sense. Q) Do you support a public healthcare option that can bargain for rates from providers and big drug companies? The ability to effectively negotiate with health care providers and drug companies is critical to making health care affordable for American families. To address a number of flaws in our current system, I have laid out a proposal for Consumer-Owned and -Oriented Plans (or co-ops) that we are so familiar with in North Dakota and across the upper Midwest. My co-op plan would create non-profit cooperatives that would provide affordable health insurance by creating a pool of consumers who could then negotiate with providers for health care. These national, state or region-wide co-ops would be self-governed by their members, and would operate under the same rules regarding solvency and consumer protections that apply to other insurers. These co-ops would serve the best interests of the public -- their members -- and address the three principles of health care reform: choice, quality and cost. Because new co-ops would need seed money to help them meet capital reserve requirements until they have premium revenues coming in, the federal government could offer startup funds through grants or loans, matched by states, local governments, or the co-op members themselves. But that would be the extent of government involvement. Q) Do you support a public healthcare option that is national, available everywhere, and accountable to Congress? Yes. Whatever option is chosen should be national in scope so that it is available everywhere. And it should be accountable to the American people. In my line of work, if I ask someone a question and they give me an answer I feel is non-responsive, I usually get a chance to ask again until I get an answer to the question I'm asking. Politics and government are a little different, so I find myself getting a little frustrated at times like this.I don't think Senator Conrad means to be non-responsive, or that he means to avoid the question, but his answer to my first question doesn't really/clearly answer the question I asked. I think his answer is no. Senator Conrad seems to be against the 'public option 72% of Americans appear to be supporting (http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2009/06/19/opinion/polls/main5098517.shtml). I have sent an inquiry to his office to find out if they think it's fair for me to characterize his answer is a no, and I'll update the post if/when I get a response. [Update: Haven't heard back from his office yet.]I'm not against co-ops, generally. I listed Farmers Union (a co-op) as my religious preference on my class registration forms in college for several years. I usually support the idea of co-ops. And I haven't seen all the details of Senator Conrad's plan/proposal, so it is too early to judge. I just think America is ready for a public health care option. I'm not sure why any Democrats in Washington would be against the public option. I'm pretty happy with Senator Conrad's answers to questions 2, 3 and 4. I'll have to look into what he's talking about regarding trigger proposals. I think I have a general idea what the phrase means, but I'm not all schooled up on it. I'll have to do that.Most Americans seem to agree that it's not enough to just make our current, broken health care system available to some or all of America's uninsured. Senator Conrad clearly recognizes there's a need to have a system in which meaningful negotiations take place with drug companies and health providers. We don't have that now and some charges are clearly out of control. I can't remember who I heard saying this, but it's interesting to hear Republicans in Congress complaining about Americans having a public option. It costs too much. It'll put the government between people and their care providers. That's not just crap; it's hypocritical crap. They need to be asked this question: Do you complain about the government getting in the way of your medical care when you use the public health plan we provide to you to get your medical care?!? When you send your kids to get medical care, do you complain about the public health plan we provide for them?!? I bet they don't complain. I don't see why all Americans shouldn't have the option to use the same health plan we provide to members of congress. I haven't gotten Senator Dorgan's responses to the same questions yet. I'll post them if/when I get them. News - Latest Tue, 23 Jun 2009 14:32:41 +0100 http://www.northdecoder.com/index.php/Happy-Birthday-to-Adam.html Happy Birthday to youHappy Birthday to youHappy Birthday dear AdammmmmmmmmHappy Birthday to youuuuu..... News - Latest Tue, 23 Jun 2009 09:13:53 +0100 http://www.northdecoder.com/index.php/Clearing-the-Air-on-MSNBC-s-biased-coverage.html So, Truth here asks where MSNBC's outrage is over the White House Visitor's list. Here it is, from the man himself:Oops, Truth almost nailed them...Except MSNBC was the organization that filed the FOIA request...MSNBC is not in the tank for Obama, Pelosi, Reid, Dean, or anybody else. Their primetime hosts are all progressives that support progressive policies in one form or another. That is the extent of their bias. Fox News is not so much conservative as it is an extension of the Republican party establishment. There's a big difference. I ask those who are trolling around about the White House visitor's list where their outrage was when President Bush refused to do the same thing(the name "Jeff Gannon" comes to mind), and when Dick Cheney refused to reveal the members of his energy task force, or any other story on the White House's obsession with secrecy during the Bush years. Good government progressives and civil libertarians have been against secrecy for decades. We don't change our opinions because we voted for the man in office. We want the President to do what is right. I love my party like a parent loves its child. I want it to succeed, but I am under no illusions that it it is perfect. I want to contribute to it in order to make it more perfect. I do not love the party like a child loves it's parent. Mommy can do no wrong. Daddy is perfect, and I won't let facts get in the way of my preconcieved notions about what I think is right. And if you're wondering why I haven't made mention of the issue on this blog, it is not because I'm a shill for Obama. I'm busy. I do this as a hobby in my free time. By the same logic, I'm totally in the tank for John Ensign as well. Go after me for what I do write, not what I don't have time to write about. UPDATE: I figured this might also be helpful to the discussion as well. Start at 1:57. News - Latest Mon, 22 Jun 2009 15:51:37 +0100 http://www.northdecoder.com/index.php/Election-Information-for-Fargo-Residents-06-30-09.html I was surprised to notice that the City of Fargo is holding a special election on June 30 with one item on the ballot. Here's the ballot language (http://tinyurl.com/fgosam) :Shall Article 3 of the Home Rule Charter of the City of Fargo be amended to authorize collection of a one-half of one percent (1/2%) municipal sales, gross receipts and use tax to commence January 1, 2010 for a period of twenty (20) years to expire on December 31, 2029, and to be utilized by the City of Fargo for such flood risk protection, mitigation and reduction as the governing body of the city may select, all as provided in the Notice of Proposed Home Rule Charter Amendment as published in THE FORUM on the 1st day of May, 2009.Ummmm...yeah. I don't expect this will fail. Frankly, I'm surprised that this didn't happen in 1997, but I digress. Yes, we need flood protection, and yes, Fargo will be smart enough to pass this initiative. Fargo residents, go out and vote. News - Latest Thu, 18 Jun 2009 22:48:36 +0100 http://www.northdecoder.com/index.php/Do-I-Owe-Jim-Poolman-An-Apology.html No. I don't. Almost two years ago I wrote a blog post about how it seemed pretty clear former North Dakota Insurance Commissioner Jim Poolman had his hand in the cookie jar (index.php/the-low-road.html) while North Dakota's media slept at the switch. Well... as it turns out, I only got part of the story. There's more. It's worse. Bismarck Tribune Editor John Irby's neighbor (http://www.bismarcktribune.com/articles/2009/03/08/news/columnists/irby/178681.txt) -- Poolman, a Republican -- was prominently featured in a major, national news story again recently. Once again North Dakotans are being deprived a major news story about questionable conduct by one of North Dakota's Republican politicians. So what's new? This latest story was in the Washington Post. It was published almost a week ago. This is going to sound quite familiar (index.php/the-low-road.html) to regular readers of NorthDecoder.com. It's a story about how Poolman was courted by insurance industry big-wigs, accepted thousands of dollars in campaign contributions from them, and then went to bat for them, drafting new model laws that benefit them. It's a story about Poolman getting an offer he literally couldn't refuse from those insiders, dishonoring his commitment to the people that elected him, and going to work making the big bucks working for the exact same people that courted him. And -- predictably -- John Irby's neighbor denies there's anything wrong with what he did. But this Washington Post story isn't about Poolman (and the NDGOP) accepting $45k in campaign contributions from one company in the viatical settlement industry and then Poolman going to bat for them. No. This new story is about how Poolman took money from a group of insurance companies, and their lobbyists, and then, two months later, Poolman spearheaded the coalition's efforts to change the way life insurance is regulated. The change would alter long-standing prescriptions for how much money insurers must keep in reserve -- a crucial variable that can influence their profits, the premiums they charge consumers and their ability to pay claims. (Washington Post (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/06/12/AR2009061201946.html)). These historical changes, according to the WaPo story, could leave policyholders -- that's you and me -- in a weaker position. The alliance went on to host receptions honoring Poolman and another top NAIC official, Sandy Praeger of Kansas.The alliance hosted receptions for those commissioners because they were listening to us and they were committed to the process, Harrison said. It is very difficult to get these things done at the NAIC, and you need commissioners and other regulators who are committed to achieving the desired outcome, he said.Harrison initially described the events for Poolman and Praeger as fundraisers but later said he preferred to call them receptions because guests were not required to give money. In a separate interview, Poolman made no such distinction.Poolman said the money didn't influence him.[ ]How much money the alliance helped Poolman raise is unclear from the public record. Of the 22 contributions his campaign reported receiving in 2005, 18 were dated May 19, according to a report filed with the North Dakota secretary of state. That may or may not have been the same day as the event organized by the alliance; Poolman said he didn't recall the date, and Harrison said only that it was in May 2005.Measured in dollars, Poolman's campaign reported receiving nearly half of his total 2005 contributions -- $9,550 -- from political action committees of insurers that belonged to the alliance, individuals whose names were consistent with those publicly identified as working for the alliance, or individuals who appeared to be executives of member companies. Neither Poolman nor Harrison provided clarification, and some others declined to comment. We're not willing to answer your questions, said Stephen P. Horvat Jr., chief legal officer of former alliance member Midland National Life Insurance Co.Two months after the gathering at the Caucus Room, in a conference call with other members of his NAIC committee, Poolman said he was changing the agenda for an upcoming meeting to focus entirely on the long-term strategies to arrive at a principles-based approach to reserving, as paraphrased in the minutes of the call. In August 2005, Poolman presided over a two-day hearing on the issue at which members of the insurance industry pressed their case.Washington Post (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/06/12/AR2009061201946.html) (page 3) Hmmm. Two months after getting over $14,000 at this May 19th fundraiser, Poolman changes the committee's agenda to better fit the priorities of the folks at that fundraiser. Hmmm. Interesting. This was a rather long story in a major national newspaper based in our nation's capitol. But here in North Dakota, the first you've heard anything about any of these stories is here on NorthDecoder.com. So you ask yourself, Why is that? Why do I have to get information about my local Republican politicans from a blog? By now you should have learned that stories like this don't appear in the North Dakota news. The North Dakota media is too busy regurgitating John Hoeven press releases. They have better things to do than publishing stories about scandals involving politicians who are their neighbors. We deserve better. [A SHOUT OUT: Greetings to our friends from www.first-draft.com (index.php/Do-I-Owe-Jim-Poolman-An-Apology.html). Our friend Athenae threw us a snark bone this morning and some of her friends are stumbling by. Howdy gang. When's the next crack van event?] News - Latest Thu, 18 Jun 2009 01:00:00 +0100 http://www.northdecoder.com/index.php/Random-Thoughts-Vol.-II.html UPDATED X 1North Dakota Senator Kent Conrad and other Democratic leaders in Washington are taking some heat in the blogosphere this week:Kent Conrad, Max Baucus, Ben Nelson, Joe Lieberman and Harry Reid, I'm talking to you. Because we're sick of hearing your lame excuses. We're tired of necessary legislation like health care reform being watered down, sandbagged and sabotaged because you want to cave to the insurance industry. We're sick of your craven cowardice. We gave your party the majority so you can fulfill promises to fix our economy, extricate us from Bush's wars and repair a health care system that's so badly broken that up to 100,000 people die every year from inadequate health care in the richest country in the world.Every week we hear a new ploy.Last week, it was the trigger, that was engineered to never be triggered. Didn't fly, did it.This week, it's the co-op proposal, designed to leave the risk pools so fragmented and the co-ops so small as to have zero influence on the insanely inflated prices in the health care market. Yeah, we know why the Rick Scott groupies like this idea.And now you're going on all the cable news bobblehead shows and saying We don't have the votes! Well, I have one word in response: BULLSHIT!!!Harry Reid, you're the Senate Majority Leader. Stop sniveling. Don't tell us that you don't have the votes. Go get the votes. That's your job. Try acting like LBJ instead of a jellyfish, and you'll be amazed at how much can be done with a little arm-twisting.And don't tell me that you need 60 votes to pass legislation in the Senate. The only reason that is the case is because you allow it to be the case. It doesn't take sixty votes to pass a bill. It takes 51. Perhaps you could make it clear to fellow members of your party that it's unacceptable for a Democrat to vote against cloture for a Democratic bill, but they're perfectly free to vote against it in the final vote if they have to object. And if all that fails, you've got reconciliation, if you've got a pair...Kent Conrad, don't tell me that the only way to get cloture on a bill is to water it down and cave in to unreasonable Republican demands. Perhaps you've forgotten that past senators in this quandry deal with it by going on the bobblehead shows, but instead of saying We don't have the votes, they say The opposition are holding this bill hostage by refusing to let it come to an up-or-down vote! It's amazing how many Republicans will start walking back when they're publicly shamed for obstructionism. You only need a couple.DailyKos (http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2009/6/15/742789/-Stop-telling-us-We-dont-have-the-votes!-GO-GET-THE-VOTES!!!) (there's more) Okay, so sometimes DailyKos bloggers can go a little over the top, but the point isn't that far off. I, too, am concerned that some Democrats in Washington aren't acting like leaders. Leaders shouldn't ever be heard to say We aren't going to advocate for the best plan because we just don't have the votes. Leaders should put together the best plan to resolve a problem (or crisis) and say, We have the best plan to resolve the problem. You can climb on board the train, or you can take the blame when our economy derails. Decide. If some Republicans want to obstruct the Democrats' efforts to keep the train on the tracks (or put it back on after 8 years of George Bush), then let them take the blame. Let them be obstructionists. Let them force the train off the tracks. Once the Dems in Washington have a solid plan put together, it really shouldn't be that hard. Put together the best plan and go get the votes. 'nuff said. [Note: There's a group of progressive state-level bloggers changing their blogs' background colors to green as an expression of solidarity with the rights of the Iranian people to have free and fair elections, and their right to peacably protest when they don't get them. I'm joining that cause for a couple days.] UPDATE #1: Here's another blogger at DailyKos (http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2009/6/15/742714/-Conrad:-Im-against-public-option-because-the-GOP-is), and a video: News - Latest Tue, 16 Jun 2009 10:13:58 +0100