E.J. Dionne: Why Democrats have rallied behind a bill that large numbers of republicans should love

[bigtree]

March 20, 2010 4:55 am

WASHINGTON — Here is the ultimate paradox of the Great Health Care Showdown: Congress will divide along partisan lines to pass a Republican version of health care reform, and Republicans will vote against it.

Yes, Democrats have rallied behind a bill that Republicans -- or at least large numbers of them -- should love. It is built on a series of principles that Republicans espoused for years.

Republicans have said that they do not want to destroy the private insurance market. This bill not only preserves that market but strengthens it by bringing in millions of new customers. The plan before Congress does not call for a government “takeover” of health care. It provides subsidies so more people can buy private insurance.

Republican reform advocates have long called for a better insurance market. Our current system provides individuals with little market power in the purchase of health insurance. As a result, they typically pay exorbitant premiums. The new insurance exchanges will pool individuals together and give them a fighting chance at a fair shake.

Republicans now say they hate the mandate that requires everyone to buy insurance. But an individual mandate was hailed as a form of “personal responsibility” by no less a conservative Republican than Mitt Romney. He was proud of the mandate, and also proud of the insurance exchange idea, known in Massachusetts as “The Health Connector” (the idea itself came from the conservative Heritage foundation). Romney had a right to be proud. As governor of Massachusetts in 2006, he signed a bill that is the closest thing there is to a model for what the Democrats are proposing.

Don’t believe me on this?

read more: http://host.madison.com/ct/news/opinion/column/article_a786ba72-0d5f-5364-9ece-23853de98711.html

[robinblue]

1. Indeed, I have thought that it is the Democrats who NOW advocate for "market-based government

solutions". Very telling.

.......What does it tell us that Republicans are now opposing a bill rooted in so many of their own principles? Why has it fallen to Democrats to push the thing through?

The obvious lesson is that the balance of opinion in the Republican Party has swung far to the right of where it used to be. Republicans once believed in market-based government solutions. Now they are suspicious of government solutions altogether. That’s true even in an area such as health care where government, through Medicare and Medicaid, already plays a necessarily large role.

As for the Democrats, they have been both pragmatic and moderate, despite all the claims that this plan is “left wing” or “socialist.” It is neither.

You could argue that Democrats have learned from Republicans. Some might say that Democrats have been less than true to their principles.

But there is a simpler conclusion: Democrats, including President Obama, are so anxious to get everyone health insurance that they are more than willing to try a market-based system and hope it works. It’s a shame the Republicans can no longer take “yes” for an answer.

E.J. Dionne Jr. is a columnist for The Washington Post. [e-mail]...

[midnight]

2. It is curious as to the shaping of a bill that has the Republican talking points

as its signature would be the template for which the new administration would use?

[Toots]

3. Republicans have been very good at saying "Please don't throw us into that Briar Patch"

While Democrats keep socking that ol' "tar baby"

[fasttense]

4. So the Democratic party is implementing RepubliCON laws

So, why don't they take a huge step forward and have Democratic leaders implement Democratic laws?

So we vote in Democrats just to have them pass RepubliCON laws. What a sham this Democracy is.

[Cirque du So-What]

5. Cutting to the chase...

The obvious lesson is that the balance of opinion in the Republican Party has swung far to the right of where it used to be. Republicans once believed in market-based government solutions. Now they are suspicious of government solutions altogether. That’s true even in an area such as health care where government, through Medicare and Medicaid, already plays a necessarily large role.

As for the Democrats, they have been both pragmatic and moderate, despite all the claims that this plan is “left wing” or “socialist.” It is neither.

You could argue that Democrats have learned from Republicans. Some might say that Democrats have been less than true to their principles.

But there is a simpler conclusion: Democrats, including President Obama, are so anxious to get everyone health insurance that they are more than willing to try a market-based system and hope it works. It’s a shame the Republicans can no longer take “yes” for an answer.

I've actually seen (ostensible) Democrats on this board claim that members of Congress are being duped into supporting the HCR bill by the repukes in a political game of 6-dimensional chess - an ultra-elaborate jedi mindfuck trick. Supposedly, repukes love the bill because it benefits the insurance companies, and they're voting as a monolithic bloc AGAINST it for political cover. Many, many millions are being funneled to lobbyists in order that astroturf campaigns get organized against HCR, but it's all just political kabuki theater.

Is this conspiracy theory *really* something to which you stake your analytical reputation?

:eyes: :crazy: :silly: :think:

Please consider employing Occam's razor before making rash statements that defy all logic & reason. It slices, it dices, it makes mincemeat of logical fallacies.

[bigtree]

7. there's still a question (for me, anyway)

. . . of what the bill would have contained - what compromises would have been necessary - if the Democrats and the White House would have taken a more partisan approach from the start of the effort. Then, there are the political considerations of producing such a large piece of social legislation without at least looking like you're reaching out to the other side. Of course, no one can argue with any credibility that this president didn't try to accommodate the nonsense from the opposition and conservatives in our own party.

I've always believed that republicans almost never present sincere legislation. Most of what they do is generate obstruction with ridiculous proposals which have nothing to do with us and everything to do with feathering their industry benefactors.

But, the politics probably favored the route the President and the Majority Leader and the Speaker took. I just know that I would have taken the most direct route to what I wanted in a bill if I had some magical influence. I certainly wouldn't have given the republicans any notice at all, unless and until I actually needed their votes. But, I'm a political hothead.

[Cirque du So-What]

9. I believe LESS compromise would have been necessary

if the Democratic party had acted like the majority party from the get-go. Democrats could still have given the repugs the opportunity to provide input without appearing intransigent. Meanwhile, the repugs haven't budged an inch, nor have they provided realistic alternatives. As for the shit that originates from the likes of Stupak, why in pluperfect hell didn't our party leadership get out in front of this and explain that his amendment is redundant and unnecessary? Instead, it was allowed to become a wedge issue right in our own party...and in spite of all this, a large contingency of internet trolls has made a cottage industry out of attempting to derail this bill - ipso facto aligning themselves with freeps/teabaggers/repugs/blue dogs/ideological purists on the left. Of course, not a mother's one will admit as much here on DU, but at the end of the day, that's how the votes are counted, and they're on the same side as the fucking freeps. Truth hurts, but accepting reality is part of growing up.

[bigtree]

11. definitely less compromise

. . . only question then would have been how visibly republican our conservative members would be willing to appear in opposing our partisan effort. That's the kind of legislating that I'm looking for. In their face, and then move on.

[cilla4progress]

12. I completely agree with your analysis,

Bigtree. I believe for the Republicans it's been about politics, even "philosophy," to be gracious, all along (as you indicate, smaller government, more "free" market, to retain the status quo economic divide). More than that, I firmly believe the current virulence has its roots in racism. Plain and simple. It makes me sick. I don't believe there's an honest patriot among them1

[Vinnie From Indy]

6. Obama is following Clinton's tactic of taking GOP ideas and making them his own

Clinton was a master at taking GOP ideas and rebranding them as his own. For a while the GOP was confused and did not know how to deal with that strategy. Nowadays they have figured it out - simply oppose everything.

[bigtree]

8. that's a good point

I'd hoped we were beyond the need for that tactic. Welfare reform . . . NAFTA . . . It just seems like accommodating republicans (rhetorically or otherwise) wasn't far from some Democratic legislators' minds from the start. I'm fed up with the dynamic which assumes that conservative notions and initiatives represent some kind of sensibility, and progressive ideas and proposals being viewed as 'radical' or idealistic.

This administration's approach, so far, seems to assume that they represent the height of progressiveism which needs to be balanced by some kind of republicanism. I think they're kidding themselves if they believe they are primarily advancing progressive notions of reform or care and just tempering that with a bit of conservatism. They've bent over so far as to fall right into the opposition's lap. Too bad republicans were never serious about their own proposals, except as an obstructionist foil against our Democratic majority's intent.

[hansberrym]

10. But some of those, such as NAFTA, were so far right that the GOP could not push them through. n/t