Markos and Jane Hamsher Battle Over Kucinich Vote on HCR: Sad Day for Progressives When We Become Divided

Very informative and trustworthy blog. Please keep updating with great posts like this one. I have booked marked your site and am about to email it to a few friends of mine that I know would enjoy reading sesli sohbet sesli chat sesli sohbet sesli chat

Your blog appears quite informative. I liked it. bathroom vanity?mosaic glass?bathtub?shower enclosure?shower room?shower enclosure?computer steam shower room?bamboo furniture?bamboo kitchen?bamboo flooring ?solar collector?solar water heater?solar heater?solar energy?solar lighting ?solar water heater?solar collector?power strip?extension cord?glue gun?power socket?power strip?power cable?speaker cable?ratchet tiedown?booster cable?tow rope?power strips?power socket?extension cords?glue stick?glue gun?booster cable?power cord?power strip?extension cord?trouble light?booster cable?glue gun?battery clip?hot glue gun?power strips?booster cable?extension cords?booster cables?battery clip?tow rope?ratchet tie down?solar water heater?solar collector So much useful material. I read with great interest.Can you please tell me how can I read your rss blog?

Markos proved one thing with his take-no-prisoners stance insisting on a single-payer health-care system: There are rigid, uncompromising hard-liners on the left as well as on the right. 

As a center-left blogger whose blog is carried on both Markos' DailyKos.com and Jame Hamsler's FireDogLake.com, it will be interesgint to see if I remain on either site for saying the folllowing: Just as abortion and same-gender marriage splits traditional conservatives from the hard-line fascists, health-care reform is splitting traditional progressives from the hard-line socialists.

My home-state senator, Bernie Sanders of Vermont, has made no secret of his being a socialist. The fact that in his nearly 30-year political career, he's lost only one election -- a 1986 run for governor -- is a reflection of what Vermonters think of him. But even Bernie is realistic enough to know that single-payer doesn't have a snowball's chance in hell of passage -- and even if it did, it would not likely survive a court challenge by private health insurers, who would almost certainly sue on the grounds that establishing a government-run health-insurance monopoly (which what the term "single-payer" really means) would violate the Commerce Clause of the Constitution.

So why is Markos so uncompromising and clinging stubbornly to something he knows cannot and will not pass? The only answer is that Markos is a hard-line ideologue as intransigent on the left as Rush Limbaugh is on the right.

I have little patience with hard-line ideologues (You have no idea how much grief I got from "Kossacks" for my editorial last fall in which I said that single-payer was likely unconstitutional and that a public option was the best that progressives could hope for).

We've crossed the Rubicon as a party and more importantly, as a nation, with this health care debate.  People know when they can afford health care.  They know when they have to do without.  And they understand, immediately and viscerally, the consequences of restricted or lost ability to prevent needless suffering and death. 

The bill that may be passed soon will bear an immediate test.  The implications of that go well beyond any personalities.  The basis judgment will be empirical.  Blogger wars based on personality and clan affiliation will vanish quickly as citizens respond in the context of a huge need for services and promises made to fill that need.

Kucinich and Moore just wanted to get as much attention as possible for progressives, but in actuality saw the need to do something about health care immediately. Please realize no matter what, we do not ever want Repubs to laud over us about absolutely anything, ever.  I can't imagine how much worse they would act if they ever gained control of any of the branches of government.  It would truly be a nightmare of epic proportions.

I don't know why Moulitsis felt he had to angrily denounce Kucinich.  Maybe he wants to purge liberals from the Democratic Party.  What, we can't have one person speaking for us? I think being liberal is something like being gay. It might take awhile to discover that you are one, it's very difficult to act like you're not one, and you may not find it easy to accept your identity.  Coming out only seems to get you hateful vibes, even from those whom you thought were liberal too, or were at least open-minded about it. In discussions they tell you that you are wrong, wrong, wrong, and that you don't see the big picture.  You are expected to deny your liberal nature and outlook when it might make people of other orientations uncomfortable, but there is no stipulation that other people should do the same when you are uncomfortable.  Coming out, however, is very liberating.  Dennis Kucinich, Jane Hamsher, and I are liberated liberals.  The Democratic Party should be open to all who love democracy, and that would include Markos Moulitsis. He should know, however, that when he attacks, insults, or threatens Dennis Kucinich, he does it also to Jane and me.  If he wants to start a tea party on the left which excludes liberals, he is free to do so.  It wouldn't surprise a liberal.

About an hour ago, Kucinich announced his support for the piece of shit giveaway to Big Insurance and Big Pharma, making the sellout complete.

We KNOW who our enemies in congress and the senate are. The question now is what are we going to do about it?

This calls for a wholesale overhaul both houses, no matter HOW painful it may be. T'would would be far better than the slow death guaranteed by parasitic corporate crooks and their lackeys in gumint.

This is surely a shameful chapter in our history. All it'll take for the sham to be complete will be a similar finance reform "bill".

What you perceive as a rift is actually the real battlefield; it is a rift in the same sense that the Civil War could be described as a 'rift' between Americans.  I applaud Dennis Kucinich for fighting for us...and let's be clear, Dennis Kucinich IS fighting for US.  Those who choose to characterize this as an ego trip for Kucinich or call him an uncompromising idealogue clearly don't understand what it really means to have someone in Congress represent them.  How many times have we seen poll after poll with significant majorities saying we want a public option?  No one has yet adequately explained to me how forcing people to buy insurance, no matter how heavily subsidized it is, represents extending medical coverage to them.  Doing that will you - nil you still puts you at the mercy of corporate profits. You don't have medical coverage, you simply have insurance that may or may not pay the cost of the care you need.  Look, you have Natoma Canfield who can not get insurance in the marketplace but needs serious medical treatment.  Now we hear that she may be eligible for State Medicaid and/or 'charitible' treatment.  The HCR bill has no public option and forces you to go to the marketplace and secure the best you can.  In Ms. Canfield's case she can't get coverage in the marketplace so she can get coverage from public option in this case Medicaid.  If this bill were passed she would be forced to pay extreme costs in order to comply with the law and still might not have her medical bills paid.

News has just broken that Dennis Kucinich will vote yes for the bill.  So this round is over.  A BS bill will pass the House.  There is no progressive victory here and I will guarantee that whatever was promised in terms of changes that will be made will be reneged on.  President Obama was swept into the White House by the force of the people; since taking office he has turned his back on those people.  Each time progressives accept the crumbs they valiantly try to portray as half a loaf we the people lose.  There needs to be more politicians like Dennis Kucinich if we, the people are to have true representation.  That is what is sad.

  And I still can't understand WHY nobody puts the issue this way: Our government is using 70+ billion dollars of OUR tax money. Now who would YOU rather see benefit from this largesse? Do you want YOUR money to go to insurance companies, or would you rather see YOUR money used to help YOU? The insurance industry does NOT need the gov't's help to get any richer, any more than the mega-banks or Wall St. crooks do. The gov't needs to be helping people who NEED the help. Can this be made ANY clearer? Progessives need to help Kucinich and stand with him because HE is helping US the way any decent human being would. And all we have to do is get on board. We don't even need to have even half of the courage he's already shown us to this point.

Markos is not a progressive!

Seriously, the guy is in bed with the DLC; he's no more liberal than Clinton or Obama, and should not even be called left-of-center in comparison to Kucinich or Jane Hamsher.

DailyKOS, Democratic Underground, and Talking Points Memo are no more than mouthpieces for the party leadership, and are completely out of touch with the progressive base. Thank you FireDogLake and Buzzflash (among others) for holding true to progressive ideals (more or less; don't ask me about P.M. Carpenter).

Markos has a greatly exaggerated view of himself.  I heard on Olbermann his all-out assault on one of the very few principled members of the House that we have left, and I could not believe my ears. I was suddenly seeing this bright-eyed little Nazi in his true colors, with a peaked cap that could have had a swastika somewhere on it. Doing what you said you would do is somehow unforgivable if you are Dennis but not if you are Barack? Actually, it appears that Dennis is softening his position somewhat - logical in the face of the number of progressive groups who see the Senate abortion and the reconciliation "fixes" as being a half a loaf. But whether he does or he doesn't, can we please reserve our ammunition for those toxic blue dogs who run to jump in bed with the reactionary Republicans (a redundancy if I ever heard one) any time the chips are down? 

KOS going on a vendetta against Dennis would reveal a great deal more about KOS than about Dennis and they would lose a great deal more credibility in the process, and rightly so.

Gosh, I hope Dennis holds firm to his beliefs (as I think he will) and votes, "No".   This bill is FAR from being a health insurance overhaul - or at least the type we need.  Instead, the insurance companies will get richer as our expense while not offering any more/better service.  This situation reminds me of when Ralph Nader was bashed by DEMOCRATS for running as the Green Party Candidate against "W".  They feared that votes would be taken away from the democratic candidate - and they were probably right.  HOWEVER, his response was right on the money.  He said (I'm paraphrasing) that, "If the democratic candidate needs my few percentage points to win the election against a man who has so much baggage, then the democratic party is in pretty poor shape."  He was 100% correct!  The democrats did an AWFUL job of selling their proposal to the public.  As usual, instead of taking the offensive and asking the republicans WHY they weren't supporting a program that would ensure that ALL Americans had healthcare, they put their tail between their legs and begged the republicans not to beat them!  It's disgusting!  On the other hand, I'm beginning to believe that the democrats (except for a select few) don't really give a darn about social injustice against the average American.  With that said,  Way to go, Dennis for standing firm on your beliefs! 

Dennis Kucinich and I share something in common, the Federal Employees Health Benefits Plan (FEHBP.) FEBHP is far from perfect but it is better than what I'd say 80% of America's citizens now have, if they even have health care insurance.

Another leading advocate of s single-payer plan is Harvard's  Dr. Marcia Angell and being senior lecturer in the Department of Social Medicine at Harvard University Medical School. I am quite sure she does not have to worry about her health care insurance plan.

Whether of not Jane Hamsher has adequate health care insurance I have no idea and really do not care, though I am assuming she does.

All these people are sincere in their advocacy yet the bottom line is that should this cobbled-together health care bill tortuously winding its way through the Halls of Congress does not pass they have lost nothing.

Over the years BuzzFlash.com has called out the leading actors on the right for their rank hypocrisy. Sorry to say but there is hypocrisy a-plenty on our side too. 

ET Spoon

 GET REAL, Buzzflash.

This bill is a sell-out. It didn't have to be this way, if the Dems had any balls and/or principles at all. I've already sent my contribution to Dennis's campaign. We need more like him.

I still think of it as a somewhat silly question for a free-type people...

KUCINICH in 2012!

Everyone has opinions, often strongly held.  But we do ourselves and others a major dis-service when we stop being open to discussion and reason. 

This requires some judgement, of course.  We don't need to waste our energy listening to the rantings of the insane or the intoxicated, but most of us can tell when someone is trying to stay grounded in reality and reason.  My own judgement is that both Dennis Kusinich and Marcos Malitsis are quite sane and rational people who are making honest judgements that happen to be different.  Neither should be shouted down and both should be listened to. 

Anyone who is too set in their own opinions to hear the other side in a matter like this should take stock in themselves.  One can become intoxicated with a doctrine just as easily as with a drug.

It can't be easy to stay neutral on this, but I think it is the right call. I have nothing but respect for Rep. Kucinich, and I would not attempt to influence him one way or another.

Red State Progressive

That is what makes us Progressives, the right to have ideas.  If we all marched in lockstep, with the same exact talking points, that would be the day to start lamenting the state of the progressive movement.

I wouldn't blame Kucinich one bit if he voted no - the Senate sold us out, and Obama played a weak game of "bi-partisanship" on Health Care.  We need principled legislators, not opportunistic politicians. 

If Kucinich votes no, I'll immediately send him money for his next campaign.