Health care reform machinations: it occurs to me…
…that if the Slaughter solution is used, members of the House will be able to outdo John Kerry in ludicrousness.
Remember when Kerry famously said, “I actually did vote for the $87 billion, before I voted against it”? Well, now Representatives can say “I actually did vote for the Senate health care reform bill at the same time I voted against it.”
That’s progress for you.
And by the way, all the machinations that have been involved so far in keeping this moribund bill alive, and possibly even passing it (if the smirking Robert Gibbs is to be believed, by next Sunday), remind me of nothing so much as the final basketball game in the 1972 Olympics, the one between the USA and USSR, where the officials kept discovering extra seconds, enough to make sure Russia had the time to finally win in the end:
Under enormous pressure, the Illinois State guard sank both free throws giving the Americans a 50-49 lead, their first of the game. After the Soviets in-bounded the ball, the referees halted the game with one second remaining. The decision was made to put three seconds back on the clock. At issue was the Soviets’ contention that they had signaled for a time-out between Collins’ two free throws. The game officials never acknowledged the time out. The validity of whether a time-out was legally signaled for has divided passions on this game for 30 years.
After the Soviets in-bounded the ball a second time, the horn sounded signaling an apparent American victory. Moments later, the teams were ordered back on the floor because the clock had not been properly reset to show three seconds remaining. Because of this mistake by the scorer’s table, the celebrating Americans stood in disbelief when they were told they had not won anything yet.
“We couldn’t believe that they were giving them all these chances,” said U.S. forward Mike Bantom. “It was like they were going to let them do it until they got it right.”…
Alexander Belov, who moments earlier had been the goat, became the hero. Rising between Americans Jim Forbes and Kevin Joyce, Belov caught a full-court pass and scored the winning lay-up as time ran out, this time for good. The controversy did not end with the game. Convinced they had been wronged, the U.S. team filed a formal protest with the International Basketball Federation. Later that afternoon, a five-member panel ruled in favor of the Soviets.
“Everything progressed according to strictly Cold War politics,” said Sports Illustrated writer Gary Smith. “There were three Communist Bloc judges. It’s a three to two vote. America loses. The Soviet Union wins the gold medal, and at that point the American players are facing a stark reality. Do they accept the silver medal?”…
Thirty years later, the silver medals sit unclaimed in a vault in Lusanne, Switzerland. The intervening years have done little to hide the emotions of that historic night in Munich.
Basketball games are sport, however. Health care reform, and the compromises the Democratic Party has been willing—nay, eager—to make with the concepts of consent of the governed, rules, liberty, and the Constitution, are something far more serious.
“the one between the USSR and Russia”
Typo – You mean USA and USSR
Patrick: yes, indeed. I’ll fix it.
It reminds me of being 7 years old and playing Army with the kid from across the street:
Me: I shot you! You’re dead.
Kid, yelling from behind his hiding place: I’m not dead – I jumped out of the way.
Me, yelling from behind my hiding place, b/c there are other kids trying to shoot me: No one can jump out of the way – it’s impossible.
Kid: I’m wearing a bulletproof jacket.
Me: I shot you with a bazooka.
Kid: The explosion went around me.
Me: Impossible! You’re DEAD!
Kid: You missed me!
Me: You know the rules. I had a clear shot. You’re DEAD!
Kid: You missed. I was moving around too much.
Me: You’re dead!
Kid: The bazooka shot never exploded! I’m alive.
Me: You’re dead.
Kid: There’s a force field around me.
Me: We’re not in space. You’re dead.
Kid: A tank rolled in front of the shot. I’m alive.
Me: You’re dead.
Kid: It was my brother. He’s dead. I’m alive.
Me: You’re a liar. You’re dead. And I’m coming over there if you don’t die.
Kid: If you try to come over here you’ll be shot 50 times.
Me: I don’t care! I’m coming over there if you don’t die!
Kid: You’ll never catch me!
Me: I’ll catch you sooner or later, and you’ll be sorry.
Kid: You’ll never catch me! You’ll never catch me!
Me, abandoning cover and crossing the battlefield.
4 other enemy kids: Bang! You’re dead Greg! Bang! Pow! Bang! Bang!
Kid, rises from cover and goes through 30 seconds of dramatic death throes, followed by: That was my strategy all along! I tricked you! Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!
Me, resume walking towards the taunting dead kid.
Dead Kid, jumps up and begins running away.
Another apt comparison is with the 2000 election. With every judicial outcome seemingly sealing it for Bush, the Democrats would come up with something else. I was convinced the Florida supreme court was going to keep it alive until some combination of events left Gore ahead and then declare that the clock had run out.
Of course, the Democrats still believe they were robbed by “procedural” fiat. I wonder how much of their willingness to ram through this bill is motivated by that perception. Pay back time?
JLS64: That’s a good one, too. I had forgotten how long that lasted, with how many twistings and turnings.
And of course, at the time, I was rooting for Gore.
neo,
when you were rooting for Gore: did you think Gore was being done wrong? were you embarrassed by Gore’s behavior at any time? were you embarrassed by Dems behavior at any time (for instance, in the matter of military ballots?)?
gcotharn: I didn’t think anybody’s behavior was all that great, as I recall. But I’ve written about the way I felt about it, here.
To expand a bit now on what I wrote then: I saw the election as a dead heat with no “true” winner. So I saw the way it ended up playing out as each side trying to use the rules (and sometimes bending them, although I didn’t see either side as using non-Constitutional means) to try to win, with the Supreme Court as the final meta-referee. Bush won, and I completely accepted it, even though I didn’t like it.
Later, of course, I came to be glad Gore had not won. But I had never quite understood all the bitterness and the “we wuz robbed!” on the part of so many Democrats, even when I was one.
thanks. I’ve often wondered about the thoughts of rational Gore supporters during that time.
Lying and cheating has gone from a vice to a virtue in democrat circles. Welcome to post Christian America and Americans. Nearly half our people are now of the same mindset as the immoral slimeballs of the Soviet Union.
Lying and cheating has gone from a vice to a virtue in democrat circles. Welcome to post Christian America and Americans.
I have said before that I think the whole world is going to be shocked to discover what a tremendous force for good a strong America has been, if the Pax Americana comes to an end.
Similarly, I think a lot of people are going to be dismayed to discover that the ideas of fair play and good will in public life are, after all, Judeo-Christian values that statists are already leaving behind them. C.S. Lewis wrote about that, I believe, in works like “The Abolition of Man” and “That Hideous Strength”.
This post is a bit out off topic. Its really more a repeat of something I said earlier, but which I feel compelled to say again. I’ll make this my last post on this.
Do you live in any of the following states?
New Jersey
Colorado
Louisiana
Michigan
Montana
North Dakota
Oregon
Washington and
Wisconsin
If so, then your state has provisions in your constitution to recall elected officials. If you live in any of theses states, and have a congressional representative or senator who is acting in direct contradiction to the will of the people… for example, by supporting Obamacare… you may want to consider conducting a recall of said elected official. More information is found at this site:
http://recallcongressnow.org/
You may want to email the site to your local tea party group, Republican group, conservative group, or any other interested group or individual. Get the word out about this.
PS: I have read that there may be some constitutional roadblocks to recalling a federal official, like a member of congress. But I suggest that the possibility of recall at least be given consideration. At the very least, you’ll be sending a message.
Ok: I’ll quit with these “recall” posts. I dont want to become this blog’s resident spammer! This will be my last post on the subject.
I would ask what lies beyond the goal to understand why they are pushing so hard. note that it gives them something that negates the other things you think would still be in play, or else they wouldn’t do it. what is the reality that most are missing?
funny thing… but the way things are going, the john birch society and welch will be one of the most prescient groups… (rod serling is laughing)
1. Greatly expanded government spending for every conceivable means of getting rid of ever larger sums of American money as wastefully as possible.
2. Higher and then much higher taxes.
3. A increasingly unbalanced budget, despite the higher taxes.
4. Wild inflation of our currency.
5. Government controls of prices, wages, and materials, supposedly to combat inflation.
6. Greatly increased socialistic controls over every operation of our economy and every activity of our daily lives. This is to be accompanied naturally and automatically by a correspondingly huge increase in the size of our bureaucracy and in both the cost and reach of our domestic government.
7. Far more centralization of power in Washington and the practical elimination of our state lines. There is a many faceted drive at work to have our state lines eventually mean no more within the nation than our county lines do now within the states.
8. The steady advance of federal aid to and control over our educational system, leading to complete federalization of our public education.
9. A constant hammering into the American consciousness of the horror of modern warfare, the beauty and the absolute necessity of peace, peace always on communist terms of course.
10. The consequent willingness of the American people to allow the steps of appeasement by our government, which amount to a piecemeal surrender of the rest of the free world and of the United States itself.
dovetails with a lot of other stuff too…
rod serling is laughing so hard…
just read about the schools textbook issue in texas and they have voted to add in the line that McCarthy was later found to be right through the decoding of Venona.
we cant understand whats going on as one of the constant messages has been putting the outcomes of such action into the crack pot bin.
how easy it would have been to stop all this early on if we were allowed to think about what the outcomes would be and not be told that what then seemed unreasonable was what it was going to go to.
as in the last thread, by attacking the ability to reason, they broke the ability to conclude, and break all prevention.
all one has to do is realize that what the guys warning about this stuff has not much changed, but the conditions that allowed one to ignore or put it out of mind have changed where the audacity of the moves makes what was previously fringe history buffs turned into cranks for knowing history, into those in the know.
problem is that whatever they are planning, will not work as there are too many other interested states to allow the deal to close without conflict
Some years ago I came to the realization that the left had managed to change the definition of morality from individual behavior to ways of thinking.
The old Judeo-Christian morality deals with how you treat your neighbor, your fellow man. Cheating, lying, stealing, assaulting, seducing, killing, and such are prohibited. The new morality is based on proper thinking about various issues. If you have the liberal view of race, gender, poverty, war, guns, homosexuality, and such, your behavior towards individuals is not to be judged. If you don’t, you are immoral.
Thus, Clinton can be a skirt chaser with little criticism, or Kerry can marry for money with no consequences. Obama’s appointees cheating on taxes is a non issue. Obama’s 180 on Federal election funding didn’t cause a ripple. Liberal politicians can take bribes, engage in nepotism, or lie repeatedly because they are really good people. Conservatives must watch their P’s and Q’s.
Mr Frank, it all also makes sense when viewing democrats as children and republicans as adults. We reflexively think one doesn’t know any better and the other should know better. Hubert Humphrey was probably the last adult democrat.
I voted third party in the 2000 election, so I was neutral at the beginning of the recount saga. I got turned off by the Democrats’ manipulation. Ex.: wanting only recounts in Democratic Party majority counties. Ex: changing the procedures for counting votes in a county where the Democratic Party-controlled county had created the ballots and the procedures. Such as trying to do away with absentee ballots from Armed Forces voters, because they were more likely to be Republican votes.
I was third-party until the recount. After the recount, I concluded that I would favor the Republicans because the Democrats had shown themselves during the recount saga to have no principles but convenience.
Slightly off topic (but not really), And McCarthy is on fire on the subject of the Gitmo Bar. A big article in tomorrow’s WSJ has shocking details that puts the question on whether these are knaves to bed for good.
That’s “Andy McCarthy,” sorry.
Let’s hope Obamacare is still a hot topic in November. Actually considering the cross between Marxist delusion and the Chicago way in Obamist thinking, even if the healthcare issue disappears there will be plenty of others to take its place. Our job will be to make the public, those doped up potheads who voted for the Messiah in the first place, realize these issues exist.
I predict the Slaughter solution will be the last, best hope for peace, progress, and social justice in the US for the foreseeable future. Until the Republicans get control of the House and start using it against House Democrats, whereupon it will become a horrible fascist abomination that the right wing invented to enslave the entire free world with a chain made of money.
In short, it’s the new filibuster.
“Patrick Says:
March 14th, 2010 at 3:18 pm
“the one between the USSR and Russia”
Typo – You mean USA and USSR”
Or would that be the USSA and the USSR?
Things keep progressing as the are it just might be the case. One can hardly fault Neo for her confusion.
/sarc
As P.J. O’Rourke said, (roughly) “Democrats believe in Santa Claus and Republicans believe in God. The only problem is there’s no such thing as Santa Claus.”
Tatterdemalian – heh. And again I say, Heh.
Psychopaths’ brains wired to seek rewards, no matter the consequences
http://www.physorg.com/print187775822.html
“It may be that because of these exaggerated dopamine responses, once they focus on the chance to get a reward, psychopaths are unable to alter their attention until they get what they’re after,” Buckholtz said. Added Zald, “It’s not just that they don’t appreciate the potential threat, but that the anticipation or motivation for reward overwhelms those concerns.”
With the President’s reversal on the vote buying provisions in the Healthcare bill, it should be clear there is no length that he and the Dems won’t go to in order to push this bill through. A hundred million for a vote here, judge appointment of someones brother there. Rules and principles are for suckers and losers. Welcome to “Honest (cough) Government”. Goodbye America, it was good while it lasted.
Who can seriously doubt … that the power which a multi-millionaire, who may be my neighbor and perhaps my employer, has over me is very much less than that which the smallest [bureaucrat] possess who wields the coercive power of the state and on whose discretion it depends whether and how I am to be allowed to live or to work? Hayek
The HCR machinations are consistent with the rest of the story with the Democrats and the current administration. I think that who they are and the nature of their program can be known by looking at their associates. Jeremiah “Black Liberation Theology” Wright, William “execute 25 million capitalists” Ayres, Van “avowed Communist” Jones, and so on. The Democrat Party has demonstrated a ‘win at any costs’ mentality for a number of years. The re-count follies were the best example. The character assassination of Judge Bork was an earlier example. And “Republicans want to starve children.” Ad nauseum. I’m sure there are earlier examples. Civility was lost long ago. These people will not stop, because they see this as their ‘window of opportunity.’ I used to believe that the Dems and the Trunks had the same goals for the country, but differed on the means. But no longer. We don’t want the same things, and we don’t want to live in the other side’s vision for America. I do not see how there is any acceptable compromise possible. They have convinced themselves that they walk on the side of the angels, and that anyone who opposes them is worthy of destruction. Our Constitutional Republic had a good run while it lasted.
One sees the occasional comment on what will happen if they pass Obamacare. Is it possible that the other side will do the same thing if it doesn’t pass? We are entering uncharted waters, and regardless of the outcome of this administration, America will look very different after this sorts itself out.
Bulls eye.
The advantage to the Slaughter Solution is that it puts time on the clock. This is a “whatever it takes” solution.
It will take years for a challenge to reach the Supreme Court. By then, who knows what the make up of the court will be? In the mean time Democrats will proceed with nationalized health care as if it is legitimate.