I'm not feeling incredibly optimistic this morning. Sounds like the most conservative (and most expensive) version of this bill will make up the final version, and I don't see much to celebrate. Is it better to have a crappy bill - or no bill at all?

And why should those be our only options?

The fact is, the Democratic leadership lacks, well, leadership. They think constructing a stage set and acting out a scene that looks like they're leading on the public option is enough to placate the people who so desperately need their help. It isn't. They simply don't get it, and it will cost them:

From the liberal end, Burris repeated a threat made earlier: That if the public option is taken out, he's gone. "I won't vote for it," he said.

"You'll lose people on the left," confirmed Brown.

Reid, aware of the fine line he's walking, told reporters that Landrieu, Schumer and Sen. Tom Carper (D-Del.) are working on a compromise public option, perhaps something that 60 folks could support and save face.

That's what you don't understand, Harry. It's not about "face." But then, it's been so long since you had to worry about paying for your health care, I suppose it's too much to expect.

Yes, this will eventually be good for the country and perhaps our grandchildren - but it won't do much to help the people who need help during these desperate times, and it's certainly going to hurt the Democrats in the midterm elections:

After announcing her intent to support a health care debate this afternoon, Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-LA) told reporters she thinks Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid will soon have to choose between a triggered public option and no health care bill. She also says Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY)--the third-ranking Democrat in the Senate one of its most fierce and vocal public option advocates--has been tasked as a point man on the issue.

"I believe it's going to be very clear at some point very soon that there are not 60 votes for the current provision in the bill, and that the leader and the leadership are going to have to make a decision and I trust that they will figure out how to do that," Landrieu told reporters.

Landrieu has been in negotiations with a number of centrist senators about a compromise that would eliminate the public option, except in states where insurance remains unaffordable. Interestingly, though, Schumer is playing a big role in that process.

"Senator Schumer's working on that. He's sort of been tasked as one of the point people," she told me. "He's been tagged as one of the point people to help negotiate that."

Schumer's involvement as a liaison between liberal and conservative Democrats puts the trigger issue in a new light. When Reid announced that he'd include his opt-out plan in the health care bill in lieu of triggers, many, including trigger-author Olympia Snowe, believed the compromise to be dead. But it now appears to be one of the central points of discussion between leadership and conservative Democrats as they try to find 60 votes for a reform bill.

It's half a victory, and a weak one at that.

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November 21, 2009 C-SPAN

Senators Hatch and Brownback preaching the evils of abortion during the Senate health care debate.

Heather: The GOP does always love the fetus until its old enough to be cannon fodder, don't they? When these people finally have the same sense of moral outrage over those they send to die in useless wars rather than wanting to control women and send them back to the 1950's, maybe any of us can take their feigned outrage seriously.

8:09 EST: Dodd, presiding over the Senate, said the motion passed, smattering of applause. Motion is agreed to. Clerk is now reporting the bill and amendment.

And that's it for the night. Debate will begin after Thanksgiving, plus amendments, then moving on to the final cloture motion and a final vote.

8:04 EST: Cloture passes 60-39. Debate will start after Thanksgiving.

7:57 EST: Voting continuing.

7:56 EST: Clerk reading cloture motion.

The question is: Is it the sense of the Senate that debate on the motion to proceed shall be brought to a close. Clerk is calling the roll.

Voting now.

7:55 EST: Vote starting 5 minutes early.

7:54 EST: Absence of a quorum noted by Reid, and the roll is being called. Vote coming soon!

7:44 EST: The American people want us to start over. All it would take is just one on the other side of the aisle to not end the debate, but change the debate.

And he's yielded.

Senator Harry Reid (D-NV) is up.

My friend, the minority leader, has had since Wednesday to read the bill. Obviously he hasn't done so.

We debate the right to live free of disease and death by giving health care for all. The road has started many times, never been completed. Merged bills have never been done before. We couldn't have got here without the help of many Senators.

As a matter of principle, that I respect, the senior Senator from Arkansas insisted we have time to read the bill. All Senators have now had ample time. That is why we are voting tonight.

I invite Republicans to join the right side of history. Around dining room tables, families are agonizing over what to sacrifice next to afford health care. Employers are wondering whether they can afford to provide health care. Americans need reform.

Debate is constant, but the only place where silence is evened considered is the Senate. Now, finally, we have the opportunity to bring this great deliberation to this body. That and nothing more is what this vote does.

A yes vote says this issue is important and the Senate should at least talk about it.

Some Republicans would like Americans to think voting to debate the bill is voting to pass the bill. Tonight's vote is only the beginning of debate. It's clear Republicans have no problem talking about health care on TV, at town hall meetings, on the radio, yet now that we have the legislation to debate, to amend, to build on, will they refuse to debate?

If we refuse to let the Senate do its job, what are we doing here? What do we fear? And who's voice to you speak for? In who's interest do you vote?

Certainly debating reform can't be more difficult than American deciding to pay their mortgage or medical bills. It can't be more upsetting than having an insurance company take away your coverage when you need it the most.

Kennedy once said let us not be afraid of debate or discussion, let us encourage it.

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November 21, 2009 C-SPAN

After Senator McConnell reads from a David Broder column Senator Harry Reid responds "To focus on an editorial written by a man who's been retired for many years is not where the Senate should be...

Kiko's House: Breast cancer bombshell lands in the middle of the health care debate

The Pump Handle: Swine flu and bird flu and lessons to be learned

Ken Silverstein: Feds document crime spree by dictator's son: Why no action?

Private Buffoon: Writes letters...

The National Protrusion: Should terror suspects be tried in U.S courts? - The Henry "Mack Truck" Harvey Show

ANNALS OF JOURNALISM: Rush to judgement...Media, Money and Sun Myung Moon...and his paper says...and his editor says...The state of journalism in Nebraska...Gernelism...Newsweek taps Bush aide for Obama reporting... Rogue?...Balance...Ethics...Setoodeh and Teh Ghey...Typography...The 'Dean' writes...WashTimes against protectionism before they were for it...

Mike Stark catches up with Blanche Lincoln in Congress and asks her if she'll join the Republican filibuster. She has been virtually silent throughout the whole health care debate and Mike does a great job of getting her to say something on the record. What she said of course was nothing.

Stark: Can you see yourself filibustering or joining a filibuster?

Lincoln: I don't even know what the bill is going to be and I'm going to do what I think is most important for Arkansans and that is to look at the bill, to see if it's going to be helpful to Arkansans and the country in expanding health care...

She knows what's going on in this debate and gives a typical non-answer about supporting the public option like many have given up to this point. We at Blue America are running a brand new ad all over her state starting today so we can help her decide that filibustering health care is not in any one's best interests except the health insurance corporations that she's taken huge contributions from.

Chris Cillizza of the Washington Post writes:

The squeeze is on for Sen. Blanche Lincoln (D-Ark.) on health care in the form of a new series of ads paid for by the liberal Blue America PAC that cast the Arkansas Democrat as bought and paid for by insurers. "Blanche Lincoln claims to fight for health care reform but whose interests does she really represent," asks the ad's narrator before noting that Lincoln has taken more than $2 million in campaign contributions from the health and insurance industries. The narrator concludes the ad by asking viewers to call Lincoln and "demand she allow an up or down vote on the public option." (This is the fourth ad paid for by Blue America targeting Lincoln this year.)

Polling shows Lincoln, who is up for re-election in 2010, holding relatively slim margins over a series of unknown Republican candidates. Lincoln's dilemma? How to walk the line between the conservative leanings of the Razorback State -- Obama took just 39 percent there in 2009 -- and the increasingly vocal and well-funded left within her own party who see the inclusion of a public option as a sine qua non for health care reform.

Her primary is the reason we targeted her originally and it's worked out very well so far.

Please help us continue running this ad and many more to come and join in on Blue America's Campaign for Health Care Choice. Donations are much appreciated.

And Digby writes:

Perhaps Lincoln should start worrying just a bit about what will happen if her Democratic base stays home. The numbers aren't looking all that good for her right now.

She's between little rock and a hard place but it seems to me that's easily solved at this point. She should vote for cloture, thus appeasing her base and then she can vote against the bill if she needs to appeal to neanderthals who want people to die quickly.

Believe me, none of her constituents will hold it against her. Most people think cloture is unpasteurized sour cream. And they like it.

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(The Cribs with Johnny Marr, officially part of the band)

Taking a stab at club crawling this weekend. Live at The Limelight in Belfast Ireland, a high-voltage set by The Cribs featuring ex-Smiths guitarist Johnny Marr from 2004.

Short, sweet and fast. A slight break from the bludgeoning you're probably going through with the Health Care debate . . . play loud, and grab a Guinness (or 6) while you're at it.

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This is sickening. Rep. John Shadegg uses baby Maddie, a 7-month-old daughter of his Chief of Staff to the floor as a prop during the health-care debate in the House earlier today.

The Political Carnival writes:

I wanted to "spit up", and wished Maddy had.

Yes, John Shadegg actually used an innocent infant as a prop, spoke baby talk, and provided us with nothing more than what was most likely in Maddy's diaper at the time. And for this, he got applause.

The collective (im)maturity of the Rushpublic side of the aisle doesn't come close to measuring up to Maddy's level of sophistication. How utterly humiliating.

Henry Waxman made a joke and said: “That was a remarkable child,” “and a great ventriloquist.”

How could a father let his child be used as a prop like that? What would have happened if he hurt her in any way? The entire Republican Party is made up of fools, and I mean the staffers as well. And then there are the people who applauded this stunt ...

By the way, John Shadegg does have a somewhat checkered past, if you remember...

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Marsha Blackburn does a good job of turning into a drama queen when it suits her, doesn't she? During the debate on the House floor over the health care bill being voted on today, Blackburn railed on about who's going to pay for this. I want to know when she's ever asked the same question about paying for war funding?

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(As always, China looks at things a teensy bit differently than we do)

I've been working on getting a world overview of the Healthcare situation. Earlier this week I ran a debate over Health Care in Australia, hearing about issues we only hear rumors about. I kept wondering if in fact, the U.S. was the only country in the civilized (or even semi-civilized) world that didn't have some form of National Health, even as an option to private insurance. Hard to believe, but it's true - we are completely backwards in our relationships to health and healthcare.

Thanks to the BBC, I was able to locate a documentary done in 2008 which asked that very question - and did some exploring in Britain, the U.S. and China and came back with some interesting and very informative answers.

John McDonough (Director: Health Care For All): “All of the incentives, right now in our system reward Health Care providers for the volume of services they provide. So you get more money by doing more and more and more at a higher technological level. And we know the real secret comes from doing the lower complexity level of care much better than what’s being now. So all the rewards come from more procedures. And the more talking you do, the more time you waste and the less money you make. The incentives are completely upside down”.

The one thing I have noticed that's most disturbing about the current Health Care debate is the total lack of knowledge of what the issues and what the alternatives are. Clearly, ignorance is far from bliss and finding out how the vast majority of people on this planet handle things like doctor visits and emergencies is absolutely imperative if we're going to make crucial choices. Having ignorant people dangle the fear card in front of you doesn't do you or anyone else any good. Useful, factual information and knowledge of something your life and peace of mind depends on may save your ass in the long run.

It's pretty clear that any health care "reform" bill will be a sorry compromise between what the New York Times on Sunday so delicately calls "organized interests."

This is important, because as you may have figured out, we're the only non-organized interest. No one is inviting us to the table to have a reasonable discussion (and no, allowing us to leave comments on the White House website is not a "discussion.") That means the proposals that are most likely to cut costs and improve efficiency are least likely to remain, and the ones most likely to remain are the ones that stick it to us.

For now, that seems inevitable. Although Congress does have its inspirational members, the legislative body is still a wholly-owned subsidiary of the banking and insurance industries. We're more likely to see progress in legislative tweaks after the bill is finally passed:

WASHINGTON — As the health care debate moves to the floor of Congress, most of the serious proposals to fulfill President Obama’s original vow to curb costs have fallen victim to organized interests and parochial politics.

Peter R. Orszag, the White House budget director, says containing costs will be a priority as health care legislation advances.

And now the last two initiatives with real bite that are still in contention — a scaled-back “Cadillac tax” on high-cost health plans and a nonpartisan Medicare budget-cutting commission — are under furious assault.

Most economists’ favorite idea for slowing the growth of health care spending was ending the income tax exemption for employer-paid health insurance to make lower-cost plans more attractive. But that would hurt workers with big benefit plans, and a labor-union lobbying blitz helped kill that idea by the Fourth of July.

Lobbying by doctors, hospitals and other health care providers, meanwhile, dimmed the prospects of various proposals to cut into their incomes, including allowing government negotiation of Medicare drug prices and creating a government insurer with the muscle to lower fee payments.

“The lobbyists are winning,” said Representative Jim Cooper, a conservative Tennessee Democrat who teaches health policy.

Total health care costs in the last 20 years have doubled to about 16 percent of the economy, with no signs of tapering. Along with universal coverage, Mr. Obama has made controlling those costs a central pillar of his health care overhaul, calling the current course “unsustainable.” The effort is a pivotal test of his campaign promise to break the stranglehold of special interests.

In his weekly radio address on Saturday, Mr. Obama applauded the bill set for a vote next week in the Senate Finance Committee. “By attacking waste and fraud within the system,” he said, “it will slow the growth in health care costs, without adding a dime to our deficits.”

In an interview, Peter R. Orszag, the White House budget director and the official most associated with the drive to cut costs, singled out the proposed Medicare commission and the “Cadillac tax” as evidence of progress. “A key priority now,” Mr. Orszag said, “is to make sure cost containment holds up as we move through the legislative process."

Neither element appears in any of the other four health care bills on Capitol Hill, and both face dug-in resistance in the House.

Although the bills contain other measures aimed at medical costs, most of the surviving ones do not antagonize any organized interest. Among them are voluntary efficiency measures like encouraging the coordination of medical records, disseminating information comparing the effectiveness of treatments and various pilot projects.

White House officials argue that in any case it is prudent to start with such tests, and that many could be expanded to more comprehensive programs. But their real impact is hard to gauge, and the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office assigns them little weight. (The budget office credited the Finance Committee bill with reducing the federal deficit, but how much it will slow the growth of total public and private health spending is another question.)

The tax on gold-plated insurance plans is the last vestige of most economists’ favorite idea, eliminating the tax exemption for employer plans. The finance bill would impose a 40 percent excise tax on insurance plans that cost more than $8,000 a year for an individual or $21,000 for a family.

The bill has aroused the frantic opposition of labor and business lobbyists who appear to have found friends in the Capitol. On Wednesday, 157 House Democrats — a majority of the party — signed a letter to Speaker Nancy Pelosi opposing the tax.

“It has no legs in the House,” said Representative Pete Stark, the California Democrat who is chairman of the health subcommittee of the tax-writing panel.

The proposed Medicare commission, aimed at providers instead of consumers, is becoming a case study in the political difficulty of reducing medical payments.

The commission was intended to side-step the interest-group pressure that often stymies Congress. Modeled after the nonpartisan commission for military base closings, it would present a roster of Medicare cuts that Congress could block only with legislation.

But along the way, the White House and the Senate Finance Committee have cut deals for political support with lobbyists that may circumscribe the cost cuts, potentially including the recommendations of the commission.

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Rachel Maddow talks to former U.S. Attorney David Iglesias about the pressure put on him to go after ACORN for voter fraud allegations and how Karl Rove wanted to use the issue of voter fraud as a wedge issue to win elections. As Rachel notes sadly, that plan is still paying dividends with the Democrats being all too happy to cave into political pressure by the Republicans instead of standing up for ACORN.

MADDOW: We have previously reported on this show how corporate interests opposed to ACORN`s really successful efforts to raise the minimum wage targeted the group using Republican-allied P.R. firms that proudly specialized in demonizing their opposition.

But ACORN has not just been targeted by corporations who worry that ACORN`s advocacy for living-wage ordinances and an increased minimum wage will hurt their corporate bottom line. ACORN has also been the subject for years of a purely political smear campaign, a campaign engineered by Republicans who are threatened by ACORN`s work to register young and poor and minority voters.

The American voter is typically older and more wealthy than the typical American, and that tends to give the Republicans an electoral edge among voters as compared to the preferences of the populations at large. But ACORN`s registration drives have gone some distance to changing that. Over the past five years, ACORN registered close to 2 million voters. And, yes, the groups of people that ACORN typically registers tend to vote for Democrats.

Over the last few election cycles, fear of a younger, less wealthy, and, frankly, less white electorate led Republicans, especially in swing states, to go after ACORN aggressively, and, in fact, to try to gin up charges against them, to try to make their voter registration efforts in general seem suspect and perhaps to bring down the group entirely. And when I say "ginned up," I`m not exaggerating.

Do you remember the U.S. attorney scandal, the alleged fire ring of U.S. attorneys because of U.S. political considerations? Recall what that scandal was really about. In 2006, nine U.S. attorneys were fired, surprisingly and suddenly, by the Department of Justice under George W. Bush.

Former U.S. attorney David Iglesias -- one of those U.S. attorneys who lost his job despite positive job reviews -- maintains that his pink slip came after he resisted pressure from Republicans to pursue bogus voter registration cases involving ACORN. The pressure began as early as 2002 when Mr. Iglesias says in his book "In Justice," he received an e-mail from the Department of Justice in Washington, quote, "suggesting, in no uncertain terms" that U.S. attorneys "offer whatever assistance we could in investigating and prosecuting voter fraud cases."

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Since the Senate is the group turning the health care debate into "either-or" - as in, "either" regular citizens get screwed "or" the health-for-profit industry gets screwed, I thought I'd point this out as a perfect example of how they think:

The Finance Committee seemed to come very close to passing an amendment Tuesday that would have violated the White House deal with the pharmaceutical industry.

Sen. Bill Nelson (D-Fla.) proposed ending what some Democrats have called a windfall for the pharmaceutical industry – and he picked up strong support from his party.

But two sources familiar with the process say it is still likely to fall short when the committee votes Wednesday.

As part of the 2003 Medicare prescription drug program, more than 6 million low-income seniors were shifted from Medicaid, which allowed the government to negotiate a deep discount for drugs, to the Medicare program, which did not. This has resulted in the government paying about 30 percent more for drugs, according to an analysis by Rep. Henry Waxman (D-Fla.).

Nelson’s amendment would shift these beneficiaries back to the Medicaid program, resulting in $86 billion in savings that could be used to close the donut hole for senior citizens.

Senators were drawn into a tense discussion over the merits of the White House’s $80 billion deal with the pharmaceutical industry, and the failings, as some Democrats see it, of the Medicare prescription drug program.

Sen. Tom Carper (D-Del.) said the Finance Committee should honor the deal with the drug industry. To suddenly double their obligation from $80 billion to more than $160 billion would not be “fair,” he said.

Now, think about that. Senior citizens are not getting needed medication because it's too expensive, but it's more important to continue giving pharmaceutical companies this windfall because they're counting on it and it wouldn't be "fair" to take it away from them.

Just so we're clear.

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(h/t Heather)

Do you want to know how lost in space conservatives are during this health care debate? Watch Eric Cantor, the golden boy of the conservatives, make a complete fool of himself. When their goal is to just block everything, lies, dodges and sick thoughts cascade out of their mouths and into the atmosphere. First he says health-care reform is so time-consuming and is stopping them from doing anything else, but the real sickness comes out when he's asked at a town hall if he could help a woman who has tumors in her belly, who had lost their health insurance and has cancer.

The anti-government freak Cantor actually looks this woman in the eye and asks her to try and find some mythical government program for help. If these programs existed, shouldn't the golden boy at least know what they are? And I thought the government was the devil to Cantor? When confronted with real-life problems, they have no solutions and just make twisted crap up.

Then he brings up the BIG CANARD: Charity care. Hahahahahahaha.

We saw the same thing with Tom Coburn at his town hall and now we see it with Cantor. Remember Coburn?

Coburn: Well, I think—first of all, yeah. We'll help. The first thing we will do is to see what we can do, individually, to help you, through our office. But the other thing that is missing in this debate is us as neighbors, helping people that need our help. [Applause.] You know we tend to ... [Applause.] The idea that the government is a solution to our problems is an inaccurate, a very inaccurate statement.

There answer is to go broke, become indigent, then beg the government for some crumbs while you die waiting for a non existent program to swoop in and save you. Or maybe you can go begging...

I wonder if one of his health-care reform proposals will be that Americans should organize charity squads that go door-to-door and beg for charity money from their towns and hope they can raise 400K in a couple of days for one person. I'm sorry, I just got queasy just watching this video of this asshole.

The San Francisco Chronicle is equally appalled:

I cannot make this up. You have to watch the entire video unedited (though I also have the short video version) and see if Representative and Minority Whip Eric Cantor's version of a "public option" squares with your personal values as a human being and as an American.
--
The question an audience participant asked is paraphrased as "Relative got cancer and lost his insurance... what happens?"

Representative Eric Cantors response paraphrased: "Sell or auction all your belongings. After you reach a certain poverty threshold, apply for Medicaid, the federal medical insurance for the very poor. If that's not enough apply for indigent services."

As I said, I cannot make this up. Just watch the distinguished gentleman from Virginia, Rep. Eric Cantor.

Cantor was on MSNBC and said that he was only trying to answer the question and figure out a way for that women to get help immediately. Tamryn Hall didn't ask a follow-up, but Cantor looked like a buffoon. Is the only thing he can think of to help quickly is that a person become indigent. Why is he blocking any meaningful reform?

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I wonder what the voters in Ross' district are going to think as this news comes out. From The Politico's Propublica: Mike Ross raises eyebrows with healthy haul:

Arkansas Rep. Mike Ross — a Blue Dog Democrat playing a key role in the health care debate — sold a piece of commercial property in 2007 for substantially more than a county assessment and an independent appraisal say it was worth.

The buyer: an Arkansas-based pharmacy chain with a keen interest in how the debate plays out.

Ross sold Holly’s Health Mart in Prescott, Ark., to USA Drug for $420,000 — an eye-popping price for real estate in a tiny train and lumber town about 100 miles southwest of Little Rock.

“You can buy half the town for $420,000,” said Adam Guthrie, chairman of the county Board of Equalization and the only licensed real estate appraiser in Prescott.

But the $420,000 that USA Drug paid for the pharmacy’s building and land was just the beginning of what Ross and his wife, Holly, made from the sale of Holly’s Health Mart. USA Drug owner Stephen L. LaFrance Sr. also paid the Rosses $500,000 to $1 million for the pharmacy’s assets and paid Holly Ross an additional $100,000 to $250,000 for signing a noncompete agreement. Those numbers, which Mike Ross listed on the financial disclosure reports he files as a member of Congress, bring the total value of the transaction to between $1 million and $1.67 million.

And that’s not counting the $2,300 campaign contribution Ross received from LaFrance two weeks after the sale closed.

Holly Ross remains the pharmacist at Holly’s Health Mart under USA Drug. Neither she nor her husband agreed to speak with ProPublica for this story.

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Mike Ross declined to be interviewed by both The Politico and The Rachel Maddow Show. He did however issue this response to The Politico:

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