The NY Times:
After months of plodding work by five Congressional committees and weeks of back-room bargaining by Democratic leaders, President Obama’s arms-length strategy on health care appears to be paying dividends, with the House and the Senate poised to take up legislation to insure nearly all Americans.
Debate in the House is expected to begin this week, and the Senate will soon take up its version. Democratic leaders and senior White House officials are sounding increasingly confident that Mr. Obama will sign legislation overhauling the nation’s health care system — a goal that has eluded American presidents for decades.
But will the final bill be any good? I’ve seen no consensus on that.
Cerberus
Don’t know because I don’t know what the final version will look like, but my strong suspicion is that it will be just good enough to be a positive change for the better but far worse than what we actually need or would have wanted.
To which, I personally say fine. Our government is pretty well dominated by corporate interests in our second gilded age so any positive progress is good.
kid bitzer
but john: it doesn’t *matter* whether it’s good or not.
what *matters* is whether it’s *bipartisan*.
unless it’s bipartisan, it will make david broder cry. and he’s very sensitive about those kinds of things.
of course, lack of health insurance might make you cry, too, but all of the villagers are very well provided for that way already, thank you.
Karmakin
It doesn’t really matter if the bill is any good…what’s important is how it is enforced.
Those on the left don’t trust the enforcement mechanisms. It’s simple as that.
That said, I suspect the whole thing will be scuttled at the last minute anyway. The foundation concepts of health care reform, eliminating price discrimination for pre-existing conditions…is unworkable for the insurance industry, and all of this is kabuki theater designed to sink the ship without the public knowing really why it’s sunk.
I suspect that health care reform limited to preventing price discrimination would poll very high.
WyldPiratd
John Cole asks:
No, because the Democrats are as corrupt and bought off as the Rethugtards and they are going to take care of the people who are their true constituents first–the industries and groups that buy them off, hire their wives and kinfolk, and give them fat jobs as lobbyists when they get out.
We are fucked as a nation. Nothing will change until there is a revolution and their is chaos and blood on the streets.
WereBear
@Cerberus: What you say is depressingly true:
It’s massive suckitude that it’s been our pattern as a nation. Just reading Impeached, which is actually about Andrew Johnson, the President after Lincoln was assassinated. The Left, which was then Republican, actually impeached him over his handling of the South, which has led to our crisis today.
When you realize there were loud voices in the Congress then, wanting full equality and voting rights, wanting to remake the South so it wouldn’t slide back to its old ways… it’s enough to make me weep.
And it did.
Napoleon
That article is way too premature.
It appears even with the POS public option the bill is so watered down and likely to take so long to impliment I am on the bubble in my opinion on whether it is a net benefit to the Dems to pass it (and without the POS public option it is not).
I really think that Obama’s way of handling this issue really shows him not to be a leader.
Rock
I WyldPiratd is right. The current versions of the bill being debated are worse than doing nothing. They are a huge giveaway to insurance companies.
General Winfield Stuck
That’s because we don’t how the end game will play out yet. The heavily compromised versions being put forth to go thru the sausage grinder leave a lot to be desired to put it mildly, especially with the PO they will include. But Lieberman and maybe some others have said no to ANY kind of PO in the final bill and any defection by any dem will stop it cold.
Then the PO will have to be stripped out of the Senate bill just to get something passed to go to conference for a final bill and vote that will likely be filibustered again, at least the PO part if it comes out of conference with one.
Then, it’s game on for the Recon. Process, which will likely see the lib senators take center stage and pass a PO standalone bill that could be very good. And pass the rest of the reforms separate by regular order.
IOW” we are just getting started now, and nothing is writ in stone, or anywhere near it.
Rock
And I have to agree with Napolean as well. Obama’s failed leadership is what brought this awful bill to the table.
WyldPiratd
ah for fuck’s sakes…”there” not ‘their’.
why have edit functions disappeared?
General Winfield Stuck
So actually, at the end of the day. Lieberman’s douchebaggery could wind up being good for getting a robust PO, which is clearly budget related and would likely pass muster with the Byrd Rule in the recon. process.
donovong
The final bill will sure as hell not be as good as it SHOULD be, but it will be a tremendous improvement on what we have now. The elimination of “pre-existing conditions,” lifetime caps and recission will be literal lifesavers. Support for low-income citizens to finally get adequate health care will mean the world to them, and take a great deal of pressure off of hospital ER’s. Assuming, of course, that enforcement is adequate.
I would like to see the PO in the final edition, but really do not consider it to be the end of the world if it has to hit the cutting room floor for the bill to pass both houses.
Phoenix Woman
FDL’s been the go-to blog on this for months now.
beltane
This whole process has left me more bitter and disgusted than I ever could have imagined. Our system is broken beyond the point of repair. It’s not just the Republicans and corporate Democrats who suck, it is also some on the left who have drifted into tyrannical insanity (have any of you checked out Jane Hamsher lately?). Right now, I’m sick of just about every player in this process.
J.W. Hamner
Most of the comments in this thread are why I find this debate so maddening. While I understand the politics of Progressives saying “current versions of the bill being debated are worse than doing nothing”… that is a statement with no basis in fact.
I can only guess people who say such things don’t actually know anyone who has a preexisting condition or otherwise unable to afford health insurance. Everything on the table is a HUGE step forward… whether or not it is a step on the path to single payer. I have trouble understanding how people who claim to care about the underprivileged and the working class can fail to see that.
aimai
donovong,
I disagree. I’m afraid Karmakin, way upthread, is right. You can’t regulate the profit out of the Insurance industry–by preventing recission, forcing them to actually pay out large sums of money to cover people, no pre-existing conditions etc… without creating a para-insurance scheme like the robust public option or some form of single payer to catch the fall out when the Insurance companies decide they’d rather go into casino ownership (where the house always wins).
One of two things will happen: the insurance companies will sucessfully scam the new regulations (a near sure thing) or they will force more and more problematic people into the weak public option and shed costs that way onto the state and then go belly up and refuse to insure anyone.
There’s a whole lot of preventable deaths and preventable havoc between the implementation of a half assed solution to the problem (which is what we are getting) and a good bill (which is emphatically what we are not getting.)
I don’t object to the observation that corruption is bipartisan. It clearly is. But why does stupidity have to also be bipartisan? The best bill evah is damned good for future graft and goodies since it would guarantee the democrats control over the levers of power from now until kingdom come. I can’t understand why the democratic leadership doesn’t make that point crystal clear to the blue dogs. I would have pointed out to them that they will lose their seats over a partial, bad, corporatist bill and there won’t be enough deep k street pockets to fully employ their asses afterwards. But if they stick with a full throated liberal, populist, progressive bill now the dems will take care of them with the usual graft afterwards.
aimai
martha
@Phoenix Woman: PW, I love you, but FDL lost a longtime reader–me–months ago. And I was there from the start. Let’s just say I’m not pure enough for them anymore.
Lola
@J.W. Hamner:
Here, here. I get very angry when I read progressives write that doing nothing is better than changing a health care system that many are excluded from or is causing bankruptcies. This type of lack of empathy and lack of understanding of the bill is just disturbing.
For people to claim that Obama is a weak leader after he has presided over health care passing all committees in the House and Senate is just delusional.
Once a health care bill is passed the groundwork will be laid to make it better and more cost effective in the future. It will be a pretty good bill that will be improved and tweaked as time goes by.
If we pass nothing there will be no progress, no groundwork laid. I will be very happy when this bill passes. It will be the greatest legislative victory for the American people in decades.
Xenos
My wife, who is European, is in London this week. She was asking how to explain to the people she is meeting there what is going on in Congress and why it is taking so long to work something out. The best explanation I could come up with is that, as is typical for Americans, we will do the right thing once we have eliminated all the alternatives. We are just neck-deep min alternatives right now.
WereBear
It’s true: both Social Security and Medicare were not legislated into the options we know today with the first legislation. They evolved into their present state with incremental popularity pushing it along.
So it will be with health care.
I was radicalized when young by my disgust that the (to me, anyway) obvious best solution wasn’t even considered by those around me, for reasons I found both incomprehensible and specious.
That hasn’t changed.
rachel
Obama should have lead the charge on HCR like Clinton did! We’d’ve had it in the bag if only… What? Clinton failed to get it done?
Never mind.
jenniebee
Is it possible that what we’re really seeing here is a shift from the last, what, five or six decades of executive-centric federal government to a more legislative-centric, weak executive model?
Not saying that Obama is weak or a weak leader, but it’s rather novel to see the president call on Congress to do a little heavy lifting. And a weak executive model of government has a lot of advantages for progressive causes. Yes, there’s a lot of sausage making, but if this is the beginning of a trend, it’s a blow to the executive surveillance state, to the shadow government, to the principle of war-by-executive-order… It’s startling to think about it, but the authority to take the country to war lies solely with the congress, and yet we’ve made such a fetish of the strong executive that we’ve been at “war” in Afghanistan for nine years by executive order with no declaration of war (just the fig leaf of the AUMF).
Porlock Junior
“The best bill evah is damned good for future graft and goodies since it would guarantee the democrats control over the levers of power from now until kingdom come.”
Had to stop and re-read that to be sure that I got its meaning. Which was unnecessary since the next sentences made it clear enough. Anyway, this is the most cynical thing I have read lately, and also the most true and relevant: a correlation that has no element of surprise in it.
I make no comment on Obama’s leadership here, because this week and probably from now on, it would just make me sound like a concern troll sent by FDL.
What is sending me over the wall is the PO, which is ever more clearly the POS. Apparently the thing we’re getting (till BHO wins the 15-dimensional hyperchess game, which I fervently hope he does) is to be available only to certain privileged groups, or Lucky Duckies. Meanwhile, I shall be required by law to fork over my money to the fucking insurance companies. Such a deal! I guess this will save me from getting any poor-people cooties?
This is called an Option, a Choice, a way of proving effective competition to the private insurers. Or something.
But of course the people who don’t now have access to insurance are a lousy risk group, and who would want to be insured at rates that apply to that group?
Really now, just what is the PO supposed to do, anyway? Insure everyone who wants, while running like a competent non-profit insurance program? I.e., instant bankruptcy due to perverse selection unless the private companies are forced into non-discriminatory pricing based on the entire population as an insurance pool. Did I miss where that was part of the plan?
Or is it just the best political subterfuge for providing the large Federal subsidies that will be necessary to get everyone insured? It’s a fucking lousy one, then, since it provides no way to tap into the 50% of American health costs that are flat-out wasted now. (Per capita cost at present, compared to countries in which people live longer than in the US)
Seriously, WTF?
WyldPiratd
J.W. [email protected]
I call bullshit on this.
I am in the group of people that has a “pre-existing conditions. I lost my job because of the fuckups of the bankers. 35% of my unemployment is going for my COBRA premium. Another 15% is going to co-pays for meds. If I can’t land a job by next September, I’m fucked. I may be fucked before then as I’m digging into my relatively meager savings to make ends meet now.
The point isn’t that the HCR bill sucks, but still helps some people. The point is that health care should not be a for profit industry. People’s lives should not be callously disregarded for the benefit and enrichment of shareholders in insurance, pharmaceutical and other medically related industries.
We already pay more in taxes for medicare/medicaid alognfg with the tax benefits for industry to provide insurance for employees than the cost of most other industrialized nations to provide health insurance to ALL of their people.
We are getting fucked–coming and going.
Ann B. Nonymous
@jenniebee: I think this is exactly what’s going on. We’ve gotten so used to the unitary executive that it’s genuinely shocking to see a more equal balance between the legislative and executive branches.
Did we like our previous elected king? I don’t even like the concept of an elected king.
Porlock Junior
That didn’t come out quite as I expected, of course. First of all, it whould have started @aimai to give due credit; I was lax in updating the comments and seeing the amount of intervening traffic.
Also, I somehow dropped the “fine with me” in the part about providing the necessary subsidies. It’s the adoption of a method guaranteed not to reform the system, thereby saving enough to finance the change and make other improvements, that is not fine.
lol
FDL is the death panel crowd of the left.
Porlock Junior
Also. The ineffective Executive, held by by the Legislative counter-force, would interest me a lot more if the latter had shown any more interest than the Excutive has in matters other than preserving corporate privilege.
Do you remember how many United States Senators voted against the PATRIOT act? Do you remember his name?
Good fellow and all that, but there is only one of Feingold, and he’s a Jew who can’t threaten to get elected President; and the massive increase in those who saw the light on renewal of the act 5 years later was only 900%, not enough to begin making the base of a power bloc.
Is there any suggestion here that the Congress is even slightly better on policy overall than Obama? Yeah, lots of them griped in one way or another at one time or another about the Bailout, most of them being corporate lackeys: big help. Is there a shred of evidence that they’re about to get better? Can you translate this into numbers in the houses of Congress?
gwangung
Your comment would interest me as a substantive post if you also realized that a weak Executive branch would mean a lot more work has to be done by individual people to pressure individual legislators.
As it is, it sounds like you want someone to do your work for you.
The Raven
3/8s bad.
I figure it this way: the Senate has taken a bad bill and combined it with a half-bad bill, creating a bill that is 3/4s bad. This will be combined with the House bill, which is pretty good. So the result will be 3/8s bad.
Croak!
Karmakin
One other thing.
All the complaints about the Democrats being “tools of Wall Street” is somewhat unfair IMO. We still live in a society that views the strength of the economy as being tied to the strength of the speculation…er…investment markets.
Furthermore, I find that ignoring the reality of a sudden switch to a single payer system and its effects on the overall economy…efficiency kills jobs. And the switch to single payer would be the biggest efficiency/productivity boost you can imagine.
Now, I still think it’s single payer, or in the long-run, die. However, it can’t just be health care reform. It has to be part of a much bigger economic reform and modernization package. And that’s something that frankly, is probably too big and too scary to contemplate.
Woodrow "asim" Jarvis Hill
@gwangung:
Exactly.
Keep in mind, both Obama and Biden taught Constitutional Law for years. What Obama is doing is both canny politically, and how the branches were setup. The Executive branch is not there to create laws.
But it’s easier to target a single President, than to move hundreds of CongressCritters, esp. when the the Pres is on the news all the time, and does have a lot of power. OTOH, any lobbyist’ll tell you it’s more important to target the right person in Congress, than to try to tempt the President.
Sloegin
Still have a nagging suspicion that the final bill will be a disaster for the Dems; it includes the worst mandate of the bunch, not single-payer, not employer-mandate… but individual mandate.
Sticking relatively healthy young people with a new, multi-$$ per year bill where their need for health care and their discretionary income are both small is going to go over like a lead balloon. Everyone seems to have forgotten how young people barely scrape by once they get out of school; this dud of a bill may keep those people in that spot for a much longer time.
I’m not looking at the benefits or the need to do this, ‘just looking at the politics of it.
Kirk Spencer
@Porlock Junior: ummm, no. yes. maybe.
OK, I’ve been dissecting the house bill and the more I look the more impressed I am, even though it’s “only” a good, not great, bill.
The really important thing (IMO) about the house bill is the mandatory exchange it creates of which the public option is, well, one option.
The exchange (read market) will include bills that meet a bunch of mandatory minimum standards. These standards include what’s covered and certain pricing elements. They ALSO include a lot of open documentation TO INCLUDE history of how often claims in the plan have been rejected.
A lot is made about how the exchange doesn’t start till 2013, and even then it will take three or more years till it’s available to everyone. Not many people have dug through to discover that some health care starts immediately (as in within 45 days of passage of bill), and what the criteria are for when the insurance starts.
To put it simply, the way it’s written a lot of people presently uncovered (Particularly those with “preexisting conditions”) get covered early and most of those left uncovered fall into the Y1 (2013) group.
If you want to read the bill for what it’s providing for you the person wanting health care, you really only need to read the first 360 or so pages – Division A. The remaining parts are changes to Medicare and Medicaid (Division B), changes to rules and laws for health care providers (Division C) and changes to laws regarding Indians (division D). And just under half the entire bill (1990 pages total) is in Division B.
Woodrow "asim" Jarvis Hill
@Sloegin:
OK, to nip this in the bud:
This House bill is not the final Bill. Nor is the Senate bill.
Both bills will get amendments on the floor, which are like Final Jeopardy — the points can really change.
Assuming they get passed without reconciliation (which would almost certainly break up the bill), then the House and Senate versions are pulled together into one bill for final passage. This is the stage where many people think the White House will actually have the most pull, and we know Obama is pretty anti-mandate, and aware of the potential political issues with it.
You’re free to note what you will about aspects of the various bills floating around. But please don’t assume that one of many bills out there is “the” version. We simply don’t know, at this stage, what’ll come out of this process, and yes, it oftentimes looks like a mess. As previously noted, so did Social Security when it first came on the scene.
Mr Furious
@WyldPiratd: Nothing that comes out of Congress—good or bad—will do jack to help you between now and next September anyway.
Kirk Spencer
@Sloegin:
Actually, it comes very close to an employer mandate.
Employers have three choices. They can provide a plan. They can subsidize employees’ individual plans. Or they can pay an excise tax into the Exchange’s trust fund. The excise tax is 8% of total payroll wages for companies with annual payrolls of over $750,000. Companies with annual payrolls under $500,000 are excused, and those with payrolls between the two have a graduated excise tax.
Anyone who makes less than 350% of the federal poverty level for their family size (well, any household that makes less) gets credits to reduce the premiums, cost-sharing, and max out-of-pocket amount to bearable levels. In addition, an employee who’s employer offers a plan that requires over 12% AGI will receive subsidization of the excess.
One more REALLY IMPORTANT thing that matters which nobody seems to be discussing. Medicaid eligibility levels are raised to 133% (well, 150% in some portions) of FPL. Right now, the national average for non-working parents is 41% of FPL (for some states it is as low as 10% FPL), and working parents the national average is 55% FPL.
The bill works on a LOT of margins and in the process comes close to closing the holes.
It isn’t a great bill. It is, however, a bill that will make things a LOT better for most of those in need.
donovong
@aimai: I don’t disagree with you, but I don’t accept the argument that the PO – in any form – is the do all to end all, either. I would love a super-strong PO that leads directly to Single Payer in a nano-second, but I will take the incremental package instead of drawing some line in the sand over the public option. The argument that nothing is better than a package without the PO is nearsighted and silly.
And, yes, no matter what is passed, the insurance companies will game the system. So what else is new?
J.W. Hamner
@WyldPiratd:
This is probably true, but if my choices are “incrementalist bullshit” or “streets running red with the blood of capitalist dogs,” then I guess I have to pick the former.
General Winfield Stuck
Newt – “It won’t make any difference”
K Street Hoes
The prevalence of lobbyist influence on the government has probably done more to damage this country than any other threat in our lifetime. We have the best congress money can buy. We shouldn’t be surprised that ANY legislation by congress is skewed towards corporate interests. Government of the corporations, by the corporations, for the corporations is here to stay : ^ (
Elie
Ok. I get it. I won’t get upset anymore.
It appears more important to have the issue (it will never work, we will end up with nothing, it will be worse than nothing, Obama is weak, etc) for some. No amount of facts about the process or anything else impact these comments. No point in commenting on them anymore..
JennieBee — you may be right about the “Weak Executive” point that you make. Many others also comment on the way we can’t know just yet what we will end up with. Yes, agree.
I know that whatever passes will not be good enough, cheap enough in enough time, cover the right people or enough people or be implemented correctly and Obama is Fail and we are just screwed and better if we never did this anyway cause I want a revolution! Let the little people bleed so we can destroy the insurance industry!
WyldPiratd
Mr. [email protected]
Elie
I just can’t help myself so here it goes…
It is totally amazing to me, given what we know of about every American politico/governmental or business institution – the frequency of corruption, the less than stellar integrity and golden reputations of our congressional leadership and the business of healthcare as it exists now in the US, that so many of you would expect a perfect and completely citizen focused outcome from health care or any other legislation. What organization/s do you think are doing this?
Rather than saying, shit, I can’t believe that we got anything even started, (and forget that we don’t have a final bill to even comment upon yet), its like, you KNOW its going to suck and that it wont do any good… If you already knew that, why did you even support change when you voted? How did you think that change was going to happen? That O was going to use some other system that he evolved by snapping his fingers and wiggling his nose? How did you think the legislative process was going to work?
Honestly, I can’t decide whether this is just stupidity or some sort of mental illness based on denial of reality. Wake up! Our system is a wacky, distorted machine and we are doing our best, in fact probably blowing a few gaskets, trying to get anything done! The only thing it does easily is make tax breaks. Anything else is hard to impossible. Its a miracle that we have even got anything done at all and here some of you are ranting, RANTING that already you know its not good enough and what a waste a time.
Enough. I got to shut up and move on.
Nick
@Phoenix Woman:
Speaking as somebody who is pretty close to people on the Hill…I can’t name one member of Congress whose vote Jane Hamsher moved toward a better bill…I can name five Hamsher moved toward a worse bill.
Nick
@Porlock Junior: Keep in mind Feingold is the same guy who voted to confirm Alberto Gonzales, voted to allow guns on Amtrak and in national parks, voted against releasing funds to close Gitmo, and voted to sustain a Republican filibuster of the Matthew Shepherd Act because it was part of the defense budget (voting no I understand, but he voted to sustain the damn filibuster)
I’m reasonable sure President Feingold would be sending some pearl clutching liberal bloggers into a rage as well.
Nick
@Ann B. Nonymous: Americans don’t do legislative democracy. We like strong decision makers, except when they make the wrong decisions, then we don’t like them anymore.
Obama is a President that fits a country in Europe (which is probably where I belong), but in the US, it’s a stretch.
Still, I take it as a good sign that he’s still popular.
Nick
@J.W. Hamner:
Howard Dean agrees.
I’m sure Jane Hamsher will skewer him now too.
Nick
@Elie: There’s a term for it…called delusions of grandeur.
Elie
Nick:
I don’t think so. I think many folks just have no idea about 1) how the system is supposed to work and 1) working any system where there is need to evolve consensus and negotiate with anyone. We like to bang our shoes on the table and demand, demand, me,me,me,what I think is the only thing that is important.
A nation of infants. No tolerance for process, no tolerance for the give and take of working with others and no ability to see big picture or plan for the medium and long term. Everything has to be apparent immediately or else it doesnt exist and not trust means it could NEVAH exist. Nothing evolves or develops. Power is absolute and does not grow, there is no momentum built from past successes. If something doesnt work right this minute, its NEVAH going to work. Its all right here right now and no one has either the trust or cognitive ability to perceive anything around strategy. Period. Or trade offs or prioritization. Everything is equally important and necessary to see and do immediately.
WyldPiratd
Elie
Nick
@Elie: No, they don’t and it’s unfortunate, but we get the government we deserve. If what Americans want are rash decisions, that’s what they’ll elect.
chrome agnomen
haven’t read the comments yet.
i will not be surprised if a lousy bill passes. what will also not surprise me is that if a lousy bill passes, the state of the health care system in this country is so bad, and sure to get much, much worse, that there will be a titanic uproar from the great unwashed that will force the lawmakers back to the table. the anger toward the health ‘care’ industry seems to be held in check now only because there is a collective waiting to see what the outcome of the current reform will be.
Elie
Wildpiradt:
I said:
“We like to bang our shoes on the table and demand, demand, me,me,me,what I think is the only thing that is important.”
Some of what you said:
“But some of the concessions made—particularly the patent protection on biologics—are insane. ”
Also about terms like Obama’s “pussytude” for not bargaining the way YOU think…(I hear bang, bang bang , demand,demand, my way is theonlyway, bang,bang,bang because I know how to do it and its only my way to do it”)
..And I bet YOU would have done it just right and everything would all be done and perfect because you would have known how to bargain only from position of strength and Obama only wanted weakness, to capitulate and give in cause he wanted weakeness and the worst kind of health care bill to pass because he is weak and scared and doesnt know how to do anything without being told by experts like yourself.
WyldPiratd
Elie,
Pretty obvious that you’ve never negotiated a damn thing in your life.
And I made no claim that I would do “it” better, but I have read a bit about the extended patent protections given in the bills to the pharmaceutical companies.
Obama’s biggest fault is that he is too hung up on the notion of “bipartisanship” and he hasn’t had the balls to put his foot on the scales. He has a fencepost up his ass and is too worried about playing nice. Already you see the Dems in the Senate not worried in the least about opposing him and threatening to wreck what would be the biggest positive achievement for America since Medicare and the Civil Rights Act.
The “pussytude” Obama is displaying is going to cost him bigtime; particularly if Dems lose major ground next year.
Personally, I think you need to pull your head out of your ass when your not too busy being an ass-kissing Obama apologist. You seem way too worried about bitching at anyone that has the temerity to criticize Obama and the Dems on their differing current incarnations of the HCR bill(s).
Finally I leave you with this earlier gem from you:
But you in your infinite all-knowingness know how these “systems” are “supposed” to work.
Hubris much?
General Winfield Stuck
@WyldPiratd:
Hey dude,. Go fuck yourself sideways you arrogant piece of shit.
Elie
WildPradt:
If you had command of your arguments without name calling…
I have negotiated plenty. Probably way more than YOU. But that is not the point. Any negotiator knows that the process of negotiation is not a hard template that can be placed on a situation a priori, but depends on the issue, the players and the agreements and understandings already on the table and many other things..
I like discussions with people on the site here. Typically, even if we disagree, I always learn and get and a feeling of mutual respect. Just reading the discussion is informative even if I dont post but cruise.
You are just an angry person with an ax to grind –your point of view seems less about values you hold than an opportunity to abuse and express your anger. I am not that punching bag. Pfft — go away…
WyldPiratd
GWS:
I don’t recall addressing you GWS, but maybe I will after I get done with your mother and wife.
Elie
Thanks Herr General Winfield…
appreciate that you got my back
General Winfield Stuck
@Elie:
No problem Ellie.
Asswipes need religion sometimes.