Apparently President Nelson, who had no Plan B, if you recall, is back to Plan A- making threats:
Even if all other issues on the health bill are resolved, abortion remains the hardest for Nelson. Regardless of the wording, he demands one result: no federal abortion funds.
“If I don’t get it, I can’t support cloture [ending the filibuster] on the next round,” he said.
The entire thing is nothing but a nauseating puff piece, replete with syrupy odes to Nelson’s conscience and his moral dilemma, and quite honestly was the kind of thing that makes me want to kick puppies. Oh, and the author is DougJ’s good buddy Paul Kane.
On the upside, you do have to appreciate that our elected officials have all the sophistication of the underpants gnomes:
Step 1- Make Threats
Step 2- ????
Step 3- Profit!
What a clown.
demkat620
So other than Eugene Robinson and EJ Dionne, what other non GOP fluffers do the WAPO editors employ?
mellowjohn
i don’t want to kick puppies. i want to kick president nelson around the block!
GReynoldsCT00
This will only be until next week, when it’s Lieberman’s turn in the spotlight again
demkat620
And yes, I know Nelson is a dem.
If he blocks HCR, he won’t be for longer. He’ll need to switch.
beltane
Is Nelson’s precious conscience troubled by Americans dying for lack of health insurance? Do huge insurance company profits create a moral dilemma for him? I refuse to read the article but I’m guessing the answer is no.
Keith
Shorter Ben Nelson: “Pleeeeaaaaaase don’t ignore me!”
Robin G.
I wonder if Paul Kane tells his mother what he does for a living, or if he invents something more dignified.
BruceFromOhio
Not gonna click it, no more hits to WPs’ site.
I wonder how Tom Delay kept his troops in line in the House back in the day. His nickname, “The Hammer,” didn’t just fall out of the sky. Seems the Dem Caucus could use a little hammering of late.
Nelson is backed into a corner – he’s gone on record, thinks he can’t change his position, blah blah blah. Like President McCain, as long as Teh Librul Media keeps sticking a microphone in his face, he’s going to keep squacking.
Kryptik
@demkat620:
Ezra. That’s…about it though.
And I’m still betting on all three of them being shitcanned within the year for either ‘cost cutting measures’ or ‘unacceptable controversy’.
As for Nelson….fuck him. And the rest of the Blue Dogs as well.
Dems only get good coverage when they want to block something that’s being proposed by other, more liberal dems. Whenever they want to block something Republican (you know, like they did so tokenly during the Bush years?), the question always seems to be instead about why they hate America so to be so partisan.
Bipartisanship is useless as long as it effectively stands for ‘Cater to the Republican Party or else’.
truculent and unreliable
Is Nelson a C Street guy? I know Stupak is.
leinie
@beltane:
This. Not to mention the women who could DIE from complications of that pregnancy that went wrong, but now, they can’t get treatment because Ben might have a qualm about it.
I’m so fucking sick of these fuckers.
I don’t want public money going to fund little blue boner pills, fucker. I don’t approve of Nelson using it to get laid.
Notorious P.A.T.
maebie benn nelsun shudd goe ohn sunDaai tak shoz annd doi ah peiog hiipwa thh ;oiaowe h!ac.
dmsilev
I refuse to give the Post the pageview, so I’m not going to read the article. Did Nelson explain why the Hyde Amendment, after decades of banning federal funds for abortion, is suddenly insufficient?
-dms
Starfish
Those underpants gnomes are more of a threat than you might think.
Meg
@truculent and unreliable,
yes, Nelson also is a member of the Family.
kay
“One alternative is a proposal from Rep. Brad Ellsworth (D-Ind.) that would require the health secretary to use private contractors to divide premiums for elective abortions under the public option from other amounts paid to the federal government. ”
Mind-boggling. Imagine if any other lobbying group got this kind of deference.
I’d like a private contractor to reallocate the portion of my check to the IRS that goes to religious groups. I want it to go to ACORN. I feel strongly that public dollars shouldn’t be funneled to fundamentalist religious. It’s a principled stand.
truculent and unreliable
@Meg: Thanks. I thought he was. Those guys creep me out.
MikeJ
At which point you’ll hear noises about bloated bureaucracy. And the bill is too many pages.
scav
OT but relevant in light of the reasons to keep on living that make your jaw drop but don’t involve LazyBoys or cats
THIS
Zoom.
More infoHere
All in all, I think I like the neighborhood although some of the neighbors seem to be currently bat shit insane.
Gozer
As I’ve said before, our government is ridiculous and the senate is clearly its most ridiculous part.
burnspbesq
@GReynoldsCT00:
In fairness to Lieberman, he did walk to the Capitol today (no riding in a car on the Sabbath) to provide the 60th vote to break a potential filibuster of the big appropriations bill.
I am highly confident that he will return to being a cancer on the body politic … umm … right about now.
kay
@dmsilev:
No. The article did go into great detail about how Nelson keeps a paper napkin as a memento of his negotiations with Cheney, over tax cuts. Dick Cheney jotted down some numbers on a napkin when he was giving Nelson marching orders on backing the Bush tax cuts.
He keeps that memento to attest to his shrewd negotiation skills.
Cheney said “jump!” , and Nelson said “how high, Mr. President?” Cheney wrote the order on a napkin, perhaps so Nelson could refer to it on the Senate floor.
Healthcare Reform
Now here’s some drama for you:
GOP Plan A. Logan’s Run – Nobody lives past 30.
GOP Plan B. Soylent Green – It’s people, baby.
dr. bloor
@demkat620:
To what, “Nebraska for Nelson?” Big fat hairy farking deal. There are no consequences for counterproductive, obstructive tanrum-throwing in this senate. None, nada, zip, zilch, nothing.
Leelee for Obama
@Robin G.: He told her he’s a pimp. It has the added benefit of being true.
Comrade Darkness
Those of us with moral dilemmas about torture and hiring thugs to rape kill on our behalf with no oversight should just go fuck ourselves, I guess.
I understand that optimally, we need the press. But these guys are worse than no press at all and I will cheer and drink when they go under.
Tom_23
This stuff is too depressing. OT – More adoption stories!
El Cid
From the Independent, London, a free podcast / streaming discussion:
Too bad they couldn’t get real journalists on who had the perspective of having lived through the hell which was White House gate crashing gate.
donovong
If nothing else, I have gained a very deep insight into why Obama wanted so badly to get out of the Senate. He actually wants to DO SOMETHING and that is just about impossible in that clusterfuck of an organization.
kay
I think it is so smart of pro-life activists to block health care access to all women.
It’s not like women have babies, or anything. And there’s no Biblical connection between the prospective mother’s health and the eventual baby’s health, although there might be some science.
I think we should pass health care reform and exclude women completely. Women have all these issues. Fast-track it. Just men and children. I guess we can cover girl children.
It would be so great if you could produce babies without involving women, and their “demands”.
calipygian
Speaking of drama queens, Andy McCarthy at The Corner is busy simultaneously pissing and shitting his pants in terror.
How does a man that cowardly get out of bed in the morning?
asiangrrlMN
@dmsilev: Ditto this. It’s the same thing I wanna scream at Stupak whenever he blathers about his amendment being in line with the Hyde Amendment–then why the fuck do we need his precious amendment? Same question to Nelson–what the fuck is wrong with the Hyde Amendment, you cretinous moron?
kay, you’re being sarcastic, but I think it comes down to this. Goddamn it. Fuck the motherfuckers with a rusty pitchfork twelve billionty ways of Sunday.
dmsilev
@donovong: True, that. It does make you wonder why we’re not hearing more calls for reforming the arcane and absurd rules that the Senate works under.
Not that calling for changes will have much effect of course; the Senate makes its own rules, and too many Senators are egomaniacs in love with their own little fiefdoms.
-dms
kay
@calipygian:
I’m really pleased they’re going forward. Write you Senator, and support Holder.
Many Democrats joined the detainee fear-monger bandwagon, last time, in Congress. They can’t close the Cuban prison without moving the detainees. If we want them to keep this promise, we’re going to have to defend them from Democrats in Congress.
dmsilev
@asiangrrlMN: I seem to remember someone asking Stupak about why Hyde was suddenly inadequate, and he responded like a threatened squid: spray a cloud of ink, and run away in the confusion.
-dms
Mike G
a nauseating puff piece, replete with syrupy odes
How could I guess that this would be from the Washington Pest before I even clicked the link.
kay
@calipygian:
I hope it’s legit, but it’s on “Big Government”, so it’s probably not.
I’ll have to wait for someone honest to verify.
Leelee for Obama
@kay: Kay-you have to watch “The People Speak” tomorrow night on History Channel. It’s based on Howard Zinn’s People’s History and a young actress will do Soujourner Truth’s “Ain’t I A Woman?” speech. It brings down the house!
Truth is, they still haven’t gotten the Lysistrata Treatment in this country, and more and more, I think it must happen. Slam it in the window till women are really equal. Gives a whole new meaning to: “My wife says I never listen to her, or something like that.”
This, of course, does not include enlightened men, only troglodytes.
asiangrrlMN
@dmsilev: Heh. You made me laugh. Kudos to you.
Jim
Sweet Jeebus. That headline is unbelievable. I couldn’t get past it. I’m sure the whole story is in the same, oh poor ben, he simply can’t vote for health care because he’s too moral. Fuckers.
kay
@Leelee for Obama:
I will watch it, and thanks.
I’ll take practical over principled any day regarding babies.
I talk to teenage pregnant girls who are raiding their parent’s medicine cabinet because they feel “dizzy”, and I am not a health care professional and should not be dispensing advice, and these idiots are going to allocate money to hire private contractors to divide premium payments?
Call me crazy, but if I were running around bleating about how much I loved babies, I might take that money and hire a goddamned NURSE.
August J. Pollak
I don’t understand why Democrats haven’t yet accepted that he’s not voting for health care reform. Neither is Lieberman. There is no “60th vote” because they don’t even have a 59th.
Why there’s still some fantasy of “Nelson is screwed if Dems don’t pass HCR” is beyond me. It won’t affect him at all and there are no threats being levied against him.
He. Doesn’t. Want. Any. Health. Reform. Bill.
Just Some Fuckhead
Paul Kane, history buff, still spreading this false story:
kay
@August J. Pollak:
I have to reluctantly agree with you. I don’t think Leiberman ever intended to vote for any bill, and that’s why Obama went after Snowe. Leiberman gives people like Nelson cover, and all he needs is one.
In my opinion, it does not help matters that (I believe) Reid gives pro-lifers too much deference because he is pro-life.
I’m also not seeing any substantive financial reform making it out of the Senate. That thing’s gonna be stripped bare by the time it leaves the Chamber of the Bought and Paid For.
I’m stumped. I don’t know how anything good comes out of the Senate.
Jim
@kay:
Yup. This was the great mystery of the quest for bipartisanship that all the purists won’t stop mocking, and why I never got excited about sixty votes, though Nelson wasn’t even on my radar. LieberNelson give cover to Lincoln, Bayh, Landrieu and probably a few others (Feinstein, Pryor, Conrad) who fundamentally just don’t want it.
Short term it pays no benefits, but they should just boot Lieberman now.
Leelee for Obama
@kay: Isn’t it just remarkable how they set up a strawman argument, weep over the problems they cause, and then come up with yet another layer of bureaucracy to handle the clusterfuck, instead of telling the twisted knickers crowd the STFU and worry about their own damn souls.
BruceFromOhio
@Meg:
This fungal plague plagues us still. Can DoJ charge the bunch under any kind of RICO statute? These Family types are certainly constituting a threat to democracy of late.
BruceFromOhio
@Healthcare Reform:
GOP Plan C. I Am Legend – Crazed zombies threaten everything.
kay
@Jim:
Nelson wasn’t on my radar either, but I did know Lieberman was probably the reason for Snowe.
I think it would have a profound effect if they would impose real sanctions on Lieberman, though, so I disagree with you there.
They won’t get his vote, of course, but he’s made no concessions, at all. I think letting him jerk them around and use opposition to Democratic legislation as a campaign platform for the next 3 years is a huge mistake.
Killing health care will make him a hero in the GOP. It almost assures his re-election. Republicans will come out in droves to support him.
I’m a compromiser, generally, but just letting this continue is a disaster. No voter is going to respect Democrats if they can’t use the rules to their advantage.
GregB
Little known fact. Fred Flintstone’s head was modeled after Sen. Ben Nelson’s.
-G
burnspbesq
@BruceFromOhio:
A useful thought exercise would be to identify three actual sections of the actual Title 18 of the United States Code that these people can be proven, beyond a reasonable doubt, to have violated. Once you’ve done that, we can talk about RICO.
They are a horror-show, to be sure, but there is a difference between being a horror-show and being a criminal enterprise.
kay
@Leelee for Obama:
Well, I use to spend some time defending them, not a lot, but some.
No more. To me, they’re the absolute picture of ideologues who pontificate but offer no practical help or solution to back it up. I’ll skip the lecture on the sanctity of life, thanks, and go right to the blood pressure check.
Nelson should stop the self-indulgent agonizing, and see if he can come up with anything tangible and helpful.
Notorious P.A.T.
Let’s face it: the reason government cares what religious groups like that say is because so many people are religious. If there were a thousand theists in America, no religious leader would be able to amass power like this. Don’t foist responsibility onto the DoJ.
BruceFromOhio
@burnspbesq:
Thanks, burns. RICO was a big, giant stretch of fantasy anyway. Any bunch that goes by “the Family” reminds me of the Gambinos, Cosa Nostra, Jimmy Hoffa, and the mob hits of the ’70s: turf battles that did a lot of damage and not much else.
Leelee for Obama
@kay: Their only purpose seems to be to gum up the works and pound their self-righteous chests. I’ve lived too long to defend their crap. I’d prefer that my tax dollars wouldn’t pay for long term incarceration of pot-smokers, or for unnecessary wars or, or any number of things. Imagine the bureaucracy needed to separate all those funds! No one gives a shit what I want, why do these people get this kind of attention? The only time I want someone’s crisis of conscience honored is when they might be ordered to do something morally abhorrent to them. Killing in the line of duty can’t apply, because we have a volunteer military now. Police and other law enforcement, same story. No one should be ordered to perform an abortion, but they can work in a Catholic Hospital or in a Dr.s office that feels the same. I don’t even have an issue with the pharmacists not giving out Birth Control or Morning after meds, as long as there is someone else who can, and will. Other than that, it’s not anyone else’s body, or, by their definition, anyone else’s sin, and they should butt the f___ out.
Done and done.
Jim
@Notorious P.A.T.:
Yup. I keep banging my head against a figurative wall that teh Family hasn’t gotten more attention, but to probably 75% of the country, their only reaction would be, to paraphrase Emil Faber, “Religion is Good”.
burnspbesq
@BruceFromOhio:
I like your taste in fantasies. My fantasy is that Grover Norquist will be caught using the National Federation of Independent Business’ money to buy crack and hookers for Max Baucus.
Leelee for Obama
@burnspbesq: Max seems like a pretty middle of the road serial polygamist, not much chance there. How about a three-way with Joementum and the Missus and Bibi Netanyahu. That would make headlines everywhere, no?
kay
@Leelee for Obama:
I don’t know. I look at how (let’s face it) successful extremists on abortion have been and get really frightened for women and access to birth control. They’ve effectively limited access to early abortion and part of how they’ve done that is the lunatics among them shot a bunch of doctors, and scared the living hell out of the rest. That worked.
If you read pro-life sites, it’s life from conception. As you know if you’ve ever read an insert on a birth control package, chemical contraception can be an abortificant, if the definition is “conception”. We also know that from the morning after pill “controversy”.
These aren’t people who compromise. And they’ve done it before. Which is how we ended up at Roe in the first place, when they moved to outlaw contraception in Connecticut.
scav
A lot of people say they are religious. Empirically? I’ve not seen much sign of it, not when I compare the output to the design specs and manuals. I don’t even bother to believe the advertising, let alone the self congratulatory posturing and self back slapping gymnastic sessions.
Napoleon
@burnspbesq:
I like how you think.
All this stuff bums me out. I can’t wait to take the Christmas train ride tonight with my niece so I can get lost in the fantasy (which she will believe) that the train is going to the North Pole.
Oh, and any Dem who votes against closure should be stripped of all their committee chairs and vice chairs, and if they do it again all their committee assignments.
BruceFromOhio
@Leelee for Obama:
Wow, this thread went toxic in a hurry. And it’s not even time to start drinking yet.
burnspbesq
@Leelee for Obama:
C’mon, I just ate. Are you trying to make me hurl?
Leelee for Obama
@BruceFromOhio: Too much? I thought it was a fantasy? Just trying to get the most political effect out of mine. Sorry if i offended.
Catsy
Bought and paid for douchebags like Lieberman and Nelson are the reason why all the noise about getting sixty Senators in this last election is so much bullshit. People keep missing the fact that the magic number sixty is not the number of people who you can get to caucus with you–it’s the number who will commit to supporting the party’s procedural votes regardless of whether or not they intend to vote against the actual bill. We didn’t get 60 Democratic Senators last election–we got at most 55, with the remainder being conservatives who ran as Democrats but who don’t actually support the party’s agenda.
Once you have 50 Senators (plus Biden’s tie-breaking vote) to establish a majority and all the parliamentary benefits that come with it, any additions to your caucus don’t matter unless they are willing to make that commitment. If they won’t, then they may as well caucus with the Republicans: having more than 50 votes to pass legislation doesn’t make a bit of fucking difference if you can’t even bring that legislation to a vote.
Reid needs to grow a fucking pair and start playing hardball with these traitors, beginning with Lieberman. That mendacious, destructive jackass needs to be told to make a choice: vote against the party’s bills if you feel the need, but don’t block procedural votes or you lose your chairmanships. All of them. All seniority, all positions of power and privilege. You lose it all, and any primary opponent who stands against you gets the full backing of the Democratic Party. If you’re going to stand with the Party of No in blocking the Democratic Party’s most important, most defining agenda, you have no business being part of our caucus and enjoying the same seniority and privileges as the people you’re stabbing in the back.
That goes for the rest of the conservative so-called Democrats. Put the hammer down on these corrupt, obstructionist fucks. The worst that can happen is that they quit the party and oppose our legislation, and frankly I don’t really see how that differs in any meaningful way from where we are now.
That’s the worst than can happen, though–the reality is that these cowardly pieces of shit will fold. What they care about is power and influence, and right now their power and influence flows from their positions, and the fact that we need their votes to overcome GOP obstructionism and have made it clear that they can aid in the obstruction of our agenda utterly free of consequence. Show them that they are gravely mistaken, and that there are consequences for this kind of betrayal. They will buckle when they realize that the consequence continuing this behavior is the loss of everything except their one vote, and the likely end of their career.
Or to put it another way, don’t negotiate with terrorists.
BruceFromOhio
@Leelee for Obama:
Are you kidding? I’m LMAO, in the slightly twisted way that I usually reserve for deviant porn. Effect achieved?
BruceFromOhio
@Catsy:
This. And everything else you wrote. Well said.
Leelee for Obama
@kay: That’s why I say, only if someone else is available to dispense who has no issue with it. Otherwise, they should do their g-d jobs and dispense the prescription.
There is too much emphasis on what one segment of the citizenry believes. Let them believe and behave in their personal choices as they wish, as long as the rest of the citizenry is not discommoded by it.
If they think that birth control causes an abortion,then they shouldn’t use it, fine. If someone else wants to, they should be able to. If the pharmacist doesn’t feel comfortable with dispensing, let them work in a multi-pharmacist establishment, or a parochial establishment that everyone is free to use or ignore.
Same thing with abortion-if they don’t prosecute these asshats that murder Docs and other clinic personnel to the max, then it will keep on happening and destroy a woman’s right to decide what happens to her own body. That is un-American, to say the very least.
AhabTRuler
What a clown?!
Leelee for Obama
@BruceFromOhio: That was the effect I was looking for!
Notorious P.A.T.
Oh please. “Sure, he SAYS he believes in a God who wants him to condemn gays, but I don’t know. . . ”
What other reason is there to persecute homosexuals? Or do any of the other hundred wacky things religious nuts do?
John Cole SAYS he likes football, but the team he supports is different from the team I support. So obviously, he doesn’t actually like football. Does that make any sense?
GregB
You spilled your Joementum all over my Netanyahu.
-G
Just Some Fuckhead
How do we know Paul Kane isn’t using Jelly?
Leelee for Obama
@Catsy: Yes, and Yes. Well said Catsy. If we can’t show them the door, show them the Nothing that awaits them when their committees convene.
Leelee for Obama
@GregB: One can only hope he wasn’t wearing a blue dress! Hope there’s a dry cleaner open.
AhabTRuler
@scav: Fuck me! (Didn’t see your link)
And I think I saw this at a head shop once.
ETA: Soundtrack for the previous links.
BruceFromOhio
@GregB:
Me: bwahahahahaha
MrsOhio: What are you laughing at over there?
Me: A comment on a political site.
MrsOhio: Which one?
Me: Balloon Juice.
MrsOhio: Are you looking at porn again?
Me: Actually, yes, kind of.
geg6
Catsy is wise. Hammer these motherfuckers. Make them squeal with pain. If it hurts badly enough, they will fold or do a backward Specter. Either one is fine with me.
pcbedamned
Completely O/T, but this just pissed me off!!!
What the HELL is wrong with your country?!? Land of the Free My Ass…(and Canada is considered commie by your extreme right-wing?!?)
PS – sorry, don’t mean to offend any Americans, but I’m pissed.
D-Chance.
Diane Francis has the solution to global warming… China’s one-child policy:
The “inconvenient truth” overhanging the UN’s Copenhagen conference is not that the climate is warming or cooling, but that humans are overpopulating the world.
A planetary law, such as China’s one-child policy, is the only way to reverse the disastrous global birthrate currently, which is one million births every four days.
Who is Diane Francis? Well, we know one thing…
I left the business to stay at home with our two babies, Eric and Julie, for six years.
She’s a typical hypocrite. Hey, Diane, which kid are you gonna sacrifice on your one-child altar of saving the freaking planet when the Great Purge of Humanity begins… Eric or Julie?
Michael D.
Why are there still Little Bitsy ads on the site?
AngusTheGodOfMeat
@Leelee for Obama:
I do, I consider it an abdication of their professional responsibility.
That issue will generate churn and agita for a while, but what I hope happens is that pharmacists just disappear. I am fine with having the trained person there to counsel me or advise me from their professional knowledge base, but there is no reason to have that person control the dispensing of the prescription. Most prescriptions can be filled by machines, the practice lends itself well to automation. As for the proofing of the scripts (say, to prevent an administrative error such as prescribing 250mg instead of 250mcg), that doesn’t require a person with years of training to do correctly. Drug interactions? That can be done by a clearing house that uses simple technology to match medication regimens against precautions and exclusions. We don’t need overtrained and sanctimnious people filtering our access to medications. The fact is, we don’t need pharamacists in their current role, which is grounded in legacy ideas of pharmacy that go back to the 19th century.
So if pharmacists want to throw their weight around and start controlling our access to medicine based on their personal beliefs, it’s my sincere hope … and expectation … that they will harumph themselves right out of their overpaid jobs.
D-Chance.
And the 70s retro hits keep a-coming… this jewel is by Matt Yglesias.
The last time I heard liberals whine about the country being “ungovernable”? Jimmy Carter administration.
The country is just too big and too complicated and those damn Republicans. We can’t do anything because a 60-seat Senate, a 81-seat advantage in the House, and The One in the White House just isn’t enough of a majority to get the job done…
AngusTheGodOfMeat
Wow, truly fascinating. It’s like a puzzle trying to figure out what innocuous use of a word might have triggered the insane, stupid, annoying, fucked up mod filter you guys employ. I wonder how many reposts I will have to do to experimentally figure out what crazy shit the filter is doing today?
AngusTheGodOfMeat
experimental repost #1
@Leelee for Obama:
I don’t even have an issue with the pharmacists not giving out Bir__ Control or Morn__ after meds
I do, I consider it an abdication of their professional responsibility.
That issue will generate churn and agita for a while, but what I hope happens is that pharmacists just disappear. I am fine with having the trained person there to counsel me or advise me from their professional knowledge base, but there is no reason to have that person control the dispensing of the pre___tion. Most pres___ions can be filled by machines, the practice lends itself well to automation. As for the proofing of the scripts (say, to prevent an administrative error such as pres__bing 250mg instead of 250mcg), that doesn’t require a person with years of training to do correctly. Dr_g interactions? That can be done by a clearing house that uses simple technology to match medication regimens against precautions and exclusions. We don’t need overtrained and sanct___us people filtering our access to medications. The fact is, we don’t need phar__ists in their current role, which is grounded in legacy ideas of phar__y that go back to the 19th century.
So if ph___acists want to throw their weight around and start controlling our access to medicine based on their personal beliefs, it’s my sincere hope … and expectation … that they will harumph themselves right out of their overpaid jobs.
AngusTheGodOfMeat
So your mod filter fires on words about c0ntracepti0n and ph@rmasee.
Wow. That’s great. I feel protected, and warm.
mk3872
Lemme guess … Markos & Hamsher will tell us all this is Obama’s fault …
jwb
@AngusTheGodOfMeat: I find the filter a source of endless joy. If it only excluded on a rational basis, it would not be nearly so much fun.
The Grand Panjandrum
You know what’s a damn shame? Not that Nebraska’s senior Senator is a WATB. Nope. What is a goddamned shame is that Alabama RB Mark Ingram is probably going to win the Heisman tonight when that trophy should rightfully go to Husker defensive tackle Ndamukong Suh. But no defensive player has ever won the trophy because sportswriters like are a bunch of front running punks. The trophy is supposed to go to the best player. But you don’t get as many chances to score on defense so the RB’s, QB’s, and WR’s get all the attention. Since Alabama and Nebraska probably won’t play one another in a bowl game (probably? NFW!) we’ll never get a chance to see Suh shed a triple team to stop Ingram for a no gainer. Damn shame.
Leelee for Obama
@AngusTheGodOfMeat: @AngusTheGodOfMeat: I didn’t have any trouble with filters, so maybe it’s something else?
Anyway, I like your idea of machines dispensing prescriptions. I’m older than you by bunches, I’m sure, so that sort of modern alternative just didn’t occur to me. It would also lower costs by many ducats, wouldn’t it? And the machines would never be closed, or need to go to lunch. Someone will whine about the lost jobs, but that’s the free market, Folks!. And they’ll still have issues with narcotics, unless, of course, we loosen up those laws at the same time. Interesting proposal, Angus. You’re just full of surprises.
MelodyMaker
machines dispensing prescriptions to Ben Nelson need to wake the fuck up! The Senate needs a healthy dose of morality. C’mon, Senator. you can do it.
MelodyMaker
I think they’re called Pyxis. or some homonym.
Midnight Marauder
@The Grand Panjandrum:
I’m pretty sure Colt McCoy is walking away with the “Lifetime Achievement/Sorry about the whole Sam Bradford thing” Heisman this evening.
@Catsy:
Absolutely brilliant. Incredible post, Catsy.
Also.
MelodyMaker
prescription machines and I spelt it rite.
AngusTheGodOfMeat
@Leelee for Obama:
Yes, there are issues that would need to be resolved, but I am pretty sure that the non-controlled substances can be dispensed in a much more efficient and non-invasive manner than we have now, without overtrained and overpaid pharmacists in the way. And probably cheaper, and faster, and more accurately.
Mod filter? Please remember that I am typing with a hoof.
And, I am almost the same age as Bill Clinton. He’s older, but not much. Not enough so’s you’d notice, I think.
MelodyMaker
without overtrained and overpaid pharmacists
that’s frightening. Did I hear you earlier on SadlyNo!? “The FDA is not in the constitution, so blah, erhm..”
MelodyMaker
You know who else liked to get prescription drugs without honest professionals prescribing them?
jwb
@Midnight Marauder: I don’t think McCoy will get it, unless the voting is really a mess and he manages to squeak through by getting more second and third place votes. Even in Austin, he only got one of the four votes from the writers at the local paper.
MelodyMaker
Nixon
FlipYrWhig
“Colt McCoy” is such a transparently fake name. It’s like a supporting character in a B-grade cowboy movie. “That lowdown varmint Colt McCoy jumped mah claim!”
jwb
@FlipYrWhig: I always thought the same thing.
Just Some Fuckhead
@MelodyMaker:
It’s either Hitler or Rush Limbaugh, right?
Yutsano
@FlipYrWhig: Or a really bad pr0n name. And he ain’t that cute.
MelodyMaker
@Just Some Fuckhead:
Colin Powell and all a y’all. and Nixon.
Midnight Marauder
@jwb:
It’s a pretty lackluster crop of candidates overall this year, as far as I’m concerned. There’s no one who really stands out in any kind of notable way; no one with any kind of “Heisman moment” that really captures the magic of their season or whatever. It’s all very meh.
To be honest, I would love for Suh to get it and hell break loose on ESPN for the next 96 hours. If there was one thing to knock Tiger Woods coverage off the air–if only for a moment–it would be a defensive lineman winning the Heisman Trophy. Stu Scott might use the phrase “crazy exciting” 583 times in a 2 minute segment. The world
of sportswould never be the same.J. Michael Neal
@Catsy:
What, exactly, would Reid growing a pair solve here? Don’t get me wrong; I think Reid desperately needs a pair, and is completely fucking useless as majority leader, but the problem is with the Democratic caucus as a whole.
1) This is what you get when you insist on putting someone from swing seats into the leadership slots. It doesn’t make them effective, and it doesn’t help them get re-elected. Ask Tom Daschle, who I think is (and was) far less useless than Reid.
2) Even if Reid grew a pair, the votes aren’t there in the caucus to strip anyone of anything. US Senators like being independent agents. They hate the idea of enforced party discipline. Some of this is structural, in that the parties have too little control over who gets elected. Part of it is the American people; compare how many politicians get elected by saying that they are a loyal party member vs. how many get elected by saying that they are an independent voice that knows how to tell their party to fuck off.
Solving the campaign finance problem would help, but the simple fact is that the American people are getting exactly the government they consistently say they want. That they are too clueless to recognize how useless it is means that they aren’t likely to change.
The Republicans have a structural advantage, in that it’s a lot easier for the party that nominally stands for the rich to be able to force its ideology and its fund raising to converge. When the people giving the cash stand behind the efforts to tell a Senators that, if they buck the party they’ll feel the consequences, then it’s a credible threat. A part of the reason that it’s so hard for Democrats to enforce discipline is that it’s not a credible threat when they say this. Ben Nelson holds all the cards in the relationship. (Blanche Lincoln is a completely different story, in that I think she has completely misread her own political interests. Unlike Nelson, she can’t pick up enough votes to her right to withstand defections to the left over her health care position. Her *only* hope of re-election next year, and it was a slim one, was to make sure that health care reform got enacted and that she could rally enough support on the left to carry her. It’s tough to blame Obama for this one, either, though, because it’s tough to threaten someone who has so little conception of her own interests.)
Counting noses, I don’t even think reconciliation is possible, so that’s something else it isn’t worth holding out hope for. Quite aside from the question of whether the parliamentarian would gut the legislation, the votes aren’t there. Count noses. No Republicans would vote for it. 60 The four already opposed won’t. 56 I have a hard time seeing Robert Byrd caring about good policy more than about the precious sanctity of his rule. 55 Bill Nelson, Kay Hagan, Kent Conrad, and Mark Pryor are pretty certain defections. 51 Carper has been eyeing the exits for a while now, and I think he’s less than 50/50 to vote for a reconciliation bill. That leaves you at the magic number of 50. Now you need every single remaining vote. Let’s, for a moment, pretend that it would be easy to keep all of Webb, Warner, Begich and Baucus on board. If you think Ben Nelson is a drama queen now, wait until you get to watch Even Bayh’s performance as the guy with the veto power.
MelodyMaker
@FlipYrWhig:
better than “Uncle Jesse”
ok, I’m done. nitey. my torties are snuggling.
IndieTarheel
@The Grand Panjandrum:
Ahem.
__
http://detnews.com/article/20091103/SPORTS0201/911030413/Heisman-winner-Charles-Woodson–not-excited–about-Wolverines
—
Also, ROLL TIDE!
jwb
@IndieTarheel: I think Ingram will win the Heisman, but UT will beat Bama for the championship.
AngusTheGodOfMeat
@MelodyMaker:
Nope, I post nowhere but here.
@MelodyMaker:
Rush Limbaugh?
IndieTarheel
@jwb: Well, you got it exactly half right. The Tide’s about due.
jwb
@IndieTarheel: What’s an IndieTarheel doing cheering for Bama?
AngusTheGodOfMeat
@MelodyMaker:
Nope, I post nowhere but here.
@MelodyMaker:
Rush Limbaugh?
@Just Some Fuckhead:
For crissakes, make up your mind. You write like Dickens. “Best of times, worst of times ….” Well, which was it? Be clear.
By the way, did I mention that I love Word Press almost as much as I love a good colonoscopy without anesthesia?
No, really. It’s an acquired taste. So to speak.
IndieTarheel
@jwb: Transplant; settled here post-military.
scav
@Notorious P.A.T.: I don’t count the religious alibi for fucking people over they don’t like as a valid evidence that they are religious. That’s just the creating the mind of god in the image of your own prejudices SOP.
MelodyMaker
@AngusTheGodOfMeat:
hmmhmm. ok, gail, I finally clicked your link. If I was standing outside, I would be cold. But I wouldn’t look as cool as those ruminants. cheers.
grrrlgeek
@AngusTheGodOfMeat:
I don’t have time to read the rest of the comments in the thread right now, but i feel impelled to
shoot my mouth offoffer my opinion.As a pharmacist, I find some of your post to be downright insulting. Just the first thing off the top of my head: Yes, a machine can count the pills, we have one where I work that counts out and labels vials for the top 200 rxs prescribed. But who is going to make sure the cells (where the pills are stored) are filled correctly? Sure, I don’t need my 20 years of experience for that–but it is part of the job. Sure, technicians can put pills in the cells. But I can’t tell you how many errors occur, and it has to be someone’s ass on the line, and it’s the person who checks at the end to make sure the right pills are in the vial. That would be MY (spectacular) ass.
SiubhanDuinne
@AngusTheGofOfMeat 2:20 pm
I think it was the “rump” in “harumph.”
jcricket
We need to kill the filibuster and get rid of about 50% of the parliamentary bullshit that is the Senate (kind of true in the house too).
I know this means Republicans might be able to ram through some of their agenda were they in charge, but I can live with that. I’d rather that than continue to feed the public’s opinion that no politician is worth keeping in office, b/c none get anything done, so let’s keep trading party control like that’ll fix stuff.
We’ve reached the point where under 30% of the population (what’s represented by the 40 Republican Senators + Nelson or Leiberwhore) can effectively stop almost all legislation. Given population trends and increased polarization, I wouldn’t be surprised if 60-65 Democratic Senators represented 80% of the population in 20 years. At that point will someone still be supporting the filibuster?
The Senate’s un-representative/Democratic enough as it is (2 Senators/state no matter the size), and the government has an insane amounts of checks and balances (House, Senate, Prez, Judges) – time to make it possible to get some shit done.
jcricket
@grrrlgeek: I think Angus’ point is that if pharmacists (and I don’t think you’re one) are going to insist that they have a newfound power to decide which medication they are going to dispense (not just for health/accidental interaction reasons) then they have another thing coming – unemployment/elimination.
Frankly, I agree. I think pharmacists provide a useful service (all the stuff you’ve laid out), but as soon as they start playing doctor or asking to “opt out” of dispensing legal medication, my support for their field goes down to zero.
Jim
@J. Michael Neal:
You mean on HCR? Or are there rumors that Carper wants to jump the aisle?
J. Michael Neal
@Jim: Just on HCR, so far as I know.
General Winfield Stuck
@grrrlgeek:
Oh my:)
AngusTheGodOfMeat
@grrrlgeek:
I’m a technology person. Dispensing routine scrips is one of the best candidates for automation that I have ever seen. Mind you I am not talking about controlled substances, necessarily. Maybe so, maybe not. Certainly not compounding. Certainly not what they are doing at PCCA.
But I take maintenance drugs that are nothing but check, count, label and sell. Every month year after year the same thing. The idea that a highly trained pharmacist has to hover over this procedure is just ludicrous to me. And the idea that a pharmacist can refuse to dispense on the basis of personal beliefs is ludicrous to me.
I lived with a pharmacist in the house when I was a kid. He had run his own store, took me to work with him, I am not unfamiliar with what pharmacists do. Or the service that they CAN provide. It’s when the pharmacists start deciding that they know better than the doctor and the patient what is best for the patient that I draw the line.
YankeeApologist
@Catsy:
A bit behind today, but I had to comment to this.
Catsy, let me begin by saying that I’m ONE HUNDRED PERCENT behind every single thing you just said. If there was a shred of true bravery in that building, Reid would do exactly what you say.
It just seems to me that our party is built on the premise of not making a stand on ANYTHING. Cut the scary parts out of the HRC bill? Okay, guys, we’re the majority, but we’re cool with that.
Take the teeth out of banking reform? Why not? It’s not my job getting lost.
I guess, all hyperbole and joking aside, I just don’t see why any of them would feel the need to change anything. They all drive nice cars and live in big houses. There’s just no impetus, Catsy.
YankeeApologist
@J. Michael Neal:
Wish I saw this. You made my point for me, except with elegance and defensible points.
Scott H
@Just Some Fuckhead:
Yeah, I didn’t make it past that sentence. It’s unlikely that something that starts off with that trope is gonna get better.