Do y’all think last night’s debate changed anyone’s mind? I don’t. But it occurred to me that both the Clinton and Sanders campaigns are a tribute to President Obama in their own ways.
Perhaps learning the lesson that eluded Al Gore in 2000, the Clinton camp has no intention of running away from a popular (within his own party) two-term president and packages Hillary Clinton as the git-er-done guardian of the Obama administration’s accomplishments.
Team Bernie is hope and change redux, offering a political revolution to overcome the stalemate in DC but with money in politics the target this time rather than the partisan divide as in 2008.
I looked at some of the pundit hot takes this morning, and many are giving the edge to Sanders. I thought it was pretty even. Will it make a difference?
Baud
This debate had the same conversation as the last two debates. It won’t make a difference.
HinTN
No. This has been another edition of (Atrios’) simple answers to simple questions.
Schlemazel
GEE! neither of these two losers is perfect nor do they agree with everyone of my positions! I guess my choices are to stay home or vote for the Republican – THAT’LL TEACH ‘EM!
Ultraviolet Thunder
@Baud:
Except repetition matters. Most people don’t pay much attention to elections at this point. Because unlike us they have healthy interests and pursuits. So the candidates’ messages have to be repeated for them to sink in. But no, it didn’t change anything except to provide exposure for both candidates. This will gradually diffuse down to the ordinary grassroots.
Lurking Canadian
The big concern I had was that Clinton would position herself as “Returining to normal after the radical Obama years”. That she’s running on “Votte for me and I’ll protect the Obama legacy” is great. Bring on President Rodham-Clinton!
Baud
@Ultraviolet Thunder:
Repetition at the expense of discussing other topics is problematic. Has there been much discussion on climate change, other than our side actually believe in it. Or immigration? It’s all health care, Middle East/terrorism, guns, and Bill Clinton. Maybe a smattering of other topics.
Botsplainer
Bernie’s health plan rollout was about as ridiculous as I expected. It fails to address the ramifications of single-payer healthcare on the half-million mostly middle-income earners in the industry itself, the tens of thousands of liter earning insurance clerks working for providers or the effect of slamming the share prices of healthcare and health insurance companies that make up nearly a third of the S&P 500 – and what that means for pensions, public investments and IRAs.
The answer to universal health care delivery is not a new and catastrophic nationwide depression; purity progressives can’t seem to grok that.
OzarkHillbilly
Ed Kilgore:
Didn’t watch it, so FWIW.
Betty Cracker
@Botsplainer: Well, to be fair, very few people except those directly affected seem to give a shit when legislation roils other sectors of the economy. I’m not sure why insurance workers are more special than, say, furniture manufacturers. That said, I’m hoping Mayhew will provide an in-depth analysis of the Sanders plan. There are plenty of provisions — and omissions — that merit discussion.
BGinCHI
The prevailing wisdom many months ago was that a candidacy such as Sanders’ was needed to sharpen HRC and pull her campaign and ideas to the left.
Mission accomplished, though a few more debates would not hurt.
The idea here ought to be governing the country well, moving progressive ideas forward, and making what progress can be made when 30% of the American public are insane and dangerous. As long as this happens, and we avoid giving any power to GOP politicians, I don’t give a tinker’s damn who is the President.
This is not a Prom King/Queen contest, for fuck’s sake.
rikyrah
Good Morning, Everyone :)
Oatler.
@BGinCHI: Yes it is.
Starfish
@rikyrah: Good morning.
MomSense
I really do like Bernie’s values but for me it all falls apart in the details and implementation. The health care plan is problematic on many levels starting with the lack of votes in Congress and the turmoil of going through another tremendous change. It would suck up all the energy from dealing with climate change, increasing minimum wage, etc.
I am not persuaded by his explanations for his Brady Bill votes and positions on gun control.
Enough already with the Clinton is going to do Wall Street’s bidding. Krugman wrote a piece on this being BS back in October.
rikyrah
Until Bernie can explain why his beloved Vermont didn’t go for Single Payer…..he’ll get tripped up everytime.
Ultraviolet Thunder
I’m camped at the BHM airport trying to get through ATL to DTW. Mechanical problems. Monday morning is not a good time for this.
Got up at 4:00 am for this flight and I won’t get home until 7:00 pm.
Well, I’m on the clock and it’s billable.
Baud
@MomSense:
Yeah, that’s the thing. What’s the thinking behind reopening health care when there are other pressing issues that haven’t been addressed yet?
debit
@BGinCHI: Oh, you and your logic.
BGinCHI
@MomSense: I’m constantly reminded of Obama’s line about changing money in politics and reforming Wall St and all of that big stuff: “Make me do it.”
Instead of rooting for a candidate like it’s a sporting event, with the enthusiasm placed on getting them in so that they can “win” just by being there and standing for something, I’d rather have someone who is able to turn the will of the people in a progressive direction into policy.
We should be able to make HRC do something smart and progressive about Wall St. The government is us, not one person who wins an election.
(I’m looking at you, Rauner, you asshole)
SiubhanDuinne
I was disappointed that neither moderator asked a question about the Flint water crisis (although Mrs. Greenspan managed to find time to ask Bernie about Bill Clinton’s sex life two decades ago) — but cheers to Hillary for bringing up the Flint situation in her closing remarks and pointing out the economic and racial imbalances that allowed it to happen.
Botsplainer
@Betty Cracker:
It’s a half million insurance workers and a third of the blue chip index stocks sitting in every public and private pension portfolio. It isn’t just another sector of the economy that gets roiled – it’s the whole enchilada.
I haven’t even begun to estimate the effect of all that empty office space on rental rates for remaining commercial tenants or ruined commercial landlords. Need I mention the harm to local tax bases in cities with major healthcare presences or the ripple effect as vendors and local businesses suffer those losses as well?
Like all pure progressives everywhere, they address a single issue at the great expense of everything else.
BGinCHI
@Ultraviolet Thunder: Did you see the temps in the Midwest? Ouch.
MomSense
Adding one more thing on Sanders that really pisses me off. His proposals only work if we have the most liberal Congress we’ve ever had. That he is not doing any fundraising for down ticket Democrats tells me how unserious he is about implementation. Supposed coat tails are not enough. We need organizers, offices with cell phones, computers, paper to print walk and call lists. Wave elections don’t just happen FFS.
Ultraviolet Thunder
@BGinCHI:
It’s 29 in Birmingham AL, 8 in Detroit, and the high is 9.
I’ll be spending the rest of the week in Ontario. I hate the cold.
BGinCHI
Off topic (if it ever really is), but in terms of “real feel,” it’s currently 52 degrees warmer here in Norway than it is back in Chicago.
Thanks Rahm.
BGinCHI
@Ultraviolet Thunder: LCBO is your friend.
Baud
@SiubhanDuinne:
It appears moderators will be shot if they bring up new topics.
Kay
@rikyrah:
He actually has an argument- an argument exists- so I’m baffled by why he wasn’t prepared for that question.
He could have said it won’t work unless it’s on a larger scale- either a really big state or a group of states or the whole country.
A small state like Vermont really isn’t a good test case. He could have easily argued that and used it to promote a national program. It’s just weak as hell not to even consider that someone might ask him.
Gin & Tonic
@SiubhanDuinne: I have to expect that Mrs. Greenspan isn’t getting much action in the sack, so has to spend her time thinking about others who do.
MomSense
@BGinCHI:
I’m so envious. Today would be a perfect day to take the “ski train” to Frognerseteren, cross country ski, and then have hot cocoa in the lodge.
BGinCHI
@Gin & Tonic: HRC’s reply, though not out loud:
“I guess you would never have to worry about your husband fooling around, since he had his last hard on during the Eisenhower administration.”
Starfish
Can we have a talk about how condescending the comments here sounded to the Iranian American person in the thread when various white guys were professing expertise based on having known some Iranians in college?
BGinCHI
@MomSense: That’s a great idea. We did a lot of sledding over the weekend, which in Bergen is a pretty serious activity. My 4-year-old had such a blast.
Mrs. BG going skiing Weds.
Third weekend in Feb we are going to Oslo then Lillehammer for a long weekend of skiing. Haven’t been there yet.
Betty Cracker
@Botsplainer: There are many arguments for keeping our absurdly expensive, redundant and corporate-friendly private insurance network (e.g., political feasibility, for starters), but its function as a job creator / sustainer isn’t one of them, IMO. It makes all kinds of sense to mitigate the effects of economic dislocation, but it would be foolish to halt technological or political progress to avoid it.
MomSense
@BGinCHI:
Have you taken your 4 year old to the Viking Museum? I thought my then 8 year old’s eyes would pop out of his head.
What a great trip you have planned. Hope you have a wonderful time.
terraformer
From the bits I saw – and it was only about 30 minutes total, popping in every so often – I thought Sanders looked and sounded better and more in command of his message. At least once, I saw a kind of smarmy “there he goes again” look from Clinton while Sanders was talking, and that didn’t do any favors for Clinton in my mind. I’ll vote for whichever Dem gets the nod, no question, but Clinton generally gets under my skin more than I thought she would. Like “it’s my turn now, and why do we have to listen to anyone else?” kind of thing.
Ultraviolet Thunder
@Betty Cracker:
I worked in IT in health insurance from ’85-2000, including during Hillarycare. They were all rabidly against it. The arguments boiled down to it would disrupt an industry that does a good and necessary job. In defense of the industry, they do an excellent job of risk assessment and (generally) claims processing. Against them: they have high overhead costs, they increase actual cost of care with their ‘paperwork’ requirements, risk assessment and rating have much less importance under national health care, and claims processing also becomes less important (except for rooting out fraud).
Gin & Tonic
@Starfish: Having posed a couple of questions in that thread, I went back and re-read it this morning after this comment of yours, and with the possible exception of one comment, I see no condescension, mostly either curiosity or some respectful anecdotes with the usual (for B-J) sidetracking into music, economics, etc. “Various white guys” makes it sound pretty widespread, and, maybe it’s just me, I don’t see it.
Starfish
@terraformer: Yes, I watched half a minute of Clinton, and she seemed condescending. I have not been for Sanders because his supporters seem a little too zealous, but watching Clinton speak made me hope that we have a better candidate pool in four years.
Gin & Tonic
@BGinCHI: LCBO is nobody’s friend. LCBO is a rapacious monopoly.
Satby
@Betty Cracker: it’s potentially a million people who face job disruption (including all the people in doctors offices whose sole job is to navigate the thicket of insurance coverage).. and that’s a lot of friends and relatives. That pensions are often heavily tied to sterling investments like insurance companies is an additional effect. I was on the Nortel account when that company imploded and took thousands of jobs and several Canadian government pension funds with it, IIRC it was a huge crisis in Canada. I’m a fan of moving to single player, but there will be serious impacts that could derail the whole thing, and handwaving about a “revolution” doesn’t address them.
NotMax
Not on your tintype, as they used to say.
Starfish
@Gin & Tonic: A lot of it came across as completely clueless. It made me glad that we have Adam here who knows what he is talking about, but there was a lot of general cluelessness.
As part of the recent omnibus, Iranian nationals were travel restricted in this odd way.
Eric U.
@Gin & Tonic: I just read through it, and I’m trying to figure out who the Iranian is in there. I imagine most Iranians know how ignorant most of us are about Iran.
I’m always surprised at how good natured they are given that we really are responsible for a lot of bad things that have happened to their country, and we are still threatening them. Or at least the Republicans are constantly and vocally lobbying to do bad things to their country.
Schlemazel
I HOPE YOU ARE HAPPY NOW! The Kool Kids all understand the election is EXACTLY like prom king & queen and you hurt thier delicate feelings when you say mean things like that!
Poor Chuckles Toddler is a weeping heap in the corner and he is just one of the more visible pundnuts (sadly My wife watched Today so being home means I am forced to hear this bullshit)
ruemara
I don’t give two farts about the debate, much less the “hot takes”. I’ll look over the health plan released by Sanders. The analysis by Vox and Krugman, as well as Chait writing “the liberal case against Sanders”, says that some people are starting.understand what I’ve feared. There’s a lot of ideas, but no sold plan & no clue in what it would mean.
A little lunch break reading and then I can think it over.
Ultraviolet Thunder
@Gin & Tonic:
Ontario is finally beginning to allow some retail stores to sell beer. Considering how thinly populated Ontario is, and how thirsty, government booze stores make sense only if the goals it to make more drunks drive farther in the snow.
Starfish
@Eric U.: You know the comment where I said that Iranian students come to the US and have anchor babies?
The person who made that comment is the child of Iranian students who came to the US.
Gin & Tonic
@Starfish: Well, cluelessness and condescension aren’t the same thing. Some people ask questions or read comments to try to raise themselves from cluelessness.
BGinCHI
@MomSense: Will do that while we are there. Good reminder.
Betty Cracker
@Satby: True. Addressing that aspect is a must, and it sounds like Sanders’ plan doesn’t. But the fact that it will cause economic dislocation isn’t a valid reason NOT to do it, IMO.
Hal
There was a debate last night?
ThresherK
I liked how Bernie went off on Mrs. Greenspan re a stupid question. He’s making the mediasphere a little safer for pushback to the idiots.
If nothing else (and Bernie has done plenty else) I want someone in that role in every Dem Prez election cycle, and I don’t know if I’ll live long enough for a black or female candidate to be on the stage (get poll #s) and fulfill it. (It’d be nice to be alive to see it.)
BGinCHI
@Gin & Tonic: I meant they are your friend whether you like it or not.
The ones in Toronto are miles better than when I lived there in the 90s. At least they are trying. But I hate the state alcohol bullshit. Worse here in Norway.
Robert Sneddon
@Satby: When your insurance premiums go up next year you can console yourself with the thought that some of that increase will go to all those folks sitting in offices shuffling papers and screwing up your insurance claims, that is after the Masters of the Universe in the insurance company’s head office have bought their darling daughters a new Mercedes coupe each with their million-dollar bonuses.
Botsplainer
@Betty Cracker:
I agree with every criticism you make, but will posit that we built this behemoth over the past 40 years, and it won’t be undone quickly without an economic disruption that makes the recent depression (and that’s what it was, not a mere recession) look like an upswing. You’re going to have to start by reinstating Certificates of Need for the licensing of new healthcare facilities AND opening up new avenues for people to become medical providers in order to break the iron lock of the current guild. Perhaps an expansion of the licensing of Nurse Practitioners. Follow that up by regulating provider charges for items and services supplied .
That bill would be staggering, as in an increment measured in the trillions. Politically and socially infeasible.
The transition is going to have to be slow, as in decades.
BGinCHI
@Schlemazel: There is some kind of Condition, illness really, that causes people to pay attention to a short-term process with a winner and loser rather than a long-term process that includes the context in which the contest takes place.
That’s an awkward way to say that horse race journalism and pro-life extremism share the same mentality.
I want good policy that admits mistakes and learns from experience. I want counter-terrorism that is more like good law enforcement and not like a fucking Marvel Comic. Etc.
BR
I think the debate helped me understand something about Clinton — she is most believable, most authentic, and most intelligent when speaking about foreign policy, especially in the context of when she was in the administration. You can see her tone and even facial expression change to one where she’s honestly thinking as opposed to trying to recall a rehearsed line. It’s why she did so well in front of the GOP congressional committee.
I think staying on foreign policy, and not just one-liners, is a winner for her.
The one thing I want to see her and Sanders push back on is the ridiculous notion that only mass shootings done by brown people are terrorism. Seems to me the shooting in SC was a textbook case of Klan-style terrorism that has been around since the nation was founded.
cmorenc
@Schlemazel:
Your snark would be hilarious, if only there weren’t so many otherwise generally progressive-inclined folks out there whose thinking about voting is along those lines. Maybe not actually voting for the Republican candidate, but staying home or wasting their votes on some hopeless third-party candidate.who manages to make the ballot in their state.
Starfish
@Gin & Tonic: Some of the comments did get better after I went to bed. I was just so annoyed at all the people who definitely knew what the Iranian students did. It was a tough time.
Botsplainer
@Robert Sneddon:
FTFY
WereBear
Well, when the legislative bodies are doing NOTHING, it’s not even that big an issue, sadly.
Percysowner
@Starfish:
So you want the Republicans to win this year? Because it is unusual for a sitting President to be challenged in the next election, unless they have screwed up monumentally. The only way we get a different pool in four years is if we have a Republican president, which, I really don’t want.
Betty Cracker
@BR: Great point. Should HRC become the nominee, that focus will probably be an advantage against her Republican opponent since the GOP candidates seem far more interested in global scaremongering that discussing domestic issues.
MattF
@Ultraviolet Thunder: Due to various ‘old guy’ problems, I’ve been interacting with the health-care industry for the past several years– and the level of complexity of the billing systems are just ludicrous. I recall one conversation where I complained about a bill, and when the customer-service person saw it, she just laughed.
Ultraviolet Thunder
@Botsplainer:
The one rock solid thing in my retirement portfolio is a small pension from Auto Owners Insurance for the 6 years I worked there in the ’80s. It’s remarkably generous for my short tenure and low pay, but in 2024 when I retire it’ll be grocery money for the month and some gas. And that’s not nothing.
If insurance companies take it in the neck there will be millions like me buying their groceries with something else.
One proposal I read was to freeze growth of private insurance and reduce its size in the marketplace, while growing government health care by periodically lowering the Medicare age. At a first approximation this seems to make sense.
Starfish
@Percysowner: I will vote for whichever Democrat gets the nomination, but I am in a caucus state where we do not actually have a primary vote so I will go with whoever the rest of you guys pick.
But as soon as the sanctions fell against Iran, Clinton wanted to renew them based on their missile program. And I found that very disheartening.
ruemara
@Betty Cracker: Betty, loved you since I discovered Rumproast during the great PUMA Obot wars of aught 8. I simply cannot see how you think disrupting a relatively large portion of our economy for single payer is not a decent reason to not try to create something in the manner many seem to think it can be created. It would never be what progressive dreams think it will be. It would have to be gradual and all the jobs and infrastructure would have to be considered. I’m not opposed, I advocated for it, but people think Sanders will wave a pen and establish the American NHS. Not gonna happen. It just seems blithe to dismiss the economic disruptions.
Schlemazel
@BGinCHI:
Me too, but that doesn’t sell newspapers (as they used to say back when people bought newspapers – Pasta only knows what they say these days)
Eric U.
@Botsplainer: I think the ACA is probably the best path to single payer, if that’s the way we want to go. I was one of the purity pony riders back when the details were being hashed out, but sometimes I’m not good at seeing the whole picture. The biggest problem with it is that Medicaid is based at the state level, and that’s something I have never thought was a good idea.
@Starfish: since I think you called me condescending, I will note that before I hit post on any of my comments on that thread, I considered what any of my Iranian acquaintances would think if they saw them. I think most of them are just happy I say Iran properly 97% of the time, old habits are hard to break. Of course, I don’t know any American children of Iranian immigrants, that’s probably different. And on a more condescending note, personal pronouns are a really great invention, you should try them occasionally when talking about yourself.
MattF
The whole ‘what do the pundits think?’ business is just hugely irritating to me. They’ve all got biasses and agendas, they’ve all got narratives to sell, they’re all pushing to be agents-of-influence in these political transactions.
WereBear
I was trapped in a doctor’s office when that show, which I hadn’t seen in decades, came on, and it was like a giant box of Pomeranian puppies yapping away. It made my head hurt, and they didn’t even touch politics.
Amir Khalid
@Starfish:
Isn’t the ballistic-missile programme a separate issue from nukes?
Betty Cracker
@ruemara: Either you’re misunderstanding me, or I’m communicating my point badly or both. I’m not saying economic dislocation isn’t a relevant concern — it totally is. My point is that the possibility of economic dislocation isn’t a valid reason not to pursue single payer.
Ultraviolet Thunder
@MattF:
Pundit chat is cheap programming. Why go out and find/analyze facts when you can just send a couple of attractive people through Makeup and have them yammer about talking points and optics?
The goal is to hold viewers’ attention, not educate them. It works.
MomSense
@WereBear:
Right but isn’t the hope that in a presidential election year you get more state legislatures, governors, and members of Congress? I’m counting on many more and new volunteers in the campaign offices where we make calls and knock on doors for all the candidates on the ticket. I think we should try to take back the Senate, get as many Dems elected to House as possible, and flip some MFing state legislatures that are causing so much suffering now. I’m not going to caucus for a candidate who doesn’t see her/his role as fundraising for the other Democrats running for office.
Also, I’m glad Clinton brought up that Sanders wanted to primary Pres Obama in 2011. Who looks at the challenges the country faced in 2009 and the unprecedented obstruction (economic sabotage!) by the Republicans and says let’s primary the person who persevered in the face of that bullshit?
It’s no secret that I have never been a fan of the Clintons and I hoped that both O’Malley and Sanders would be viable options, but they have been yoogely disappointing.
Schlemazel
@cmorenc:
You have to remember I am a very bitter old man so when I post this shit you have to read it in the snottiest, most condescending, voice you can muster. It was aimed exactly at those people you mention & the humor, such as it is, is really more angry than funny.
I have been betting the “don’t pass” line for 16 years now
Ultraviolet Thunder
I gotta get on a plane. Have a good week and I’ll catch up after Ontario.
Cheers.
Starfish
@Amir Khalid: I am pretty sure it is. This is the article that bothered me. Clinton is always a little hawkish, and I think the way they put that “We might renew sanctions” before the “But I am happy with the current outcome” made her sound as hawkish as she was in the last election.
Mingobat f/k/a Karen in GA
@BGinCHI: I remember riding though small, seemingly isolated little mountain towns a little further north and inland, at higher elevations than Bergen, and wondering how they survived during the winter. I still wonder — how in the world do they manage? Do they stock up in August and never leave their houses again until May? Do they resort to cannibalism and is that why the population is so low? What is going on there?
gelfling545
@Botsplainer:
This has been an issue for me. My area is home to a large number of businesses that employ significant numbers of people in the processing of insurance claims, policy coordination, etc. These are not folks making big bucks. They are making $12-$20/hour. Tossing them all out of work is really not (or should not be) an option.
Botsplainer
@ruemara:
You would have hoped that someone in Bernie’s camp would have thought to bring up how the disruption would be addressed, in order to show that the plan was serious. Instead, they rolled out a long progressive wish list, only about a handful of which stand a ghost of a chance of passing in a congress where each chamber has above 60% democratic membership.
It’s the mirror image of magic wand conservatism, and equally unworkable.
Baud
@Starfish: she is more hawkish than Obama. But Obama has already imposed new sanctions for ballistic missiles. I don’t know where Sanders stands on this issue specifically, although he definitely comes off as less interventionist than both Clinton and Obama.
gelfling545
Biggest “change of mind” I have seen among the FaceBook set is people saying “Hey this O’Malley guy is not too bad either.” Not enough to change them from Clinton or Sanders supporters but getting some name recognition for later.
Schlemazel
@Percysowner:
well the GOP did not go totally batshit insane in 8 years, it to 20, it was incremental. I expect any return to normal for the nation will involve with Democrats pushing back and moving the conversation to the adult table. The Wingnuts are doing their part by horrifying the average fools they have been conning for 30+. The hope should be that the Democratic wing of the Democrat party can step up even more and win more elections.
WereBear
@MomSense: Oh, me too, no question.
I think we’re dealing with the incredible drag of what the Republicans did across the country; removing Civics classes, for one. I’ve defended President Obama dozens of times by explaining “He’s not a King. He has to have the votes in the other two bodies…” and they haven’t a clue.
I also get a laugh when I say, “How old am I? I remember when the news explained things.”
danielx
@BGinCHI:
It is presently 4 above zero in my location, and I just trotted out in a tshirt to put more trash in the barrel after remedying the condition of a couple of cat boxes.
That will clear your sinuses out in a hurry – the cold, not the litter boxes.
BR
@ruemara:
It seems to me there’s an seamless way to implement single payer so the disruption isn’t as bad, which is by introducing a national public option that first subsumes existing government insurance (e.g., Medicare and state-level Medicaid) but becomes open on the exchanges to purchase by anyone. Unless Bernie and his economists are way off, this plan will actually be cheaper to purchase than ones from Blue Cross, etc. Young people, among others, will buy it based on price, and the risk pools will get better. After three years, start ratcheting up the “Medical Loss Ratio” annually so that private insurers can make less and less profit, until they all go out of business.
Baud
@Starfish:
BTW, here is her official statement, if you don’t want to rely on reporters’ spin. It’s short.
Schlemazel
@WereBear:
BINGO!!!
I love that and wish I had thought of it. They are all just shouty-faces & it does hurt my head.
Mustang Bobby
I was greeted in my in-box by WaPo’s Chris Cilliza who told me that Hillary Clinton was the big loser last night because she did not chop off Bernie Sanders’ head and shit down his neck. OFFS.
Schlemazel
Gotta go – Black Lives MAtter is having a big MLK day sale here in Mpls. DOn’t want to miss these bargains that only appear when I am at work it seems.
Have not been tear gassed in 46 years so I have my hopes up.
Amir Khalid
@Baud:
Is Bernie really less interventionist on foreign policy than Hillary or Obama, or has he just not had time to give foreign policy much thought?
BGinCHI
@Mingobat f/k/a Karen in GA: I think they are slowly knitting sweaters that they are wearing while knitting them.
It’s both productive and useful.
Honestly, I wonder the same thing when we go up there. It’s even weirder when you imagine what it was like before decent roads and transport, and especially before all of the tunnels!
FYI, for those who don’t know: when you drive inland in Norway from the coast you go through dozens and dozens of tunnels, long and short, instead of climbing any of the mountains. If not for that strategy, you couldn’t go anywhere half the year. It’s an amazing infrastructure accomplishment.
Gin & Tonic
@Starfish: I’m sure it was very difficult, which is why I was curious, as I left college three years before the Shah was overthrown and lost contact with that milieu. If you’re, say, halfway through a doctoral program 5,000 miles away from home when everything about home changes so significantly, you have a lot of hard decisions that you’re unprepared for.
Botsplainer
@Eric U.:
Agreed. Being too lazy to check, since it was always provided via the states, I’m guessing that it was done that way to assuage the fears of southern and western conservatives about “them” getting too much.
Baud
@Amir Khalid:
I really couldn’t tell you the details either because he hasn’t explained them or I don’t remember them. But he does strike me as less interventionist.
BGinCHI
@danielx: I do NOT miss that.
MattF
@Mustang Bobby: I’ve just stopped reading his stuff. He never has anything non-trivial to say. Never.
Botsplainer
@Amir Khalid:
Dude runs a bumper sticker campaign. He clearly gives little thought to anything other than the emotion of the moment.
Patricia Kayden
Every Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. birthday, some of us suffer the onslaught of Conservatives/Republicans/Rightwingers gleefully lying about Dr. King being a Republican. Just found a perfect tweet on LGF to counter this nauseating claim.
twitter.com/viciousbabushka/status/682549977483243521/photo/1?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
Keep in mind that Republicans are pretty vocal about their anti-Blackness. It’s laughable that they think that had Dr. King not been murdered, he would be on their side given their extreme positions which actually hurt the Black community today.
debbie
Is anyone talking about cutting the costs of services and fees charged by doctors and hospitals? As much as I like the idea of single payer, if costs aren’t controlled, then health care will break this country.
BGinCHI
@MattF: He’s a prime example of the kind of dipshit who is too stupid to get a gig on Sportscenter and so turned to political journalism.
I do sports, but as politics!
Davis X. Machina
@MomSense:
True progressives.
Steeplejack
@Ultraviolet Thunder:
Well, since you’re sitting around doing nothing :-) and you are a grizzled, professional traveler, let me ask you a question: do you check a bag or go carry-on only?
I am an infrequent flier, and a poky one at that: I’m not usually on a tight schedule, so I don’t mind going to baggage claim and waiting around a bit. (The baggage fees some airlines charge are a bite in the ass, however.) But the last time I flew I thought about doing the carry-on thing. The only thing I worry about is if the flight attendant thinks overhead storage is getting too crowded and says I have to gate-check my bag. I’d want to hang onto my notebook computer in that case, so I’d have to take that out of the suitcase and then I’d have it on my hands during the flight. (Usually I use only my tablet in the air.) And if I take the little attaché bag for the computer, that takes up more space in the suitcase if I don’t need it. It’s a conundrum. So what do you do/advise?
Just One More Canuck
@Gin & Tonic: @BGinCHI: Living here in Ontario, I don’t have a particular problem with the LCBO. Far better run than some of the government agencies that they are trying to privatize
Baud
In complaining about the moderators’ choice of topics, I was remiss in omitting anything related to abortion, contraceptives, or women’s health, even though there are two big cases on those issues this Supreme Court term.
Botsplainer
@Davis X. Machina:
They’re always getting sold out, even when they get what they want, because when you give them what they want, you’re simply trying to buy time by appeasing them.
The True Progressive(TM) is always agitating for better…
Botsplainer
@Steeplejack:
Use a little daypack. They ALWAYS fit.
Swiss Gear makes some nice ones with laptop compartments.
different-church-lady
@Davis X. Machina: True on-line progressives, yes. True real-world progressives don’t have time for that shit because they’re out there trying to make progress.
I'mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet
@MomSense: To be fair, and not to pick on you :-), it’s unreasonable for Bernie’s campaign to roll out a, say, 2000 page document explaining all the provisions and changes and details of his plan. It’s good he put something out with enough details about the funding to have some idea that he realizes it will require major changes to pay for it.
Remember Paul Ryan’s 19 page 2009 “Budget”? Bernie’s publication is a very, very broad outline right now.
If Bernie is still around after mid-March, we’ll hear much more about his plans before then.
I do not expect anything like that to even start to be implemented in the next decade. But change and progress are slow. Change doesn’t happen until someone sticks their neck out and starts to talk about how things can be different and why they should be different.
I don’t think Bernie is crazy enough to think that his plan could pass without a 70% D majority in each House, and probably substantial changes to the SCOTUS.
My $0.02.
Cheers,
Scott.
BGinCHI
@Just One More Canuck: The Vintages stores are really nice now. They used to be pretty terrible, even in TO. I’m guessing that in less populated places there ain’t much to choose from. The Norwegians seem to generally think the Vinmonopolet is terrific, but it must be national pride + not having shopped in a place with a great selection.
I’m a serious wine person and I’m drinking wine out of boxes. That should give you a hint of the culture here. There are good wines, but it’s the price and variety that are crappy.
I’m spoiled, I know. Plus, 9/10 on the White People Probs scale.
MomSense
@WereBear:
I say the same thing about civics classes and the news. It’s become something of a joke with my kids.
@BGinCHI:
Having knit with women in some of those little towns, I will tell you there is nothing slow about it. They knit so fast their needles are on fire–which helps to keep them warm.
The only people I have seen who knit faster are the women in the Shetland Islands. They are so fast they wear holsters! Actually they are knitting belts but anyway they are speedy.
Mingobat f/k/a Karen in GA
@BGinCHI: They’re definitely impressive feats of engineering and construction, but after going through a few of them on the motorcycle they started getting old. They just became dark, damp and seemingly endless. I was looking forward to riding through one of them, near Laerdal — the longest or one of the longest in the world — just to say I did it. But by the time I got to the area I had no interest in riding through another tunnel, and took the Aurland road over the mountain instead. (Stunning road — but you could say that about pretty much all of them.)
I told the guy who rented me the bike that I was impressed by the tunnels but after a while started thinking, “Enough already.” His response: “Yeah, everyone comes back and says that.”
WereBear
It’s a common criticism, especially if you have never heard of him before. But he’s been incredibly effective, especially for an Independent from a small state.
I have the advantage of living next door to Vermont, and watching him in action for 15 years.
This is a good article:
Gin & Tonic
@Steeplejack: I go with a carry-on, but I also have a reasonably large second bag for laptop and the stuff I really need in case I’m forced to gate-check my other bag and they lose it (which has happened.) But to some extent it depends on itinerary, i.e. am I connecting, where, and how much time do I have. If I’m going via ATL, for instance, odds are that I’ll need to go from one end of one concourse to the opposite end of another at a dead run, so I’d rather have less to carry.
If I’m traveling internationally I’ll check a bag and take a smaller bag on board.
Calouste
@Kay: Luxembourg has single-payer health insurance IIRC, and that’s quite a bit smaller than Vermont.
But to quote Churchill, Americans can be relied on to do the right thing, after they have tried everything else, specially if the right thing has been done by foreigners first.
Starfish
@Gin & Tonic: I am going to overshare a little. Usually I do not do this. I was born in 1978. My mom took me to Iran to meet my grandparents when I was 1. I had to stay there for years due to some not-without-my-daughter type stuff but without the father being insane. He was just in a postdoc program in the US and not going back to be tossed into the war effort. My mom went home to the US, and I did not see her again until I was about 5.
Gin & Tonic
@Just One More Canuck: Well, LCBO is better than SAQ, I’ll give you that. Low bar, though.
Southern Beale
I didn’t watch because I’m sick of this shit and I’m already locked in for HIllary so there’s no changing my mind. I’m glad Sanders is doing well, though. He can definitely be credited with pushing Hillary to the left, IMHO. And I also think a surging Sanders puts to rest those BS “no coronations!” arguments. I always thought that was stupid but people kept repeating it so fine, there won’t be a coronation.
Bernie won’t win the nomination, though. But I’m glad he’s running.
sparrow
@Betty Cracker: And as I said last night during the debate: don’t you think some of these out-of-work insurance employees will find work in the new government program? It’s not going to run itself. There will also be supplemental insurance programs.
I agree that massive changes like this need to be thought through, but it’s not clear to me that they haven’t been.
MomSense
@I’mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet:
To be fair, it’s unreasonable to think that the next Congress will pass a single payer health care plan so why waste our time with that pipe dream???
Seriously, we have people trying to support themselves and their families on $7.35 an hour with irregular work schedules (good luck finding reliable daycare), decreasing SNAP benefits, unreliable and unaffordable transportation, and no better work prospects on the horizon.
I’d rather deal with the priorities. Let’s face it, single payer became the rallying cry for the “disappointed” progressives who stayed home in 2010 and gave us the Republican House and a bunch of Republican governors and legislatures that re-districted us into the mess we are in. We had millions more votes for Senate candidates in 2014 and yet we still lost the Senate.
I'mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet
@SiubhanDuinne: That is the worst thing about these “debates”. One can predict the questions in advance, and they rarely have to do with what government can actually do to make the country better. They have to do with binary us-vs-them, Teabagger-vs-Non-insane-people, etc., arguments that rile people up. They have to do with trying to trip the candidates up – “35 years ago you said…” – ala their hero Tim Russert.
:-/
It’s uncomfortable for the PTB to discuss Flint because “everyone knows” that Michigan cities are a basket case because the Unions ran them into the ground. “They’re bankrupt!!1” So, the heroic Governor and Legislature “had to rescue them” by appointing “independent” managers who weren’t under the thumb of the “corrupt and incompetent local government officials”. It’s dangerous to the GOP narrative. There’s compelling evidence that specific people in power are responsible. If they do their job and go after Snyder and his appointees, then it hurts the narrative that he’s a “sensible, moderate leader”. And it hurts the narrative that there is still sensible people in the GOP to counter the Democrats.
I’m usually less cynical than this, but it’s hard to avoid following that train of thought in this case.
Of course, it could also be the usual laziness in too much of the press – “The previous debates asked them about these topics before, let’s try again – maybe we’ll get a good sound-bite this time….”
:-/
Cheers,
Scott.
sparrow
@Ultraviolet Thunder: …spoken as someone who has never been denied coverage for complete bullshit reasons, or been forced to pay for a school insurance program with a medical loss ratio of 30 freaking percent. There are tons of decent people working in the insurance industry (our dear Matthew for one), but like always happens with corporations, the sum total acts a lot like a psychopath — they’ll lie, cheat, and steal whenever they can get away with it.
BGinCHI
@Mingobat f/k/a Karen in GA: This is true, but the alternative, in the winter, is FAR worse. The mountain roads would not be navigable.
We have been through the longest one, which is almost 25K long. It’s pretty hard to concentrate after a while, but beats sliding off a mountain or having the road closed.
Botsplainer
@Gin & Tonic:
The “dead run in order to make a connection in another concourse” is where using a daypack shines brightest. None of that wheeled awkwardness need be done.
I’ve been using just a Camelbak with the water bladder removed – that fit a change of clothes, divemask, iPad, a hardcover book and scuba regulator/dive computer and pressure gauge set. I’m going to get a Swiss Gear pack for my next trip, and use the Camelbak for its intended purpose.
Baud
@I’mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet:
I commented last night about this new lamentable practice of reporters engaging in commentary during the debate. Maybe they realized everyone was changing channels as soon as it was over.
ruemara
@Betty Cracker: I think we’re seeing possibility differently. Luckily, we’re grokking each other fine, so we just disagree.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
If Sanders finds some way to transfer the enthusiasm people feel for him to down ticker races, he’ll have made a difference.
Baud
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
It will also be nice if he can transform his movement into a sustainable, persistent political force, like the NRA has done.
oldgold
I do not have a horse in this race. I will happily vote for Clinton or Sanders in the fall.
That expressed, this Iowan, thought Clinton was the clear winner.
I try not to pay much attention to debating points or policy details when watch these. Rather, I try to come away with general impressions.
I came away with this:
1} What is this “angry old man ” doing in my living room on Sunday night; and,
2} Doesn’t he respect the job Obama has done?
Botsplainer
@sparrow:
So you’re now opening up government offices dealing with benefits allocation in multiple cities, hiring employees who may or may not have the skills to do the jobs on newly defined federal job posting classifications at pay structures which have to somehow integrate into the federal system. On top of that, you’ve got supervisory level employees, training regimes and the like which also have to be integrated into civil service, many parts of which probably don’t fit well.
Which employees that spent their entire lives in Nashville or Charlotte or Tampa or Louisville (etc., etc., etc.) get to uproot their lives to go to wherever these holdovers exist? Do they have the resources? Can they survive well while leaving extended family and friend networks behind?
Botsplainer
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
That takes hard work and effective leadership, something not evident in his bumper sticker campaign.
You have to go beyond “Rich People Suck” to come up with policy.
Gin & Tonic
@Baud: It will also be nice if he can transform his movement into a sustainable, persistent political force
Maybe call it something like, I dunno, the “Democratic Party”?
bystander
@BGinCHI: If the Norwegians couldn’t figure out how to jar it or can it, they figured out how to dry it or ferment it. If you can catch New Scandinavian Cooking on PBS, you get a real sense of the current reinterpretation of Norwegian classics. Caught an episode today in which Andreas Viestad showed how to make cracklings Norsk style. It takes about 6 to 7 days to prepare and 15 seconds to deep fry.
Just noticed the good news that Claus Meyer, the Danish guy who do-founded Noma, is opening a Scandinavian food hall in Grand Central this year. Hope there’s a big counter of Norwegian chocolates.
opiejeanne
@Steeplejack: We each take a suitcase small enough for European carry-on (smaller than U.S.), and a smallish backpack; the laptop rides in the backpack. We have stopped checking luggage whenever possible and are still learning to travel and pack lightly. We spent a month in Europe in 2014 living out of these bits of luggage, and my backpack was rarely used. We no longer drag our big cameras along on trips, which helps a lot.
I'mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet
@MomSense: Good points.
When HRC defeats Bernie, I hope and fully expect him to strongly endorse her and work to get her elected and to increase her coat-tails. If he doesn’t, then it will be damaging to him (and her and the party effort) – to some extent anyway.
He has a chance to continue pushing her and the Democratic party to the left. The way to do that is to elect more Democrats. I hope he will transition to doing that after March.
We’ll see.
Cheers,
Scott.
WarMunchkin
I think lots of people paint Sanders with the same brush as they did during the firedoglake/Jame Hamsher era. He just isn’t that.
I do like that his plan is being criticized and that people are rightly pointing out that single payer is something that’s going to be a pain in the ass to implement. But some of the attack lines here make no sense – any Democratic legislation is pie in the sky. Any. So, do we want a Democratic debate where we just ignore the wish of passing any legislation whatsoever? That’s realistic and pragmatic, but also makes our election purposeless.
I think Sander should be pressed, over and over again, to flesh out a reasonable transition path towards single payer, if that’s the goal. What I’m instead seeing is an at-large rejection of single payer – not because of the moment or legislative challenges – but because people actually think single payer is a bad idea, even if we had 100% pinko commie liberal Dems in office.
Also, economic dislocation is something that should be used to challenge a candidate and push them to figure out a meaningful policy. There’s a difference between doing that and doing what the Republicans do, which is argue against climate change initiatives because it hurts coal miners. Single payer is probably a long-run worthwhile goal, and preventing climate change is definitely one. Addressing these policy issues are going to necessarily displace workers, but that’s okay as long as there is a labor transition path. I mean the argument made here seems to be that single payer is contractionary fiscal policy, and I just don’t see that.
@MomSense: Has there been any evidence that the 2010 elections were caused by progressive purity ponies, or is that just horseshit?
Steve in the ATL
@MomSense:
Well said. And this is where Hillary’s experience really shines.
Cacti
@rikyrah:
This.
His “Ask the Governor of Vermont” was a total cop out. He’s going to need a better answer.
MomSense
@bystander:
Isn’t the problem that they have to import almost all of their produce? Veggies are expensive there.
Starfish
@WarMunchkin: The focus on insurance companies right now is mis-directed. The discussion when it comes to health care should be on network transparency (such as not having out of network doctors at in-network hospitals) and on the astronomical cost of pharmaceuticals and some of the imaging technology. There should also be a discussion about price transparency.
Baud
@Gin & Tonic:
The D Party is currently a bigger tent than Sanders’ supporters. I was thinking more of a grass roots organization that is willing and able to take on conservative voices and maybe even start to compete in state and local elections.
MomSense
@WarMunchkin:
I will tell you that in my volunteer recruitment calls in 2010 I heard a lot about how disappointed they were that Obama abandoned single payer. I don’t have access to those lists anymore but it was the most common complaint. It was also all over the intertubes at that time. The people pushing the disappointed meme constantly invoked single payer and public option.
Why make an issue of single payer now when we are so close to the passage of the ACA? I would also argue that green energy is going to create a lot of jobs which the energy sector needs. Natural gas is killing coal, not wind power or solar.
Southern Beale
Boston Globe: Bernie Sanders Doesn’t Get How Politics Works.
I really agree with this guy. I just can’t take Sanders seriously.
Baud
@WarMunchkin:
I think it’s hard to know. Supposedly, the percentage of self identified liberals who vote has remained steady. But how much does criticism from the left depress turnout, if at all? Who knows? I do think there is a lot of rhetoric about not voting from the left, which leads to the perception that at least some of them do stay home.
Roger Moore
@Steeplejack:
I think the classic answer to your conundrum is to get a laptop bag that’s small enough to count as your personal item. The personal item is allowed to be fairly large- a quick check said at least one airline lets it be as big as 9″x10″x17″- so finding one that will hold your laptop, wallet, and all that other stuff you don’t want to gate check shouldn’t be hard.
Betty Cracker
@ruemara: FWIW, I’m not in favor of the Democrats taking another swing at reforming healthcare without firm majorities in Congress and a lock on the presidency. The ACA is a good start, and there are other things we should focus on. I don’t think single-payer will be realistic until the current Republican Party implodes and is replaced by a saner entity.
WereBear
Geez, I had no idea insurance company employees were such special snowflakes!
But then, I’m cynical; my experience with them is that they would happily leave me to pay for my emergency procedure unless I, in great pain and under pressure, jumped through all of their flaming hoops in the correct order. That they would send my disabled husband backdated paperwork, and if he missed it catching it one time, he would lose the check each month he had faithfully paid for before he got sick. That they gave me an 800 number so I could call a nurse and consult about a painful condition that they decided wasn’t worth a trip to the emergency room, so I could toss and turn all night without pain relief.
Those folks. Yeah, I’ll miss ’em.
bystander
@Baud: All three candidates will be in agreement, in the main. So, no friction, no interest. Mitchell thought she had come up with a clever way to refer to the Clenis, but Bernie, to his credit, told her off. Although I do wish somebody would ask Mitchell how she would feel about having her career judged on the basis of her husband shtupping a hypocritical blowhard for years.
Kay
@Calouste:
Right, but it’s all of Luxembourg. Vermont’s plan excluded groups of people:
In a state with a bigger population they could retain the status quo re: those three groups and still have enough people left over to support a single payer plan.
srv
It’s Peak Curtains for liberals and their hipster economy:
Baud
@Kay:
Less certain about TRICARE, but isn’t Medicare a huge cost. Why would excluding them make it more difficult to implement single payer. Agree that the exemption for large businesses hurts.
Betty Cracker
@Baud: I think it’s mostly horseshit. I suspect that people who care enough about politics to define themselves outside the mainstream show up. People who can only be arsed to follow politics when a presidential race brings reality TV show-style drama are the ones who don’t show up in off years.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Baud: My recollection is the numbers say 2010, and ’14, were a return to usual mid-term election patterns (older, whiter and sub/urban) after the anomalies of 2006 and ’08 that had as much to do with how bad things got under Bush (Iraq, Katrina, Bush’s attempt at Soc Sec privatization, Abramoff, Mark Foley in 06; Iraq still and the near total collapse of the economy in ’08). I remember a lot of interviews with “disappointed” voters that ranged from middle aged suburbanites confused and half engaged frustration that Obama hadn’t fixed everything yet– they voted Republican– to college kids expressing their frustrated romanticism– gay rights, Gitmo, public option. I think they mostly stayed home.
bystander
@MomSense: I don’t know how much they import now, but that’s a postwar era thing. Also, Norway is now so wealthy they can do all kinds of things they didn’t before the oil boom. There’s very little arable land in Norway, so veggies and fruit have always been expensive. But what’s not expensive there now? I’d love to go for a trip but afraid I’d run out of money before the trip was over.
BGinCHI
@bystander: The food is great here. Perhaps the most surprising thing about Norway is the bread. Holy shit is it good. Way better than in the states, generally speaking.
The meat is also very good. Lots more tasty and less mass produced. When you buy a roasting chicken it’s small and flavorful, not large and Frankenchicken-like.
Ohio Mom
@WereBear: Oh we have required civics for high school graduation here in Ohio. My kid just started — I’m expecting to have lots of stories about the right wing crap he’ll taught.
Still, will anything top 6th grade economics when he was taught that public goods are “businesses run by the government”?
Peale
@WereBear: And despite all that, it turned out that the vast majority of people liked their insurance and a good many of them went nuts when they thought Obama as going to take it away, change it, make it less expensive, give them more bang for their buck, eliminate parts of the plans that they said they hated.
There isn’t any appetite among actual elected Dems to continue to take a healthcare drubbing. Sanders could win 48 states and there are probably a handful of Dems who’d touch it.
different-church-lady
@Starfish:
Before we have price transparency we need price coherency. Right now there is none.
MomSense
@BGinCHI:
Bread is seriously tasty but I think that is because wheat is expensive so they add other grains to it. I could eat salmon for breakfast, lunch and dinner it is so delicious.
I used to enjoy the elk stews with potatoes and brussels sprouts. I would give up my veggie diet if I went back.
sparrow
@Botsplainer: Honestly: fair price to pay. Disruption sucks and we should mitigate it, but this is like saying we shouldn’t move to green energy because of coal jobs.
Punchy
Trump finally the off-shore odds-on fav to win. Took until now for the odds to move completely in his favor. Rubio second, Cruz third. Jeb went from -180-ish (August) to +400-ish (today). That’s one hell of a drop.
debbie
@BGinCHI:
I bought a couple chicken breasts (bone-in) and I swear they could have been used for a mid-sized dog.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Peale: I don’t know where the line was between “I like my insurance” meaning it’s actually good, and “Oh god we’re barely hanging on with our crappy low premium, high deductible policy and maybe we won’t need to use it for the love of god don’t rock the boat!”
BGinCHI
@MomSense: Made a reindeer roast at Christmas. It was fabulous.
Yeah, lots of grains. All the baked good are tremendous. Much less sugar in them here too, which is nice.
BGinCHI
@debbie: If they sold capons now (do they?) they would be the size of a buick.
Keith G
@Calouste:
Smaller, but as a sovereign state, Luxembourg has economic prerogatives that escape a governing unit which is a small part of a larger union.
And then there is this from our friends at Wikipedia:
Sometime after my lifetime, it seems to me that more and more Americans will come to understand the simple barbarity inherent in the notion that the capitalist profit motive can mix well with the provision of a society’s health care. That is not to say that all profit incentive must be divorced, but certainly that behavior must be transparent and regulated within a micron of its life.
Think of how we rile at for-profit education, yet for-profit medicine? The transitional period known as Obama Care will have many successes, but in the end will still show the shortcoming of letting corporations make health care decisions while directing their behavior toward increased shareholder value.
Bernie, in this case, is simply making an argument ahead of its time – as was Harry Truman.
Ruckus
@Botsplainer:
Back when the ACA was being built I discussed it with some friends and they wondered why we didn’t just get single payer or a national healthcare system like the UK and I asked them the same questions you are asking now, what happens to the kludge that is our current broken system? How do you unravel it from the general economy without causing a huge economic/human disaster? By what system do you nationalize the doctors/hospitals to form the NHS and who would go along with this? I don’t think a lot of people think outside their own little box, not the ramifications, the pitfalls of major policy changes. Conservatives sure don’t, just look at the Iraq debacle for an example, we’re just going to run right in and set everything up in 3 days and leave! How did that work out?
MomSense
@BGinCHI:
I had some reindeer that I swear had fed only on mountain wild flowers and wild sage. It was unbelievably delicious.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
OT: this apparently is a thing that was said
ETA: In my father’s house there are many mansions, yooge, and they’re incredible, they’re like nothing you’ve ever seen before. Classy mirrors everywhere, marble and glass from places you’ve never heard of, because I’m rich and you’re not. Verily, I tell you it is so.
Mingobat f/k/a Karen in GA
@BGinCHI: That goes without saying. There was snow piled up on the sides of the Aurland road in mid-July.
Made for some fun pictures — not every day you see a motorcyclist in front of a pile of snow.
Davis X. Machina
@MomSense:
The people pushing the disappointed meme constantly didn’t know the difference between them.
They didn’t get their bicycle. The brand of bicycle they didn’t get doesn’t really matter at that point.
Davis X. Machina
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
“Donald Trump
lives a life of loving and helping others as Jesus taughthas an R after his name.”FTFY
J R in WV
@Starfish:
The old sanctions were against Iran the whole country. The newer missile based sanctions are against individuals and companies breaking the rules about technology transfer, and explicitly NOT against Iran the whole country.
So comparing the two sets of sanctions is like comparing oranges and rabbit pellets (not the rabbit input food, the rabbit output waste). This is partly why Iran isn’t blowing their stack over these new sanctions – they don’t mean much harm to the country, and they don’t stop the country from participating in the global economy.
Maybe you weren’t aware of the vast difference in the two sanction regimes, and without hitting a couple of in depth articles, I wouldn’t know of the difference. But I was curious about why Iran was so happy the nuclear-related sanctions were ending, even though new missile based sanctions seemed to be beginning, and so went to find out.
Secretary Clinton isn’t brainless, and doesn’t have built-in hate for foreigners in general like so many Republicans do. So I don’t expect her to take knee-jerk positions in foreign policy. She was a pretty good SecState, after all.
Patricia Kayden
Today, on Dr. King’s birthday, you may see Republican tweets claiming that Dr. King was one of them. However this is what Dr. King had to say about the Republican Party in Chapter 23 of his autobiography:
“The Republican Party geared its appeal and program to racism, reaction, and extremism. All people of goodwill viewed with alarm and concern the frenzied wedding at the Cow Palace of the KKK with the radical right. The “best man” at this ceremony was a senator whose voting record, philosophy, and program were anathema to all the hard-won achievements of the past decade.
Senator Goldwater had neither the concern nor the comprehension necessary to grapple with this problem of poverty in the fashion that the historical moment dictated. On the urgent issue of civil rights, Senator Goldwater represented a philosophy that was morally indefensible and socially suicidal. While not himself a racist, Mr. Goldwater articulated a philosophy which gave aid and comfort to the racist. His candidacy and philosophy would serve as an umbrella under which extremists of all stripes would stand. In the light of these facts and because of my love for America, I had no alternative but to urge every Negro and white person of goodwill to vote against Mr. Goldwater and to withdraw support from any Republican candidate that did not publicly disassociate himself from Senator Goldwater and his philosophy.”
SFAW
@Punchy:
It took Amir Khalid longer than he originally thought to work his magic. (Amir’s, not Trump’s, magic, that is. Although Trump’s magic is certainly yuuge, classy, and godlike.)
sukabi
@BGinCHI: and Andrea would have replied “That’s just one of the perks, the other two are access and money.”
Ruckus
@Betty Cracker:
I don’t think that economic disruption that creates a much better health system is not in itself the issue, but how a change as big as single payer really is handled, how fast it is implemented. It would be a huge change in the entire economy, lots of jobs lost, lots of jobs changed. The ACA took how long to implement and even then there were hiccups and that is a much less dramatic change. It would change how we look at healthcare, the number of people in the system, the total number of employees, the economic ripples. It’s not that many of the changes would be positive in the long run, it’s the resistance to that change from the people affected negatively that has to be handled reasonably and minimizing those losses. That’s why the ACA as envisioned was a brilliant piece of work and why it almost didn’t make it through the legislature.
Kay
@Keith G:
I think the difference there, for me anyway, is we actually HAVE a universal public system of education for K-12. We’d be ending a public system and replacing it with private contractors.
We only have two universal public systems or programs: K-12 education and Social Security because Medicare is a just a public payment system and even that is partly privatized.
Ruckus
@Starfish:
Hasn’t President Obama reinstated some sanctions for business between Iran and the US? Is that any different than Clinton is proposing? Isn’t there a 90 day moratorium but some sanctions go back into place then?
It isn’t a free for all for Iran, there are limitations, just not nearly as severe as they were.
Germy
@Patricia Kayden:
King’s 1952 letter to Coretta Scott:
The Other Chuck
@Keith G:
Seems to me there’s an organized effort to change that under the banner of “reform”. I’m sure police and fire are next.
Peale
@J R in WV: But I’ve been told by my progressive betters that Hillary and Cheney are just two sides of the same PermaGovDeepStateSM coin. And that Sanders, once he is done with reforming healthcare, won’t bother to touch the drones.
cmorenc
@Schlemazel:
I read your original comments in the proper spirit in which you intended them, and agree with them. I was commenting on the fact that though the snark is indeed funny at first glance, it’s precisely the fact that the snark is bitterly spot-on in foreshadowing the potentially disastrous consequences the thinking of those it was directed at might have upon the rest of us that quickly drains the humor from it.
the Conster
@Botsplainer:
“single payer” and “audit the fed” are the magical incantation words – gang signifiers for political fantasy teams much like “Benghazi” is for wingnuts. As soon as someone says any of those words, I know I’m not dealing with a serious person.
Cacti
@Ruckus:
I don’t think single payer proponents do themselves any favors when they hand wave objections or concerns away with the response that “it will be better in the long run”. As John Maynard Keynes aptly observed, “In the long run, we’re all dead”. Many people don’t think much further ahead than next week, and if you want to implement a broad national change to healthcare policy, you need many of those people on your side.
There are 3 major issues that any serious discussion of single payer is going to have to confront head on: 1. It’s going to raise everyone’s taxes, 2. The transition costs from the current system will be substantial, and 3. It’s going to displace a lot of workers in the private insurance industry.
For single payer to have any chance, all of the above have to be seriously discussed, and a majority of the public has to be convinced that it will be better for everyone despite those things. I’ve yet to see any public figure tout single payer, who didn’t want to tiptoe around the uncomfortable parts mentioned above.
Keith G
@Kay: Indeed.
And what I am getting at is that roughly the same critiques can apply when an under-regulated profit motive is allowed to prevail or at least given too many unscrutinized options.
Interestingly enough, predatory profit-driven behavior hurts much the same population whether the business is medicine or education.
Goblue72
@Botsplainer: When your argument is “but who will think of the insurance workers and insurance stock prices!”, you’ve so lost the thread as to have disappeared up your own rear end.
Davis X. Machina
@Peale:
He’s not making this up, folks.
Cacti
@Goblue72:
Thank you for illustrating my point so succinctly, broseph.
Steeplejack
@Gin & Tonic, @opiejeanne, @Roger Moore:
Part of the subtext, and perhaps I could have been more clear, is that I want to carry only one bag. My small attaché bag is fine for my (very small—11.6" screen) ThinkPad, tablet and a few accessories, but I don’t want to carry that and the suitcase. I want to put everything in the suitcase and then take out the tablet to use during the flight.
I guess a small backpack or daypack would mean that I wouldn’t have to “carry” two bags in my hands, but it’s not exactly the solution I was looking for. But thanks for the responses. It’s always interesting to hear what other people do.
ruemara
@BR: that’s very workable.
I’m stepping off the internet for the day except for work reasons. Between conservatives “reclamation” of MLK to slap black people around and Bernie fans sharing pics of Bernie to co-opt MLK day to explain how Bernie is my pal, I think I’ll seceed the territory to ridiculousness.
the Conster
@Cacti:
LOL. The FIRE sector could use a good disruption to start the Bernie revolution, amirite?
debbie
@Patricia Kayden:
Glenn Beck has been likening his own efforts and beliefs to those of MLK and Gandhi. This usually gets me pretty upset; however, this morning, I listened to him trying to reason with listeners who support Trump. His frustration and anger were really quite rewarding.
WarMunchkin
@Davis X. Machina: I believe the phrase “nut-picking” may have originated somewhere or another.
@the Conster: Really, single-payer is Benghazi? I mean come on, you’ve just been reading a thread where lots of people are talking about the challenges of implementing a system that may or may not be better in the long run and how to get there.
ruemara
@WereBear: Mayor is really different than Senator and President. It would also depend on the level of power given to the Mayor based on a city’s articles of incorporation. I spent a lot time asking questions of the city lawyer when I worked for one
ruemara
@Betty Cracker: gotcha and fully agree
Peale
@the Conster: I’m sure there will be no consequences of note once we disregard all of the people who work in that sector. Because they don’t do real work unlike the rest of us who clearly do real work…probably with our hands or in factories. When we type, there is grease and cow dung under our finger-nails, lunch buckets in hand we type away all day. More value add than thou we are.
Steeplejack
@Steeplejack:
Been thinking about this a little more, and I guess the answer is to pack so that I can put the attaché bag inside the suitcase. The ThinkPad, tablet, power cord and mouse have to go into the suitcase anyway, so why not inside the attaché case? Sort of like how people use “packing cubes” to organize their stuff. Theoretically, the attaché case doesn’t add that much bulk, but it just feels vaguely wrong somehow. LOL.
Ruckus
@Cacti:
Single payer may raise your taxes but it also lowers the out of pocket money to, if done properly, nothing. And that ain’t nothing to sneeze at. And it depends on what you make as to what your taxes would be raised so people still with no health care today would have it. Of course that might be in name only if they don’t have a doctor to actually see them.
I must have not written my comments properly if anyone thinks I’m not for single payer. I am. What I’m saying is the road to get there is not a short, straight line. There are many potholes, dips, mountains and curves on this road and they can be negotiated but not at warp speed. And it isn’t the only road to having universal healthcare.
So which is more important, universal health care or a better way to pay for what we now have?
the Conster
@WarMunchkin:
I’ve been reading progressives who think that Bernie will be elected and do a louder bullier pulpit thing for single payer that Obama wouldn’t or couldn’t do because he was either weak/incompetent or a worse corporatist sellout than Bush. There’s a LOT of progressive ridiculousness around this issue and willfull ignorance about the difficulty of displacing deeply entrenched interests that comprise a huge sector of the economy.
Cacti
@Ruckus:
My comments weren’t directed at you in particular. It was just an observation vis the single payer as a hobby horse crowd.
the Conster
@Peale:
LOL. When the revolution comes, health insurance claims processors will be first against the wall.
piratedan7
well, I tend to look at it this way…. if we do implement single payer down the road, what makes you think that this wouldn’t warrant an expansion in federal jobs? Unless the GOP has the ability to jury rig that process (and they can and will if they have the means), suddenly putting millions of Americans into a new federal or expanded Medicare system is going to take many many much warm bodies, to update and maintain the database and to keep track of what is covered, what isn’t, rates of reimbursement… etc etc etc… I would like to think that the Feds would be smart and pick up a significant amount of workers already in that field for those positions. Will it/would it be a direct 1:1 correlation, probably not, but I also think it’s disingenuous to imply that if national health care system was in place that there would be a net zero increase in corresponding federal jobs. Plus, we still have an insurance industry serving the 50+ crowd with the supplemental insurance to Medicare still out there, I could foresee a growth out there for folks that want more than the Feds would begin to offer.
The big thing is to ensure a decent standard of care and reimbursement for all and eliminate the overhead that goes to the pay of the CEO’s of the insurance industry itself, that’s plainly obscene.
Cacti
@the Conster:
Yep.
Lot’s of Green Lantern Theory proponents among the “Feel the Bern” contingent.
The thing I’ll miss most about President O is that he was great at soaring rhetoric, but also very results oriented.
Ruckus
@Steeplejack:
When I traveled a lot it depended on how long each trip was. Long enough and I checked a bag. Short enough and carry on only. Always had a computer bag for all the personal stuff/laptop and frequently large amounts of cash coming back from the events I was traveling to and a backpack for carry on. I sometimes got crap for having two but I just pointed out that women could carry a purse of any size and a carry on and equality was a two way street. Mostly it meant not having spares of anything if I carried on. But after yrs of traveling I found that if I needed anything there are stores where I’m going and in the long run not carrying extras was better.
the Conster
@Cacti:
I watched those “town hall” meetings he held during the ACA hearing period, where he had all the stakeholders in a room. He was the master of ceremonies/moderator for the ensuing discussions, recognizing and validating the concerns of all of the affected parties, of which there were many. It was all carefully thought through, and I believe it was the most change that can happen to such a gargantuan interconnected system in my lifetime. There just is not enough organized constituency for replacing the current system – maybe theoretically, but to get buy in from the industry that will be displaced, somehow, is above everyone on the current political stage’s pay grade.
Elie
@Botsplainer: Absolutely agree!
Elie
@the Conster:
Totally agree w this. The Bernie policy mavens are unable to accept the basic laws of health politics and were obviously on another Planet during the Aca. I really dislike this kind of willfully ignorance
Betty Cracker
@the Conster:
You’re not seriously puzzled by that, are you?
different-church-lady
@the Conster: Their inevitable shrieking of “BETRAYAL!!!!” when he doesn’t instantly make everything better with a wave of his hand would make the Obama years seem like a Beethoven sonata.
different-church-lady
@the Conster: You left out “BANKSTERS!”
FlipYrWhig
@the Conster:
Yup. They think Obama didn’t try hard enough because he was corrupted by Big Bankster (per different-church-lady), but Sanders is incorruptible, so he’ll try harder. Or, better still, because people believe in Sanders’s hard-trying ability already, the public will be more on his side and elect more hard-trying-allies and other progressives. And thus the things that Sanders would try hard to get will actually come to pass soon enough, which is both the promise and the plan. I think this sounds like utter bullshit and the opposite of the lesson of 2009-10, whose result was the most liberal Congress in recent memory, which still wasn’t that liberal where it counted, still watered everything down to get passed, and so forth, and NOT for lack of trying but because, ya know, even the Democrats who get elected in the US of A aren’t necessarily Bernie-grade liberal stalwarts eager to get to work on the Bernie Agenda.
Brachiator
I was glad that I watched most of this debate, since it was the last chance that Sanders and Clinton had for making a case for their candidacy before the primaries (sorry O’Malley). I can see the point of those who wanted more debates, though as I have said before, the often lame questions continually asked undermines the usefulness of more debates.
I’m still torn. Now I am looking at candidates for their political and campaigning acumen. Clinton is stiff and wonky, but she hit gold when she blatantly talked about extending Obama’s legacy, and attacking Sanders on possible digs at Obama (this needs fact checking, I would think). People say that she is not as charismatic as Bill or Obama, but she still has to find a way to be less robotic and calculating.
Sanders is a lovable crank. But his plan to tax the middle class to bring health care (and maybe free college) to everyone is insane. Worse, even though apparently many college age folk love him, he seems intent on alienating black voters with a sadly reductive view of economics that ignores realities of race in America. He also is wrong when he suggests that being pure in his hatred of and distance from Big Money automatically makes his proposals sound or workable.
I would like to know how many bills Sanders has championed while in Congress and how effective he has been with working with other Democrats and Republicans.
Neither candidate has slammed the dunk for me. I think that Clinton might be better able to get out the vote, but she is vulnerable if Sanders can peel supporters away from her.
And although it is not directly debate related, the stories I see about Sanders running around with Cornell West , whom I absolutely detest, makes Bernie much less appealing to me.
Ruckus
@FlipYrWhig:
Purity ponies are purity ponies. They want/need a purity pony leader and think they have found one and that’s all that matters. Their reality is nicer than the right’s purity ponies for sure but it is still not feasible in real life, at least not in one fell swoop.
And it’s not that we don’t often have the same desires/policy ideals, it’s just some of us don’t think a wreaking ball, a couple of 2x4s, a pound of nails and a sledge hammer is a viable way to get there.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
H e was one of those sniffing around for a primary challenger in 2011, even flirted with the idea of doing it himself, which he now denies
I think this kind of talk, with and around Sanders, was a regular feature of the Thom Hartmann show in 2011-12.
the Sanders movement strikes me as the flip side of Republicans taking about Dash, we just need to speak (or shout) the magic words and the world will change!
mclaren
Hillary Clinton will not win the Democratic nomination, so it doesn’t matter.
Elie
@Brachiator:
I think you summed up many of my same concerns and observations….
As one black person speaking just for me, Bernie has not sold me and in fact continues to surprise me with his ongoing arrogance on a number of issues (not just those related to race). He comes across to me as pretty command and control — he is going to ram that baby in and will not take any advice on how the system actually works in doing big complex things — whether health care or throwing the Bankstas in jail.
chopper
@Ruckus:
exactly. anybody who offers up a single payer policy plan that doesn’t address this issue somehow (by, for example, implementing it slowly and methodically) is pissing fairy dust up your leg.
Brachiator
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
From Sanders remarks during an interview:
I guess I can say that Sanders has been consistent as an independent. But he is also full of shit here.
chopper
@Cacti:
don’t worry, president bernie will just sign an executive order making recessions illegal.
Tom65
I’d give the edge to Sanders. Clinton came off as what I’ve always thought her to be: a triangulating DLC moppet.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Tom65: So you confirmed your pre-existing bias and Sanders won.
“moppet”?
Mike J
@Tom65: I sincerely hope you don’t know what a moppet is. Otherwise I have to think you’re repeating the Republican “feckless child” talking point. If you are, fuck you.
Never attribute to malice what can be explained by stupidity, though.
Peale
@Elie: apparently you just have to look at into a banisters mind and know that he’s guilty. It’s the shiftiness.
Look, I’m not a tea party supporter. So the issue of 2008 wasn’t that the banks collapsed and needed a bail out. I think we’re better off not testing the waters of what letting it collapse and rebuilding a financial system would entail. We may have found that they did something useful that we would miss. The gross injustice to me was that the bankers sued and got their bonuses when I’ve never heard of employees earning bonuses that weren’t tied to a company’s overall performance and insolvency usually means no bonus for you. But the successfully sued, so there’s not much threatening to throw them in jail can do.
Brachiator
@Tom65:
What does this mean in English?
Satby
@Robert Sneddon: I was gone all day, but my insurance premiums have gone up every year I’ve had insurance, though many years I didn’t. And I know people who work at low levels in that industry, not every cog is a Master of the Universe. I stated I support single payer… I also agree with Botsplainer that some of the disruption involved in eliminating or drastically reducing labor in an industry has big consequences that need to be addressed before they happen. That’s not even a disagreement, that’s just common sense. Because people in this country don’t have employment security and will agitate pretty strongly against an unknown (to them) predicted benefit and to keep the devil they do know that puts food on the table.
I have lived through several of these industry dislocations, and a goomba like Trump is what happens when people feel like they haven’t got much to lose.
Satby
@sparrow: Jayzus! No one is saying not do single payer, they’re pointing out that it will require long term planning and consideration of mitigating the effects on an industry that has a huge reach in the economy.
J R in WV
@gelfling545:
Maybe in a world of universal health care, they could get good jobs in hospitals, rehab centers, home health care work, clinics, etc, etc.
You think? Maybe more beneficial to society than paper shuffling – you think?
Just rambling some thoughts here, but this “People would lose their insurance jobs!!” line really ranks me. Prison guards would lose their jobs if all non-violent drug offenders were pardoned, too, but the pardon would be the right thing to do. Along with making drugs available to anyone over 21 at a pharmacy for the cost of production.
That would make all those poppy farmers in Afganistan etc legal too.
Portugal made all drugs legal years ago, and their usage rate went down. Other countries too, but I’m too lazy tonight to look it up. The War on Drugs failed years ago, and El Shorty is one prime example of how bad the loss was.
gwangung
I think, with this kind of thinking, you’re just begging for the law of unintended consequences to come and bite you in the ass.
One of the underappreciated apsects of Obama is that he sure as hell did his best not to let that happen.
David *Born in the USA* Koch
Gallup — Monday January 18 – Obama Ratings
Approve……………….51%
Disapprove……………45%