Come for the politics, stay for the snark.
The big event around the Cole household will be the first hour of the Hope for Haiti concert followed by Caprica on SyFy at nine. You?
My dinner is not as exotic as Tim’s. I’m having a cold cut sub and a pickle from the deli.
BTW- This is another Evelyn DeHais graphic (link in the blogroll) that we will probably use for Cafe Press.
If it isn’t obvious, yeah, I’m tired, emotionally drained and probably getting a little punchy. I’m going to take a nap. Then I’ll play Dragon Age for an hour and then cook some beef bourgignon and a creme brulee.
Open thread.
Looking at our updated list of where Reps stand, and judging by your own feedback and the insidery stuff that Josh Marshall posts, I do not think that most House Democrats have a fucking clue what they are going to do.
Get on the horn and make a suggestion. (202) 224-3121. Instructions for first-timers here.
Actually an email. I left out which Congresswoman to protect the emailer’s anonymity.
Called XXXX’s office again [district removed; ed.]. This time I got someone who knew something.
He told me that she has no final position. It’s going to depend on how Pelosi and Obama choose to do things, if they want to push things through or wait until Brown is seated.
He didn’t know what exactly was going on with the many discussions they were having on the subject, but said there had been a lot of meetings. He said they were closed-door, members-only meetings and he didn’t know exactly how it was being discussed.
He said there had been a lot of constituent calls in the last few days on the subject. He asked specifically what I was for. I told him I was for passing the Senate bill; it wasn’t perfect but it was the best we had and hopefully it could be fixed down the road.
He said the calls were very much appreciated and helped the Congresswoman to shape her opinion. PLEASE KEEP CALLING!
Your Congressman’s office would also love to hear from your friends, family, coworkers, fellow parishioners and anyone you email on a regular basis. Just a thought.
Chat about whatever.
Might as well make a separate post about this. Critics are perfectly right to point out that the Senate bill that I want to see passed is, at best, a shit-and-banana sandwich. That sounds pretty bad except that (1) if Democrats don’t pass it then they might as well stay home in November, and (2) the country is about to die from potassium deficiency. I cannot stress enough how badly we need that banana individual mandate and complete ban on pre-existing conditions and rescission. Medicare reimbursement problems, the excise tax and affordability questions are all problems that I think, meaning I genuinely believe, are worth the price to get the bill’s key components the bill enacted into law.
As I see it, Congress can repeal the shitty parts of the bill any time but no politician can take away the general right to health insurance and live. This is how it works everywhere else in the world: citizens constantly petition government to iron out problems but nobody ever, ever proposes to take the fundamentals away.
However, with reconciliation the Senate can theoretically wash most of the shit off any time they want. They can’t write a new bill, because the fundamentals in the bill we already passed won’t work in reconciliation, so the House still has to eat a shit and banana sandwich. Nonetheless the Senate can give us an almost complete win if they want it enough. Call your Senators.
(202) 224-3121
***Update***
Regarding what to say: we need a fix to Medicare reimbursement rates, the excise tax and affordability and (what the hell, why not) the Public Option passed through reconciliation. If the Senate commits then the House will almost certainly reciprocate and Democrats will look like winners who can deliver positive change or the country. If not then Democrats utterly fail and a Republican Congress will spend the next two or six years pawing through Obama’s underwear drawer for another whitewater/travelgate/OMFG he asked for dijon mustard he must be a French muslim terrorist spy.
Phone your Representative. It feels better than yelling at pseudonyms on an internetblog.
Here is how you do it.
(1) Use a phone. Email has nigh on zero impact. Trust me on this. Letter mail gets read, but you don’t have time. Reach the House switchboard at (202) 224-3121 .
(2) Remember, this person works for you. You pay his or her salary and you voted for them. You’re the boss here, or at least one of them, and it’s they who should worry about what you think of them.
(3) Identify your name and the town or neighborhood where you live zip code. If you are not a constituent don’t bother. Since you guys never listen to me, at least google a zip code in the appropriate district before you call.
(4) State the issue. This is easy: pass the Senate bill or the party gets it. We can (and certainly will) fix the shortcomings later.
(5) How strongly do you feel? Don’t apologize about feeling passionate or pissed off. The squeaky wheel gets the grease.
(6) What are you going to do about it? (Updated from earlier) This part is not that relevant when they’re getting a ton of calls. Every teabagger threatens the end of the world, so they get pretty jaded about it.
One last, important point. We want to track where Representatives are swinging on this and who is willing to commit. However your Rep’s intern responds about the Senate bill, please email me or post it in the comments. We are most interested to know who is voting yes, who will vote no, who will not commit and whether the abortion language is a problem with conservative Dems.
***Update***
It can’t hurt to assure the intern that you hate the Senate too, and you’ll gladly get behind punishing those guys just as soon as we get this stupid bill passed and over with. House members are LIVID at the Senate right now.
***Update 2***
As BTD points out, it cannot hurt and may do a ton of good if you call your Senator as well. The ultimate win situation is to have the House commit to passing the Senate bill while the Senate commits to fixing its bill through reconciliation.
I may be too jaded to hope for that kind of win, but who knows. I would never feel happier to be wrong.