Welcome, one and all to the most intense nightly read anywhere on the ‘sphere… The BitsBlog Nightly Ramble.
- NO MODERATION HERE: Jennifer Rubin of Commentary opines: [1]
[2]
David Brooks [3]says he’s out on the ledge, morose, and about to have a “Howard Beale” moment. Just last week [4]he was telling us that Obama was a misunderstood moderate. Now he confesses that Obama is aiding and abetting unlawfulness of the worst kind. He explains:
Barack Obama campaigned offering a new era of sane government. And I believe he would do it if he had the chance. But he has been so sucked into the system that now he stands by while House Speaker Nancy Pelosi talks about passing health care via “deem and pass” — a tricky legislative device in which things get passed without members having the honor or the guts to stand up and vote for it.
Deem and pass? Are you kidding me? Is this what the Revolutionary War was fought for? Is this what the boys on Normandy beach were trying to defend? Is this where we thought we would end up when Obama was speaking so beautifully in Iowa or promising to put away childish things?Not very moderate. Not even defensible. Brooks is left, as many of us are, blinking in disbelief:
It’s unbelievable that people even talk about this with a straight face. Do they really think the American people are going to stand for this? Do they think it will really fool anybody if a Democratic House member goes back to his district and says, “I didn’t vote for the bill. I just voted for the amendments.” Do they think all of America is insane? … It’s just Democrats wanting to pass a bill, any bill, and shredding anything they have to in order to get it done.
[5]Jenifer Rubin
So I think we can agree that this is not moderate, not thoughtful, and not Burkean [6]. (And it turns out that a perfectly creased pants leg was not a sign that “he’ll be a very good president.”) What we have learned is that Obama is willing to use radical means to defy the popular will and enact a massive expansion of government.
As Jennifer points out, most people figured out a long time ago that the mantra of change hope, and God help us, post -partisanship, was all so much bilge. That understanding is probably the best explanation for the approval ratings for both Congress and for the White House. Obama is exposed as a radical leftist by his aims and his means. Interestingly, in the doing he’s been successful in revealing the remainder of this party to be radical left as well. Most Americans now see the moral bankruptcy that drives these people. And here’s the thing; It’s gotten to the point where even a numb-nutted hack like David Brooks has to admit it.
- SMELL THE DESPERATION: It’s also to the point where even Obama himself recognizes that things have gotten desperate. Desperate enough, in fact for him to show up on Fox. Over at Pajamas Media, Roger Simon points out : [7]
[8]Pajamas Media's Roger Simon
There’s no way Barack Obama would have appeared on Fox Wednesday night in a sit-down interview with Bret Baer [9]had not the President’s health care bill been in serious trouble. Things must be really bad, even with all the legislative legerdemain being cooked up by Pelosi and company. The interview itself was testy with Baer doing relatively well, I thought. Nevertheless, the President was able to filibuster away from answering most of the questions. But whoever “won,” I doubt it changed many minds at this point; everybody’s already so disgusted with the process. (I was amused by the competition between Baer and Obama over the number of emails they received. When Baer claimed 18000 for Fox, Obama felt he had to best him with 40000 a day to the White House.) When you think over the last year, it’s clear Obama has some of the most inept advisers in recent presidential history. Allowing him to risk his entire presidency on a global overhaul of health care – when an incremental overhaul could have been had simply for the asking – seems absurd politics, win or lose.
Frankly, Roger, I’m not convinced that what we’re dealing with here is ineptitude. I think what we’re dealing with here is a dedication to radically leftist ideas. Socialism, in short. A dedication that prompts one to fall on one’s sword, politically speaking, for the greater political and of enacting socialism here in these United States. Roger, you ask the question if these people live in the real world. I think they do, but they live under a different value structure than you and I, and certainly a different value structure than most politicians. Their central objective is to enact socialism, thus killing America. Frankly, there’s no other reasonable explanation for that pattern of behavior that you rather eloquently describe.
- The CBO: The word on the street just now is that the final CBO numbers for the Healthcare bill probably won’t be out ’till Saturday [10], or possibly Sunday. It wouldn’t surprise me a bit to see those numbers show up after the vote is taken. As we indicated here yesterday, even then the numbers presented will be at least questionable. The fact of the matter is that the bill is still written in invisible ink.
- STRAW MAN? I DON’T THINK SO: Joyner, over at OTB writes: [11]
Dan Riehl [12] is in the cross-fire between Alan Colmes [13] and MEDIAite [14] over a rather bizarre argument:
[15]Dan Riehl
I’m not sure I quite understand this, given that cost is so important as a burden to taxpayers when it comes to health care. If Democrats want so badly to abort babies because of it, why are we bothering with someone who has a broken neck and back at 69? It sounds to me like she’s pretty well used up and has probably been living off the taxpayers for plenty of years to begin with. Aren’t we at least going to get a vote on it?
He’s talking about Harry Reid’s wife, who was injured, along with their daughter, in a car accident [16] last week. He continues:
Come on, Harry – do your civic duty. The nation’s broke and counting on you guy. Pull the plug and get back to work. And don’t bill us for a full day today, either. This is no time to be sloughing off. Air freight her home, you can bury her during recess on your own time and dime. Or are you going to bill us for that, too?
Now, aside from it being poor form to try to score cheap political points off the suffering of politicians’ families — Lara Reid isn’t the Senate Majority leader — the argument doesn’t even make sense on its face. While I oppose the current health care reform plan, Reid and company are trying to extend care, not limit it. For that matter, while I’m passionately against abortion in all but the most extreme cases, who’s arguing that it should be performed more often so that we can save money? Certainly, not any Democrats I know.
The thing is, James, that’s what all those arguments are going to come down to in the future. Remember, my friend, this is not about Health care, this is about power. Governmental power. If you think not, let’s try a little thought experiment. Let’s replace senator Harry Reid’s wife, with Mrs. Jane Average. I suspect there are very few who don’t intuitively understand that given the same conditions the government health care cost miners would find that it’s just far too expensive to keep Jane alive. And frankly, that’s a question that slime balls like Alan Colmes will never dare consider.
And let’s consider something else, here. Dan says today: [17]Rahm Emanuel insulted Nutroots types by calling them “retards,” [18] also claiming they could be taken for granted on Obama Care and mostly ignored. Of course, the Netroot bloggers were furious.
So, what did they do about it? Precisely what he said they would [19], nothing. It also points out how out of step the Netroots is with the country. They believe Obama went too far to the Right with Obama Care. But the country disapproves of it because it’s still too far Left.
Well, I guess it shouldn’t be a surprise to anybody that the Nutroots really haven’t done anything other than help to empower the current Congress and the current White House occupants. You see, they actually believed the “everything for everybody” ploy. That’s another reason why Obama is so desperate. Not only has he lost the center because they’ve identified he is a pathological liar, he’s lost his Nutroots core, as well. Politics, you see, it is mostly about perception. Try as the Democrats might, (Obama, particularly, of late) …they have never been able to successfully remove themselves from the influence of the leftist nutballs, such as the Nutroots. leftist politics, let’s face it, is loaded with logical inconsistencies that any get ignored by its adherents. It’s those logical inconsistencies embedded in leftist politics that do the most damage to leftist politics. And, as Obama shows is clearly, leftist politicians as well. Those logical inconsistencies are the most pronounced among their most vocal supporters. Rahm Emanuel recognized that when he said what he did; He was trying to separate the Democrats from that core group.. But the fact of the matter is, the Democrats are unable to separate themselves from the leftist nutballs. Either in reality, or in perception. It doesn’t help the case when it is so bleeding apparent, by way of his policies and the means he uses to get them in play, that Mr. Obama doesn’t appear to want separation from the ideals espoused by the nutroots… merely the consequences of being associated with them.
