HorsesAss.Org

Ezra Klein makes this point magnificently:

When Medicare was being considered, the American Medical Association hired Ronald Reagan to record a record housewives could play for their friends. It was called Operation: Coffee Cup, and you can listen to it in the clip atop this post, or read the text here.

Reagan was a more graceful speaker than Blackburn, but his point was much the same. Kill the bill. “If you don’t do this and if I don’t do it,” he said, “one of these days you and I are going to spend our sunset years telling our children and our children’s children, what it once was like in America when men were free.”

Well, the bill passed. And moments ago, Rep. Paul Ryan was on the floor of the House, bellowing against Democrats who would dare propose “across-the-board cuts to Medicare.” This is breathless opportunism from Ryan — he has proposed far deeper across-the-board cuts to Medicare, and is making arguments against the Democrats’ bill that would be far more potent and accurate if aimed at his own — but leave that aside for a moment. The GOP’s embrace of the program that Ronald Reagan fought, and that Newt Gingrich sought to let “whither on the vine,” is based on the lived experience seniors have had with the bill: It has made them more, rather than less, free.

Blackburn’s introduction aside, people do not “celebrate” the freedom to not be able to afford lifesaving medical care. They don’t want the freedom to weigh whether to pay rent or take their feverish child to the emergency room. They don’t like the freedom to lose their job and then be told by insurers that they’re ineligible for coverage because they were born with a heart arrhythmia.

When faced with the passage of programs that would deliver people from these awful circumstances, the Republicans adopt a very narrow and cruel definition of the word “freedom.” But when faced with the existence of programs like Medicare, and the recognition that their constituents depend on those programs to live lives free of unnecessary fear and illness, they abandon their earlier beliefs, forget their dire warnings and, when convenient, defend these government protections aggressively. There’s nothing much to be done about that. It is, after all, a free country. But Americans should feel free to ignore these discredited hysterics.

The House now has the votes to pass this thing.

Last week’s contest was won by Liberal Scientist. It was Mt. Vernon, NY.

For those who are new to the contest, click the picture and within the Bing mapping webpage, select Aerial and then select Bird’s Eye if you think you’ve at the location pictured below. Here’s this week’s, good luck!

From KIRO’s Twitter feed:

Rep. Brian Baird just told our DC Bureau that he will be voting yes on the health care bill. He was undecided before.

I’m shocked that the incumbent endorsing Denny Heck has come around, when it’s pretty clear that a vast majority of regular Democrats think we should pass the damn bill. Like Craig Pridemore has said all along. Hmm, maybe having more and better Democrats run in primaries really is a good thing.

At any rate, now we can go back to ignoring what’s his face.

They’ve never been anything more than an angry mob:

Tea partiers and other anti-health care activists are known to get rowdy, but today’s protest on Capitol Hill–the day before the House is set to vote on historic health care legislation–went beyond the usual chanting and controversial signs, and veered into ugly bigotry and intimidation.

Civil rights hero Rep. John Lewis (D-GA) and fellow Congressional Black Caucus member Andre Carson (D-IN) related a particularly jarring encounter with a large crowd of protesters screaming “kill the bill”… and punctuating their chants with the word “nigger.”

[…] And that wasn’t an isolated incident. Early this afternoon, standing outside a Democratic whip meeting in the Longworth House office building, I watched Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA) make his way out the door, en route to the neighboring Rayburn building. As he rounded the corner toward the exit, wading through a huge crowd of tea partiers and other health care protesters, an elderly white man screamed “Barney, you faggot”–a line that caused dozens of his confederates to erupt in laughter.

After that incident, Capitol police threatened to expel the protesters from the building, but were outnumbered and quickly overwhelmed.

Makes you proud to be an American, huh?

Of course, bullies are also cowards, and outside of the security of their own mob, I don’t really believe that most tea baggers have the balls to act on their convictions, let alone their threats (The traitor Dave Reichert votes for cap and trade, yet faces no Tea Party challenger… what’s up with that?), but as I’ve written before, there are crazies out there, and violent rhetoric breeds violent actions. So if health care reform does pass, and right-wing violence does break out, I hope responsible political leaders have the guts to brand them as the terrorists they really are.

Leviticus 25:44-45
And as for your male and female slaves whom you may have—from the nations that are around you, from them you may buy male and female slaves. Moreover you may buy the children of the strangers who dwell among you, and their families who are with you, which they beget in your land; and they shall become your property.

Discuss.

Not that that’s news to most of us here, but it appears that even conservatives are starting to figure it out too.

From The Seattle Times:

Rep. Adam Smith announced Saturday that he will backthe House’shistoric vote on health reform scheduled for Sunday,leaving Rep. Brian Baird as the sole member of Washington’s congressional delegation who remains undecided.

And there you have it, almost. Lots of moving parts back in the other Washington, but at this point reliable sources on the Tubes seem to suggest there will be three straight-forward votes in the House, rather than “deem and pass” and all that stuff, and that Rep. Bart Stupak, R-Sepsis, has been told to go infect himself. And as for Baird, I have nothing left to say about him at this point. Call him, don’t call him, it doesn’t matter.

So if this thing passes, it’s either the final communo-nazi-islamic takeover, or it’s a baby step towards getting fair treatment for millions of more Americans when it comes to health care. It depends on which version of reality you choose to live in. For those who choose the Fox Noise version of reality, it must be nearly unbearable.

One thing is certain, right wing hyperbole is expected to reach a crest of 6.9 meters sometime early tomorrow afternoon. Hyperbole sirens are sounding every half hour in the nation’s capital, and the Atlantic Histrionics Warning Center in Palm Beach, Fla., has issued an Exploding Head Watch, effective until 10 pm EDT Sunday.

You might think that the execution-style murder of a young American couple by drug lords in Mexico would be a significant tragedy and another piece of evidence of our massive failure in how we deal with drug use in this country. But as Paul Armentano explains, if you’re the deranged individual who President Obama just nominated to run the DEA, the killings are a clear sign of success.

The Seattle Times editorial board has, of course, come out in favor of handing over a couple acres of the Seattle Center to a wealthy local family to build a for profit museum. Much more on this editorial later, but…

Seattle Center officials should have opened to all comers the possibility of siting a project on the south side of the Fun Forest. That would have made Chihuly’s glass house a cleaner proposition.

The way forward now is to seek proposals for other privately funded ideas. Exhaust the possibilities, sate the process hounds, then proceed with this promising upgrade.

Honestly, how fucking condescending can they get?

The same ed board that pees its pants over sunshine and open government advises to simply make a charade of it when it comes to a private deal with one of Frank Blethen’s Rainier Club drinking partners.

I think with these two paragraphs the Times has pretty much written itself off as a serious contributor to this particular conversation.

(And there are plenty more media clips from the past week in politics at Hominid Views.)

From The Columbian’s political blog, concerning the vague, say-nothing-meaningful approach taken by one candidate seeking to succeed him, Democrat Denny Heck, on health care reform:

Baird, who has endorsed Heck, told us he agrees with Heck’s broad-brush stance on the issue, saying, “It’s not his job to take a position on this bill.”

Thus far it apparently hasn’t been Baird’s job either.

Another day, another intentionally misleading, anti-labor editorial from the Seattle Times:

LAST year organized labor pushed a bill to restrict a company’s ability to talk to its employees. It was marketed as the Worker Privacy Act, and its aim was to shut up managers during the organizing of a union, so that only the union organizer would be heard.

That, of course, is a load of crap. The Worker Privacy Act would have done nothing to restrict a company’s ability to talk to its employees, it didn’t “shut up managers,” and would not have assured that only union organizers would be heard. Employers would have been just as free to oppose unionization as they are now, even to hold meetings expressly for that purpose. The only difference under WPA would be that employees would be equally free, if they so chose, not to participate in such non-work related meetings (regarding unions, religion, politics, etc.) without fear of retaliation.

As it stands now, your employer  can call a meeting for the sole purpose of proselytizing and converting non-Christian workers, and then fire your ass if you walk out or choose not to attend. They can force you to attend a companywide Tea Party. Or they can crowd you into a room without a union representative, and cajole/harangue/threaten as much as they want in their effort prevent unionization. That’s the inequity the WPA sought to address.

No law like it existed in any other state.

You know, except for neighboring Oregon, and I’m guessing a few other states. But regardless, that’s an incredibly stupid argument prima facie. No other nation guaranteed freedom of religion, freedom of the press and freedom of speech at the time our First Amendment was adopted, so would that have been a reasonable argument to reject it? According to the Times, yes.

Business hated it, and Democratic leaders, elected with union support, found an excuse to kill it.

In a hyperbolic charade intended to provide political cover for scuttling the bill, Democratic leaders literally called the cops on labor over an internal email that state troopers and other watchdogs ultimately laughed off. And the Times presents this as a good thing?

The spirit of this bill resurfaced deep in the 292-page budget measure, ESSB 6444, moving through the Legislature. Certain employers receiving state funds would be forbidden “to use these funds to assist, promote, or deter union organization.” The “or deter” is what this is about.

This restriction is not for all employers. It is only on those providing long-term care or services to people with disabilities. But the principle is the same: The state would use its spending power to favor unions.

You gotta be kidding. The 30-word provision in question has absolutely nothing to do with the WPA. The WPA would have protected workers from retaliation when choosing not to participate in workplace communications related to issues of conscience. On the other hand, here is the specific language to which the Times objects:

“No employer, provider, or entity receiving state funds to provide long-term care services or services to the developmentally disabled may use these funds to assist, promote, or deter union organization.”

Would the Times object to the provision had the word “deter” been deleted? No, of course not. Indeed, the Times wouldn’t even have been aware of the provision had it not been brought to their attention by the Association of Washington Businesses. (You don’t think the Times’ editors are actually in the habit of reading 292-page bills, do you?)

In fact, the provision is actually quite evenhanded, as it prohibits an “employer, provider, or entity” from using state funds to “assist” or “promote” union organization, as well as to “deter” it — specifically and only within the context of providing long-term care to the developmentally disabled. And yes, there are union “entities” that receive state funds for the purpose of providing training to long-term care workers, that would fall under this provision, so it does impact employers and unions alike.

Oh, and it’s not like this provision was added without provocation. Long-term care employers have used state funds to hold mandatory “training” meetings for the purpose of deterring union activities… and they’ve been caught on video. The Times is all gung ho about reducing the footprint of state government while protecting seniors from shoddy long-term care, yet apparently the editors believe mandatory anti-union meetings to be an appropriate use of taxpayer funded training dollars. Go figure.

Here, not coincidentally, the benefit would go the state’s most politically aggressive union, the Service Employees International Union (SEIU).

And here, not coincidentally, is the crux of this issue. The Times just hates SEIU, and thus anything SEIU supports, the Times opposes. SEIU = evil incarnate.

Compared to the whole economy, long-term-care homes are not large. But if this provision goes through once, it will be used again. “We view this provision as a crossing of the Rubicon,” said Kris Tefft, counsel to the Association of Washington Business.

AWB = second coming of Christ on Earth.

Oh… and I’m sure SEIU and the provision’s sponsor were asked to provide a comment too, but just never got around to it.

Let us be clear: Under federal labor law, unions can speak to workers. So can employers. A state cannot abridge the rights of either side. The U.S. Supreme Court said so recently in Chamber of Commerce v. Brown (2007). There the Court threw out a California law that forbade any employer receiving $10,000 in state money from using it “to assist, promote or deter union organizing.”

Let us be clear: the Seattle Times editorial board has the legal acumen of a walnut, and is no more in the habit of reading (let alone understanding) obscure court opinions than it is of spelunking through the details of 292-page legislative bills. Like the provision in question, the Times was only made aware of this court case through the tireless PR efforts of the water-walking, loaves-and-fishes-multiplying AWB, and you can be pretty damn sure that the Times’ interpretation of Chamber of Commerce v. Brown came straight from the mouth of AWB. So forgive me if I don’t take it at face value.

In fact, Chamber of Commerce v. Brown appears to very narrowly focus on whether or not the National Labor Relations Act preempts state restrictions that attempt to regulate employer speech about union organizing under circumstances where Congress intended free debate. A quick reading of both the decision and the dissent makes it clear that the entire case rests on interpreting Congressional intent.

But while the California statute rejected under Chamber of Commerce v. Brown was broad, the particular provision to which the Times objects (at the apparent behest of AWB), merely seeks to reiterate a policy that is already in federal Medicare and Medicaid law, and thus unambiguously sanctioned by Congress. The Medicare provider manual states that “Costs incurred for activities directly related to influencing employees respecting unionization or related to attempts to coerce employees or otherwise interfere with or restrain the exercise of employee rights under the NLRA are not allowable costs for program purposes,” and a few minutes of Googling reveals that this language is duplicated in state Medicaid regulations throughout the nation. (Minnesota, North Dakota and Alabama, for example.)

The ruling was 7-2, with the Court’s senior liberal, Justice John Paul Stevens, laying down the law.

Well, as long as the Times is lauding a liberal justice — you know, when it believes it suits its purpose — let’s take a look at what Justice Stevens actually wrote:

[T]he mere fact that Congress has imposed targeted federal restrictions on union-related advocacy in certain limited contexts does not invite the States to override federal labor policy in other settings.

That is the heart of the majority opinion, and since ESSB 6444 imposes targeted advocacy restrictions within the exact same limited context and setting as that already provided under federal law, it is clearly permissible, and the Times application of Chamber of Commerce v. Brown to ESSB 6444 is clearly wrong. Ignorant, misinformed, boneheaded wrong.

The same language Justice Stevens struck down has been in and out of the budget bill in Olympia. It is a bad provision and has to stay out.

Like I said… the legal acumen of a walnut.

But then, that’s the kind of foolishness that comes from letting your hatred of organized labor get in the way of the facts.

The Seattle Times and the national press need to stop with the endless health care articles about WA-08. Sure, it’s a swing district, and yes, the incumbent, Rep. Dave Reichert, R-Wash., is searching his soul over health care reform. And if he votes “not moderate” he will risk losing, because the 8th is nothing but moderate. I mean, it was The Seattle Times who insisted that only Dave is “moderate” enough to represent those fine folks.

The thousands of phone calls from around the country, the audience in the Oval, the casual debates late at night with colleagues. I mean, we GET IT. The 8th is a swing district, we know, and moderates like Reichert have to weigh these decisions carefully! The citizens are likely closely divided, as in other key swing districts, but that’s why we have elections, so that when the tough issues get decided, legislators must vote on behalf of their constituents, and not just a party line. It would be terrible if that were not the case.

But enough! He’s only human!

Really, I can’t take all the attention this key swing district is receiving.

The Seattle Times editorial board is starting to sound like a broken record:

There is still time to make structural spending changes and reduce the footprint of government, but the moment is passing.

And that is a lost opportunity.

Yeah, maybe, but the point the Times’ editors seem to miss is that voters didn’t elect Democrats to “reduce the footprint of government.” That’s the Republican platform, one which voters consistently reject. So, um, why exactly should the Democrats use this economic crisis as an opportunity to enact the Republican agenda when the majority of voters clearly prefer the Democratic platform?

Now if the Times wanted to dis Dems for failing to take the opportunity to enact structural revenue changes, that might be more in line with the will of the people, instead of just the will of the people who own newspapers.

Oy…

From McGinn’s perspective, Chihuly’s “glass house” spells revenue. He says that the $500,000 in annual lease payments could be enough to operate the city’s libraries for a week, or to hire five police officers or seven crime-victim advocates.

Well, by that measure, why not just sell off the real estate entirely? If leasing the Fun Forest property to a for-profit, pay-per-view museum can raise enough money to hire five police officers, just think how many police officers we could hire if started selling off chunks of the Seattle Center to developers of high-priced condos?

And years from now, when there’s no more money from the sale to subsidize basic public services, and there’s no more Seattle Center land to sell off, well, that’s future generations’ problem.