He's goin' down.
Posted on 02/21/2010 9:58:45 PM PST by 2ndDivisionVet
Something has gone very wrong.
Was it just a year ago that Democrats assumed more control in Washington than the party has had in my lifetime? It was.
Was it just a year ago that President Obama promised a new era of change, bipartisanship and transparency? It was.
Just weeks into office, the president pushed through a major stimulus package to save the American economy, restore credit, build infrastructure and create jobs. Now, unable to get Republicans to support what was their idea — a bipartisan commission on the deficit — the president has appointed one of his own, complete with warnings about how the deficit will sink us in the future if we fail to act.
Republicans shouldn't be able to get away with opposing a bipartisan effort to reduce the deficit, but they can and they have, for one simple reason: The country has turned.
The president and the Democrats may have only lost one Senate seat (so far), but in terms of actual control, they have lost much more. Republicans can just say no as long as the country seems to agree with them. Do you want to guess what they'll be saying to television cameras next week at the "negotiating" session on health care?
So what went wrong? Every Democrat I talk to has a different answer or, rather, a different person to blame. It was Nancy Pelosi's fault or Harry Reid's or Rahm Emanuel's. Should have made a bigger show of reaching out to Republicans; shouldn't have cut those deals behind closed doors. It is, I am told every day, a communications problem.
Years ago, when I was working in politics, I had a meeting with our pollsters that I'll never forget. After a particularly detailed (and negative) survey, one of the guys who had been polling for years leaned over to me and said, "We have a very big problem. People just don't like our candidate." Not an ideological problem. Not a problem with his experience or positions. They just didn't like him.
Of course, you can't tell your candidate that the people don't like him. So we looked at each other and shook our heads. There is only one way to translate that result. Candidate, we said to him, the people don't know you.
The White House is trying to treat the problem with its health care proposal as a communications problem. It's not that people don't want the plan; they just don't know how great it is. Our fault, says the president, for not communicating more effectively.
Not so fast.
Barack Obama is a great communicator. He's talked a lot about health care in the past year. And I've been listening. I know just as many horror stories as they do about what happens to people with pre-existing conditions, how you can't get insurance no matter what you're willing to pay, and if you have it, you can't afford to give it up, no matter how many arms and legs they charge you or how bad the coverage.
I'm all for letting people with pre-existing conditions buy affordable insurance. But letting a slew of older, sicker people into any pool will dramatically increase premiums for everyone in that pool. (What did they say about letting everyone into the pool with federal workers?) So you have to make the young, healthy people join, too, or the costs will be exorbitant.
So, hypothetically, now everyone has insurance — either they pay for it, or we do. Then what happens? Everybody gets more health care. Just exactly how does that save us money? Just exactly how do we pay for it?
Cost controls? In order to get refills for my arthritis medicine every month, I have to get pre-approval each time from the insurance company, which this week has taken most of the week. I always get the approval, of course, because this is medicine you don't stop taking after a month or two. If the insurance company saves money, it's only because making the pharmacist jump through more hoops sometimes means I miss a dose or two. This cannot be what they mean by cost control.
Get rid of unnecessary tests? I'm not really into unnecessary tests. It's getting the necessary tests approved that causes so much trouble.
Paying doctors and hospitals less to give us more? That's bound to work…
It's not a communications problem. What's gone wrong is that people see the country swimming in debt, see the jobs recovery lagging, see friends and neighbors who are not even hanging on, and they just don't know how this administration is planning to pay for a massive health care reform effort.
The appointment of a bipartisan commission on the deficit only underscores the problem and makes it seem that the administration has no answer for it except another new spending program. "Just say no" isn't the answer to the need for health care reform — but neither is another big spending program when we are being told our historic debt is a ticking time bomb for our children.
Not the usual brain dead liberal propaganda.
Which means that even a leftie like Estrich is not buying Obama’s endless lies.
Which in turn is why Obama is a rapidly failing One Term Wonder.
Aside from her grating voice and condescending attitude in every appearance I see of her... she does have nice hair. /s-on/
Her analysis and advice in regards to this wonderful country, USA... are completely and totally insane.... just about every time she opines.
A low voltage buld sometimes starts to glow when there is enough static...
buld = bulb
Yeah - Susan Estrogen is an idiot.
I’m hoping he gets himself impeached and his butt thrown out of the white house.
LOL! Very funny (even without the correction the picture is painted). Thanks.
It's great to mock them BUMP!
It took a year to figure out something’s whacked? Earth to Susan: Wakey! Wakey! You can’t make everybody happy.
parsy, who figures in 2014, a Republican will be asking the same thing
Susan, your political philosophy is a failure. Always has been, always will be. You will occasionally gain power due to a powerful personality, or outright cheating, or both, but Socialism Always Fails. Hope that helps.
And siding with the American people is a bad thing?!
She did miss a major point.
Past 50, you’ll get the insurance, at an expanded cost, of course, due to your age and the medical conditions that go along with it. You’ll be INSURED!
But at the rates they plan to pay to the health care industry, you won’t have access to health CARE.
Not a problem, though, since your INSURED!
The only thing I wonder about is how long it’ll take one of these geniuses to figure out that you can save $10 if you don’t bother to give them their final pills.
After all, they were going to die anyway...
The president has zero credibility on this issue. What good is a bipartisan committee going to do? If Obama wants to start suggesting some specific cuts, I'm sure the Republicans will support him. But why waste time with committees when there is no will at the top.
"It is, I am told every day, a communications problem."
I once described a problem as a "communications problem" in a business strategy class. The professor took a long hard look at me and said, "Every problem is a communications problem." The problem is that Obama is not listening to the people. And keeps trying to ramrod his own agenda down our throat.
"What's gone wrong is that people see the country swimming in debt, see the jobs recovery lagging, see friends and neighbors who are not even hanging on, and they just don't know how this administration is planning to pay for a massive health care reform effort.
She got that one right. But she still missed the parts about the public option, abortion, lack of transparency, and backroom deals.
Obama and the rats pushed the public option and abortion too hard. Nobody wanted Government as the insurer, nobody wanted to pay for abortions, and now nobody trusts Obama to be able to do any type of reform without trying to sneak those things in.
They not only pushed for these things over our objections they did so with a complete lack of promised transparency, and even then they had to bribe democratic senators to vote for it.
Obama has no credibility left. He should resign.
BO was a great communicator. He speaks well, but the things he says make no sense. Just like, "the govt. can run health care cheaper and better than the private sector, cover everyone and it won't cost you one single dime".
Even people who don't pay attention to politics know he is lying, incomptent or a fool.
These liberals purposefully ignore the reason there are so many unnecessary tests--defensive medicine. They also are in bed with the primary cause of defensive medicine--greedy lawyers and their even more greedy clients.
I still relate everything Susan Estrogen says in comparison to her drunken performance on Fox News the night Algore told GWB not to get snippy.
I don’t think she’s become as accurate as the broken clock, but she’s nailed it in this piece. Why, I’m not sure. Do they think this kind of “OMG!, we’re losing!” commentary will shock the Dems into doing something new or different?
Or maybe they’re just whores, working a different street now that the corner of Hope and Change isn’t working out too well anymore.
Everytime I see her know, I think of a bulldogs face and do the same revolted shake he did. Guess I inherited his 0 tollerance for liberal propaganda. Thank you Dad!
Yes, that will work as well as your candidate that no one liked, Susan!
Ha! This was a good piece, her analysis is much more tolerable when you don’t have to hear her wretched voice!
He's goin' down.
Susan was seemingly such a ‘bioatch’ years ago flacking & flogging for Dukakis, but she is now one of those so very rare honest liberoids to be found ‘anywheres at-tall’ ....
Good on you, Suzie Q!
But it will cost many, many, pounds of dimes...just not one dime. (I learned to read carefully during the CLinton Administration.)
I’m sorry, even reading it I can hear the voice. A true Marlboro man.
The Republican aren't just saying "NO", they have come up with some other solutions, but the Democrats in Congress are not interested in hearing them. Obama, Reid and Pelosi preferred to try to cram THEIR idea of what we all need down our throats. Unfortunately for the Dems, we now have the ability to find out what they're doing, and can marshall the forces to oppose it!
I was expecting another typical leftist screed about how stupid the country is for not swooning before Zero’s brilliance - but was pleasantly surprised. It seems she’s at least willing to confront the monstrous flaws in the ‘rats healthcare scheming.
ssssssccccrrrreeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeecccchhhhhhh
Susan?
The shine is off the cult, Susan.
Time to punt.
Actually is a leftist screed clothed in a few “reasonable” views, but basically indicating Republicans are obstructionists.
Big mistake.
Huge.
I can’t stand Susan’s voice & have to tune her out asap. Reading was so much easier on my ears.....
When you’ve lost Susan Estrich...
1) Obama was the least experienced president candidate ever and his performance has been exactly what I predicted. A total empty suit Carter like disaster.
2) The dems gained a majority in the congress and ruined it by predictably doing what dems do. Spend like drunks in a whorehouse. And in this case, spending trillions of other peoples money on their pork projects, public sector and unionization growth (Obamacare) while completely ignoring the private sector, and corrupt power grabs (Cap and Trade aka Cap and Tax). To make matters worse, they’re doing it during one of the worst recessions this country has faced.
3) Thus any mandate these clowns believed they received back in Nov 2008 has been squandered like I knew they would. They can’t help themselves. Their limousine liberals and never change their behavior.
That’s why the buttkicking they so richly deserve is coming in Nov. The wheels were set in motion for this trainwreck. There is no stoping it. You reap what you sow.
Susan is just in premptive finger pointing mode. Its what the liberal MSM does best.
Can this Squirrel get more fans than Barack Obama?
ON FACEBOOK
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Can-this-Squirrel-get-more-fans-than-Barack-Obama/313624401833?ref=nf
Susan, your parents MUST have had at least ONE child that survived. Sheeesh!!!
The only time I ever spent watching or listening to her when she was on Fox news DRUNKER than a Skunk when Kerry lost. Only then did her Southern accent come shinning through.
Sorry .. I’m already at puke!
Uh, Susan, maybe this time "the message DID get out'?
Ya think?
Fear of Failure! They are trying to change the lie.
Pray for America’s Freedom
Poor Susan. She can’t get over the fact that the Democrats control Congress and can damned do what they want (and have tried) till Scott Brown changed the equation.
Now she’s beginning to wake up to reality, a little too late in my opinion, and question Obama’s policies. But she also said that he was a great communicator. If she means by confusing the hell out of people with contradictory but nice sounding soundbites, then she is right. At least Joseph Goebbels was to the point.
Obama is all red smoke and mirrors. He has a marxist arm, a Chicago thug arm, an pure propaganda arm (Baghdad Gibbs), and a black extremist arm. In fact, he’s got more radical arms than a leftist octopus.
The Dems are on the ropes because the American people finally woke up from their Sleeping Beauty poisoned nap, hopefully in time to stop Obie and his Commissars from destroying our country.
We don’t need no Hugo Chavez clone misleading America.
So Susan, congratulations. You finally put down the KoolAid and started drinking milk.
Why is it when 51 dem senators vote together its considered bipartisan, and when 49 republican senators vote together its obstructionist?
Aside from the obligatory digs at the Reps, she nails it in this piece.
And I am starting to wonder why, instead of allowing the lizards in Congress and their staffs to EXEMPT themselves from this glorious plan...just exactly why don’t the Republicans suggest that ALL Americans can join the federal employees plan? That would solve a lot of problems, as each policy is set up according to the mandates of each state’s existing insurance boards. You can choose from a cafeteria-style choice of plans (high/low deductible etc.)
Employers that offer coverage to employees already could simply buy from existing products. People who wish to buy on their own could buy exactly what they want and pay for it themselves (and it would be much cheaper as part of the large federal group). Those who need help could be given subsidies. I wish everyone could deduct their premiums from their taxes. But if that proves too expensive, perhaps offering a “carrot” of tax deductibility to those under age 40 or so, would bring younger and healthier people into the pool. Young people (like my 24 year old son) typically have few if any things they can deduct on their taxes. This might be enough to bring them in.
“Was it just a year ago that President Obama promised a new era of change, bipartisanship and transparency? It was.”
She obviously doesn’t remember the post watergate years. The dems had such a majority they just overrode Ford’s vetoes. Then there was that other charming era after the death of JFK after the 1964 elections destroyed the R’s and put oodles of bad, leftwingers into congress.
Of course, the destruction done by them amounts to a major part of the infrastructure of the nanny state.
That said, they are pikers compared to Nancy, Harry and Barry in intention to make America unrecognizable.
Estrich makes some very good points. She is shooting straight here.
Obama has Susan Estrich calling B.S. on his health care rhetoric! That really shows you how bad it is for the 'Rats right now.
Susan, you made your bed long ago.
If this is understood, or if Ms. Estrich could come to the understanding that Barack Obama has an agenda which is inimical to the interests of the American people, she would not falsely state: "the country has turned." The country has not turned, it has wakened.
For example, the country is plagued by exorbitant healthcare costs some portion of which are driven by unnecessary tests in turn caused by a tort system out of balance. Her party will not address the cause of this government created distortion of the healthcare system because it has sold out to the trial lawyer contributors. Ms. Estrich will not address the root of the problem, rather she dismisses it with a slight of hand, "Get rid of unnecessary tests? I'm not really into unnecessary tests. It's getting the necessary tests approved that causes so much trouble." Implicit in her toss away line is the very assumption that government should get rid of unnecessary tests with more control.
This is purblind and the country has awakened to recognize it as such. In this context, "just say 'no'" is a perfectly rational reaction.
Ms. Estrich has nearly come to understand that she cannot conflate her party's ideology with the good of the country, in fact, the good of the country has come to be equated with stopping her party which is now verging on a rogue tyranny. But the whole of this truth will require light years for her to see.
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