Credit cards and guns

Republicans, with some help from western state Democrats, attached an amendment to the popular credit card regulation bill that allows loaded guns to be carried in national forests and parks.

I think our legislative process would be much cleaner and transparent if no amendment could be attached that did not have some bearing on the main bill. But that's the way they do it.

What's at stake here: Bush had signed an order that allowed this, and the court overturned it. So now the Senate tacked it on to the must-pass credit card bill, which wound up passing 90-5.

This wasn't playing with the filibuster, 60 votes for cloture, scenario. It was a simple amendment that enough people voted for straight up to attach it. They had plenty of support for the gun amendment among Democrats.

Sen. Barbara Boxer said, "It's a shame. But you have to come to a realization around here that at this point in time, the N.R.A. gets the votes."

She continued, "Either you are going to bring down the whole Senate and never do anything or you are going to swallow hard and say I will just vote my conscience on those amendments and speak out until people get a hold of their senses."

I agree it's a shame -- the strangle hold the N.R.A. has on sensible gun control ensures that we have insane policies regarding guns.

But as a political move, I'm not so sure this is bad for the Democrats. In getting health care reform legislation passed this fall, the plan is that, if it doesn't pass in a simple vote by a certain date, they will push it through as an appropriations issue. That way, it will not be subject to filibuster and will require only a simple majority in both the House and the Senate.

So, it will take some of the steam out of the Republicans howling about that to be reminded what they did with the gun amendment on credit cards.

Ralph

Uh-oh, the clowns are back

I just finished watching Rep. Michele Bachmann arguing with Rep. Barney Frank about funding for ACORN. She's no match for the smartest guy in Congress, but she just sat there blithely ignorant of her ignorance and repeating her little non-sequitur non-argument.

Then I clicked on the web, and there was this stunningly stupid comment from Rep. Joe Barton (R-TX) arguing against the cap and trade bill to reduce carbon emissions. Get this -- he says that we don't need to worry about CO2. It's harmless.

I'm creating it as I talk to you. It's in your Coca-Cola. your Dr. Pepper and your Perrier water. It's necessary for human life. It's odorless, colorless, tasteless, doesn't cause cancer, doesn't cause asthma. There's nobody that's ever been admitted to a hospital because of CO2 poisoning.

But what we're worried about here is not CO2 poisoning human beings. We're concerned about what the large industrial emissions do to the atmosphere, trapping heat and contributing to global warming that is already changing the geography as well as the climate of our planet.

It just shows that any idiot with a fixed idea can find some partisan group to feed him talking points, in this case he quoted the Heritage Foundation.

Would it be antithetical to our democratic processes to require people running for Congress to at least have normal intelligence and to pass a test of critical thinking? To protect the public, we require tests for all kinds of professions. Why not a test for competency to be in Congress?

Be as ideologically partisan as you want -- just don't be stupid.

Ralph

PS: And besides this being a stupid argument, it's also very wrong. It's true our bodies make CO2 and we breathe it out; when we are unable to breathe adequately, CO2 accumulates in our bodies and does in fact have very bad effects.

The Nancy flap

Nancy Pelosi caused political storm waves when she said the CIA had not briefed her on the facts about the use of waterboarding back in 2002. And when the CIA said they had records that showed she had been briefed, she said that was not true -- implying the CIA was lying.

Republicans got all outraged, and some wanted her to resign her position as Speaker of the House. The CIA was backed up by Peter Goss, who said he had been briefed in his position as Chair of the Intelligence Committee at the same time as Pelosi, who was then the ranking minority member. Goss later was appointed to head the CIA by Bush, but he didn't last long because, even by bush-league standards, he was an inept choice.

They also made much of the fact that current Director of the CIA, Leon Panetta, put out a statement backing the CIA, and he's a friend of Pelosi. So who's telling the truth??

Look carefully at Panetta's carefully chosen words:

Let me be clear: It is not our policy or practice to mislead Congress. That is against our laws and our values. As the Agency indicated previously in response to Congressional inquiries, our contemporaneous records from September 2002 indicate that CIA officers briefed truthfully on the interrogation of Abu Zubaydah, describing "the enhanced techniques that had been employed." Ultimately, it is up to Congress to evaluate all the evidence and reach its own conclusions about what happened.

He is not vouching for the accuracy of the records, only that the records say she was briefed. And, of course, it's not the policy or practice to mislead Congress. That does not prove that they always follow the policy. And the CIA often operates in what Cheney calls "the dark side," so I'd back Pelosi.

Or, as most of these things go, it's probably somewhere in between. They probably said some ambiguous words that could be taken either way.

But LET THIS BE CLEAR: The issue is not whether Pelosi was briefed and whether she should have done something to stop torture back in 2002. The issue is that we did torture, illegally and immorally and to the detriment of our country. And, as is becoming accepted as fact, some of it was done for the sole purpose of getting "evidence" (whether true or not) that the Bush administration could use to sell its war on Iraq. That should be an indictable offense.

Ralph

Open hearts, open minds

"Open hearts. Open minds. Fair-minded words."

Those words capture the message President Obama gave in his commencement address to the Notre Dame graduates.

It didn't have the scope and profundity of his Philadelphia speech on race during the campaign, but it was like it in that he chose to address candidly the issue at the midst of a controversy surrounding him. This time he spoke openly about abortion at a Catholic university.

The question, then, is how do we work through these conflicts? Is it possible for us to join hands in common effort? As citizens of a vibrant and varied democracy, how do we engage in vigorous debate? How does each of us remain firm in our principles, and fight for what we consider right, without demonizing those with just as strongly held convictions on the other side?

Nowhere do these questions come up more powerfully than on the issue of abortion.

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[W]hen we open our hearts and our minds to those who may not think like we do or believe what we do - that's when we discover at least the possibility of common ground.

That's when we begin to say, "Maybe we won't agree on abortion, but we can still agree that this is a heart-wrenching decision for any woman to make, with both moral and spiritual dimensions.

So let's work together to reduce the number of women seeking abortions by reducing unintended pregnancies, and making adoption more available, and providing care and support for women who do carry their child to term. Let's honor the conscience of those who disagree with abortion, and draft a sensible conscience clause, and make sure that all of our health care policies are grounded in clear ethics and sound science, as well as respect for the equality of women."

Understand - I do not suggest that the debate surrounding abortion can or should go away. No matter how much we may want to fudge it - indeed, while we know that the views of most Americans on the subject are complex and even contradictory - the fact is that at some level, the views of the two camps are irreconcilable. Each side will continue to make its case to the public with passion and conviction. But surely we can do so without reducing those with differing views to caricature.

Open hearts. Open minds. Fair-minded words.

And thus Obama showed us once again his admirable spirit of respect and empathy and honesty, of disagreeing without demonizing the adversary, and of reaching out to bring people together in common cause, even if not in agreement.

That is the most we can hope for in a diverse, pluralistic society.

This is a president we can be proud to have elected. He calls us to be our better selves.

Ralph

More on health care reform

I wrote yesterday that the only way to significantly reduce medical costs in private plans is to ration care. Let me explain.

There will be some savings from going to electronic records (although many of us worry about the inevitable errors that expose patient's confidentiality). But that plan will go forward. Projected advantages are really more in efficiency of patient care than in lower costs, although there will be some monetary savings, especially from less need to repeat laboratory tests, x-rays, MRIs, etc. done in another doctor's office.

Another place that could lead to savings is in some sort of tort reform so that doctor's malpractice insurance premiums are decreased, as well as the current need to practice "defensive medicine," where doctors order tests that are unnecessary except to avoid being attacked in court for failing to do those tests (even if they were are not indicated).

Of course, all this can happen within a private insurance system, just not so easily enacted.

Where the real savings could occur, however, is in revamping the whole health insurance system to remove the profit motive; ie, to end the current private insurance industry and go to a single payer, government sponsored plan.

It seems totally impossible in today's political climate to bring this about any time soon. But it's astonishing to me how much we have moved in that direction -- just in this last election cycle. First, as expected, Republicans are screaming "socialized medicine," but it's not really catching on the way it once did. More and more, the response is: "So?"

Second, we now have leaders who are committed to universal coverage, as an important first step, and who are at least friendly to the idea of eventually having single payer coverage.

The best we can hope for is a step-wise plan over time: first, a competing government sponsored, not-profit plan -- such as "Medicare for all." Then let the market do its work. Over time, insurance companies will phase out medical plans as not profitable. Or they will downsize to providing supplemental policies for those who want more than the basic coverage -- just as we now have the Medicare supplemental policies.

Opponents' are fighting tooth and nail to prevent this part from passing. Their claim is that is will be unfair competition. Fine. That just proves the point that the private plan is too expensive and without redeeming advantages.

The example that proves this: Bush introduced the Medicare Advantage plan to the Medicare system that was working fine. It subsidized private companies to lure away Medicare patients with minor tweeking inducements. Even with the government subsidizing them, they didn't work. Patients were dissatisfied, some plans went out of business, and the whole thing was a failure -- at great cost to the government that could have gone to the uninsured.

The goals of a reasonable plan: (1) universal coverage, no more pre-existing conditions or denial of coverage and not tied to your job so that you lose insurance when you lose your job; (2) emphasis on prevention, which private insurance has little incentive to cover because it's advantage is long-range, not short-term profits; shift the emphasis from profits to service and health.

It will be a tough fight to get the non-profit plan approved in Congress. Let's hope the camel doesn't have too many humps and that it can at least walk.

Ralph

Health care reform

Cynthia Tucker says in her AJC column today: "Any genuine health care reform will have to eventually eliminate the profit-making health insurance industry."

She's right, and it's time someone put it this candidly. In trying to get a reform bill that can be passed by Congress, Obama is presenting a compromise that will offer a government program (sort of Medicare for everybody) to compete with private insurance programs. And that's what has conservatives upset, along with the insurance industry.

They're shouting that it would be unfair competition, because they have to make a profit for their shareholders. Well, yes. That's the very problem. As a society, we should be squarely facing the decision about our goal: is it a healthy citizenry or profits for an industry?

A government program not only would eliminate the profit-making, it would eliminate the absurd lengths insurance companies go to now to avoid insuring sicker patients and to deny claims to those they do insure. This, along with all their advertising and marketing costs, plus big executive salaries, keep driving up costs of medical care.

It has been shown that eliminating those administrative costs would save enough money to cover all the uninsured people in the country today. The only way to significantly reduce costs under private plans is to ration care.

We're probably going to wind up with a camel -- you know -- a horse designed by a committee. That is, there will be some kind of partial reform that will probably be a nightmare of compromise. But it must retain a government-sponsored competing plan, and work toward single-payer later.

If our politics were less driven by moneyed interests, we would adopt a European style single payer insurance program now. But we can't do that; we have to muddle through and hope someday we can do what needs to be done now.

Ralph