(UPDATED BELOW)

 Kucinich drops opposition to health-care bill (Washington Post).

Well, so much for conscience. The other day here, we had kind words for the stand taken by Dennis Kucinich against the boardroom-backroom boondoggle known as the health care bill. The main thrust of that post was not meant to be the innate wonderfulness of St. Dennis but the hypocrisy of the "Fightin' Progressives," such as Commander Kos and Alex Koppelman, who had launched a vituperative attack on Kucinich for daring to oppose the bill -- a measure which not only represents a complete and craven surrender of even the smallest crumbs of the progressives' original hopes for health care reform, but was also fatally tainted by the brazen bribe Obama took from the gorging, gouging drug and insurance cartels to make sure their destructive sway over American health care remains unbroken.

Still, I admit I was pleasantly surprised to see Kucinich stand up against the health care bill, apparently on principle, especially as he was also sponsoring a bill to end the Afghanistan War at the same time. (I realize the latter was a wholly symbolic act -- then again, all acts are symbolic to one degree or another; that is, they symbolize the moral stance behind the act, whether it is effective or not. Thus, "savvy" compromises on, say, appropriations for the Terror War or detainee policy or illegal surveillance symbolize an underlying acceptance of atrocity, tyranny and war crime.)

But I suspected the fix was in when I saw reports that Kucinich was flying with Obama for a presidential appearance in Ohio. There was little or no chance that Kucinich would have been engaged in such high-profile hitchhiking if he was not already in the bag for Barack.

And so it proved. Kucinich's cave-in did win him a respectful nod from the New York Times, which featured his turn-around in a front-page web story that had none of the usual snide asides about his "kooky" ideas that normally accompany any mainstream mention of him. The Washington Post kept the wonted snark, however, noting in its lede that:

...Kucinich, often a proponent of very liberal, unlikely ideas such as the creation of a "Department of Peace" and the impeachment of then-Vice President Cheney, has found his pragmatic streak.

Impeaching Dick Cheney! Gawd, what a loon, eh? And peace? We don't need no stinkin' peace.

Anyway, in the end, Dennis proved to be no menace at all to the Boondoggle Express. He got on board offering the same lame justification for junking his principles that a plethora of progressives have served up: the idea that passing the current HCR (High Corporate Returns) bill is somehow a step forward toward real reform somewhere down the road someday. The usual line is something like, "If we don't pass this horrible bill, we won't get another shot at real health care reform for 20 years." Or as Kucinich himself put it (somewhat inelegantly): "This is a defining moment for if we will have any opportunity to move off square one on health care."

This seems to me to be the exact opposite of the truth. In reality, if this horrible bill passes, we will be stuck with it for 20 years, because no Democratic politician -- "progressive," "pragmatist," or otherwise -- will want to go near the issue again.  You can already hear the "savvy" counsel party bigwigs will dispense if anyone tries to "move off square one" on health care in the foreseeable future: "For God's sake, don't rake all that up again! Don't you remember the hell we went through getting that damn thing passed in 2010? You want to give the Republicans another club to beat us over the head with? We've done 'reform.' Leave it alone."

However, if this bill (which almost every "progressive" has declared is a misbegotten, corruption-ridden, botulistic glop of indigestible legislative sausage -- even as they threaten to wage holy war against anyone who votes against it) is defeated, then the ground will be cleared for genuine reform. A real leader could then say: "OK, we tried it your way. We brought in the corporations. We courted the Republicans shamelessly. We gave away the game on day one, took all our cards off the table, compromised every value we profess to hold. We backed down, we turned tail, we sold out. And it didn't work. Now, we're going to do it for real. Single-payer, universal: that's where we start, and by God, that's where we finish, or somewhere damn near to it. And if you don't like it -- well, let us refer you to the famous words uttered by Dick Cheney to Patrick Leahy on the floor of the Senate on that historic day in 2004."

If the bad bill is defeated, you can bring up a good bill in every Congressional session -- yes, for the next 20 years, if need be. Hell, you can bring it up every week. And if you beat the drums for genuine health care reform with even one-tenth of the strength and fervor that the Obama team lavishes on demonizing Iran, protecting torturers and enriching the criminal rich, then you wouldn't need 20 years -- or 20 weeks -- or 20 days -- to get it passed.

That's what a real leader could do. But of course, there is not even the shadow of a semblance of a real leader within 500 miles of the festering core of the Potomac Empire.

UPDATE: John Caruso has more on Kucinich, "the origami congressman."

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Comments (18)

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Debbie(aussie) said:

... With reference to some past silliness, maybe the members of the Democratic Congress(did I get that right)should be sent a package containing a pair of balls.(this of course perpetuates the only males are tough bs, but nothing more appropriate leaps out). For the life of me I can not understand how every delevoped and a few delevoping countries can have some form of universal health care except US.

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March 18, 2010
Votes: +3

Sean O'Neil said:

... There is only one form of possible goodness to come out of this era: that people will realize it's not about Repub vs Dem, nor about "more and better Democrats," because the whining since 2000 has been about getting Dems in power and once in power, getting "more and better" ones, and that's what brought us to 2010's Obama Admin and Democrat-owned Congress. And they are giving even MORE to corporations than even Bush/Cheney, the most craven corporate whore Admin in my 49 years on Earth. If there is any person left who holds out hope for Obama's messiah-ness, or the Democrats' nobility, let him or her open his or her eyes to reality. Kucinich has long been a fine actor who is very good at reading his lines. Whatever egalitarian notion he once may have had, it has withered and died under the public attention he receives for being the Democrat stooge of "radicalism" who is used for the Democrats much like Sarah Palin is used for the Republicans -- as a court jester who is put on stage to mock and belittle, thereby controlling public opinion through what is NOT preferable (what is mocked). Also, when the Washington Post mocks Kucinich as a lunatic for trying to impeach Cheney, you know how honest the Post is being. Note the Post didn't mock him for pretending to want impeachment -- it mocked him for actually trying to achieve it, as if impeaching Cheney was somehow an unAmerican thing. I think we're finished here. I hereby promise to never make enough money to have to pay Federal income taxes, because if I'm gonna have to be forced to pay Big Insurance, Big Pharma and Big Medicine through my tax dollars, I'm not gonna make taxable income. I'd challenge others to do likewise. Or to do like Mr Floyd and some other commenters have done, and leave the nation!

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March 18, 2010
Votes: +7

nina said:

	Oh yeah pressure drop a drop on you I say when it drops, oh you gonna feel it Know that you were doing wrong. My heart is broken. If not Dennis, then who? Who will stand down? Tell me who.
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March 18, 2010
Votes: +3

Michael B said:

Proving once again... The Democratic Party plays an indispensable role in society's political machinery. This doesn't mean it has any power, in terms of controlling the state or setting policy. It means that without the existence of the Dem Party, the US could no longer maintain the pretense that it's a "democracy." If the Dem Party disintegrated, the US would be revealed for what it really is -- a one-party state ruled by a narrow alliance of business interests. The party's true function is thus largely theatrical. It doesn't exist to fight for change, but only to pose as a force which one fine distant day might possibly bestir itself to fight for change. Thus the whole magic of the Dem Party -- the essential service it renders to the US power structure -- lies not in what it does, but in its mere existence: by simply existing, and doing nothing, it pretends to be something it's not; and this is enough to relieve despair & to let the system portray itself as a "democracy." As long as the Dem Party exists, most Americans will believe we have a "democracy" and a "choice" in how we are ruled. They will not despair, and will not revolt, as long as they have this hope for "change within the system." From the system's point of view, this mechanism serves as the ultimate safety valve -- it insures against a despairing populace, thus eliminates the threat of rebellion; yet guarantees that no serious change to the system will be mounted, because the Dems weren't designed to play that role in the first place. The Democrats are not the "lesser evil;" they are an auxiliary subdivision of the same evil. To understand the political system, one must step back and regard its operation as an integrated whole. The system can't be properly understood if one's study of it begins with an uncritical acceptance of the 2-party system, and the conventional characterizations of the two parties. (Indeed, the fact that society encourages one to view it in this latter way, is perhaps a warning that this perspective should not be trusted.) The Democrats are permitted to exist because their vague hint of eventual progressive change keeps large numbers of people from bolting the political system altogether. Emma Goldman once said, "If voting made a difference, it would be illegal." Similarly, if the Democrats potentially threatened any sort of serious change, they would be banned. The fact that they are fully accepted by the corporations and political establishment tells us at once that their ultimate function must be wholly in line with the interests of those ruling groups. Doesn't the presence of the Dennis Kuciniches et al "prove" that the Democrats are progressive? No. The Kuciniches and are indeed significantly different from the Hillary types -- but there are compelling reasons not to get too excited about them, either. First, they are used by the party as a "Left decoration," simply to keep potential left defectors in tow. Secondly, the party power brokers will NEVER in a million years let the Kucinich faction have any real power. The existence of a few decent Dems makes no real difference in the overall alignment of the party, and they will never be internally influential. They are a distraction. For the Democratic Party to even begin to serve as a vehicle for opposing the absolute rule of capital, it would at a minimum have to be capable of acknowledging the conflict that exists between the interests of capital and the rest of the population; and of expressing a principled determination to take the side of the population in this conflict. A party whose controlling elements are millionaires, lobbyists, fund-raisers, careerist apparatchiks, consultants, and corporate lawyers; that has stood by prostrate and helpless (when not actively collaborating) in the face of stolen elections, illegal wars, torture, CIA concentration camps, lies as state policy, and one assault on the Bill of Rights after the next, is not likely to take that position.

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March 18, 2010
Votes: +27

Grandma Jefferson said:

Nina ...Who? There's no one. I think there never was anyone. It's all Kabuki, a shadow show, an utter farce. It must all play out to the end, as I've often said. While we can't afford to pay for real Healthcare for all citizens, rebuild the rotting infrastructure, create jobs, educate our children, clean up the poisonous environment, restore pensions or regulate any robber barons, we CAN bail out every oligarch institution on the planet, and pay for three illegal wars, while launching a fourth, on yet another innocent country, Iran. We have trillions for all that, just nothing left, not even crumbs, for the rubes footing the bill. But I really believe the latest crime against humanity in the offing, the Iran atrocity, will be the tipping point at last, and end of empire, and we can watch the entire putrid edifice collapse. Then, the trick will be to live through it. What with the murderous, armed, utterly insane Brown Shirt factions loosed upon the nation by the NeoNazi Right Wing, this will be tricky. I always wondered what a real Gotterdammerung would be like. I think we're about to find out.

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March 18, 2010
Votes: +13

scott douglas said:

... In a wildly paranoid dream last night it became clear to me that there was no place to hide. Residences of friends or associates? Known. Public market places? Surveilled by video, heavily patrolled. Roads were blockaded with search teams and friends with a car suggested I hang out of the vehicle to avoid the scrutiny of the agents examining the passengers -- well, you know how absurdities creep into such dreams... There were the armies of the road, as Ian Anderson would say, but they are routinely questioned, at least in this city, as a means of rousting them along. Nowhere to hide. Will a time come soon when we will all have to shut our mouths tight and hope the red wave passes us by? Well. I am not so sure that the real mood of the populace is reflected by the media or the machinations of the high profile puppets of the ruling class...Let's see what thirty million working class people say when they are forced to buy something they cannot afford. The mind boggles -- the party of the people imposing an almost feudal and definitely draconian sur-tax upon the rudest of the poor, dumb peasants in all the land. It's almost unbelievable, frankly. Who, really, cooks this shit up? Let's see what they do when the budding trade war with China hits the prices on the Walmart shelves with a Paul Krugman mark-up of 25% No, seriously; this would be the result of the good Professor's latest policy hunch-punch. Let's see what happens when the working class, even now struggling through a second great depression -- the invisible depression! -- get a load of $6 a gallon Iran War gasoline. I don't know. But I would wager that these Plutocratic crack-pots have been drinking their own koolaid for too long to even get out the abacus or bother their augerers with the questions...

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March 18, 2010
Votes: +6

Jimmy Montague said:

The people who cook this shit up -- The people who cook this shit up can easily afford $6 gasoline so they think everyone else can, too. They live in a fantasy land. It puts me in mind of those two senators who, back in the Sixties, decided to prove that Social Security recipients were all on the Gravy Train. The two senators decided that THEY would live on the same amount of money that Social Security pays the average recipient monthly. They actually tried to do so. Both men were theoretically broke by the end of the second day. Even so, Washington never learned and never will learn. If we DO war on Iran, I'm sure I'll be fascinated by the financial acrobatics that Washington will employ in trying to prosecute its war. The Chinese haven't called in their markers yet because they are afraid that, if they cash in, Washington will hand them a couple of oil tankers filled with worthless currency and call the debt paid -- and the Chinese are probably right. But suppose the Chinese cash in anyway: With the United States embroiled in a world war (let's call it what it is), what will Washington do? Surely they have SOMETHING planned. . . . Whatever the plan may be, it promises to shade anything that Ringling Brothers, Barnum & Bailey ever staged.

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March 18, 2010
Votes: +4

Sean O'Neil said:

... Michael B's narrative once again hits constant bullseyes. Jimmy M is hitting dead center when he says the people running the show can afford $6/gal gasoline so they don't care what happens to the rest of us. That's also how they feel about health care. If THEY can afford it, then we can too -- even if "affording it" for some of us means going without food, or heat, or needed clothing, or NECESSARY health care that isn't covered by the Criminal Congressional Syndicate's wonderful new legislation. The whole point of the Fed Govt right now is to destroy the middle class and make everyone from the middle class into the working poor or the utterly destitute. It is pure feudalist in impulse, but faux-democratic in implementation. Again, see Michael B's excellent narrative for how it works. Yes, America is fucked. As are about 85% of its citizens. I think it's time that self-styled "progressives" learned something crucial about the "progressive" monniker: it is something donned by sycophantic capitalist yuppies and liberals in order to feel informed and avant-garde. The urges of the American "progressive" movement are to protect capitalism from attacks by the likes of people such as myself. That's their goal and purpose.

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March 18, 2010 | url
Votes: +8

Little Brother said:

... If there was ever an occasion for Kucinich to finally repudiate his dark "Judas goat" side, this was it. Instead, we got fatuous, normative slogans equivalent to "Gotta support the team!", although "Gotta support the star quarterback!" is more accurate. Beyond that, Kucinich's sketchy apologia amounted to his declaring that he pretty much was left with the prospect of becoming a scapegoat for the bill's failure, or reprising his habitual role of Judas goat who would live to "fight" another day. But Judas goats like Kucinich (and Sanders, Feingold, etc.) don't actually fight, do they? Oh, they rear up and paw the air once in a while, and bray a good game. But that's only to keep up the spirits of their followers, and ensure that their enthralled charges nod so vigorously that they fail to notice that the leader of their escape party has actually led them out to a side door opening on a chute to the killing floor. The always-problematic CommonDreams site has crashed or been taken off-line this afternoon. Perusing the comments there, one still finds a few resolute sheep Standing by Their Goat. Not surprisingly, their rationalizations feature self-flagellating masochism, claiming that the fault is not in the Star Goat, but Us for failing to provide the Goat sufficient support to enable him to confidently take a stand against his party's leadership. There's also that peculiar righteous cynicism, breezily "forgiving" Kucinich for taking care of bidness because he really had "no choice" to do otherwise in this depraved political vale of tears. One alleged Cleveland resident scathingly asserts that "we" Let Him Down, and explains that Dennis learned his lesson when he attempted to stand up and defend ordinary citizens against the local predatory power company and its political backers. None of the Kucinich-defenders convincingly explain how he was forced to vote "yes" on this No Insurer Left Behind abomination apart from concurring with his manifestly self-serving "better safe than sorry" policy. I won't bother to catalogue other fantastic expressions of cognitive-dissonance resolutions, i.e. one chap's assertion that by "seeming" to capitulate, Kucinich is shrewdly lining himself up to fight even more effectively for true health care reform! (He certainly can't fight less effectively, so it's an understandable leap of illogic.) I'm perpetually on as much as anyone about reactionary anti-intellectual wingnut yahoos and troglodytes drawn to bombastic celebrity demagogues like flies to fresh dung. But it's even more sad and frustrating to read comments from moderate liberal-lites and die-hard Kucinich supporters ratifying this wrong and revealing decision. Kucinich is neither more nor less than a Judas goat. Yet when he returns to his flock from the killing floor, reeking of gore, he merely has to turn his head, flutter his eyelashes sorrowfully, and bray plaintively; a few sheep immediately start lining up behind his bloody hoofprints. [cross-posted @ The Distant Ocean]

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March 18, 2010
Votes: +5

Donald L. Smith said:

The Liberal Rock Band Syndrome Back in the Stone Age, I sincerely went into the streets with my brothers and sisters agauinst the war,(that hoary ghost, Viet -Nam). Not being of an age where I had acquired the cynicism which seems to be needed to even begin to understand the twisted workings of a warfare state, I believed that someone, somewhere would do the right thing. Part of my rebellion was to manage, play and sing in a rock band. Protest music would surely help speed the moral uplift of America, right? It was pretty much the same tired moral condemnation stuff, talking down to the poor, ignorant masses who must be searching for the Truth. Today's liberals seem to be part of that accusatory, binary process, congratulating themselves upon the great righteousness they are leading. Preaching to the unwashed and ignoring the fact that they are only on the stage as scenery in a play which has no leverage, a pole which exists only to show that there exists an opposition to the Bad Right, a role which shows we are still part of a Free Country. My approach now, when I address my ever shrinking circle of acquaintances, is very direct. Is the war still going on? Is the country destitute? Is anyone in power achieving ANYTHING to turn this around? This site is therapy for me, Mr. Floyd reminds me that not everyone is trapped in madness.

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March 18, 2010
Votes: +7

Sean O'Neil said:

	... Little Brother sees the truth!
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March 19, 2010
Votes: +0

Art James, bebop-o, GoodCelery! said:

Little Brother & Big Sister Little Brother remind me of Big Sister Merry Emanueal Swedenborg. That's getting into mysticism, theosophy, physics, and pantheism. Little Brother had a great case of dyslexia. Kindergarden do helps. Merry Brother Little Brother and smooch Merry Sister Smoochy lips. We'll all be okay before we get married. Merry quite contrary loco. I am just saying nothing. I never could understand politico gibber. Hi Little Brother. You'd love my Big Sister. I'll set you up for jails. Tie a hemp rope chain and Liz Cheney bowling bowl to a ankle.

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March 19, 2010
Votes: +0

Grandma Jefferson said:

	Meanwhile.. The InsCo Extortion bill is now being touted as "paying for itself", by BHO, that evidently being the entire point of the enterprise, not health CARE, just fiscal responsibility. Yes, the cits get to pay for their own form of Insurance extortion, and the G won't be stinted in any way, in paying for the ongoing wars, bailouts, & weapons funding. What a relief.
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March 19, 2010
Votes: +3

derekmann said:

systems analysis instead of serious analysis from either political party, we get smoke and mirrors. stands to reason that until you take the profit out of the equation, costs will not go down. remember that reported HC profits are after the executives have gotten huge payouts; salaries are a business expense, as is advertising, corporate retreats, etc. etc. the canadian single payer legislation is reportedly 14 pages long. a simpler solution would be to follow the german model, health care and health insurance corporation are non-profit by law, take the profit incentive out and you will lower costs; at that point you could deal with access. this current bill will make the federal government into the collection agent of big business, and will almost certainly further erode confidence in government. the mistake that was made by the democrats was they did nothing to educate the public before the legislation was introduced. a one or two year educational campaign could possibly have prepared the public to hammer any elected official who opposed genuine health care reform. just a thought. i really, really, think chris is right on about it being better to introduce real reform, and then push it, push it, push it.

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March 19, 2010 | url
Votes: +0

scott douglas said:

... The legislation is a travesty. I don't feel right dealing with the details; it is all so tawdry. But just in case there's a wavering democrat dithering upon the edge of that golden valley: One: Please note that a mandate to purchase insurance is not the same thing as universal coverage...um, I, personally feel a rhetorical avalanche when I type this simple sentence; and yet I am sure that the intended audience of my comment is scratching his useless nuts... Two: The promise of no refusal of citizens with pre-existing conditions does not in any way protect that patient from a fee structure based upon the actuarial statistics associated with the condition in question. DUH! C'mon, Proggies -- get a clue.

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March 19, 2010
Votes: +2

Sean O'Neil said:

	... Scott: on your points 1 and 2, I agree. See here: http://pezcandy.blogspot.com/2009/12/no-to-obamacare-no-no-no.html
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March 19, 2010
Votes: +0

Michael Hureaux Perez said:

... As regards Kucinich, no surprises. He bravely turned his noble tail and ran everyone into the Kerry camp six years ago, so why would he do anything different now? And Grandma Jefferson nails it precisely. We are headed for treacherous, dangerous times. I've chosen the crew I'll be working with, everyone else needs to do that as well. The sooneer we get busy with the task of building fighting, independent organizations of wage earners, rooted in real community and labor organization, the better off we're going to be. As Amilcar Cabral said, the more sweat in peace time, the less blood in war time. And unfortunately, like many others here, I do not believe that this ruling class is going to leave the stage of history without bleeding a lot of us. The more self-directed infrastructure and organization we create along the way, the better off we're going to be. But it is absolutely pivotal that everyone drop any illusions they have in the democratic party, or "progressives", right now. All of that hokum is over with. From now on, it's our own efforts, or nothing at all. The longer we drag out this nonsense of the so-called "democrats", the worse the blowback is going to be, and the better equipped the really dangerous people are going to be. All of this seems a pipe dream, but so did the collapse of stalinism a mere 25 years ago. I refuse to believe we can't defeat an enemy whose only asset is viciousness. In the words of Ulysses Grant, I among many others are tired of hearing about what Bobby Lee is going to do to us. We want to know what we're going to do to Bobby Lee.

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March 22, 2010
Votes: +2

hal said:

	you guys are the best Chris (and Arthur Sibler) is the best writer on the web and you who comment here are the most astute and awake in the 'Homeland'. I am honored and thankful to have found this site.
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March 25, 2010
Votes: +1