Here at Liberadio(!), we had high hopes after the bittersweet moment of Election Day 2008, where Democrats and progressives were jubilant at the election of President Obama but frustrated at the loss of both state houses of the General Assembly to Republicans for the first time since Reconstruction. Our hopes were high because, despite Tennessee’s electoral contrarianism, we had a pair of Republican Senators who did not seem to take cues from the Inhofe/Palin/Limbaugh/Beck wing of the party.
They were heady days in early 2009, when we saw former Sec. of Education and now Tennessee’s senior U.S. Senator Lamar(!) Alexander join current Sec. of Education Arne Duncan in co-writing an op-ed for The Tennnessean on the importance of improving Tennessee’s charter schools laws. This was meaningful bipartisanship. It was almost—dare we say it?—statesman-like.
It seems to be shrinking. Like the ice caps.
Our hopes, however, have since been dashed. It was not long before Lamar(!) was using Glenn Beck math in a prelude to boycotting bipartisan committee meetings.
And once he had set foot on the slippery slope of being a member of Republican leadership in an era in which true leadership seems to be in hiding, it wasn’t long before he had slid down into the depths, where he saw fit (with the blessing of advisers?) to repeatedly call Medicaid a “medical ghetto.”
“Or arrogant in its dumping of 15 million low-income Americans into a medical ghetto called Medicaid that none of us, or any of our families, would ever want to be a part of for our health care.â€
We’re left wondering whether he feels similarly about all government services, including public education.
Now we discover that he’s “quietly” trying to provoke teabaggers into another wave of astroturf town halls.
We can and should advocate for effective government, but achieving this model must always be done in recognition that there is a group of people, now including Lamar(!), that hate government and want to see it fail. We want to see good governance and a sound legislative process that attracts the best and the brightest to the domain of public policy. We want programs that are well-run so that they serve the American people well. With detractors and obstructionists like Lamar(!) thinking that his family is too good for government services, success is made difficult but not impossible. Fortunately, there are 100 Senators, and Lamar(!), should he choose to stand (a process requiring a spine) for re-election, will be up again in 2014.
We proudly present the 2009 Liberadio(!) Jive Turkey Award to… Lamar! Congratulations, sir. We hope that you and last year’s winner Bill Hobbs will enjoy cigars at the reception. The buffet table will be full of leftovers.
[...] » The 2nd Annual Liberadio(!) Jive Turkey AwardPosted 17 hours [...]
We want programs that are well-run so that they serve the American people well. With detractors and obstructionists like Lamar(!) thinking that his family is too good for government services, success is made difficult but not impossible.”
Regarding the first sentence, most Republicans and Conservatives would heartily agree. And I will not deny the existence of some loony right-wing ideologues and opportunists.
But is suspicion of government any worse than blind faith in it? When has the left stepped up and admitted that a major program it loves has not worked? The standard response to failed government programs inevitably comes down to:
A ) We need to spend more.
B ) We did not give government enough power to effectively regulate something.
C ) We cannot expect people to act in their own best interest. Government must do it for them.
Consider the opposition from the left to any moderate/conservative reforms of welfare, social security, medicare (like the $40 billion in savings that only became possible when it was required to fund health care reform), agriculture etc. Denied any willingness to cooperate on solutions that favor less government, the left has put leaders like Senator Alexander in an untenable position.
Good post.
Which programs, exactly, are failed goverment programs?
I do wish Republicans would be honest and campaign on a platform of ending “socialist” programs like Medicare and Social Security.
I would argue Medicare and Social Security are enormous successes. They’re very popular and have helped many people. They could, without question, stand some tweaking from time to time. And there is a question of their solevency, but it’s a question that is extremely overstated, and could be solved with a less aggressive foreign policy. In fact, sometimes I think one of the main purposes of a boondoggle like Iraq is to justify diverting resources from social programs.
A guy like Sen. Alexander is in an untenable position, but the far right — which seems to have more and more control of the Republican Party — exacerbates his delimma. Tennessee is a red state, but not ultra-conservative. If he goes too far to the right, it will be a hinderance by the time 2014 rolls around.
Mark, I would generally call myself a skeptic, and I don’t limit that to government. But for public policy that has an opportunity of success, especially where the private sector has repeatedly demonstrated failure, as with meaningful health security for Americans, watching Sen. Alexander *ahem* ghettoize Medicaid is an embarrassment, especially when Tennessee competes for the bottom in terms of least healthy states.
Private insurers can’t profit off of people who bring to the table health conditions that cost more to cover than any standard policy. And plenty of Americans are clearly willing to turn a blind or uncaring eye to this lot. The Republican approach thus far has centered only on cost control, but this has nothing to do with access for the millions of Americans who couldn’t help conditions they were born with or happened to them during the courses of their lives.
Our main criticism of Sen. Alexander is not his willingness to be a member of the loyal opposition but rather the tactics he seems willing to use in order to do so. It’s not the left that’s given him no choice; it’s the teabagging right.
Dean,
It is possible to want to reform programs rather than get rid of them. Tweaking and insolvency are not the same thing. Just because a program worked in the past does not mean that it will continue to work without more than a tweak. For example, if we can expect savings of some $400 billion over ten years to fund health care reform, aren’t you curious about why we couldn’t save $200 or $300 billion over the last ten years?
Freddie,
The private sector does not have a responsibility to provide ‘meaningful health security for Americans.’ Various elements of the private sector like doctors, nurses, insurance companies, hospitals, technology companies etc provide components of our health care system. Health security, requires us to consider lots of other components like education.
This is why reform should begin with fixing components of the system rather than blowing up the system and trying to rebuild it. Cost control, for example, can help fund coverage for more people. Tort reform could reduce excessive testing. Allowing insurance companies to offer coverage across state lines could expand competition.
Yes, the tea partiers can be a problem. But so are the lefty versions, the ones who refuse to accept any reform that doesn’t include a public option or who insist on single payer or who want to remove economic incentives because ‘profit’ is a dirty word. Their desire to keep demanding greater and greater government control of health care makes any compromise by moderates like Alexander difficult because they know that there will be more and more demands.
Mark:
I am curious about that, but I find it curious whenever the GOP says it has a plan to reform HC. The GOP had long periods when it was in control of the WH and Congress, but never touched on the issues of pre-existing conditions or the rising cost of the system. Now, with a majority of Americans screaming for reform and the political winds shifting in that direction, we’re supposed to believe that the GOP is genuinely interested in reform?
To your greater point: I think there are Republicans who interested in keeping these programs and helping improve them. But I honestly believe these are the silent Republicans who are being pushed out of the party. These are the Republicans who would deem any program “socialist,” and then hem and haw when it’s suggested the GOP would rather eliminate them altogether.
There are genuine conservatives who are very reasonable. But they, like Sen. Alexander, face a delimma of sticking to their own beliefs or maintaining their power inside the party’s core.
The above comment belongs to me. — Dean
Mark, I’m specifically trying to eliminate the illusion of responsibility for health security on the part of private insurers. I’m very happy to disagree with people who don’t perceive this as a public policy issue in need of a fix.
Otherwise, though, our point in singling out Sen. Alexander was not that thoughtful skepticism of majority politics should be decried but rather that his tactics and rhetoric are now borderline teabaggery.
http://alexander.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Contact.Home
Drop Lamar an email and congratulate him on being this year’s big winner. I did!
Freddie, not only are you trying to eliminate responsibility for health security on the part of insurers, but you are also trying to eliminate responsibility on the part of the insured.
I don’t understand why you liberals think that everyone deserves to have health care given to them. Anything worth having isn’t going to be free, or cheap, right? Why should health care be any different? It is your responsibility to find and afford care for your family, not mine. Let me handle my family, and you go buy the bottom of the barrel crap (public option) for your family that “means so much to you”… In the meantime, I hope you are explaining to your little kids why daddy can’t work for their healthcare, but he can go on a vacation, drive a new car, have every channel on cable (with his plasma tv), and be carrying around the newest blackberry on the market.
You want the best of everything, and you want the government to give it to us. Good luck with that.
Ryan, your ability to be obtuse competes favorably with your ability to be insulting.
If you’ve followed any rational discussion about healthcare reform, the general position of those favoring health security is not to remove responsibility from individuals to ensure their own wellness but rather to ensure access to insurance in the event of a pre-existing condition, whether one that occurred at birth or one that is a result of an accident. These aren’t hypotheticals for actuaries or pundits to poke and prod at; they’re real scenarios affecting real Americans.
In an employer-based health insurance model, loss of a job typically means loss of access to affordable health insurance. If you’ve never faced COBRA premiums (which expire) or HIPAA premiums, try it. You won’t like it.
As someone who clearly favors the free market, I’m surprised by your willingness to trap a labor force that could be operating more efficiently in jobs just so that they can maintain access to healthcare.
A number of Americans interested in this debate want to work but can’t lest they earn so much income they no longer qualify for Medicaid. And if they have a severe enough pre-existing condition, they’re uninsurable in the eyes of private insurers or else, if they exercise their HIPAA rights, they’re charged premiums high enough that they’re pushed right back into poverty.
Imagine my surprise if you turn out to be anti-abortion-rights and also anti-health-security for those Americans with pre-existing conditions from birth.
It’s quite nice of you to put words in my mouth by falsely asserting what i want, but let me spell it out for you since you keep getting it wrong: I want access to affordable healthcare for all Americans. The only thing I want government to give me is the right to compete fairly with all Americans, regardless of how any of us were born or affected by unforeseen circumstances.
In order, I favor:
You’re welcome to adopt a position that punishes the community of Americans who wind up with pre-existing conditions, and I’ll gladly continue to oppose your policy prescriptions.
Ryan:
The majority of the people who don’t have insurance have applied for it, but have been denied because of a pre-existing condition.
As for those who don’t have insurance because they can’t afford it, the philosophy is simple: let’s pay for them to have access to pre-emptive care, because right now all they have access to is the ER, which is much more costly.
Health is a condition, not a commodity. I feel that way about my health, my kids’ health, my father’s health and your health. It’s not something that should be used to help deck out some CEO’s pad in the Cayman Islands.
I was always taught that I am my brother’s keeper, and that what you do to the least of my brothers, you do to me. So it’s not about greed or avarice. It’s taking care of my fellow man.
And hell yes, I want the best of everything. I don’t expect government to do it all, but dammit, we should demand more of a system that produces absolutely unacceptable results when it comes to life expectancy and infant mortality. If our health-care system was a college football team, it would be Notre Dame: all sizzle and no steak.
What we have now is totally unacceptable.
Damn, Freddie. You kick ass.
[...] first there was a typical cold, knee-jerk, and factually-challenged conservative reaction to a health care reform discussion from another reader: Ryan [...]
[...] first there was a typical cold, knee-jerk, and factually-challenged conservative reaction to a health care reform discussion from another reader: Ryan [...]