Is Reid Buying Off Ben Nelson On Health Care?

It's crunch time for Harry Reid, which usually means, time to open up the purse strings. This bill is actually disastrously close to passing, I'm afraid. Nelson is up there in age and not up until 2012. If he decides to retire then, he can make whatever deal he wants without worrying about the political implications. That would make him an expensive free agent in Senate speak.

In a statement issued late Friday night, Reid says he intends to unveil final revisions to the measure on Saturday and is confident they will prevail. Nelson also said real progress had been made but said there was nothing final. Nelson has been seeking greater restrictions on abortions as well as more money for his home state in last-minute talks.

The remaining potentially problematic Dem hold-outs would be the Leftists disappointed with the bill. They can be brought in line fairly handily and the WH has shown no signs of backing down. Dean has. That could easily give them sixty votes to move forward with a watered down, though still disastrous bill. That's why Republicans are still fighting, see call to action video below.

D.C. insiders want to frame the fight for real healthcare reform as Howard Dean vs. the White House. But this isn't about Dr. Dean and it isn't about the White House.

Comments

[Axel Kaspar Edgren]

This will be a nice Christmas present for the extremely partisan fear-mongers that have taken control of the once decent GOP. No good faith and sympathy for those who have shown none.

Millions will be given the right to have an abortion, take a stronger stance against the bloated and subsidized insurance company tyrants when they get their care denied, demand explanations for price-jacking and also have their children protected - and there is nothing you people can do about it.

Why? Because the house is blue, the senate was blue enough, and Barack Hussein Obama is the president while John McCain ISN'T.

Will the dems get a drubbing in 2010? Of course, but now it seems they won't suffer a 1994-style setback. Just like Medicare, this new reform will soon become welded together with American society, impossible to remove.

[Dan Riehl]

Not so fase Axel's rod. The bennies don't come till 2014. The price begins now. Plenty of time to take this sucker down. Watch as the narrative around it plays out.

[Axel Kaspar Edgren]

You were ready to elect Palin as VP, and is therefore not worthy of mentioning my rod.

I am perfectly ready to see the dems getting hurt in the midterms (and you endlessly predictable people will say it's proof that the US thinks democrats makes baby Jesus and Washington cry tears of blood, and that Obama should step down) but I think someone described it well elsewhere.

2008: Voters kick the GOP in the glockenspiel.
2010: Voters rear their foot back for more power, democrats may lose senate. GOP breathes a sigh of relief, the media says that democrats should commit suicide collectively (even though incumbent parties never do well in midterms).
2012: Voters kick the GOP even harder in the glockenspiel - right-wing bloggers say that this is because the GOP wasn't right-wing enough. Plans are drawn to send Palin back in time to get impregnated by Reagan to deliver the last True Republican.

[James]

I agree.

Moreover, if we are unable to pay our bills, we may face "bloated and subsidized" government-financed tyrants who will ration care to satisfy our creditors. We may even be forced to abandon or pare back this and other social programs if China and others decide we become an investment risk over the next few decades.

Millions already have the right to abortions. The only change would be taxes would pay for them.

[Axel Kaspar Edgren]

"Millions already have the right to abortions. The only change would be taxes would pay for them."

In the current time limit already imposed on the legality of abortions, the fetus is simply not capable of housing consciousness or feelings. Therefore, removing that fetus is no more immoral than an appendectomy - and if appendectomies are paid for, so should abortions. I would not be pro-abortion if I thought that it would lead to a human consciousness being snuffed, but I am not interested in hearing what religions have to say about when life begins or a soul is created. I'm sorry, there is no way that anything actually human can reside in the amalgamation of cells that a fetus is in the time period during which abortions are allowed in today. It's a medical procedure.

[Joseph Brown]

Axel ol'...buddy? Why not take your Europeen BS back to the socialist country you escaped from. Personally, I don't want nor need your know-it-all BS.
If your idea of being American is telling us how great the socialist system was, why the hell are you here?

[Axel Kaspar Edgren]

Stop your belly-aching. You are a grown man. The current system has an insane imbalance between producers and consumers, where the former can do whatever they want to the latter with little to no accountability. Customers are unable to vote with their money if there is only one insurance company to choose - that's not how capitalism is supposed to work, and you know it.

A deal is made when a person performs and is given something in return. Insurance companies want to rake in the premiums and give nothing in return. They make more money by denying people the health-care they paid for.

[southdakotaboy]

Axle you rest your whole argument on the Heath Care reform being successful. You think that it will really work. The rage the American people will feel when the economy tanks will be epic. With the rise of new media and new social networks the left will not be able to hide the failure. When the right gets back into power hopefully we will play hard ball and destroy the left in this country root and branch. The lefties need to be bodily driven from this country and castout to fend for themselves in the wilderness.
You people on the left don't really understand the rage that is building on our side. We are going to do more than punish you we are going to destroy you. We are tired of playing nice with you traitorous scum.

[Axel Kaspar Edgren]

This is the same thing republicans grumbled about when Medicare went through: Ol' Raygun said that Medicare would destroy America and kill Jesus all over again or something. Yeah not so much.

Again, republicans in general haven't been very good at making predictions lately.

[Joseph Brown]

Axel, try explaining the "one insurance company" when and if the feds take control of the system. Do you think there will be a large group of companies?
There is not one example in the history of this great country where the government ran anything that didn't tank. However, the government usually fixed the problem by throwing more money at it hoping some would stick.
That worked real well with the postal service and Amtrack, didn't it?
I haven't ridden a train since 1955 and don't intend to, preferring those old capitalist antiques called airlines.
And for some reason my postage stamp prices continue to rise. Gevernment needs to work on that.

[North Dallas Thirty]

The current system has an insane imbalance between producers and consumers, where the former can do whatever they want to the latter with little to no accountability.

Absolutely they have control over it; they choose from whom, when, and how they buy insurance.

The problem here is that lazy worthless welfare moochers like Axel who don't pay taxes and don't want to work need the rest of us to cover their bills for their wastefulness and indolence. So they try to blame the insurance companies for their own worthlessness and hatred of the productive.

What happens when people stop paying taxes, Axel? The Obama Party members like yourself don't; why should anyone else pay? Who will you steal from then, worthless child?

[Axel Kaspar Edgren]

"The problem here is that lazy worthless welfare moochers like Axel who don't pay taxes and don't want to work need the rest of us to cover their bills for their wastefulness and indolence. So they try to blame the insurance companies for their own worthlessness and hatred of the productive."

That kind of talk would have caused me to punch you if this was in person. You do not talk down to a fellow adult that way. Any man would have told you those are fighting words. You'll assume anything about people of different political positions. i don't. That makes me your better.

[North Dallas Thirty]

"You do not talk down to a fellow adult that way."

You are not an adult. You're a spoiled, whining welfare brat who quite obviously went directly from stealing from their parents to stealing from other taxpayers.

Case in point:

"You'll assume anything about people of different political positions. i don't."

Lie. In your very first comment to this thread, you slandered everyone who works for health insurance companies as "tyrants" who want to hurt people, and everyone in the Republican Party as "extremely partisan fear-mongers" with "no good faith and symphony".

In short, welfare brat, you lie about yourself, lie about others, and then shriek when your behavior is called out. And then you threaten to punch me? You haven't lifted a finger your entire life; why should I be frightened of being hit by someone who is so lazy?

[North Dallas Thirty]

"Sympathy", that is, not "symphony". That's what I get for listening to classical this early.

Meanwhile:

That makes me your better.

Oh, I have no doubt that you have all sorts of ways that you can come up with to make you my "better" in your mind. Indeed, the entire mantra of the Obama Party is that its nomenklatura like yourself are so much smarter and brighter than the rest of us that they should control the country. Meanwhile, the rest of us are so stupid and helpless that we need our "betters" like you to control the market and tell us what to do; furthermore, we should be grateful to you for taking the money and property for which we've worked hard from us and "redistributing" it to those who don't, because obviously we're too ignorant, lazy, and greedy to manage it ourselves.

Is that how you rationalize what you do, moocher? Why else would you and your Obama Party support and endorse not paying taxes, as you clearly do?

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203946904574300013592601036.html

[North Dallas Thirty]

Meanwhile, I think we should remember how the worthless welfare brats like Axel "punch" people; they demand that the government agencies they control prosecute them and throw them in jail.

http://www.politico.com/blogs/scorecard/1209/Grayson_wants_to_imprison_critic.html?showall

That shows you how spoiled and desperate Axel and his worthless ilk are. Imprisoning people for political dissent? That's their dream world. It's what pathetic Axel supports, it's what the Obama Party wants, and it's what Barack Obama himself supports and endorses.

http://www.politico.com/blogs/scorecard/1009/Obama_Grayson_an_outstanding_member_of_Congress.html

[southdakotaboy]

I have been saying this for awhile now but I haven't gotten much support.Now hopefully that will change. Conservatives need to economically shut down. Don't spend any money you don't absolutely have to. Switch to cash only and hide as much as you can. We need to prevent Obama from having any economic progress if we are going to retake this country and start undoing all the damage that traitorous scum bag Obama is doing to this country.

[Right Thinker]

It's only a matter of time before single-payer comes to the US. All modern societies have evolved this way. Conservatives need to stop wasting their energy fighting the inevitable and find battles to fight that the tide of history is not against them.

[North Dallas Thirty]

"It's only a matter of time before single-payer comes to the US. All modern societies have evolved this way. Conservatives need to stop wasting their energy fighting the inevitable and find battles to fight that the tide of history is not against them."

Or, as people were saying in the 1780s, "It's only a matter of time before these nascent United States become a monarchy. All modern societies have evolved this way. People need to stop wasting their energy fighting the inevitable and find battles to fight that the tide of history is not against them."

Turns out we were the vanguard of change then, and we are still now. Countries are paring BACK their socialist, leftist-imposed systems and allowing more and more private alternatives. We're already there.

[Get Real]

The current system has already failed. The insurance companies and providers do nothing as costs double every 8 years. It is obvious that at some point there will be public pressure to create a public, non-profit alternative. You simply cannot have the cost of health care double in 8 years, quadruple in 16 years etc. without reaching a critical mass of resistance from consumers. The same would be true if the cost of food or shelter doubled every 8 years. The quality of our health care is irrelevant if people can't afford it.

The Democrats have recognized this and offered an alternative. Some aspects of the bill may need work, in which case there are safeguards built in to allow changes to be made by individual states.

The Republicans refuse to offer an alternative. They literally have no plan. They have only offered a few pages of happy talk about tax cuts and free markets (despite the fact that the status quo protects monopolies and the Dem plan allows more competition.)

There will be successful policies in this bill. The sky will not fall. The public will recognize this and be thankful that Democrats made it happen. Will Republicans continue to quote Reagan and predict doom and gloom Third Reich scenarios? Or will they accept the fact that Americans want change and offer their own plan?

[North Dallas Thirty]

"The Republicans refuse to offer an alternative. They literally have no plan."

Actually, there have been several.

http://usconservatives.about.com/od/healthcarereform2009/a/GOP_Health_Care_Plan.htm

http://gopleader.gov/UploadedFiles/hr3962amendmentBoehner.pdf

The CBO's own scoring says that the aforementioned Republican plan would lower premiums, reduce costs, and reduce the deficit without tax increases or mandates to buy insurance.

In contrast, the CBO has stated that Obama's takeover of health care will INCREASE costs.

"Under questioning by members of the Senate Budget Committee, Douglas Elmendorf, director of the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, said bills crafted by House leaders and the Senate health committee do not propose "the sort of fundamental changes" necessary to rein in the skyrocketing cost of government health programs, particularly Medicare. On the contrary, Elmendorf said, the measures would pile on an expensive new program to cover the uninsured.

Though President Obama and Democratic leaders have repeatedly pledged to alter the soaring trajectory -- or cost curve -- of federal health spending, the proposals so far would not meet that goal, Elmendorf said, noting, "The curve is being raised." His remarks suggested that rather than averting a looming fiscal crisis, the measures could make the nation's bleak budget outlook even worse."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/07/16/AR2009071602242.html

If your Obama Party truly cared about costs, it wouldn't be ramming through a plan that raises them. The facts show clearly that it does. Why do you and your fellow welfare addicts continue to tell lies about that fact?

The answer is very simple; welfare addicts like yourself refuse to work and be responsible. You can't afford health care because you are lazy and indolent, so you want everyone else to pay for it for you. Screaming brats like yourself and your worthless Barack Obama, a classic example of an ignorant failure who has never worked an honest day in his life, think you have the right to steal from others who do work hard and make the choice to pay for coverage themselves rather than spending it on drugs or drinking because you refuse to do either.

Grow up and get a job, brat, and you won't have these problems. Or start deciding to pay for health insurance instead of wasting your money on alcohol, drugs, and fancy clothes, if it's so important. You won't make those choices, you don't deserve coverage. Do you understand that, brat?

[Reagan]

"The answer is very simple; welfare addicts like yourself refuse to work and be responsible. You can't afford health care because you are lazy and indolent, so you want everyone else to pay for it for you. Screaming brats like yourself and your worthless Barack Obama, a classic example of an ignorant failure who has never worked an honest day in his life, think you have the right to steal from others who do work hard and make the choice to pay for coverage themselves rather than spending it on drugs or drinking because you refuse to do either.

Grow up and get a job, brat, and you won't have these problems. Or start deciding to pay for health insurance instead of wasting your money on alcohol, drugs, and fancy clothes, if it's so important. You won't make those choices, you don't deserve coverage. Do you understand that, brat?"

If this is what you pass off as intelligent discussion, it is no wonder the right is so rudely characterized in the mainstream media.

These redneck rants will convince or convert no one. Leave the bar-room bully crap at home and try to have an adult conversation.

[North Dallas Thirty]

If this is what you pass off as intelligent discussion, it is no wonder the right is so rudely characterized in the mainstream media.

Actually, the reason the right is so rudely criticized is because of liberal bias and bigotry -- such as you showed when you ignored the facts presented, with references and links, in the first two-thirds of my comment.

The problem here, Reagan, is that welfare brats like yourself can't win on the facts, so as you did when you got a bad grade in elementary school, you run screaming off to your ignorant mommy about how "unfair" and how much of a "bully" your teacher is, rather than owning up to the fact that you didn't study and didn't pay attention in class. After all, you figure that she was dumb enough to fall for it, so why should you put forth effort to actually educate yourself?

[Joseph Brown]

AXEL!? AXEL?! Anybody seen Axel? They say if the it get's to hot in the kitchen....
He needs to come back and get Reagen and Get Real. Or would that be Larry and Curly?
Just askin'.

[Axel Kaspar Edgren]

"The problem here, Reagan, is that welfare brats like yourself can't win on the facts, so as you did when you got a bad grade in elementary school, you run screaming off to your ignorant mommy about how "unfair" and how much of a "bully" your teacher is, rather than owning up to the fact that you didn't study and didn't pay attention in class. "

I know you weren't addressing me, but my grades were top notch.

"That shows you how spoiled and desperate Axel and his worthless ilk are. Imprisoning people for political dissent? That's their dream world. It's what pathetic Axel supports, it's what the Obama Party wants, and it's what Barack Obama himself supports and endorses."

You accusing me of readiness to imprison dissenters is as disgusting and disingenuous as me accusing you of wanting to put black people in specially designated cities they may not leave. Lose the damn identity politics.

"AXEL!? AXEL?! Anybody seen Axel? They say if the it get's to hot in the kitchen....
He needs to come back and get Reagen and Get Real. Or would that be Larry and Curly?
Just askin'."

I have slightly more important things to do than allay all of your concerns and express sympathy for all the imagined wounds the left has caused you. Sooner or later one has to stop assuming good faith, sound thinking and redeemable faculties of thinking in others - the party of Bachmann, Palin, torture, Inhofe and this new list of ten commandments that even Saint Reagan wouldn't pass 8/10 on - that party I can not safely assume anything about. Sympathy and good faith are commodities to be used sparingly.

Basically, I'm economically uncommitted. I would love to see a country run with the same demands on efficiency and effectiveness that a corporation endures, and I am perfectly ready to see unnecessary taxation as theft. The thing is that I also believe in *social* independence and laissez-faire - I would rather eat my eyelids or have sex with my mother than vote for a party that would tell my gay friend that he doesn't deserve to adopt or may not have the same civil benefits and status that straight loving couples receive. Homophobia will always equate to racism, and thusly the GOP is still - morally - a racist party. You chuck the homophobia, and you might have yourself a vote mister. Until then, what you get when you scream about the democrats imposing things on you is a solo from the world's smallest violin.

[North Dallas Thirty]

"You accusing me of readiness to imprison dissenters is as disgusting and disingenuous as me accusing you of wanting to put black people in specially designated cities they may not leave."

Not really. I have proof of you supporting and endorsing the former.

http://www.politico.com/blogs/scorecard/1209/Grayson_wants_to_imprison_critic.html?showall

And here's another entertaining response from the spoiled welfare brat.

"I would rather eat my eyelids or have sex with my mother than vote for a party that would tell my gay friend that he doesn't deserve to adopt or may not have the same civil benefits and status that straight loving couples receive. Homophobia will always equate to racism....... You chuck the homophobia, and you might have yourself a vote mister.

But of course, Axel, the Obama Party welfare brat, fully supports and endorses the following statements by the Obama Party and its base.

“God don't like men coming to men with lust in their hearts like you should go to a female. If you think that the kingdom of God is going to be filled up with that kind of degenerate crap, you're out of your damn mind.”

http://www.adl.org/special_reports/farrakhan_own_words2/on_homosexuals.asp

Or this one:

"The Obama administration cited Catalano v. Catalano (marriage of uncle to niece, "though valid in Italy under its laws, was not valid in Connecticut because it contravened the public policy of th[at] state"); Wilkins v. Zelichowski (marriage of 16-year-old female held invalid in New Jersey, regardless of validity in Indiana where performed, in light of N.J. policy reflected in statute permitting adult female to secure annulment of her underage marriage), and re Mortenson's Estate, (marriage of first cousins held invalid in Arizona, though lawfully performed in New Mexico, given Arizona policy reflected in statute declaring such marriages "prohibited and void").

“Holy cow,” wrote Aravosis. “Obama invoked incest and people marrying children.”

http://blogs.abcnews.com/politicalpunch/2009/06/obama-justice-department-defends-defense-of-marriage-act-that-candidate-obama-opposed.html

In short, Axel, you fully support and endorse from your Obama Party and in the Obama Party base what you scream and whine constitutes "racism" elsewhere.

Furthermore, given your party's attitudes, it wouldn't surprise us in the least that you have sex with your mother. Or little children, given how Barack Obama endorses and supports pedophile sex classes for underage children.

[North Dallas Thirty]

And as for Axel's "gay friend", in my experience, Obama Party gays are fully supportive of and endorse bans on gay marriage by their Obama massas.

http://mpetrelis.blogspot.com/2007/02/lets-see-if-we-can-follow-bouncing.html

Indeed, they fully endorse and support the babblings of their Messiah Obama.

"I believe that marriage is the union between a man and a woman. Now, for me as a Christian, it's also a sacred union. God's in the mix."

So it's kind of hard to take seriously the rantings of bigots and racists like Axel about what they call "homophobia" when they themselves, by their own definition, fully support and endorse "homophobes".

Pity your parents and teachers didn't bother to teach you consistency, Axel. Looks like they were either too weak or simply too lazy to tell you that you can't say one thing and do another. It just makes you look like a complete fool.

[Axel Kaspar Edgren]

"Not really. I have proof of you supporting and endorsing the former."

I am not Grayson and I did not vote for him. What substance are you on, dunderhead?

"In short, Axel, you fully support and endorse from your Obama Party and in the Obama Party base what you scream and whine constitutes "racism" elsewhere."

If I have to vote for a lesser evil to spite a greater one, it would be foolish to abstain. To vote democrat deigrates my values, to not vote would be a much greater net denigration of them. You need to relax. Also, if you called me a welfare brat to my face, I would be perfectly right to tear out your lying scum tongue.

"Furthermore, given your party's attitudes, it wouldn't surprise us in the least that you have sex with your mother."

Most hillbillies at least go for the closest sibling, but whatever white trash excreted you out of its yeasty cloaca must have f**king *inseminated itself* or somehow bridged the chromosome disjunction with a dog. You are proof positive that there is no god.

"Or little children, given how Barack Obama endorses and supports pedophile sex classes for underage children."

Wishful thinking, you pusgargling, woman-beating, semen-puking scabcunt of a satanic abomination - you're going to have to become a catholic priest or GOP congressman to screw children, with no government help provided.

I could rape every single one of you wingnuts with a confederate saber and it would be an act of no more moral weight or ramification than swatting a fly. You are the absolute nadir of humanity and your souls are composed of tumors and boiling sewage. Holy sh*t.

[North Dallas Thirty]

"I am not Grayson and I did not vote for him."

Your party and your Barack Obama fully support and endorse him, as do you.

http://www.politico.com/blogs/scorecard/1009/Obama_Grayson_an_outstanding_member_of_Congress.html

"If I have to vote for a lesser evil to spite a greater one, it would be foolish to abstain."

As expected, you fully endorse and support your Obama Party masters doing what you criticize Republicans for allegedly doing. That makes it clear that you're a hypocrite and a bigot who merely uses gays to rationalize your bigotry, and doesn't really care about them one way or another. If they can be thrown aside for your Barack Obama, you'll do it.

"Most hillbillies at least go for the closest sibling, but whatever white trash excreted you out of its yeasty cloaca must have f**king *inseminated itself* or somehow bridged the chromosome disjunction with a dog."

(laughs heartily) Axel, dear, my mother has numerous life accomplishments, among which I am but one. Your attempt to attack her in such fashion, while consistent with your Obama Party's belief that women are "bitches" and "whores" who are subordinate to men and deserve such scorn, as expressed by your idols and party leaders Schumer and Grayson, falls just as flat as theirs does, for the same reasons.

"Wishful thinking, you pusgargling, woman-beating, semen-puking scabcunt of a satanic abomination - you're going to have to become a catholic priest or GOP congressman to screw children, with no government help provided."

Oh, I think not. Why, by being an Obama Party staffer, you can even set up your appointments to do so on government computers.

http://www.thesmokinggun.com/archive/years/2007/1203072senate1.html

And if you'd like to see more, google "Kevin Jennings" and "fisting", and you'll see what lovely sexual techniques and thoughts your Barack Obama wants taught to kindergartners on up.

And finally:

"I could rape every single one of you wingnuts with a confederate saber and it would be an act of no more moral weight or ramification than swatting a fly."

But you won't, dearie, for several reasons.

1) As a liberal, you can't touch a Confederate saber, because that would be racist and require you to join an Obama Party cult like the Weathermen that declares all whites are pigs and teaches you to hate yourself.

2) Since you have no familiarity with weapons or common sense, you'd grab the blade, rather than the hilt, and give yourself a nasty hand wound -- which, since you're already on welfare, means you'd be stuck for weeks trying to find a doctor that would take the piddling rates your Obama Party intends to pay them.

3) Having never lifted a finger, you're certainly well below being able to lift a saber -- which means you'd probably have to hire an illegal immigrant to do it for you, and set up the necessary Obama Party means of avoiding immigration law, payroll taxes, or minimum wage requirements.

4) There is an elementary school on the way to my house, which means you'd have to stop and spend several hours pleasuring yourself as you watched them play.

5) Closely related, there is a park nearby, which means you'd have to stop and repeat Number Four.

6) By the time you actually got anywhere near my house, thanks to Steps Four and Five, you'd be too tired to climb the hill -- which means, rather than raping me with a saber, you'd probably just settle for exposing yourself to a two-year-old and going home to demand your mommy cook you dinner -- twice.

[North Dallas Thirty]

Oh, and by the way, Axel, you've done me a service, though; you've pointed out that finger-wagging scold "Reagan" is a hypocrite.

For example, take "Reagan's" screed above:

"If this is what you pass off as intelligent discussion, it is no wonder the right is so rudely characterized in the mainstream media.

These redneck rants will convince or convert no one. Leave the bar-room bully crap at home and try to have an adult conversation."

And yet, not a word about your raping people, calling women "white trash", and so forth.

"Reagan" must be a sockpuppet of Conor Friedersdorf -- another person who is always ready to lecture conservatives about their language, but who seemingly has nothing to say about liberals.