Now they're pinning Obamacare's failures on the GOP?

There is a post by Debra Saunders, a columnist for the San Francisco Chronicle, on the Real Clear Politics website which I was happy to read, because it points out a lot of useful background on the Obamacare disaster. It was dated October 27, 2013, and titled “Lies the Dems Tell Themselves,” and I reproduce it here:

During the Obama years, a potent mythology has taken root in Democratic circles. In this narrative, Democrats are victims, martyrs even, whereas Republicans are wily tricksters.

Last year, there was a hyped-up fable about Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell. President Barack Obama told “60 Minutes,” “When I first came into office, the head of the Senate Republicans said, ‘My No. 1 priority is making sure President Obama's a one-term president.’” Sen. Dianne Feinstein even told the San Francisco Chronicle's editorial board she heard McConnell speaking to that effect on the Senate's opening day.

The thing is that the quote in question first appeared nearly two years later — in an October 2010 interview with the National Journal's Major Garrett.

The latest iteration of Democrats-on-the-cross works like this: Obamacare hasn't delivered the big savings promised by the president — $2,500 annually for the average family — because Democrats ditched the single-payer model to mollify Republicans. In the Los Angeles Times, Harvard professor Jane Mansbridge writes,

“The Democratic Party reluctantly adopted RomneyCare, a.k.a. Obamacare, to get Republican approval.” What's more, House Republicans “coerced the Democrats into adopting a Republican health insurance reform plan.”

A reader emails me, “The Republicans who hate Obama would not permit the creation of a decent single payer plan which would allow private insurance carriers to participate on a competitive uniform benefit program.” Another insists, “We wanted single payer! The GOP did not — that was the compromise, and it was one of many from this president.”

So, Democrats are now calling Obamacare a compromise, crafted to be acceptable to Republicans? As Saunders points out, this is a rather strange sort of a compromise:

Really? The Affordable Care Act did not win a single Republican vote on the House or Senate floor. If Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi abandoned single-payer to win GOP votes, they are the most incompetent negotiators in history.

Actually, it got one Rebublican vote in the House. But the basic thesis of Saunders here is correct. And certainly, there is clear evidence that the Democrats were not looking for compromise:

Former Sen. Olympia Snowe, R-Maine, voted for the Obama stimulus package and a measure to end “don't ask, don't tell.” In her book, “Fighting for Common Ground: How We Can Fix the Stalemate in Congress,” Snowe recalls how 40 House Republicans voted with 249 Democrats to expand the State Children's Health Insurance Program, only to watch Democrats unveil a stimulus package with no GOP input a week later.

There was little spirit of bipartisanship when Pelosi crowed: “Yes, we wrote the bill. Yes, we won the election.”

When Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., rolled out his draft legislation in 2009, he didn't have a single Republican at his side. When the Senate Finance Committee voted on two Democratic public-option proposals — to allow government plans to compete with private insurers — Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, denounced the public option as “a Trojan horse for a single-payer system.” Let it be noted that centrist Democrats joined Republicans to defeat both measures.

And where was President Obama in this process?

In “The Audacity of Hope,” Obama laid out a plan for universal coverage that allowed private carriers, such as Blue Cross and Aetna, to compete with new state pools. Still, he didn't stick his neck out to push for Democrats' public-option proposals.

In a 2003 speech, Obama, a second-term state senator, called himself “a proponent of a single-payer universal health care program.” PolitiFact, however, couldn't find a similar blank-check statement. The fact-checking organization observes that as Obama became a more well-known national figure, he spoke “favorably of single-payer in concept, but always (added) qualifiers.”

Snowe voted for the Democrats' health bill to get it out of committee, but it never won her support on the floor. You see, Snowe foresaw Obamacare's big problem. As she wrote (my italics), “not one single member in Congress — Republican or Democrat — could answer whether the newly created health insurance plans would be affordable, yet we hurtled headlong toward a final vote on a monumental bill affecting every American.”

Saunders continues, picking up other Democratic pleas for single-payer insurance (which, by the way, has immense problems in Canada, so it would be unconscionable to have it here!):

In a savvier Republicans-ruined-Obamacare argument, Washington Post wonk-blogger Ezra Klein contends that the Democratic part of Obamacare — Medicaid, which is single-payer — works. But: “The part of Obamacare that's troubled is the part Democrats lifted from Republican policymakers. It's the part that tries to integrate private insurance companies with government systems in order to create a universal insurance system that's subsidized by the state but run by private companies.”

Get it? If Obamacare fails, it's because Obamacare is a Republican plan.

In conclusion, Saunders points out:

Now, I won't deny that two decades ago, some conservative think tank swell came up with the term “individual mandate” — which allowed other wonks to try to pin the tail on the elephant. But if liberals have to fish for a 1989 Heritage Foundation policy paper that had no Republican support in 2008, 2009 or 2012 to establish Republican paternity for the Affordable Care Act, that tells you one thing: They think Obamacare won't work.

So when you find Democratic sources claiming “Obama is a centrist; he actually embraced a Republican plan,” perhaps they should read Saunders' column. It tells the real truth.

Israel's borders

President Obama is showing, once more, his pro-Arab bias. His administration is trying to push Israel to go back to its 1967 borders, giving up, for example, the Old City of Jerusalem, which is holy to Jews. And this only on the hope that it might get peace from the Arabs.

Our neighbor, Canada, makes a lot more sense. The Canadian prime minister, Stephen Harper, understands the situation. The Toronto Globe and Mail reports:

The Harper government is refusing to join the United States in calling for a return to 1967 borders as a starting point for Mideast peace, a position that has drawn sharp criticism from Canada’s staunch ally Israel.

At a briefing ahead of the upcoming G8 summit in France, federal officials said the basis for the negotiations must be mutually agreed upon.

It's a fine kettle of fish when the U. S., usually Israel's staunchest ally, takes a position that, compared to Canada's, is hostile. But what can be expected of a man named "Barack Hussein Obama"?

Am I a Neoconservative?

There used to be only a few labels for different kinds of politics: ones like "conservative," "liberal," and "socialist." But in recent years,they've gotten split up into various subdivisions, like "paleoconservative" and "neoconservative." And I must admit I do not really understand all these subdivisions. The term "neoconservative" has often been used to describe such people as Charles Krauthammer, with whom I frequently agree, so I've often wondered whether I am one. And a day or two ago I was reading a posting on FrumForum, one of the blogs I generally like, called "Barbara Kay to Frum: Come Back to Canada," in which one of the commenters on the post used the same "neoconservative" label to refer to David Frum. In his comment, the person posting it defines what he means by a "neoconservative." Let me quote the commenter precisely:

He’s a neo-conservative, which means, in brief:


1.) foreign adventurism and an essentially unlimited defense budget in the name of “ending evil” or some such grand design;

2.) dramatic increases in government welfare spending, far beyond what even the Clinton and Carter Democratic administrations spent;

3.) an acceptance of European views on climate and energy policy, which is to say, a belief in making energy use far more expensive;

4.) outright liberal social positions on gay marriage, abortion, or any other matter of concern to social conservatives;

5.) a disdain for anything remotely resembling constitutionally limited federal government, a profound ignorance and disdain about the meaning and importance of federalism, and, for that matter, a disdain for even referencing the Constitution in public debate;

6.) a belief that allegedly intelligent “planners” in Washington DC (presumably, especially Mr. Frum) have the mental wherewithal to comprehend how 1/3 of a billion Americans should organize their economic and social arrangements.

Well, if this is what a neoconservative is, I certainly accept part of neoconservative doctrine. Points 1 and 4, especially.

What the poster calls "foreign adventurism" I would rather call protecting us before the enemy hits us at home. We need to recognize that the world does not love us, and although Moscow no longer is a major threat, there remain others who will be. We stayed out of World War II till we were attacked directly on Hawaiian soil at Pearl Harbor; would it not have been better for us to enter before we had that attack?

As to "matter[s] of concern to social conservatives," I must say that "social conservatives," in my belief, are just moralistic bigots who have no business trying to impose their standards on the rest of us. As I state in the header to this blog, I believe that "No person has a right to have his own beliefs on religious, moral, political, or other controversial issues imposed on others who do not share those beliefs." And it is exactly this sort of imposition which "social conservatives" advocate.

The other four points are a different story. But I'm not sure that Frum (or Krauthammer) really holds the views that the commenter charges them with; I certainly do not. So what really is a "neoconservative"? And am I one? That's the problem with labels.

How great is the Canadian style health plan?

Obviously, not very. I just read today that Belinda Stronach came to the United States for medical treatment. (many sources; here is one: http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/20070914/belinda_Stronach_070914/20070914?hub=Canada ) Now you may ask, who is Belinda Stronach? She's a Canadian member of Parliament and former Cabinet member. And she came to the US because the medical care is better!

People who say we ought to emulate the Canadian "single payer" plan want us to imitate a system that is so bad that top government officials admit we have better medical care than they do? Really!