Ah yes, the "anything is better than nothing" argument. Glad we are reaching for the stars.

As for this kind of bullshit:
"The 2004 presidential campaign that propelled Dean to national prominence was fueled predominantly by "wine track" Democratic activists-generally college-educated white liberals"

Who do you think propelled Barack Obama to national prominence? Using that as an early-essay indictment is childish.

But: The $200 billion tagged to spend annually IS not chicken feed and will certainly do some good. BUT with many of the provisions chopped out of the bill that money will go not go anywhere near as far as insurers will eat it up in increased premiums for those poorer consumers (often b/c of more health problems). Without a public option to keep insurers honest, all that spending will have its knees chopped out.

Dean isn't even a voter on this. But he is one of the only Dem voices (beside, now, Sanders) at least threatening to pull the bill as it gets hacked more and more to death. You're going to hate on him because he wants to IMPROVE a bill? What does that say about the Democrats? This victory of low expectations shit, where Franken gets applause for cutting a guy off, is EXACTLY what plagues the left.

Then show some stones and say that. OR, you know, FORCE A VOTE for christsake. Sure, stomping on leiberman now is fun... but a little late, no?

You can't force a vote when Lieberman is dangling his filibuster. That's what this whole thing is about. Jeez!

Actually you can, but that would mean making Lieberman really filibuster the bill and not just threaten to. Unfortunately Harry Reid hasn't got the balls to make him put his money (or Aetna's) where his mouth is.

Yes, we can all agree that forcing a vote would accomplish a lot. Give me a fucking break. Talk about grandstanding.

@London: Exactly.

Yes, exactly, let's pretend to force a vote, knowing there won't be a vote. Good thinking.

Nic: Then why do you want Leiberman to shut his face and "move this thing along?" Move what along? Leiberman is "this thing" right now so if that's your angle it's better to appease him or at least not try to piss him off in petty ways.

Actually I'd rather throw my hat in with Olympia Snowe at this point. Forget Lieberman. And he won't be much help on the other issues down the road either. He is a petulant child.

No. Not at all. Dean's a centrist. The risk is, granted not huge, but significant if he ever runs for office again and wants the support of any of the entrenched senate/Dem party.

Actually I think it was pretty much all children under 18 and pregnant mothers, close to all.

Well, his state was different tan all the US so it's hard to translate his results. And I'm not sold on his being a great president. He'd be the white Obama; bogged down by the realities of washington once he got there (read: failure). BUT he did have passion, and he got skewered for that as if it was a liability. Shameful.

I see where you're coming from.

In what ways different? Genuinely curious.

Well, size for starters.

It's all in how you use it.

Yes Flossy, clearly I am advocating to screw those people.

Never be health care reform? That's exactly the kind of sentiment used to both water it down and sell it. But, look, I agree that this "reform" would be incrementally better than what we have now (though in the long term, who knows). But the idea that speaking out against it is somehow anti-reform is preposterous. And the Dems who are standing up saying this represents real reform are sell-outs. And the president who supported the public option while running for president and stayed quiet is a weasel. Calling this bill "reform" (and this whole attempt) is a joke that history will judge as a truly low moment.

Well, never's a long time, but you're not going to kill it and then start over any time soon and hope for a better result. I don't think speaking out is anti-reform. At the very least you want people speaking out from the left (or whatever you want to call it) for political reasons, and that's not to mention speaking out becuase of real live genuine beliefs. But I also don't think getting what you can and going with it is automatically selling out or being a weasel;to me it's another completely legitimate way of looking at the political process--and one that others are, of course, free to disagree with.

Yeah but tragedy here is that healthcare should be a civil rights issue. Instead it's been accepted to be, even by the left, an economics issue in which compromise and "the best we can get" are acceptable.

What kneetoe said. Criticizing the bill to improve it isn't anti-reform; calling for it to be killed explicitly is, obviously. Every major social program since social security has been built on and improved after it was passed. This will be too. And these bills aren't just this year's opportunity for health care reform, they're this generation's opportunity. I will not review the history of every health care reform attempt since the 1930s here, but the trend is, uh, clear. But this is the opportunity to begin a process. See: everything Ezra Klein's written in the past month, but for example, this: http://voices.washingtonpost.com/ezra-klein/2009/12/the_case_for_moving_forward.html

And let's not be naive about the political consequences for Obama's domestic policy agenda more broadly if this fails.