Feingold: Thank Obama For The #Publicoptionfail

I truly believe Rahm Emanuel is a cancer on the Obama White House, and unless Obama gets rid of him, his presidency is going to be very, very mediocre.

Watch Bill Moyer's show this past week. It tells you all you need to know about this White Houses' incestuous relationships with corporate special interests .

http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/12182009/profile.html

He might carry more weight if he's spoke up sooner! This is the same man who held CZAR hearings. Sorry Russ, but you are just as responsible as Obama is. Maybe even more. After all, it's the House and Senate that hasn't got their act together. They knew Obama campaigned for the public option but, did nothing to stop Lieberman, Nelson, Lincoln and Landrieu. Tell me Russ, do these clowns share the blame or are they totally to blame? And what stand did you take? Did you threaten not to vote for the bill without the public option? After all, the President doesn't write legislation. You do! He signs it into law. Do us a favor Russ and save your tough talk for the people sitting at the table on your side of the aisle! The rest is just bluster!

Where were you last month, Russ? Bernie?

Exactly! I love Bernie but, I was actually embarrassed watching him trying to put this bill in a good light. It's a bad bill and Bernie, Rockefeller, who I also love, along with Harkin, and even Weiner all failed in their attempts to spin this bill. Hopefully they can fix it and stick to their guns. Let these trolls on either side filibuster. Just how long will the people of this country put up with that nonsense before calling for all their head. We could start with states that already have recall laws! They'd better fix this or they're dead!

if feingold thinks any amount of pressure from the white house was going to stop lieberman from being a dick, or landrieu/nelson/lincoln from being republicans, he's naive, and i know he's not naive. he's just frustrated ... this is a tantrum.

my 6 year old does the same thing when he slams his finger in the door -- he blames the door.

Don't let the good be the enemy of garbage.

Northwestern Mutual and many large insurance companies are based in Wisconsin. Feingold is a insurance company house slave like so many others. The democratic party deserves losses that will follow the passage of this most ridiculous insurance company give away.

The current democratic party is a fucking fraud and a bunch of Uncle Toms for wealth. At least the repubs do not pretend otherwise.

I predict a major revolt when the government starts trying to force people to pay insurance comapnies. Blodd will flow rest assured, figuratively speaking at a minimum of course.

The Dems will get crushed if this bill passes and they don't make changes because we'll start getting taxed next year while not seeing any of the benefits until it begins in 2014. Obama could be gone by then and the Republicans have already said they'd repeal the law. Let's just see how hard Progressives fight for and win changes. If they don't, I won't go out and vote for them!

Of course the buck stops with the President but I just can't imagine Lieberman supporting the public option NO MATTER what Obama did. Lieberman just wants to give a big fat FUCK YOU to the Democratic party and would have been very glad to join the Republican filibuster in blocking health care reform.

Lieberman thanks Feingold for shifting the blame. Wooh! Now the two of them can hold more Czar Hearings.

Feingold has made it very clear for a long time that he doesn't like the President.

I believe the WH wanted Reid to go for the trigger PO and get Snowe - so we could have told Lieberman to take a hike. Snowe would have provided cover for Lincoln, Landrieu and Nelson. Instead we had to deal with Lieberman.

But, of course, it isn't Lieberman's fault. It's President Obama's.

You know, Russ, if the f#$king Senate had 60 votes for it, then it would be in there.

All this year I've been hearing how Obama was playing chess not checkers. He was ten moves ahead, blah blah blah, now all of the sudden he is totally impotent, there was nothing he could. Rahm was the guy who used profanity and got stuff done in the House, he was the hard ass arm twister. But the Public Option beat him; it was too difficult even for Rahm and his F-Bomb.

So all this was either Bullshit or these two really didn't want a public option. I think it’s the later.

Honestly, I thought that it was obvious that these guys didn't really want the public option and didn't work too hard to get it, so I am a little surprised at all the anger directed a Mr. Feingold for pointing out the obvious.

The cons are angry.

The libs are angry.

Looks like the President Clinton era.

Well, he will get health care passed and this is how the dems govern.

"In August 1994, Democratic Senate Majority Leader George J. Mitchell introduced a compromise proposal that would have delayed requirements of employers until 2002, and exempted small businesses. However, "even with Mitchell’s bill, there were not enough Democratic Senators behind a single proposal to pass a bill, let alone stop a filibuster."

A few weeks later, Mitchell announced that his compromise plan was dead, and that health care reform would have to wait at least until the next Congress."

This is the next Congress that does have the votes.

This is how the dems will govern. The only power the libs have is a vote and President Clinton still was reelected.

History repeating itself again.

I've been fighting all year for a strong public option to compete with the insurance industry and bring health care spending down. I continued that fight during recent negotiations

Did he? He was awfully quiet about it. I heard Tom Harkin, Chris Dodd, Al Franken, Chuck Schumer, Bernie Sanders, Sheldon Whithouse, Sherrod Brown and even Arlen Specter fight for it. My damn near Blue Dog Senators at least spoke up about it. I didn't anything from Russ until it was too late and it was time point fingers. Which strikes me as pretty typical from this prima donna.

Shut up, Russ. You are a giant, Democrat-bashing phony. All we've heard from you for six months was a freaking 'czars' hearing. Go rub McCain's gnarled feet.

Weeferdog

** BS **

Feingold couldn't even keep his own caucaus from voting against cloture with the public option. Seems awfully child-like to point the finger at the president when you can't even convince your own fellow caucaus members to vote for it.

Obama stepped in to do what he could do to move it to an up or vote before the whole thing collapsed.

I’m usually in agreement with Senator Feingold and I share his deep disappointment with the lack of a public option in the plan the Senate just passed (hell, I’m disappointed they didn’t pass single payer!), but he is talking out of his senatorial backside when he tries to lay the blame at Obama’s feet. There were never 60 votes in play for a public option. Not a single one of the 59 Republicans was ever going to vote for anything but to block reform and there was no way Lieberman (R – Hartford), whose wife is a lobbyist for the insurance industry was going to vote for anything that would increase competition and decrease profits for the insurance companies.

The things for which Obama and the Dems need to be blamed isn’t lack of support for a doomed measure, but the fact that they didn’t first attack the peculiarities of Senate rules that allowed a minority to kill it.

The filibuster needs to be abolished or significantly reformed as proposed by Tom Harkin. The Republicans were willing to “go nuclear” if they weren’t allowed an up or down vote on judicial nominations. The Dems are so spineless that they won’t do the same to save 45,000 lives per year – (that’s fifteen 9/11’s to Rudy Giulianni). The public option is supported by a strong majority of the American people, a Nobel laureate president elected in a landslide 13 months ago, and a majority of the Senate, but was never seriously in play due to the abuse of arcane Senate rules. Until filibuster reform is enacted, no part of the progressive agenda stands a serious chance of passage.

Second, Congress needs to adopt ethics reforms that provide for the recusal of members who face conflicts of interest. No federal or state judge would be allowed to preside over a case if the judges wife were a paid lobbyist for one of the parties to the case, yet Joe Lieberman was able to kill the public option?

Serious structural reform needs to precede efforts to add things like the public option and revocation of the insurance anti-trust exemption.

Tsk, tsk, if only Russ Feingold were president! I'm SURE he would have been able to make Lieberman, Lincoln, Landrieu, and Nelson (et al.) support the public option. Hell, he'd have made them support sngle payer! Yes, the only reason we don't have single payer OR the public option is because *Obama* didn't want it badly enough! Or try hard enough! I mean, every other president who has tried to push health care reform has gotten exactly what he wanted, right? Right?

Oh.

Jesus, people. Feingold is just posturing for the benefit of his base, same as everyone else.