Tag: Rahm Emanuel

Feb 28 2010

On Assigning Blame, Or, “So, You Think I’m Retarded?”

LANGUAGE WARNING: Today’s story is uncharacteristically blunt, and from this moment forward we will be using lots of inappropriate language in making our points.

Gentle Reader, you have been officially…warned.

With that in mind, if you take offense when confronted with language strong enough to knock a fuckin’ buzzard off a shitwagon, please stop reading now.

It is by now fairly well known that Rahm Emanuel, President Obama’s White House Chief of Staff, had a bit of a blow-up with liberals who were ready to start running ads against “blue dog” Democrats who were working very hard to shut down the health care reform effort.

Now we’re not gonna get in the middle of that argument today; instead, since we’re finally getting a chance to talk, I figured me and Rahm could get a few other things out of the way that have been on everyone’s mind for the past year or so.

Feb 21 2010

Rahm Emanuel’s DoJ skull-fucks torture victims.

“Emanuel worried that such investigations would alienate the intelligence community…,” Mayer reported. “Emanuel couldn’t complain directly to Holder without violating strictures against political interference in prosecutorial decisions. But he conveyed his unhappiness to Holder indirectly, two sources said. Emanuel demanded, ‘Didn’t he get the memo that we’re not re-litigating the past?'”

“Bring me their skulls!” thundered the Office of Professional Responsibility.  “We have stripped from them all human dignity and autonomy, we have branded them with an absolute sense of self-alienating vulnerability to the agonizing sovereignty of their inscrutable, perverted, and god-like tormentors, we have blocked all avenues of justice, we have forever sealed their grievances in their tormented souls, and now we must fuck their skulls.”

Jan 30 2010

Conspiracy Theory

What digby said–

The most generous reading I can give is that he’s trying to derail any efforts to pass a public option or medicare buy-in through reconciliation and ensure that none of the deals he struck will be harmed in the process.

Which leads me to ask if they still don’t ask the right question: did Rahm ever want to pass real health care reform? And if he did, can there be any excuse for his having mangled the legislative strategy so badly?

From the absurd strategy to try to call health care reform “deficit reduction”, to backroom deals after the president ran explicitly on transparency, to allowing the hostage taking by the Gang of Six for months to a dozen other inexplicable tactics — it all makes the most sense if you already assume that he wasn’t fully committed to its passage.

Maybe not. I’m not one to mythologize single actors, and I do believe that the buck always stops with the president. But either Rahm is a brilliant legislative strategist, in which case he didn’t bother to use his great powers to pass health care reform for reasons we can only speculate about, given the stakes — or his reputation for brilliance is extremely overrated. But Rahm’s culpability, whether intentional or not, has long been obvious and there’s nothing surprising in these recent statements.

Jan 29 2010

Obama’s SOTU Rhetoric .vs. Governing

Obama sure looked good last night.

He was poised, articulate, even more forceful than aloof at various times.  He sure seemed like he really cared. I certaintly wouldn’t mind getting the chance to talk with him. He seems like such a well intentioned guy.

The only problem is Obama outright lied in several places, and his wonderful rhetoric is in great conflict with his actual governing decisions and priorities. For example:

1. Obama assured us again that he was “Ending the Iraq War”.  First he said that he would have all our “combat” troops out by August.  Then a few sentences later he claimed that “all our troops” (unqualified) would be out of Iraq. But the reality is that this is the man who brought back George W. Bush’s outgoing War Secretary, Robert Gates (CIA-IRAN-CONTRA crook) to run his War Policies. Gates and Obama and Hillary Clinton (also a WarHawk) are all in agreement that at least 50,000 troops will remain permanently in Iraq, and of course, the 17 unwelcome U.S. Military Bases will also be there permanently.  The private contractors Halliburton and Blackwater (which operates under another name now), will all continue to remain as well.  Obama’s claim to end the Iraq War in August 2010 has about as much validity as his claim to end Guantanimo within 1 year. The crooked Oil Contracts, the Corporations, the Military Bases, the huge multi-hundred million dollar U.S. Embassy, and at least 50,000 troops to protect all of that — ain’t going nowhere.  

Whether the people that are stuck there are classified as being “combat” troops or not, is hardly relevant. The War and the Foreign Occupation has not ended, is not ending, and will not end. The vow to end the Iraq War is another empty promise from President Obama, and until and unless he stops listening and empowering the likes of Robert Gates – no meaningful change to this corrupt War policy will truthfully occur.  We have over 1.5 million dead Iraqis, over 2 million Iraqi refugees, over 5,500 dead Americans, over 75,000 wounded or disabled Americans, and have wasted of some 3-Trillion of the taxpayers dollars.  Clearly our Foreign Policy does far more damage to our own Country (as well as to the World) then anything any terrorist could ever dream up.  Obama’s patty-cake policy on confronting the tragedy of the U.S. Iraq intervention is sadly insufficient.  

Moreover, he is expanding our excessive American Militarism and violence to the far corners of the Earth even more by tripling the troop exposure in Afghanistan, starting War with Pakistan, killing civilians with cowardly CIA-run, unmanned Drones equiped with Hellfire bombs, threatening Iran, Yemen, and Venezuela (via Columbia). He has embraced the illegitmate Bush-era policies of detaining people with no charges, and no rights. And he has kept torture sites such as Bagram, Gitmo, and Abu Grahib open for business, while additionally directly outsourcing human torture through the disgraceful secret program of CIA renditions to Foreign prisons.  And let us never forget that the Obama Military budget far exceeds any of the Miltary budgets submitted under Bush & Cheney.  While the words sounded good, the governing remains a shameful tragedy, and a bankrupt wasteland of corruption and unnecessary human carnage, and bloodshed.

2. Obama also spoke about the plight of the middle-class and winning their trust.  He said: “To close that credibility gap we must take action on both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue to end the outsized influence of lobbyists; to do our work openly; and to give our people the government they deserve.”  It is hard to take him seriously however when his administration has empowered and promoted the very special interests that were responsible for the Financial meltdown, such as Timothy Giethner, Lawerence Summers, Ben Bernanke, and unabashed GOP-Lite Corporatists like Rahm Emanuel. If Obama wants to help the middle-class, why are the crooked Banking/WallStreet elites hand chosen by him to run his policies? Why does he want to give the Federal Reserve even more power, instead of audit them?

Jan 21 2010

Caption This: (Wednesday Edition)

Dec 30 2009

Dennis Kucinich Will Investigate Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac

Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D OH-10), Chairman of the Domestic Policy Subcommittee of the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, is calling for an investigation of lifting of the $400 billion cap by the Treasury Department and possible corruption.

This is Rep. Kucinich’s statement:

As Chairman of the Domestic Policy Subcommittee of the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, I’m announcing that the Subcommittee will launch an investigation into the Treasury Department’s recent decision to lift the current $400-billion cap on combined federal assistance to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, opening the way for additional, unlimited funds through the end of 2012. This investigation will include the role played by Fannie Mae chief executive Michael J. Williams and Freddie Mac chief executive Charles E. Haldeman in the decision, if any, and will seek to ensure that the additional assistance is used for homeowners and not Wall Street.

Many questions remain unanswered regarding this move by the Treasury. Why suddenly remove the cap? Indications are that Freddie and Fannie, even as millions of Americans lose their homes, have used just $111 billion of the $400 billion previously available to them. Is lifting the cap on assistance a back-door TARP?

Additionally, I want to determine whether Fannie and Freddie have a cohesive plan to buy up the under-performing mortgages that remain on the books of the big banks, at appropriate prices, and undertake a massive reworking of the terms of the mortgages so as to stem the foreclosure crisis that continues to plague our country.This new authority must be used responsibly and for the benefit of American families. This cannot be used simply to purchase toxic assets at inflated prices, thus transferring the losses to the U. S. taxpayers and acting as a back-door TARP.

As a result of a curiously-timed Christmas Eve announcement by the Treasury Department, the mortgage giants will have access to unlimited funds without having to come back to Congress. Since the federal government is the majority owner of both companies, their operations will remain under Administration control.

This relationship between Treasury and Fannie and Freddie bears inspection, particularly in the wake of reports that the mortgage giants’ chief executives will now receive $900,000 each in annual compensation, bonuses of up to $6 million each, and an additional $42 million in special compensation will be spread among a dozen other executives.

Dec 20 2009

Are liberals useless? A further meditation on Chris Hedges’ piece

I know, this Chris Hedges piece came out nearly two weeks ago.  This is a further exploration of the “liberals are useless” meme in political conversation.  Here I will suggest that liberals, progressives, etc. may be useless, but they can’t be dismissed outright.  Thus we need the building blocks of a more proactive stance.

(Crossposted at Orange)

Dec 18 2009

Obama No Longer Fooling The Left

We have now reached a point where there is beginning to boil over a lot of open criticism and disappointment finally from the “mainstream”  left over the performance of Barack Obama, and his leadership skills.

Instead of just a few grumblings, made over hushed tones, immediately followed by pronouncements about how it’s only been just 3 months…5 months…8 months… etc., people are now coming to the full realization, even on DailyKos now, that Obama is not going to govern in a manner that brings about any substantial change whatsoever.

Yet many commentators from Ed Schultz, to Michael Moore, to Arianna Huffington, to Markos, to Keith Olbermann etc. generally see the problem as one of being — that Obama is just too unengaged, or not forceful enough, or not providing strong enough leadership. The idea put forth here is that Obama really wants to do the right thing, but he is just a poor negotiator, or isn’t standing up enough, or too happy to compromise away his real “dearly held” beliefs.

But I disagree with this second part of the analysis. I have seen enough now to come to the conclusion that Obama is really executing the agenda that he wants, and advancing the agenda that he and his friends want. He just fooled a whole lot of people during the Primaries with his (deceptive) lofty rhetoric, deliberately left unspecific, and charming speeches and charisma.  

The problem with Obama, however, is not one of ommission, but one of commission. Recall that just as George W. Bush ran in 1999-2000 as a “compassionate” conservative with no critera at all about what that really meant for the middle-class ( a Dick Cheney Presidency-??). Well, Barack Obama ran his campaign very similarily as “Martin Luther Obama” come to save the little people – with no policy program ever put forward for doing any such thing – and an ever accumlating track record for totally backtracking on the few progressive ideas casually tossed about (then later retracted) throughout his campaign. Things like….suddenly being anti-NAFTA during the critical Wisconsin Primary (which he won), only to immediately reverse himself (and align himself with the pro-NAFTA agenda) once that State had voted for him.

But what we continually see is that Obama has no problem whatsoever with twisting arms, pressuring the Senate, asserting his own will, etc. when he wants them to vote against the reimportation of cheaper, generic Drugs (to prevent seniors from saving enormous amounts of money). He has no problem with villifying Howard Dean right out in the open, or outright intimidating progressive Congressman like Pete DeFazio with the open threat “Don’t think we’re not keeping score, brother“, when he disagreed with Obama’s new Military escalations.  And he has no problem with protecting, and even praising the agenda of Joe Lieberman.

Dec 17 2009

A Realistic View of the Health Care Blowup

In two separate entries, here and here, Chris Bowers discussed what he feels are the likely consequences if the nightmare bill now in the Senate doesn’t pass.  He’s assumed the worst-case scenarios in every one of them, it seems, and is using them as an excuse to say we shouldn’t kill the health care reform bill in the Senate.

This to me is an utterly defeatist attitude to take.  We shouldn’t fight this because Rahm will run right-wing primary opponents against our people, something he’s already been doing for years and will do no matter what, and that’s why we should give up now?  With all due respect to Mr. Bowers, this is neither realistic or helpful.  I don’t think the people who are telling us we need to pass this bill realize what the public really thinks about health care reform or the likelihood that we will end up with something that will force us to buy unaffordable junk insurance under penalty of increased taxation we can’t afford to pay — all without doing a thing to bring down costs.

I think we have the Democrats by the gonads here, but how many of us really know it?  Every single member of the House is up for reelection next year, as is a third of the Senate.  Why can we not call them up and threaten to withdraw all support — money, votes, and campaign volunteers — if they don’t kill this bill and pass something acceptable, and then follow through on it?

We need leaders in the progressive movement, but we don’t seem to have any.  Not here, not at Kos, not at any of the other blogs, and certainly not in Congress (with the exception of Dennis Kucinich, but most people — even folk on the nominal left — treat him like a clown).  This too is unacceptable.  If we don’t fight this monstrosity now, what will we fight for?  The realistic scenarios are thus:

1.) Progressives roll over and the bill passes.  Rahm Emanuel runs right-wing candidates against progressives in next year’s primaries anyway.  We lose more ground because we’re not fighting and playing hardball, and the public doesn’t support politicians who don’t fight on its behalf.  Worse, there will be no fixing the law later, because Dems will probably be out of power for a good long time after next year and even if they keep it, the excuse will be that they’ve already done reform, so why bother going through another year of hell trying to pass a fix?

2.) The bill passes, but progressives are seen fighting it with everything they have to the bitter end.  The conservative Dems lose their seats, most progressives keep theirs, and therefore have a chance of increasing their numbers going into 2012.

3.) The bill fails, we get to start over from scratch.  This is not the nightmare scenario some people seem to think it is.  As early as February, polls were showing a majority of Americans in favor of single-payer health insurance (Source).  As recently as July, Kaiser polling was showing 58% support (Source), and if you go state by state, you’ll find that support is high (like in Pennsylvania).  Finally, pnhp.org has posted a six-part series showing that 2/3 of Americans really do support single payer or a public plan closer to it.*  So the chances of voters punishing Democrats for failing to pass a massive bailout of the insurance industry are actually quite low.  Chances are, however, quite high for retribution at the ballot box next year if Dems pass the monster as-is.  We have nothing to lose by killing the bill, and a lot to gain.

There really is nothing to be gained by giving in on the health care reform battle.  This close to an election year in which the public is good and angry, and we’re not going to seize the opportunity to force the conservative wing of the party to blink and do as we say?  If we fail to do this, then we really do deserve to be out of power.

So here’s the House Phone Directory and that of the Senate.  Call them up and demand that the insurance bailout dies a horrible flaming screaming death, and passage of something good, or else no money or votes next year.  Not one penny, not one ballot, goes to any Democrat who votes in favor of passing the bill.  We can do this.  We just need the will.

*: Here are the links to the series on single payer support.

http://pnhp.org/blog/2009/12/0…

http://pnhp.org/blog/2009/12/0…

http://pnhp.org/blog/2009/12/0…

http://pnhp.org/blog/2009/12/1…

http://pnhp.org/blog/2009/12/1…

http://pnhp.org/blog/2009/12/1…

Dec 16 2009

20% of your labor belongs to Aetna

Health Care on the Road to Neo-Feudalism

By: emptywheel Tuesday December 15, 2009 8:53 pm

Consider, first of all, this fact. The bill, if it became law, would legally require a portion of Americans to pay more than 20% of the fruits of their labor to a private corporation in exchange for 70% of their health care costs.

…

It’s one thing to require a citizen to pay taxes-to pay into the commons. It’s another thing to require taxpayers to pay a private corporation, and to have up to 25% of that go to paying for luxuries like private jets and gyms for the company CEOs.

…

They will, at a minimum, be asked to pay 9.8% of their income to the insurance company. And if they have a significant medical event, they’ll pay 22%…

…

But for those who think we can fix it, consider this, too. If the Senate bill passes, in its current form, it will mean that the health care industry was able to dictate-through their Senators Joe Lieberman and Ben Nelson-what they wanted the US Congress to do. They will have succeeded in dictating the precise terms of legislation.

…

When this passes, it will become clear that Congress is no longer the sovereign of this nation. Rather, the corporations dictating the laws will be.

I understand the temptation to offer 30 million people health care. What I don’t understand is the nonchalance with which we’re about to fundamentally shift the relationships of governance in doing so.

We’ve seen our Constitution and means of government under attack in the last 8 years. This does so in a different-but every bit as significant way. We don’t mandate tithing corporations in this country-at least not yet. And it troubles me that so many Democrats are rushing to do so, without considering the logical consequences.

Dec 15 2009

Health Care Debacle

There is a lot of blame to go around over the Health Care debacle. A lot of people (DailyKos) are focusing their anger on just Joe Lieberman or Harry Reid.

Harry Reid tried at least to put in some token amount of reform, but then he knuckled under the pressure — not so much from Joe Lieberman — but from Rahm Emaneul and Obama.

You see, Leiberman knows that he can just walk the thing backwards all day long, because Obama and Rahm Emanuel will never arm twist or pressure him — just as they never pressured the Drug and Insurance Companies themselves.  They will always gut the reform part out of the bill, and instead conspire to please whatever corrupt demands that Lieberman and the GOP make of them.

It is time to understand that Obama is just a theater President.  He likes to create the illusion that he is on the side of the people, but he has really done nothing but place pro-WallStreet, pro-Bankster, pro-Corporatist, pro-NAFTA, pro-War, Pro-Drone, and pro-Bush-NEOCON apologists into the key positions of real control and power to ensure that their crooked agenda always carries the day.

Obama thinks nothing of going to the progressive wing and telling them all “you have to get in line now” and making that demand on them (and the House will now cave-in and vote for this charade just for Obama’s sake).  But would Obama ever in a million years ever go to Joe Lieberman and tell him “Joe, you have to get in line“?

Of course not.

This tells you everything you need to know about Obama, and the Obama Presidency.

Dec 15 2009

Thanks for nothing.

Darcy Burner: The Senate bill is a recipe for national disaster. If it’s that bill or nothing, I prefer nothing.

by Joe Sudbay (DC) on 12/15/2009 08:10:00 AM

The fundamental failing of the newest Senate proposal is that it requires individuals to purchase health insurance, but does nothing to rein in what insurance companies charge. There is nothing to stop spiraling health costs from eating up an ever-increasing percentage of our national productivity.

Democratic leaders are going to have to explain how forcing a mandate on people to buy private health insurance, without controlling the insurance industry, makes sense. That concept might appeal to Joe Lieberman, but it doesn’t sit well with everyone else.

The fire this time

By: TBogg Monday December 14, 2009 10:28 pm

If Rahm Emmanuel is all he was supposed to be, we can safely assume that the Obama White House either never gave a shit about health care reform, or they managed health care reform so horrifically and incompetently that they are now willing to settle for a “win”, no matter how meager.

I hope they enjoy their Pyrrhic victory because they just burned the base.

Where We’re At On The Lieberman Health Care Industry Profit Protection Act Of 2009

By: David Dayen Tuesday December 15, 2009 5:00 am

Another major addition in the mystery “deal” on the public option, the extension of the medical loss ratio to 90% (meaning that insurance companies would have to spend at least 90% of premiums on medical care), took a major hit from the CBO, and an ideological one at that. Doug Elmendorf basically said that such a medical loss ratio would make the private insurance industry into a government entity, “so that all payments related to health insurance policies should be recorded as cash flows in the federal budget.” This would make the health care bill cost several trillion dollars in CBO’s eyes despite the fact that nothing would have materially changed, and so this arbitrary decision basically killed the medical loss ratio, at least at 90% (it’s unclear what the magic MLR number is that turns the private insurance market into a government entity; Elmendorf didn’t explain it, just saying that it was somewhere between 85% and 90%).

One question for those who argued that liberals could easily bargain away the public option for something really valuable and good – how does “nothing” sound to you?

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