Making Nothing out of Something – or – Snatching Defeat out of the Jaws of Victory

Leading LIke a Democrat

Once again the Democrats have shown that when put in charge of the legislative and executive branches of government – with a clear mandate from the people for change – they are incapable of leading.

The so-called health care reform bill getting ready to limp across the legislative finish line is a prime example of the Democrats inability to stand up for their core values. Stripped of all real reform, this bill represents another stunning defeat for the American people and the last chance to address this burning issue for at least another generation.

While the Democrats negotiated and gave away, piece by piece, any true reform that was in the bill, trying to reach the elusive and phony target of a filibuster proof majority, they consistently ignored the wishes of a majority of Americans. Instead, due to their fear of a filibuster, the Democratic leadership elevated one man – Sen. Joe Lieberman from Connecticut – to the position of decision maker dictating what would be in the final version of the bill. Reveling in the national spotlight, Senator Lieberman served his true constituency, not the people of Connecticut that elected him nor the people of the United States that want true health care reform but the insurance industry, his true employer of record.

While serving in the US Senate, Mr. Lieberman has taken in an astonishing $2.5 million in campaign contributions from the health care industry, including health insurance companies, pharmaceuticals, hospitals and nursing homes. All poised to continue record profits and ever-bigger bonuses for the executives if a watered-down health reform bill passes with no public option. But, being the family man that he is, Joe Lieberman’s wife was also on the payroll of these very same companies. As a paid lobbyist (now there s something truly perverse about an electoral system that allows spouses of legislators to be paid lobbyists for companies that depend upon legislative initiatives and regulations) working for a company that raked in millions in fees from companies such as Glaxco Smith Kline, Sankyo Pharmaceuticals and Pfizer, Ms. Lieberman was representing those very companies that are opposed to health care reform.

So now we have Democrats and the president supporting a bill that barely chips away at the edges of needed health care reform. Gone from the bill is a public option, even though this is supported by a majority of Americans. Also excised from the bill as Democrats ran to avoid any real debate is a Medicare buy-in for people over 55 who do not have health insurance and end of life counseling. However, the democrats in the House did manage to include a clause restricting access to abortion. So not only do the Democrats manage, as only they can, to celebrate a watered down health care bill that does little that is needed, but they allowed and then endorsed the insertion of the abortion restriction.

Where is the change? Where is the hope? Where are the Democrats?