This agreement does not resolve the important differences that still remain.
via Over (For Now) | Talking Points Memo.

13 rural airports will lose funding.

Like 2009′s removal of the HIV ban, which was as painstakingly slow but thereby much more entrenched, this process took time. Without the Pentagon study, it wouldn’t have passed. Without Obama keeping Lieberman inside the tent, it wouldn’t have passed. Without the critical relationship between Bob Gates and Obama, it wouldn’t have passed. It worked our last nerve; we faced at one point a true nightmare of nothing … for years. And then we pulled behind this president, making it his victory and the country’s victory, as well as ours

via Obama’s Long Game: 65 – 31 – The Daily Dish | By Andrew Sullivan.

Obama as the Commander in Chief deserves props for setting the administrative and political course for repeal, Secretary of Defense Gates deserves props for dutifully executing the military review of the policy and advocating for the permanence and political weight of repeal through legislation and Lieberman deserves props as the whip for the bill.

Sullivan left out a few folks. Sullivan wasn’t too hype on Nevadans re-electing Reid in September 2010 when the DADT Repeal combined with DREAM Act bill failed in the senate.

If I lived in Arizona Nevada and had the vote, even though Sharron Angle is beyond nuts, I’d vote for her. Better nuts than this disgusting, cynical, partisan Washington kabuki dance, when people’s lives and dignity are at stake.

via Petty Politics While Gay Troops Fight On, Ctd – The Daily Dish | By Andrew Sullivan.

And in October 2010:

I was arguing last night with someone about Harry Reid. Sharron Angle is a nutcase, obviously. But if I were a Nevadan and had the vote (nearly there), I really don’t think I could vote for Harry Reid.

He is everything I hate about Democrats: incapable of making an argument, a face so weak it changes depending on the way the wind is blowing, a voice so sad you think he’s a funeral director, a man whose appareance on television has never evinced any reaction from me but “where’s the remote?” I just couldn’t pull the lever for the guy. Sorry. So I won’t be surprised if the nutjob wins. And a tiny part of me will feel a pulse of intense pleasure to see him go down.

via Watching The Senate – The Daily Dish | By Andrew Sullivan.

Here is video of Senator Reid promising to repeal DADT at Net Roots nation:

I doubt Sullivan would feel intense pleasure if DADT didn’t pass before the end of the 111th congress while Senator Angle helped to strike it down.

Sullivan also inexplicably blamed Pelosi and McCain for the congress not being able to get anything done:

Sens. Byron Dorgan of North Dakota and Dick Durbin of Illinois have been working intensely on a jobs bill for more than a month, talking with relevant committee leaders and other members and dispatching aides to dozens of other meetings in the hopes of crafting a bill that could get through the Senate quickly.

And when they walked into a meeting in the office of Reid (D-Nev.) on Jan. 22, they thought they were about to cross the finish line — the Dorgan-Durbin plan would be blessed by the small group of senators in the room, presented to the full Democratic Caucus on Jan. 28 and then taken straight to the floor for a vote.

But Montana Sen. Max Baucus had other ideas.

The chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, where the health care bill was debated for months last year, surprised the senators gathered in Reid’s office by suggesting he wanted a chance to mark up portions of the bill under his committee’s jurisdiction before it went to the floor, according to several people who attended the meeting.

via Democrats squabble over jobs bill – Manu Raju and Meredith Shiner – POLITICO.com.

Here is what I have to assume, Baucus wants to do what he did with the moderate health care bill: water it down, send it through weeks of useless negotiations and see how his constituents (aka industry and angry tea baggers from the right) feel about it before he comes up with a bill that no one likes. Now mind you, the President and the Democrats are under pressure to get more done for job creation. Durbin and Dorgan were proactive and Baucus inserts his ass on the tail end of the process (no pun intended). One of these kids is doin’ their own thing.

He was wowed by Obama’s oratorical gifts and believed that the country was ready to embrace a black presidential candidate, especially one such as Obama — a “light-skinned” African American “with no Negro dialect, unless he wanted to have one,” as he said privately.  Reid was convinced, in fact, that Obama’s race would help him more than hurt him in a bid for the Democratic nomination.

via The Juiciest Revelations In “Game Change” – The Atlantic Politics Channel.

Inartful, Impolitic, dated, but not racist. I still don’t believe Obama’s ethnic background helped him. Race is only a non-factor when there is no background attached to it. “Of course I would hire a [fill in the ethnicity] guy” in the generic, hypothetical sense. When context gets filled in, quite often a person of color and/or woman is expected to answer for more than themselves and their children. When the crazy preacher was Jeremiah Wright instead of Jerry Fallwell, Obama was to account for Wright’s opinions. Obama was badgered about a non-ally Farrakhan in a debate while Hillary Clinton was not asked about praying with The Family and Cokie Roberts mused that the black guy in Hawaii to visit his ailing grandmother just looked too foreign. So I disagree with Reid on that point.

I agree with much of what John McWhorter says regarding this topic (especially being that he is linguist): yes there is Black English (Negro Dialect), yes its frowned upon in professional settings (as are many other non standard dialects), and no candidate is getting elected if his slogan was “H to the izzO, P to the izz-E, vote for Barry, ya’ll gots to feel me!!”.

Fifth: We have to really listen to what Reid said instead of getting carried away over the tangy, backwards flavor of the one word “Negro.” In mentioning that Obama doesn’t speak in “dialect,” Reid acknowledged something many blacks are hot and quick to point out, that not all black people use Black English. Okay, they don’t – and Reid knows. He didn’t seem surprised that Obama can not sound black when he talks – he was just pointing out that Obama is part of the subset of blacks who can. He knows there is such a subset. Lesson learned.

Indeed Reid implied that black dialect is less prestigious than standard, such that not speaking it made Obama more likely to become President. That is, he implied what we all think too: Black English is, to the typical American ear, warm, honest — and mistaken. If that’s wrong, okay – but since when are most Americans, including black ones, at all shy about dissing Black English? And who among us — including black people – thinks someone with what I call a “black-cent” who occasionally popped up with double negatives and things like aks could be elected President, whether it’s fair or not? Reid, again, deserves no censure for what he said unless we’re ready to censure ourselves too.

via Reid’s Three Little Words: The Log In Our Own Eye | The New Republic.

Reid apologized. Obama accepted. I would like to think Reid then asked if “this will be an issue in the future”. And Obama just said “Nah, we straight”.

And then he could tell the Majority Leader to “brush. that. dirt of ya shoulda’, Harry”.

Only if he wanted to.

*correction at 1/11/2010 08:00 AM

Senate Majority Leader  Harry Reid (D-Nev.) announced Monday that the bill he will bring to the Senate floor will include a public health insurance option that individual states could decline to participate in.

“I’ve concluded –with the support of the White House, Senators Dodd and Baucus — that the best way to move forward is to include a public option with the opt-out provision for states,” said Reid, referring to the Senate health and finance committee representatives, respectively, Sen. Chris Dodd (D-Conn.) and Sen. Max Baucus (D-Mont.). “The public option, with an opt-out, is the one that’s fair.”

via Reid: “The Public Option With An Opt-Out Is The One That’s Fair”.

Personally, I will take it. Its a start. Let’s see where it ends up after the most exclusive club gets done with it.

I think an opt out puts pressure on GOP Governors and legislators who say they are anti-government health care option. They now actively have to deny this choice to their own constituency for their “small government principles”, but they have to reject a public option with their own political capital. Its more than adequate cover for any Senate Blue Dogs.  They can vote for cloture and then vote against the bill on the floor if they would like. Reid needs to get 51 votes. Only the most conservative House Blue Dogs (aka future Republicans) will vote against this.

If the stimulus battle was any indicator they will call Obama, Reid, Pelosi and Dodd dirty socialist commie fascist liberals, stomp their feet, cross their arms and snort derisively until a bill is passed. Shortly thereafter, on the local news in every red State, these same governors will be front and center at all the ribbon cuttings for new health centers and public health programs funded under this health care reform package, giant scissors in tow.

It will be interesting to see how health insurance industry stock prices do tomorrow. Wall street tends to have a knee jerk reaction to what they see as bad news. A public option that the health insurance industry fund managers think will pass should trigger some sell offs.

So, I repeat: Why has it come down to these six? Who anointed them? Apparently, the White House. At least that’s what I’m repeatedly being told by sources both on the Hill and in the administration. “The Finance Committee is where the action is. They’ll tee up the final bill,” says someone who should know.

via Why the Gang of Six is deciding healthcare for 300 million of us | Salon .

“And Democratic Party officials enlisted in the fight by the White House acknowledged in interviews that the growing intensity of the opposition to the president’s health care plans — within the last week likened on talk radio to something out of Hitler’s Germany, lampooned by protesters at Congressional town-hall-style meetings and vilified in television commercials — had caught them off guard and forced them to begin an August counteroffensive.”

via “We were a little surprised” | Philadelphia Inquirer | 08/11/2009 [c/o Susie Madrak of CrooksAndLiars.com].

Many folks left of center are handwringing about Obama’s Administration “over learning” from the Clinton White House mistakes. Those on the right are gleefully happy that Obama had let the debate be pulled into, what they feel, is a leftist ideas graveyard by the “evil” Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) and the wicked Senator Harry Reid (D-NV). Now this may be the new theme: the insurance industry and drug companies end around lobbying has fooled poor naive Obama and his hapless administration.

I doubt the genuineness of this surprise expressed by an official in the President’s White House or rather that the entire team is stunned. Rather, I think the Obama White House is letting the crazies open their mouths and prove their craziness. Obama likes to draw out the over aggressive. Let them ramble, anounce and bluster. Obama believes the arrogant big mouths and short sighted ideologues will always state their positions with absolute certainty of a “you always” accusation and “I never” virtue, all the while draping themselves with political tethers.

Far right ideologues lament the coming socialist state and that he must be stopped. Former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin says things like Obama’s health care bill, which doesn’t exist, will use a “Death Panel” to determine that toddlers with Down Syndrome must die, immediately. The Media, for once, brushed her aside. Even then, the media fails to expose the simultaneous silliness and cynicism of Palin’s dog whistle attacks. While she says Obama-care will kill your less than A+ kids, at the time of her resignation, Alaska was actually the worst in the nation at administering health care for the elderly and those with disabilities:

State programs intended to help disabled and elderly Alaskans with daily life — taking a bath, eating dinner, getting to the bathroom — are so poorly managed, the state cannot assure the health and well-being of the people they are supposed to serve, a new federal review found.
The situation is so bad the federal government has forbidden the state to sign up new people until the state makes necessary improvements.

No other state in the nation is under such a moratorium, according to a spokeswoman for the federal Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services.
via Troubled Alaska health programs face federal restriction | Anchorage Daily News | LISA DEMER

The town hall screamers, mostly just a bunch of angry old folks, many of them jump right on past health care issues and attack Obama’s legitimacy. What about these new 15 minute fame flames, the town hall screamers? One requested that her GOP congressman keep “government hands off” off her Medicare. Another, while being allowed in front of Specter to speak said Specter was denying them the right to speak. Another asserted that he was sure, the IRS under Obama care will collect data from all citizens on behalf of said government (as if the Bush administration didn’t already authorize and do that when they rolled up Carnivore into the big brother bill to watch us all, the Patriot Act).

The Michael Steele’s and Dick Armey’s of the world see this fervor and these quotes and they probably think: let’s throw some party and lobbyist resources at these folks and encourage more people to show up at town halls and be mad as hell for no reason under the sun. More wood on the fire. And I think Obama is fine with that. Beltway GOP congressmen assert that Obama has gone too far and the American people are all happy with their healthcare because they see 15 Pennsylvanians from a conservative small rural town of Lebanon taking their turns screaming at Sen. Arlen Specter (D-PA).

The more the crazies talk, and throw out specific, yet false statements about the direction health care is going, the easier it is for Democrats to defend the abstract legislative process that is actually taking place. Obama aww shucks these anecdotal diatribes and uses these sound bite screeds as a straw man in his health care town halls and interviews. Without any serious and principled opposition or alternative from the GOP, the Democrats in the Senate do have cover to get whatever they can pass in the senate and then get it to Obama’s desk.

I doubt the White House is surprised. In 1994, a bill couldn’t even get out of either House of Congress. Today, Pelosi was able to do what then Speaker Dick Gephardt couldn’t and the White House is essentially waiting for Senate Finance Committee to deliver a version that is palpable to blue dogs so that everything can be voted on, negotiated in conference committee and delivered to Obama’s desk. Many lefties, including me in some aspects are not 100% pleased with the process, but that’s how democracy is. Even then, this is a reform start:

Many people, including Ezra Klein and Matthew Yglesias and Kevin Drum, think these bills do some of the most important things of all in fixing the American health insurance system. Namely, they ensure that every insurance plan has to accept everyone at the same premiums regardless of prior health, that you can’t be kicked out of a plan for getting sick (or old, or anything), and that you can’t have a lifetime cap on payments. Universal community rating is probably the single most important reform of all, as it removes private insurers’ perverse incentives to make money by denying coverage to sick people.

via Matt Steinglass – Accumulating Peripherals – That slope just ain’t very slippery – True/Slant.

It don’t think its gonna be universal or single payer, but there will be some base improvements. 2009 is not 1994.

[Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV)] accused the media of inflating the importance of an August finish.

“You folks have created the deadline,” Reid chided, asserting that President Obama’s original goal was simply to pass legislation by the end of the year.
[...]
At a press conference with family physicians, Sens. Reid, Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) and Patty Murray (D-Wash.) discussed the legislation in language liberally laced with medical metaphors.

“America’s had a check-up and the prognosis is not very promising,” Reid opened.

“You’ve heard the diagnosis,” warned Durbin, “the health care system is chronically ill.”

via Reid Blames Press For August Deadline, Baucus Hedges.

Reid says he expects the tactic of gentle persuasion to work best, given the size of his Senate Democratic flock and the political divergences within it. “I don’t dictate how people vote,” he said in an interview this month. “If it’s an important vote, I try to tell them how important it is to the Senate, the country, the president … But I’m not very good at twisting arms. I try to be more verbal and non-threatening. So there are going to be—I’m sure—a number of opportunities for people who have different opinions not to vote the way that I think they should. But that’s the way it is. I hold no grudges.”