Matt Yglesias complains about Max Baucus and Kent Conrad catering to the "concerns" of Republican Rep. Joe Wilson on non-US citizens being covered by health care reform. I can only remind Yglesias of what he wrote about progressives who fight for the public option:

[P]rogressives can’t adopt an attitude of sociopathic indifference merely in order to strengthen our bargaining position, because refusing to adopt such an attitude is part of what it means to be progressive.

Why is Matt adopting an "attitude of sociopathic indifference" and letting this issue stand in the way of "health care reform?" Why is he criticizing Baucus and Conrad for acting PRECISELY as he has advised Democrats to act? See also Chris Bowers' response to Yglesias' ridiculous post.

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So the Republican congressman who yelled at the President apologized last night and called the White House to apologize and all that, but remorse seems a fleeting concept for Republicans:

Rep. Joe Wilson (R-SC) just appeared with local talk-radio host Keven Cohen on WVOC radio in Columbia, South Carolina, where he explained how it was that he came to yell "You lie!" during President Obama's speech to Congress -- and he also said that he's received support from his colleagues in Congress, and even from Democrats. Wilson said that overall, he's gotten a positive reception. "It's been truly incredible, the phones have run off the hook at home in all offices, and the e-mails, the vast majority have been very favorable."

. . . I'm very, very appreciative of the outpouring of support."

Allrighty then. So I guess that regret Wilson expressed was well, a lie. Got it.

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While "progressive" blogger Ezra Klein (Ezra wrote this very good post so I give him a pass on this one) and Matt Yglesias may think this demonstrates "sociopathic indifference" to the issue of health care reform, I was happy to see Jane Harman state unequivocally to Andrea Mitchell on MSNBC that she was a a "Blue Dog" who supports a "robust public option."

Does that make her "Left of the Left" now?

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I'm obsessing on this, but it bothers me so much, I can't stop writing about it. Matt Yglesias writes:

[Chris] Bowers likes to make the point that the administration does more to lean on progressives than it does to lean on moderates. This, however, ignores the basic reality that the administration has more leverage over progressives than it does over moderates. It also ignores the basic reality that progressives are actually the good guys. If you decide to adopt an attitude of sociopathic indifference toward the gargantuan looming catastrophe of climate change, this gives you a lot of bargaining power in a legislative negotiation But progressives can’t adopt an attitude of sociopathic indifference merely in order to strengthen our bargaining position, because refusing to adopt such an attitude is part of what it means to be progressive.

(Emphasis supplied.) According to Yglesias, being a progressive means sucking at political bargaining. More than that, trying be be a good political bargainer means you have "sociopathic indifference" to issues. Of course it should mean the exact opposite on both points. A good progressive is the one who can bargain most effectively for important progressive issues. The milquetoast "progressive" Yglesias in fact represents is really the worst type of progressive in that he does not think there are any issues worth some hard bargaining. This impulse is truly one of the most dangerous in the Democratic constellation. It is a new version of The Third Way really. One last point - Yglesias is right in criticizing Bowers about this being an issue of "trust." Only a fool trusts a pol.

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I written for weeks now about the irrationality of certain "progressive bloggers" regarding political bargaining. Matt Yglesias' latest gives a clue why:

It’s worth noting, after all, that even the versions of health reform in congress that do include a public option would be better for the insurance industry than no bill at all. It seems to me you ought to be able to look an insurer executive or lobbyist in the eye and tell him, “I’m casting a vote that will help you get even richer” even while voting “yes” on the House version. To hold out for Baucuscare or nothing requires a sort of disturbed mindset that I’ve puzzled over before. And it’s striking that the people holding this position not only haven’t given any sort of actual reason for their view, but they’ve barely been asked to give a reason.

The reason why no one asks them is because people like Ezra Klein and Matt Yglesias (and Jon alter and Joe Klein) provide Obama and the Media cover to tell progressives to give up on the public option (indeed, the insurance industry now cites to Klein.) Forget about the merits of Klein and Yglesias' views on the substance (and I find their views quite weak), their complete obtuseness on the subject of political bargaining has been a wonder to behold. They truly appear to be clueless about it. The Steny Hoyers of the "progressive" blogs. "Serious" people. More . . .

Reading through some other reviews of Obama's speech last night, I was struck by the reactions of Nate Silver and Tom Schaller at 538:

Nate Silver: [. . .] Obama needed to appeal to liberals -- both the 60 or so members of the House who have threatened to vote against a watered-down bill, and the much broader, activist community who has grown wary of what they perceive as a Clintonian president who is too willing to compromise. . . .

Tom Schaller: This was classic Obama, both from a policy conceit and rhetorical framing. Anyone who read The Audacity of Hope knows how Obama works through issues—he sets up how one side conceives it and how the other side does and then, after admitting he is inclined toward progressive/Democratic side of the ledger, he humbly suggests the best solution is probably somewhere in between.

(Emphasis supplied.) Schaller cites Obama's set up with single payer advocates as one extreme and free marketers as the other. I noted that as well and thought it was a good set up for a vigorous defense of the public option. And that is where Obama failed imo - he dd not provide a vigorous defense of a public option. But what really gets me is that what Schaller calls "classic Obama," and it was, did not strike anyone else as "classic Bill Clinton." What is pejoratively called "triangulation." More . . .

Brian Beutler:

"I appreciate that President Obama shared many of the details of his vision for health reform at this pivotal and historic moment, and signaled a willingness to work across party lines," Snowe said. "At the same time, as I continue to oppose the inclusion of a public option in any package, I would have preferred that the issue were taken off the table as I have urged the President - given that any bill with a public option will not pass the Senate and this divisive subject is unnecessarily delaying our ability to reach common ground."

Translation - President Snowe wants what she wants and that's that. Senator Schumer needs to remind the guy who was elected in November that there is this process called reconciliation. He also needs to remind Obama that he is the President, not Olympia Snowe.

Speaking for me only

This is very smart tactics:

On a conference call with reporters just now, Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-OH) said "[Obama] wants to always be open to ideas...but he sets his standard. [. . . ] The other options don't even come close to doing it." Brown's statement amounts to a belief that Obama has implied a demand for a public option. "I think he laid it out in a way that only a public option will get us where we want to go[,]" [Brown said.]

Good thinking. In fact, take the pledge Senator Brown - "I promise the President that I will never let him down by letting a bill pass that does not have the public option."

Speaking for me only

Some good news prior to Obama's speech tonight. Via Matt Yglesias, Senator Schumer still talking reconciliation :

I’ve always favored using reconciliation for good parts of the bill. I think that will get you the best bill, the strongest bill and the bill that will have the greatest positive effect on the American people. Ultimately, we’ll be judged not by whether we pass the bill, but ultimately we’ll be judged by whether it works. Leaving the bill as something that doesn’t work, even if we pass it, leading to hurting both the country and the party.

Schumer gets it. It is also interesting to me that Anthony Weiner is a political protege of Schumer's, considering Weiner's statements that whether the public option survives is up to the President. Even Yglesias likes the idea. The new Center.

Speaking for me only

Via TPM:

"I talked to [President Obama] last week while I was in Maine and I talked to him on Monday as well," [Senator Olympia] Snowe said on MSNBC earlier today. "We talked about the public option. I was ... urging him if he could take the public option off the table in his speech this evening so it could provide, I think, a momentum of a different kind in moving this issue forward overall."

(Emphasis supplied.) So who was elected President last November, Obama or Snowe? Time will tell.

Speaking for me only

In response to "even the liberal" Ezra Klein's arguments against the public option, Paul Krugman wrote:

[W]hat is one to make of the practical, political argument from the likes of Ezra Klein, who argue that any public plan actually included in legislation probably wouldn’t make that much difference, and that reform is worth having even without such a plan?

There are three reasons to be suspicious of that argument. [. . . MORE]

Ezra's latest is much better:

How you'll judge Max Baucus's framework depends on how you understand the goal of health-care reform. . . . It really would insure tens of millions of people. . . . It really will expand Medicaid and transform it from a mish-mash of state regulation into a dependable benefit. . . . The main disappointment is that insofar as you see the bill as a vehicle for moving us towards a better, more efficient, less costly system, there are some problems. In particular, this bill seems to block off . . . possible points of expansion. . . . [T]he co-op plan is an interesting policy proposal, but unlike a public insurance option, it's difficult to imagine it growing into anything significantly stronger than what's outlined in the paper.

To follow Ezra's point, if this is where health care legislation is heading, it is no longer reform, but merely providing relief to the poorest among us. And that is an absolute good. That is the cannolis. Let's take that. But let's leave the "reform" (the mandates and the co-ops), or the gun.

If we are giving up on positive incremental structural reform, and to me that means a public option, then let's leave reform out altogether. Let's take the money for Medicaid and other coverage expanding programs, and leave out the mandates. And that makes a reconciliation bill quite doable. Then, maybe, we can do health care reform right later.

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