Timing Is Everything Dept.: Health Care Reform

The Worm Turns: A Play In Many Acts.


ACT I
First, you have the Senate Finance Committee headed by Max Baucus dragging its feet on the health care reform bill, hung up over the dreaded public insurance option (gasp! socialism! gasp!) and Republican members Chuck Grassley of Iowa and some guy named Enzi from somewhere supposedly important to bring on board to make the final bill look like it's bipartisan.

All the while N.D. Dem. Kent Conrad mumbles incoherently about something called regional co-ops, which he refuses to elaborate on, but which he insists are a solution to the problem.

Liberals/progressives fuss and fume.

ACT II

The administration says things that  make it sound like it could drop its loyalty — never fully committed in public — to the public option.

Liberals/progressives fuss and fume.

The Republican National Committee says — stroke of genius here —  that co-ops are just another government takeover  and they'll never support such a "compromise."

Chuck Grassley says he won't vote for any kind of health care reform. No way, no how.

Who's Enzi again?

ACT III — Aug. 19, 2009

Wait for it, wait for it...Rahm Emanuel, the president's chief of staff, fires off an accusation in today's NYT ( Drudge has had the headline with the notation "NYT: developing" up since sometime yesterday) that Republicans aren't interested in any kind of health care reform, which a huge portion of the American public supports in theory at least, including most polled Republicans. He says (gasp!) they're only interested in playing political games to defeat anything the Democrats try. (Who's that guy Grassley again?)

Too early for Republican response.

Some nameless White House official says he can't understand why liberals are so tied to the public option.

(It's too early, but  liberals/progressives will fuss and fume.)

End of Act III

Tune in tomorrow, or maybe later today for another episode of our newly renamed, multiple-act,
always entertaining presentation of Recess Games. 
(The Worm Turns was just a working title.)

SUBTEXT BY Fightin Bill at TPM or Kabuki 101

Can it be any more obvious that this is a "don't shoot til you see the whites of their eyes" strategy?
They have compiled hours of incriminating video tape to run as needed in the 2010 elections, from all the Republican "luminaries", spewing obstructionist and traitorous rancor. They have ugly footage of angry, ignorant "ordinary citizens" spewing hate, racism and obvious falsehoods, and carrying assault rifles to boot. They have gone WAY out of the way to float every possible concession, knowing that the Republicans wouldn't budge and would take the bait. They now have a clear field to do Health Care reform with a Public Option and with all of the ingredients that will give it the best chance to succeed.
And this has been done, in part, to provide cover for Max Baucus, Ben Nelson and their ilk in the Senate so that they can help us reach 60 votes to deny the filibuster and then vote as needed on a final bill that contains a public option. If their votes are needed to reach the majority, Blue Dogs have the cover of having fought the good fight to slow this down, which will help them in their conservative states. (Read Kevin Sack's piece in the NY Times from a couple of days ago about Blanche Lincoln of Arkansas to better understand why this is such an important component of the strategy.)
Remember when Rahm Emmanuel scolded activists a few weeks ago about running ads against Ben Nelson and other Blue Dogs? It was because the strategy was long since in operation: any Obama operation excels at counting and does their homework. They had to figure out a way to solve the Democratic votes in both the House and the Senate, and create a mechanism for centrists and Blue Dogs to get on board. And boy, the Republicans have fallen for this, hook, line and sinker. Charles Grassley, for one, could be reading from scripts written by David Plouffe and David Axelrod--perfect campaignfodder for 2010.
Do you think Obama and his crew got to where they are by being emotional and reactive? No, they outsmart people by always taking the long view. I suspected this is what they've been up to, and for me it was confirmed earlier this week by the big grin on Howard Dean's face when he made the rounds of morning and evening shows to insist that everything's on track, and again last night by the serene Mona Lisa smile on the face of Linda Douglass as she calmly endured Ed Schultz's interrogating rant.
This is Obama's way of doing business. I think his record speaks for itself.

I so want to believe this.

UPDATE: Or maybe it's just getting everybody back to the message as one Dish reader notes:

What just happened in three short days?
With one statement about the "public option" from Obama, the entire health care reform discussion shifted totally away from the right wing crazies and Palin's "death panels"  In just three days with one statement about the "public option", liberal Democrats who stood on the sidelines and barely jumped in to the death panel discussions, have finely stirred off their duffs to get into the fray and argument.

The White House says officially it doesn't know what they're talking about cough cough.