George Bush Rode Bicycles, Barack Obama Plays Basketball

And is reputed to have sharp elbows.

I sent the following memo to Talking Points Memo tonight in response to this story.

For this armchair progressive with a 30-plus year appreciation for the reality of politics (and therefore not enough energy to even respond to the backers of single payer when the frantic emails started arriving and all it took was a click to sign some online petition), I think this thing is a game changer. It certainly is for me.

The people in the reluctant states who will be yelling the loudest will be small business owners, their employees, and right-minded health care professionals, and they will impress the largely unaware ordinary citizens, especially if they get organized for it. And run some well-publicized polls as things develop.

 If I were in one of those states, I would sign up for any public activity to pressure the state powers and if I, on Medicare and with no dog in the fight except possibly a reduction in my Advantage plan benefits whose extras are definitely not worth the extra I pay for them — either/or $400 worth of optical or dental care, a health club membership — I bet I could talk a bunch of my friends into this, too. I love the prospects of that kind of “all politics is local” part of this the best.

Enough with the tea party tactics, suckers, we’re hitting the bricks and THE MEDIA — with this one. Local media don’t play in the same arena as The Villagers. Their editors and assignment editors respond to phone calls and requests for editorial boards. They have to, they’re really working close to the bone these days.

In fact, I’d go anywhere anyone was willing to pay my travel to volunteer as an unpaid outside agitator. I was in newspapers for 30 years, all at the local community daily level. I’d be valuable. (Well, maybe not in Arkansas, but I have friends and family in Texas.) If I would do that, there’s a lot of others who would, too.

Anyway, what I really wanted to observe is that I think I smell a good rope-a-dope theory. I want to believe they’re that smart, and know how to learn from their mistakes and the lessons of all past legislative efforts. Obama and his people are students of this stuff, plenty experienced in local-level politics and they’ve got an organization emailing me almost every day.

So, taking the rope-a-dope angle a little farther, if I were advising the White House and Congressional Democratic leadership, I would say, “Play it totally cool. Don’t even look in their direction. Pretend your eyes are pointed in an entirely different direction and that you’ve already spent so much time and effort on that other direction that you’re really incapable of seeing the possibilities here.

Fake them out. Let the reliable second stringers (Shumer, whoever)  take the lead. They’ll love the glory. And the Republicans won’t know which way to turn. They weren’t prepared for this either. Because we sat on it, because we’re smart and we learn fast. They’ll believe that act because they have to believe you’re no smarter than them, otherwise they couldn’t do what they do. They have to believe they can get what they want, which is failure. But they’ve got no message machine working on this and starting one up today won’t give them time to dent this, although time would be the first thing I’d advise them to ask for. It sounds so reasonable. It might startle the Democrats into letting that happen. Yeah, that would be bad advice but I don’t think there is any good advice in this situation. They’re screwed. (Who called Dole? I want to know who called Dole.)

Guess who else wasn’t ready for this eleventh hour Hail Mary? About 1,300 health insurers, that’s who.

Slowly, slowly, the will of the Congress will turn like the big ship it is. Well, still before Christmas. And the White House, after many meetings, will endorse the idea they’ve been cooking up. It may be a fairly new idea. I’m not saying they had this in mind back in July, for instance. (But I’m not saying they didn’t. I don’t know anything about game theory, but I do know there have to be lots of contingency plans and creative, innovative brains behind it.)

I’m also not saying this or any similar rope-a-dope theory is flawless or even realistic. But somebody’s got a helluva novel here. And besides, I want to believe. Nope, never grew out of it.

Cheers,
Julie McCormick
Port Townsend