Rabid Blue Dogs

As we watch the party of Theodore Roosevelt skipping merrily down the road of utter and permanent self-destruction (TRA-LA! LA-LA-LA!) I think the time is long overdue that we have a blunt and serious discussion about the future of the party of TR's distant cousin, Franklin Delano. The tangible cockiness that has been emanating from certain quarters of the Democratic party is, to sat the least, somewhat misplaced.
Hey, Dems! Although I left your silly party over a decade ago, my heart is still essentially with your platform and agenda. I would ask all of you to think of me as Dr. Degan, your loving and trusted family veterinarian. After a complete and thorough examination of your beloved pets, it grieves me to offer you this final diagnosis:
Your Blue Dogs must be put to sleep.
Let's stop kidding ourselves and face some serious and uncomfortable facts here, folks: Any chance of serious health care reform is about as dead as the nails the GOP has spent the last nine years hammering into their own coffin. And the biggest irony? It was killed by a coalition of "Conservative Democrats" - or DINOs: Democrats In Name Only - which begs the musical question: With donkeys like these, who the hell needs elephants?
The Democratic party has been plagued by their conservative wing from the time they were formed in 1828. It must be remembered that the Republicans were formed in 1856 as the anti-slavery alternative to the Democrats, many of whom were southern slave owners. For one-hundred years, the "Solid South" was in the committed to the Democratic party. The conservative southerners were known as "Boll Weevil" Democrats. To be sure, for most of the Twentieth Century it was an uneasy alliance which existed between northern progressives and southern racists. For all the social and economic progress of the Roosevelt/Truman years, the half-wits that comprised the southern wing of the Democratic party just could not bring themselves to join the party of Abraham Lincoln, "that nigger-lovin' bastard what freed the slaves!"
Look away, Dixieland.
Then in 1964 and 1965 respectively, two earth-shuddering events occurred that forever destroyed the Democratic hold on Dixie: the Civil Rights Act and the Voting Rights Act. That did it, Bubbah! The very idea of equality with NEGROS was just to much for these assholes to bear. When President Lyndon Johnson signed those two laws into existence, he told his aids, Jack Valenti and Bill Moyers, "We've lost the south for a generation." It was an understatement. The "solid south" has been solidly Republican ever since. LinkHere

Republicans Aim To Gut Baucus Bill With Amendments
Shepherding a Bill With 564 Amendments

Senators have offered 564 amendments, all posted on the committee Web site, and the Republican proposals generally reveal seemingly irreconcilable differences. While they would gut the bill, one Republican, Senator Olympia J. Snowe of Maine, wants important changes but appears ready to get behind it, provided Mr. Baucus can keep his fellow Democrats in line.
For Mr. Baucus, the challenge will be to stop his fellow Democrats — they outnumber Republicans 13 to 10 — from shifting the bill so hard to the left that they chase away Ms. Snowe, who could provide the crucial 60th vote needed to get the measure through the Senate. LinkHere

Blue Dogs Aim To Scrap Key Component Of Obama's Financial Reform

Blue Dogs and other conservative Democrats — uneasy with a key element of President Barack Obama’s plan to regulate Wall Street — are rallying around an alternative proposal that scraps the consumer financial protection agency the president has been pushing. LinkHere

Baucus Bill: Health Reform That Isn't

Source: Huffington Post
With the long-awaited release of the Baucus health plan, which is said to have Obama's approval, the fix is in. Billions of taxpayer dollars will be thrown at the insurance and pharmaceutical industries, much of it diverted from Medicare and Medicaid (despite Obama's protestations that he would not raid Medicare to shore up the private system). We'll simply pour more money into a system that's already shown itself capable of absorbing whatever we put into it without providing anything like commensurate health care.
Look at the bare bones of the plan. Americans will be required to buy health insurance at whatever price the companies choose to charge, many using government subsidies. Businesses will have to contribute or be fined. Drug companies will still be able to charge whatever they like for drugs, and continue to jack up prices at several times the inflation rate. In short, the government will deliver to the insurance and pharmaceutical industries millions more paying customers, with virtually no curbs on their profiteering. The "public option" was first gutted, then all but dropped.
LinkHere