Behind public option: Subsidies fight - David Rogers - POLITICO.com

Behind public option: Subsidies fight - David Rogers - POLITICO.com . . . . . When all is said and done let it be known that POTUS is endeavouring to play politics of his own choosing to maintain the pendulum on his side of the hill . . . . . and will it also be known whether or not the public does truly benefit from this round of politics?

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White House Tidbits re: Health Care issues

CHICAGO TRIBUNE has a guide to the White House health-reform players: Rahm Emanuel, Jim Messina, Nancy-Ann DeParle, Phil Schiliro, Peter Orszag and Dan Pfeiffer. (The Trib needs to get a Pfeiffer file photo!)

TOP TALKER -- DEMS TRY TO BOX OUTCHAMBER -- POLITICO's Lisa Lerer: 'The White House and congressional Democrats are working to marginalize the Chamber of Commerce ... by going around the group and dealing directly with the CEOs of major U.S. corporations. Since June, senior White House officials have met directly with executives from more than 55 companies, including Chamber members Pfizer, Eastman Kodak and IBM. 'We prefer the approach - particularly in this climate - where the actual people who are on the front lines, running businesses, trying to create jobs, come and advise us on policy,' senior White House adviser Valerie Jarrett told POLITICO ...

'Chamber officials say the White House is scapegoating the Chamber and other trade associations as a way of dividing the business community, a move that could help the administration made headway on health care reform, climate change legislation and regulatory reform. 'It's happening with the deliberate hope and attention to weaken the influence of this institute and the business community in town,' said Bruce Josten, executive vice president for government affairs at the Chamber. 'When they launch a frontal assault against free enterprise and the Chamber of Commerce, I can guarantee it is not lost on any trade association executives or staff in this town.' ... Executives from a huge swath of companies have attended breakfasts, lunches, dinners and coffees with Jarrett, Obama, chief of staff Rahm Emanuel and senior economic adviser Larry Summers in recent months. On June 25, for example, Obama and Jarrett ate lunch with the CEOs of Honeywell, PepsiCo, Avon, IBM, Pfizer and Aon. Six days later, they sat down with executives from Verizon, Nucor, Starbucks and Wal-Mart. And last week, they met with CEOs from Amazon.com, FPL Group, Eastman Kodak and Kraft.'

'A ROADMAP TO HEALTH-CARE OVERHAUL BY CHRISTMAS' -- Commentary by Bloomberg's Albert R. Hunt: 'Republican Senator Olympia Snowe remains the single most important member of Congress on this issue. Democrats might be able to pass a bill without her; it will be hard. Rahm Emanuel will be a central figure in crafting any Senate-approved measure and the final bill. The White House chief of staff may have to delegate much of the Afghanistan account and any plans for a stealth stimulus, spending most of his time on health-care deliberations. ... For all the focus on the public option, ultimately the issue of affordability and how to pay for the overhaul will be more important. ... Veteran observers have no doubt there will be several doomsday moments and dismiss the notion that everything will be approved and reconciled by Thanksgiving, the target deadline. The odds are a measure will pass -- assuming Snowe stays on board -- with Christmas lights and music in the background when Obama signs it.'

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WH Clarifies Obama Positions Regarding Same-Sex Ballot Measures - Towleroad, More than gay news. More gay men

WH Clarifies Obama Positions Regarding Same-Sex Ballot Measures - Towleroad, More than gay news. More gay men . . . . So this is the 16th of October's explanation and standing as per the White House for the Obama. What will their position be for each and every day hereafter? It would seem to me that the Obama will hold to a specific stand only after he is painted into a corner.

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President Barack Obama's speech at the HRC dinner | The Bilerico Project

President Barack Obama's speech at the HRC dinner The Bilerico Project . . . There are many opinions, views and perspectives to this age, this political setup in D.C., this POTUS, these issues which many hold dear.  Therefore, I am going to present the verbatim verbiage of Mr. Obama and forego opinionising today.  The message is too important for me to just present my opinion, when each  one's individual opinion(s) is just as sacred, just as important as the next.

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Image by Getty Images via Daylife

Barack Obama Wins Nobel Peace Prize




The U.S. president Barack Obama won the Nobel Peace Prize "for his extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples," the Nobel Foundation said in Sweden on Friday.

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AMERICAblog Gay | A great people deserve their rights: "Pressure mounts on Obama speech"

AMERICAblog Gay A great people deserve their rights: "Pressure mounts on Obama speech" From this editor: If there is anything you read when you come across this blog, please read not only this entry but also the side references within the body of this post.

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Obama Talks Up Counterterrorism Efforts - The Caucus Blog - NYTimes.com

OF INTEREST . . . Obama Talks Up Counterterrorism Efforts - The Caucus Blog - NYTimes.com OF NOTE . . . . . . . The White House has said - if it can be said that the White House can speak . . . for the President - that "at the right time" he will speak up and out on - and for ? - GLBT rights and issues. OF COURSE . . . . Now was, is and will continue to be the 'right time'. What was that Mr. President that you said ?  I couldn't hear you.

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The Morality of Health Care Reform, Pt. 2

Posted: 24 Sep 2009 03:30 PM PDT

"We are determined to make every American citizen the subject of his country's interest and concern; and we will never regard any faithful law-abiding group within our borders as superfluous. The test of our progress is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much; it is whether we provide enough for those who have too little."

Franklin D. Roosevelt, Second Inaugural Address

"Sixty years after Roosevelt's Second Inaugural, that egalitarian test, I think, is still the best measure of our progress and humanity, and the core of The Triumph of Meanness is the contention that as a nation we are failing that test."

Nicolaus Mills, The Triumph of Meanness - America's War Against Its Better Self.

Home of the Mean

As with the election of Barack Obama last fall, the health care reform debate presents us with another opportunity to decide what kind of country we want to be. But that making that choice requires an unvarnished look at the country we have become.

In the seventy-plus years since Roosevelt's Second Inaugural, and the dozen years since Nicolaus Mills' offered his assessment that "as a nation we are failing" at "providing enough for those who have too little," we have actually become a country where a surprising number believe that those who have too little don't deserve to have any more than they do. It's a phenomenon at play in our reactions to any number of current crises, including health care reform.

Continue reading "The Morality of Health Care Reform, Pt. 2"...

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Maybe an individual mandate is a tax cut

Image by SavaTheAggie via Flickr

OF INTEREST . . .

George Stephanopoulos tried to argue today that by requiring all Americans to get health insurance, President Obama was imposing a tax increase on those Americans who don't have insurance - because he's requiring them to pay money for something (an odd argument, since by that definition, shopping for food, or buying a CD, is a tax increase).

OF NOTE . . . . . . .

But in any case, if one wants to argue that making someone pay a monthly fee for insurance is a tax increase, then lowering the monthly premiums for the rest of us - which supposedly Obama's plan is going to do - would be a tax cut for the rest of us. And considering more of us are insured than uninsured, that would mean most of the country would be getting a pretty large tax cut. So there.

OF COURSE . . . .

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Chairman of the Joint Chiefs still giving odd non-committal answers about repealing DADT

Image by cena carioca via Flickr

The following has been clipped from the Americablog Gay dated 16 September 2009 _________________________

At what point does Admiral Mullen actually have to start following President Obama's orders, and not the other way around? And when exactly will President Obama be moving ahead on this strategy to repeal DADT? After health care reform is done? But then we'll be doing Wall Street Reform. And next year is the congressional elections, and we've already been told to forget gay stuff that year. So when will be a good time to set our people free? SLDN is pissed, and rightly so.

TK: What is it with this admiral? Is he senile, waterlogged, arrogant, or just plain dumb?  Perhaps the earwigs have gotten to what little brain matter he has?  Then again, isn't the military supposed to stay clear and above the political fray, as are the religious establishments?

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Joan Walsh @ Salon: The Blackening of the President

The following has been clipped from Salon via The Bilerico Project Report dated 16 September 2009.

_______________________________________

There's a portion of America that has insisted, despite ample evidence to the contrary, that the nomination and election of the first black president was proof that we've reached a post-racial society. The President's status as a biracial man largely raised in the Midwest was seen as a "safe" black man -- not of the traditional civil rights leadership often seen as an ornery bunch mucking in society by many. He was not the descendant of West African slaves, an origin that made many American blacks of that extraction suspicious of his racial fidelity.

But as the campaign wore on, we saw display after sad display of outright racism and bigotry (documented in dozens of Blend posts) emerge, stoked by the McCain/Palin campaign and the noisemakers on the right. But the vile behavior seemed to come from a demographic we all knew was below the surface -- people who would never vote for a black man under any circumstance. It all died down for a millisecond -- a period of calm after the inauguration, but the full-out attack was cooking as the anger at the reality that Barack Obama is President sunk in when he started affecting policy and approach to governing.

Continue reading "Joan Walsh @ Salon: The Blackening of the president"...

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The following has been clipped from the New York Times published 09 September 2009.
_______________________________________

By SHERYL GAY STOLBERG and ROBERT PEAR


With President Obama speaking tonight on health care reform, Senator Max Baucus said his committee would vote on the bill within two weeks with or without Republicans.

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