Digby's Hullabaloo Posts

Licking their chops: Capitol hill is drooling over the possibility of exchanging health care for more military spending

by digby

I’ve heard some cynical takes on the health care bill (including this depressing NY Times article about the newly revealed details of the White House deal with Pharma) but I have to say this really takes it to a new level:

Congress could stumble into a big pile of cash from an unlikely source: the Supreme Court.

The justices will deliver their landmark ruling on the 2010 health care law this month, and the government is in line to reap hundreds of billions of dollars in savings — perhaps more than $1 trillion — if certain parts of it are struck down.

That money could be freed up just in time for a battle over whether automatic cuts to the Pentagon and social programs will kick in, and some members of Congress are already dreaming about the possibilities.

“We’re thinking [about] different options, but there are so many variations of what could happen from the court decision, it’s hard to make any hard plans,” said House Appropriations Committee Chairman Hal Rogers (R-Ky.). But, he added, a windfall “would be a factor” in discussions about whether to keep in place pending Pentagon cuts.

How much money would they have to spend on killer drones and missile defense? A lot.

The Congressional Budget Office estimates that eliminating the law’s individual mandate would save $282 billion over 10 years, a figure based on 16 million fewer people signing up for health care through Medicaid, new health exchanges and private insurance.

Bill Hoagland, a vice president at the insurance company Cigna and the former top Senate Republican budget aide, says that number would jump to more than $500 billion through 2022 if the mandate and related insurance market reforms, such as the requirement that insurers provide coverage for people with pre-existing conditions, are struck down. And there’s even more money at stake in the law’s expansion of Medicaid and the Children’s Health Insurance Program, which the court reviewed alongside the individual mandate, during oral arguments in March.

If the court throws them all out but keeps revenues in place, the savings could eclipse $1 trillion

And wouldn’t that be fabulous. What a nice simple way to pay for our obscene defense spending: tax people more for health care and give them less! And if they can keep those lazy poor kids and sick people from having health care too we’ll be good to go. Sheer genius.

No one knows what the court will do — it could uphold the law, strike down parts of it or knock down the whole damn thing. If the law is upheld, the budget picture doesn’t change. If it’s struck down in its entirety, deficit projections would most likely go up by $100 billion to $150 billion over 10 years. But it’s the prospect of a partial strike-down that has some folks on Capitol Hill licking their chops…

With respect to how this affects the budget discussions at the end of the year, I think people will take a little bit of a wait and see,” said Maryland Rep. Chris Van Hollen, the top Democrat on the House Budget Committee.

But many wonks have their eyes on the money.

During oral arguments in March, the justices focused in large part on whether the mandate is unconstitutional. The mandate would force consumers to buy insurance or pay a penalty, and it is among the cost drivers for the government. CBO’s estimate of a $282 billion savings from killing the mandate includes $149 billion less in Medicaid costs for the government, $69 billion less in subsidies for Americans who purchase health care through exchanges created by the law and $80 billion in new tax revenue because fewer companies would offer health plans to their employees.

Jon Gruber, the MIT professor who helped devise Mitt Romney’s Massachusetts health care law and then the federal version, said, “It’s just penny-wise and pound foolish” to eliminate the mandate. “You’re basically saving a little to hurt a lot. You spend three quarters as much to cover half as many people.”

In addition, most experts agree that striking down the mandate but leaving in place insurance industry reforms — like requiring plans to cover people with pre-existing conditions and letting 20-somethings stay on their parents’ insurance — would have disastrous consequences for consumers. The logic: Costs would go up for insurance companies, and the bill would be passed on to consumers.

The court also looked at the constitutionality of the law’s expansion of Medicaid and the Children’s Health Insurance Program, which account for $936 billion in government spending through 2022, according to CBO’s latest projections. Some of that overlaps with the money calculated as stemming from the mandate. If both the mandate and the Medicaid and CHIP expansions are struck down, only the provisions designed to pay for the cost of the program remain in effect.

“You really just have a shell of a program on the spending side at that point,” said Jim Capretta, a fellow at the conservative Ethics and Public Policy Center who was an associate director of the White House’s Office of Management and Budget during President George W. Bush’s first term.

Fantastico!

Still, I’m not sure they wouldn’t honestly prefer the whole bill to go down. That would make the projected deficit go way up — and possibly allow for a budgetary bloodbath in the fall the likes of which we haven’t contemplated up to now. And the Dems, as is their wont, would be shellshocked and walk right behind them over the cliff. After all, they could blame the Supreme Court and still be deficit hawks. That’s what they call a real win-win …

But short of that, this is an excellent outcome for the faux deficit mongers. And you have to admit that using health care money to kill people is diabolically brilliant.

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A Teacup Pig’s partisan politics

by digby

This makes a much sense as anything else:

The Colbert Report
Get More: Colbert Report Full Episodes,Political Humor & Satire Blog,Video Archive

Plus it’s really cute …

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The belt-tightening boomerang

by digby

Fox Nation tweeted that this is Obama’s “greatest gaffe ever”:

We’ve created 4.3 million jobs over the past 27 months. Over 800,000 just this year alone. The private sector is doing fine. Where we’re seeing problems is with state and local government, often with cuts initiated by governors or mayors who are not getting the kind of help they’re accustomed to from the federal government.

It is, of course, true. But in political bizarroworld, telling the truth is a gaffe.

Now, it’s hard for me to feel tooo sorry for the president when he gets the “Obama says the private sector is doing fine!” treatment from the press and the Republicans because he was the one talking about “tightening our belts” and freezing government hiring for months, making it sound as though government must slash spending in the middle of a recession. That was a big mistake, not because it changed the policies — the Republicans were hardly going to allow any more stimulus. What it did was create a bipartisan consensus that government should be cut — after all, the president and the Republicans agreed, didn’t they? And now we’re stuck with it.

Still, this is going to be a particularly frustrating brouhaha. Of course the president is right that the private sector is doing ok and it’s government cutting spending that’s causing the depression. But I’m not sure how much it benefits him to point it out at this late date.

Update: Also too — he should have said “doing better” rather than “doing fine” which isn’t the way people feel and sounds odd to the ear. Plus it isn’t actually working up to capacity, so “fine” is more optimistic than it should be.

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Netroots Nation Keynote: The war on women — 12Noon est

Some of 2012′s most exciting races involve strong, progressive women who are leading the national conversation on not only on women’s issues but also things like the economy and LGBT rights.

Massachusetts’ Elizabeth Warren, Hawaii’s Mazie Hirono and Washington’s Darcy Burner are each known for standing up for workers, the middle class and equal opportunity for all. That’s why we’re excited to have the three of them on the big stage at Netroots Nation.

In a Friday lunchtime session moderated by the Huffington Post’s Amanda Terkel, Warren, Hirono and Burner will address the past year’s growing War on Women and the GOP war on the middle class. They’ll discuss what playing offense looks like for women and how election wins this fall will translate to policy victories in 2013 and beyond.

Making the irrelevant voter relevant

by David Atkins

Never has the need to eliminate the electoral college been more clear:

With so many resources focused on persuading an ever-shrinking pool of swing voters like those here in Nevada, the 2012 election is likely to go down in history as the one in which the most money was spent reaching the fewest people.

Much of the heaviest spending has not been in big cities with large and expensive media markets, but in small and medium-size metropolitan areas in states with little individual weight in the Electoral College: Cedar Rapids and Des Moines in Iowa (6 votes); Colorado Springs and Grand Junction in Colorado (9 votes); Norfolk and Richmond in Virginia (13 votes). Since the beginning of April, four-fifths of the ads that favored or opposed a presidential candidate have been in television markets of modest size.

There are two major problems with this. First and most obvious, this system renders the needs and desires of huge, otherwise important states like Texas and California irrelevant. There is a grand ideological battle being played out in America, and the argument between blue states and red states needs to happen honestly and in the open. When the entire presidential election gets decided on the whims of states like Nevada, Florida and Iowa, perverse things start to happen. The nation adopts bizarre and counterproductive stances on a variety of issues, from Cuba policy to corn and ethanol subsidies. Issues important to big, comfortably partisan states on both sides tend to be ignored.

But perhaps of greater concern is that the acceptable range of political discourse in the country shrinks dramatically. There are a lot of reasons why it’s difficult for progressives to gain traction in America, but one of them assuredly is that any Democratic President cannot afford to adopt major stances that would offend swing voters in places like Ohio or suburban Virginia. Republicans are similarly forced to nominate candidates like McCain and Romney who in no way openly represent the true soul of the modern GOP.

The sort of voters who live in purple states and pay so little attention or are so conflicted that can’t seem to make up their minds whether to cast their vote for tickets as markedly different as Obama/Biden or McCain/Palin in no way represent the real America. Putting the entire fate of the country in their hands is preposterous.

It’s long past time to enact the National Popular Vote and give Americans of all political persuasions wherever they happen to live an equal chance at affecting the direction of presidential politics.

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Heritage joins the mudwrestlers

by digby

It appears that the Heritage Foundation’s prestigious Breitbart Awards will live up to their name. Via LGF I find out that Ace of Spades is winning their blogger award.

Loving the NRA

by digby

Adam Weinstein at Mother Jones has written a riveting story about the history of the “stand your ground” law:

THE FLORIDA LAW MADE INFAMOUS this spring by the killing of unarmed teenager Trayvon Martin was conceived during the epic hurricane season of 2004. That November, 77-year-old James Workman moved his family into an RV outside Pensacola after Hurricane Ivan peeled back the roof of their house. One night a stranger tried to force his way into the trailer, and Workman killed him with two shots from a .38 revolver. The stranger turned out to be a disoriented temporary worker for the Federal Emergency Management Agency who was checking for looters and distressed homeowners. Workman was never arrested, but three months went by before authorities cleared him of wrongdoing.

That was three months too long for Dennis Baxley, a veteran Republican representative in Florida’s state Legislature. Four hurricanes had hit the state that year, and there was fear about widespread looting (though little took place). In Baxley’s view, Floridians who defended themselves or their property with lethal force shouldn’t have had to worry about legal repercussions. Baxley, a National Rifle Association (NRA) member and owner of a prosperous funeral business, teamed up with then-GOP state Sen. Durell Peaden to propose what would become known as Stand Your Ground, the self-defense doctrine essentially permitting anyone feeling threatened in a confrontation to shoot their way out.

Or at least that’s the popular version of how the law was born. In fact, its genesis traces back to powerful NRA lobbyists and the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), a right-wing policy group. And the law’s rapid spread—it now exists in various forms in 25 states—reflects the success of a coordinated strategy, cultivated in Florida, to roll back gun control laws everywhere.

Read the whole thing. This is largely the baby of a specific NRA lobbyist who worked on this stuff for years down in Florida and created the template for doing it all over the country. It’s chilling, honestly.

And guess what?

In April, a Reuters/Ipsos poll found that the National Rifle Association was viewed favorably by 68% of Americans, and unfavorably by 32%. Unlike most polls, the Reuters poll apparently did not allow “unsure” or “undecided” as a choice. In each of the demographics which the poll provided–Republicans, Democrats, independents, whites, and blacks–the NRA was viewed favorably by at least 55%.

A 2005 Gallup Poll had found a 60/34 favorable/unfavorable view of the NRA. Previous Gallup results were 52/39 (May 2000), 51/39 (April 2000), 51/40 (April 1999, right after the Columbine High School murders), 42/51 (June 1995), and 55/32 (March 1993)[…]
There are many causes for the evolution, but it seems plausible that at least part of the cause has been the increasing effectiveness of the NRA itself. To the extent that the NRA has convinced some Americans that handguns in the right hands are beneficial, then those Americans may have become more likely to view the NRA favorably. To the extent that popular NRA spokesmen (such as three-term NRA President Charlton Heston) or popular NRA programs (such as Eddie Eagle Gun Safety) have made some Americans view the NRA favorably, some of those Americans may have become less inclined to support handgun prohibition.

Because the NRA has (despite some fierce criticisms by Republicans, including in 2010) continued to support Democrats with good records on the Second Amendment, and to oppose Republicans with bad records, the NRA has avoided the problem of being identified with only a single political party. When an interest group supports only one party, that group will inevitably be viewed unfavorably by most members of the other political party.

And now that even long-time anti-gun advocates such as Hillary Clinton and Charles Schumer have been affirming their support for the Second Amendment individual right, the basic premise with which the NRA is identified has become so widely supported that only politicians in very safe districts dare to dispute it publicly.

Founded in 1871, the NRA views itself as “America’s oldest civil rights organization,” an embodiment of American freedom values. These days, it seems that most Americans tend to agree.

Also, too, the elected Democrats made a strategic decision to simply fold, which made it completely useless for their membership to even think about an alternative to the NRA. And now we have no argument at all — it’s a free fire zone on American streets (as long as you cross your heart and promise that you really, really felt threatened.)

It’s an interesting view about special interest “bipartisanship.” Oddly, it only seems to go one way. Take, for instance, the abortion question. Once again we have the Democrats with “good records” being supported by the anti-abortion lobby and it’s dragging the party to the right on the issue. (Look for “religious liberty” to go the same way.) Can we think of even one liberal interest group that’s successfully doing the same thing with the Republicans? I can’t.

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Devolving

by David Atkins

Depressing numbers from Gallup, via the FailBlog:

Never forget that a society can move backward as easily as it can move forward. It’s happening right now.

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Supplementing the kill list

by digby

I’ve been contemplating the NY Times kill list story again over the last couple of days. (Or maybe haunted by it is more apt.) Among many other fleeting impressions and thoughts when I first read it, I had meant to mention this:

[S]ome officials felt the urgency of counterterrorism strikes was crowding out consideration of a broader strategy against radicalization. Though Mrs. Clinton strongly supported the strikes, she complained to colleagues about the drones-only approach at Situation Room meetings, in which discussion would focus exclusively on the pros, cons and timing of particular strikes.

At their weekly lunch, Mrs. Clinton told the president she thought there should be more attention paid to the root causes of radicalization, and Mr. Obama agreed. But it was September 2011 before he issued an executive order setting up a sophisticated, interagency war room at the State Department to counter the jihadi narrative on an hour-by-hour basis, posting messages and video online and providing talking points to embassies.

How is it possible that this wasn’t done earlier? I guess I knew the Bush administration’s disdain for anything short of a full military response would have led them to ignore something this “soft” but I did expect that the tech-savvy, “global messenger” Obama administration to have been doing this from the beginning.

It’s a small thing, of course. But the fact is that the National Security apparatus moved very quickly to secure the president’s full cooperation with their War on Terror strategy and the administration apparently jumped into it with both feet. But I would have thought they’d at least have been supplementing their assassinations and drone strikes with something more civilized at the outset.

Part of the problem here is seems to be a lack of imagination — these surveillance toys and flying kill robots have blinded our government to the fact that humans are complicated and can be motivated by something other than fear or that the only method of is to “kill ’em over there so they don’t come and kill us here.”

Seriously, what could it possibly have hurt to put a serious effort behind making the argument against jihadism (even as they pick off alleged terrorists one by one in some quixotic quest to “get ’em all”?) It’s almost as if the government, for reasons of its own, is radicalizing Muslims so it has something to keep shooting at.

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“That’s what freedom is all about: taking your own risks” — (Ya feel lucky, punk?)

by digby

Blitzer asked what Paul would prefer to having government deal with the sick man.

“What he should do is whatever he wants to do, and assume responsibility for himself,” Paul said. ”My advice to him would have a major medical policy, but not before —”

“But he doesn’t have that,” Blitzer said. “He doesn’t have it and he’s — and he needs — he needs intensive care for six months. Who pays?”

“That’s what freedom is all about: taking your own risks.,” Paul said, repeating the standard libertarian view as some in the audience cheered.

“But congressman, are you saying that society should just let him die,” Blitzer asked.

“Yeah,” came the shout from the audience. That affirmative was repeated at least three times.

Here’s Lance Mannion, talking about what these people really have. (It’s not freedom.)

[A]t their wake some Republican friend looks down into their coffin and says, “Your own fault, pal.”

“You should have planned better. You should have made smarter decisions. You should have managed your money more wisely. You should have taken better care of yourself, and don’t give me any crap about genetics. You should have lived your life the way I lived mine. You should have arranged things so that you were as lucky as I’ve been.”

Well, no they don’t.

At least not that very last bit.

You’d never hear one say, “I’ve been lucky.”

They haven’t been lucky.

They’ve been deserving.

They’ve deserved everything they have because they’ve earned it.

They earned having the parents they had. They earned being born in the richest, freest country in the world. They earned having no genetic predispositions to high blood pressure, arthritis, depression, schizophrenia, cancer. They earned not being hit by a bus when they were in grade school. They earned having a roommate in college who was able to explain general relativity or Hamlet to them the night before that midterm. They earned not having the plus sign turn blue. They earned that the company they went to work for didn’t go belly up when the market crashed or let them go in the round of mass layoffs that followed. They earned having children who didn’t get deathly sick or have disabilities or develop emotional problems or drug habits that required them to take their focus off their jobs, take time off work, and cause their bosses to say, “We feel your pain, but we can’t afford to carry you anymore if you’re not here to pull your weight. Here’s your hat, don’t let the door hit you on the way out. Make sure you give your cell phone to security. And, no, we don’t have any idea what you’re going to do about insurance now and we don’t care and we don’t have to care and anyway you should have planned better. You should have saved more. You should have worked harder. You should have been luck…You should have deserved not to have what’s happened to you happen to you.”

They deserve it. They earned it. You? You didn’t. If you had, you’d have it. QED. And what you didn’t earn and don’t deserve, you don’t get. Simple as that. You suff.

That’s right. “Freedom” means being able to take your own risks lucky.

I think from now on when anyone asks me why I support universal health care, I’m just going to say (in my best Clint Eastwood,) “Bad things can happen to anyone, even a hard working, all-American success story like you. Ya feel lucky, punk?”

Mannion’s piece is worth reading in its entirety. O’ Lucky us.

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