from
http://lefthooktheblog.blogspot.com/

Tonight, the Obama went before a joint session of congress to try to
sell his version of health care reform. His speech had some good
moments, as speeches go, and if being President of the United States
required little more than giving speeches, I have no doubt the Obama
would be remembered as one of the greats.

Unfortunately for the Obama, the job requires something a great deal
more than words, and tonight's speech is primarily of interest as a
monument to how very little the Obama seems to have learned in his time
in office.

The thrust of the Obama's speech is, as usual, the same Rodney King-ism
ye humble editor spends so much time excoriating on this blog. Instead
of solidly embracing a liberal policy and fighting for it, the Obama is
once again stuck on "Can't we all just get along?" He's still trying to
find compromise with those who don't want any reform, cooperation with
those who have spent weeks accusing him of wanting to allow federal
bureaucrats to kill the elderly, the infirm, the "unproductive," still
looking for some mythical common ground, the warm-and-fuzzy concept so
beloved of the pundit class, "bipartisanship."[1]

The Obama was elected in a landslide that also brought a large majority
for his party in the House of Representatives and a fillibuster-proof
supermajority in the Senate. What part of that suggests to him a public
mandate for "bipartisanship" I can't even imagine. Time and time again,
though, that's where he goes, and it's where he went tonight, throwing
in a heaping helping of the vile triangulation of Bill Clinton, a tactic
which draws a false equivalence between the liberals and the
conservatives and rhetorically marginalizes both.

Given this, a few moments stood out. It was actually refreshing to see
the Obama finally take on the "death panels" charge that has been
leveled at health care reform for weeks. With a candor almost entirely
absent from politicians at such events, he skipped any euphemism and
called it exactly what it is: a lie. The Democratic members in the
chamber erupted into applause at that moment. The Republicans, who have
always known the charge was a lie, sat on their hands and looked as
disgusted as if they'd just been served a shit sandwich. Immediately
after that, when the Obama correctly pointed out that the health care
bill didn't, as so many of its opponents had alleged, cover illegal
aliens, Republicans, who knew what the Obama said was the truth, began
to bark objections, and Rep. Joe Wilson, Republican and first-rate
scumbag from South Carolina, loudly shouted "You lie!"

These moments made for quite a contrast. The Obama calls, at great
length, for cooperation and bipartisanship; those in the other party sit
on their hands looking disgusted when he calls a vicious lie what it is,
then call him a liar for telling what every one of them knew to be the
truth. It makes Republicans look bad. It makes the Obama look even
worse.

To handle the Republican response, the Republicans chose Rep. Charles
Boustany of Louisiana. Boustany was appropriate for a number of reasons.
First, he is, like most Republicans now, a crackpot who dabbles in
"birther" conspiracy theories about the Obama not even being a U.S.
citizen. Next, he's an exceedingly stupid man, who had apparently
written his "response" before having read the Obama speech; what little
of his rambling that was comprehensible was nonsensical, and the
entirety of it was badly read, in a monotone, from a cue card the
congressman seemed barely able to read. Boustany rolled out the tired
Republican mantra of malpractice tort "reform," and that's the other
part of what made him a perfect messenger for the Republicans--before
coming to congress, Boustany had been a surgeon, and had been repeatedly
sued for malpractice. His patients/victims had won millions.

One expects this sort of thing from conservative Republicans.

One doesn't expect it from more responsible elected officials, though,
and that's why the Obama's can't-we-all-just-get-along call, in his own
speech, for allowing states to begin experimenting with malpractice tort
"reform"--measures aimed at preventing us from suing butchers like
Boustany--was particularly depressing.[2]

As all two or three of my regular readers have probably guessed, I'm
quite tired of this administration. I've been tired of it since before
it took office, actually. I really do think Obama had a spark within
him, a little glowing ember that could have flared up into his becoming
something akin to a great president, as such things are usually judged.
It has always been there. I even saw it in parts of his speech tonight.
He's wasted his chance, though. He wasted it before he was even sworn
in. Barring some horrendous catastrophe or scandal in the years ahead,
he's limited his place in the history books to being the first person
elected to the presidency who wasn't entirely white. A few centuries
from now, that won't be impressive enough to make him more than a
footnote. His complete failure to seize the opportunity open to him is a
genuine tragedy. Probably not one that should seem unexpected in this
day and age, but a tragedy no less.

---

[1] And his plan has gotten worse. Tonight, he pooh-poohs the importance
of the "public option," while embracing the idea of a legal mandate that
everyone carry health insurance (a notion he'd previously rejected).

[2] Malpractice suits account for only between 0.8% and 2% of total
health outlays--completely eliminating all malpractice suits serves the
conservative interest in creating an overclass that is impervious to any
public accountability, but does nothing to reduce health care costs.