Al Franken Rips Into White House

It seems that I am not the only one angry with the White House with the lack of leadership with the health care bill.

From Politico:

"Sen. Al Franken ripped into White House senior adviser David Axelrod this week during a tense, closed-door session with Senate Democrats.

Five sources who were in the room tell POLITICO that Franken criticized Axelrod for the administration’s failure to provide clarity or direction on health care and the other big bills it wants Congress to enact."

Progressives have every right to be angry. The lack of leadership now is going to kill this bill. The ship doesn't appeared to have a captain. No amazing speech is going to save health care this time. No town hall meeting is going to have the magical touch. We need a leader and we don't have one. Al is voicing a lot of what us liberals are feeling. We need the job to get done and the White House is not doing its job.

If the bill goes down due to lack of leadership, you'll find a lot of progressives not all too interested in helping out the dems come november.

Reid Showing Cojones

A bit late to go on the attack but nice to see.

"Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) is accusing Republicans of undermining national security, saying GOP filibusters of White House nominees are leaving critical posts empty at the State Department and Department of Homeland Security."

Attacking repubs on their bread and butter issues is great. Keep hitting on this point.

DailyKos Poll Shows Craziness of Republican Base

DailyKos had a recent study done to see how crazy the repub base is. It comes back pretty shocking. Here are some highlights:

Do you think Barack Obama is a socialist?

Yes 63
No 21
Not Sure 16

Do you believe Sarah Palin is more qualified to be President than Barack Obama?

Yes 53
No 14
Not Sure 33

Do you believe Barack Obama is a racist who hates White people?

Yes 31
No 36
Not Sure 33

Should gay couples receive any state or federal benefits?

Yes 11
No 68
Not Sure 21

Check it out. There are some other really disturbing part and Kos kind of has a point about all of this.

"Ultimately, these results explain why it is impossible for elected Republicans to work with Democrats to improve our country. Their base are conspiracy mongers who don't believe Obama was born in the United States, that he is the second coming of Lenin, and that he is racist against white people."

This is why dems should not try and negotiate with repubs. They are useless.

Exercise In Futility

I have never seen a situation where beating your head against a wall gave good results but for some reason the White House seems to think it will.

"White House political adviser David Axelrod tells Mike Allen the White House is looking for more opportunities to involve Republicans in the tough choices necessary in governing,"

Really? More opportunities? The repubs have actually rebounded in polls because of their objective agenda. So, why would they offer to do anything when they have seen such success in doing nothing?

The problem. Dems messaging. Dems still do poorly in having a common message.

Not Looking Good For Dems

Because of bad jobs and the glacial pace of health care, people are angry. And so they should be. But this is not boding well for dems. There is a possibility that dems could lose up about 5-7 senate seats. Even senators who have a long history of good politics in solid dem states are at risk.

CQ politics has a good graphic up that says there are 9 toss up races. And most of those are currently held by dems. To add to the frustration there's this:

"Sen. Chuck Schumer's (D-NY) 'once rock solid approval rating has taken a slide. For the first time in nearly nine years, Schumer's approval rating has fallen below 50%.'"

Yea, that is right. Chuck seems to be taking a hit as well. Dems need to change the tune to this year's election quickly.

Obama's Losing Allies

It seems it is not just me who is becoming disillusioned by the president. It seems Jon Stewart is getting in on the action.

"Last week, though, the president was the punch line. After showing video of Obama speaking to schoolkids, the "Daily Show" host said in amazement: "You set up a presidential podium and a teleprompter in a sixth-grade classroom? . . . I'm not a political adviser, campaign strategist, et cetera, but that's not a great photo op in a middle school classroom."

As you read, it seems that Rachel Maddow, Ed Schultz, and Keith Olbermann also might be getting buyers remorse.

I really do think all this comes down to this. For 8 years we, dems/liberals, had a president who thumbed his nose at us. He went out of his way to give us the middle finger. The way he legislated, gave speeches, and in his appointees, Bush did not give a rats ass about the other side of the table. Now that dems are back in control, we want someone who is not afraid/timid to show his liberal side. I don't want a president doing what Bush did. What I do want is someone who is unabashed about being liberal. I wanted Obama to be a leader who will work with the other side but if they don't want to work then screw them. This timid/overly cautious road that he is taking is pissing us off. Stop cowtowing to such a bunch of obstructionists and get the countries shit done.

And here's the vid:

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
Obama Speaks to a Sixth-Grade Classroom
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Health Care Crisis

Dems Messaging Still Sucks

A new Pew Research Poll shows that only 32% of Americans know that the GOP was blocking the health care bill. This is absolutely ridiculous. Not only do dems have to fight tooth and nail to get anything passed, the public doesn't even know how hard they are working.

Dems have always had a hard time of getting their message across but I'll be damned if I am going to let this one slide past. It is their responsibility to let Americans know who is standing in the way of millions of people getting health care.

Dems, you will never be able to legislate until you can effectively put the heat on the GOP. This low number of public awareness of GOP obstructionism cannot be allowed to continue.

Harry Reid Will Probably Lose in November

Reid's chances of winning in November are looking dimmer and dimmer. He is losing to all possible GOP competitors and he is well below 50% favorability.

It will also be a mid-term election. Which basically means that motivated voters show up. Up until now, it is the right that is motivated.

Also adding problems to the mix is his son is running for Governor. This duo only seems to be reminding the Nevada electorate of how much they are not into Reid name.

At the end of the day, I am on that upset about it. Reid is not a motivating leader. I feel almost as if he fell into the job back in 2006 and has never really been able to catch his breath. Everything seems to be calling for a larger person than who he is.

What Killed The Heath Care Bill

The fall of the health care bill (while it is not dead yet, it is on life support.) I will lay at the feet of two people.

1. Looking back over the past year, it was the glacial pace of the markup of the Health Care bill the really killed the bill. Max Baucus made the really bad decision to try and get repub support for a bill that repubs had determined early to never support this piece of legislation. Max helped kill this bill

2. The lack of leadership from Obama. While leaving the mark up of the bill in congressional hands, when things were flagging, (during Baucus's mark-up) he did not come out and lead. Blame it on his tenor in the senate, but he did need to come out and bust some heads. 6 months on a bill when you have a majority was way too long. He needed to show some leadership and expedite the process.

What is left? There is a bill the senate passed and the house could pass it. It sucks but it could be passed and can be amended later. Now more than ever we need leadership and what do we see. No one. We see repubs steeling the headlines. Very discouraging.