15 Comments
User's avatar
⭠ Return to thread
User's avatar
Comment deleted
Aug 13, 2021
Comment deleted
Expand full comment
HBI's avatar

Do you remember the Hillarycare adventure of 1993-4?

He probably could have appeared like he was fighting harder, but he took what he could get. The health insurers had enough votes to kill the bill. Do you not realize that?

Expand full comment
Abbybwood's avatar

Obama could have championed “Medicare for All” with a fireside chat and a few graphs. He could have asked ALL Americans to contact their members of Congress.

But he didn’t. He was owned then and he he owned now.

Expand full comment
JohnOnKaui's avatar

Brings to mind an image of a vaudeville stage and a puppet. Mr Fish could draw it.

Expand full comment
HBI's avatar

Does anyone really believe in smash mouth politics where politicians do things not in their own interest because they get phone calls because they are frozen in fear in their offices?

Do you believe in the Easter Bunny and Santa too?

Expand full comment
Nobody's avatar

If there's an actual fear of being voted out it makes a difference.

Expand full comment
Thomas Hancock's avatar

I didn't know health insurers could vote in Congress. Anyway, using sortition instead of voting for members of Congress could clear up the lobbying mess. Also wouldn't need to flush billions of dollars on political campaigns every few years. ...

A vanguard revolution and overthrow of the current US government--which now is just a front for the dozen of so richest people in the world--will eventually happen. A strongman or group (the ideology doesn't matter, left or right, as long as it is authoritarian) will find the key to starting a populist uprising in the U.S., and then the real fun will start.

Members of the military gunning down protestors by the dozens, like is done in other nations. Concentration camps, thousands of people "disappeared", mass graves, the whole nine yards. This is what's coming and Obama, after Bush, set the country up for it. It's surprising people don't say this. Maybe they don't realize how bad it is in the nation. I suppose they think the NSA is listening.

Of course I could be wrong. Maybe we just gradually sink into the mire until China takes over, and everyone stays happy at home, watching sports and playing videogames. I am though almost 99 percent sure elections don't matter anymore. You can't vote against the interests of Goldman Sachs.

Expand full comment
Sevender's avatar

Anyone this stupid should probably be euthanized for the sake of simple humanity.

Expand full comment
User's avatar
Comment deleted
Aug 14, 2021
Comment deleted
Expand full comment
Sevender's avatar

Insulting your what?

Expand full comment
User's avatar
Comment deleted
Aug 14, 2021
Comment deleted
Expand full comment
HBI's avatar

He wasn't there to send a message. He was there to accomplish something to burnish his own legacy. It's a consistent theory of people acting in their own interest. Divining that interest is the hardest part, and usually not that hard. Do you not think that if he could have instituted a NHS he would have? It would have been a better legacy. He took what he could get.

With the de facto fascism inherent in the system in the US, I don't think anything like the NHS or M4A is possible. Where is the money that is going to make it in politicians' interest in the short term to do this? That's right, it doesn't exist.

Expand full comment
User's avatar
Comment deleted
Aug 14, 2021
Comment deleted
Expand full comment
HBI's avatar

Both are based on a fantasy of people acting not in their own interest.

Expand full comment
Thomas Hancock's avatar

Nixon and FDR both acted out of fear of the people, and many politicians took their promise of serving the public seriously, and didn't acquire vast wealth. That's just two. So you are completely wrong with your "it's always been this way." Politicians do occasionally act for reasons other than their own interest. Read up on some history and you won't repeat this embarrassing falsehood.

Expand full comment
ErrorError