With Friends Like This

Ezra Klein had a rather interesting interesting post up at his Washington Post blog about Sen. Joseph Lieberman's (I-Connecticut) behavior during the crafting of the healthcare reform bill. The context of the post is the recent election and the current finger pointing going on with respect to why the Democrats did so poorly. But it's also about how the Senate operates, especially in dealing with issues crucial to the American public.

Late in the negotiations over the public option, a group of five conservative Democrats and five more-liberal Democrats seemed near to an unexpectedly smart compromise: Allow adults over 55 to buy into Medicare. This idea had a couple of different virtues: For one, it opened an effective and cheap program up to a group of Americans who often have the most trouble finding affordable insurance. For another, the Congressional Budget Office has said this policy would improve Medicare's finances by bringing healthier, younger applicants into the risk pool. Oh, and it's wildly popular with liberals, who want to see Medicare offered as an option to more people, and since Medicare is already up and running, it could've been implemented rapidly.

But Lieberman killed it. It was never really clear why. He'd been invited to the meetings where the compromise was developed, but he'd skipped them. He'd supported the idea when he ran for president with Al Gore, and he'd reaffirmed that support three months prior to its emergence in the health-care debate during an interview with the editorial board of the Connecticut Post. But now that it was on the table, he seemed to be groping for reasons to oppose it. About the best he managed was that it was "duplicative," which was about as nonsensical a position as could be imagined. Nevertheless, he swore to filibuster the bill if the buy-in option was added. The proposal was duly removed.

In other words, yet again Joe Lieberman, the once-upon-a-time Democrat who became an Independent after he lost the Democratic primary, screwed the party that allowed him to keep his plum committee chairmanships even though he was no longer a Democrat and had zero seniority. Apparently the deal given to him by the Senate Democratic leadership only required that he caucus with the Dems, not that he vote with them. Some deal.

That the "most exclusive country club in the world" is a dysfunctional body comes as no surprise to anyone. That's one of the reasons why voters were angry this election. This little episode also sheds some light on why liberal voters were so angry that many of them just stayed home on election day.

The White House never promised a single-payer system, but did hint at a public option for those who simply could not afford private insurance premiums. When that hint evaporated, there was at least an attempt to compromise on the issue. While the compromise was certainly not a replacement for what most Americans need, at least it was a move in the right direction. And it would have been enough of a sop that liberals would have settled for it. The compromise also had the virtue of shoring up Medicare. Yet Joe Lieberman was allowed to scuttle it, and he will not pay any penalty. He wasn't up for re-election, and he will have the same power in the 112th Congress.

What I find so horrific about the whole episode is that this is the first time I've heard of it, and I followed the healthcare reform process pretty carefully. I also don't consider myself to actually be a "fucking retard," although I will cop to being naive. It would have been nice if somebody in the press had weighed in on the threat made by Joe Lieberman. It would have been nicer if Harry Reid or any other senator had let us know why we couldn't have a public option or something vaguely approaching it beyond stating "the votes aren't there." Well, the votes weren't there earlier this month, and this is one of the reasons why.

Morons.

Signs Of Life

For all the angst and heartbreak this whole crazy episode of "health care reform" has brought us all, there were a few times I actually felt something akin to hope. I know, that's crazy talk. Progressives have been on the losing end on each and every issue. Still, there have been moments when just how high the deck was stacked against real reform was pointed out by unlikely sources. This morning contained one of those moments. In an editorial entitled "The Million Dollar Man", the NY Times clearly and decisively ripped Joseph I. Lieberman (I-CT) a new one for his crass and contemptuous behavior.

...way back in September, the senator was publicly championing a Medicare buy-in.

In an interview with The Connecticut Post, he said he had been refining his views on health care for many years and was “very focused on a group post-50, or maybe more like post-55” whose members should be able to buy Medicare if they lacked insurance.

This week, when there actually seemed to be a compromise on health care that did not focus on Mr. Lieberman, he announced that he would block the package if the Democrats included a terrible idea — allowing people between 55 and 65 to buy Medicare.

He presented this as a principled effort to keep down federal debt, but when a Times reporter asked about his 180-degree turn, he said he had forgotten taking his earlier position until the Democratic leadership reminded him about it over the weekend.

Mr. Lieberman has taken more than $1 million from the industry over his Senate career. In his 2006 re-election campaign, he ranked second in the Senate in contributions from the industry. He doesn’t seem to have forgotten that.

There's nothing ambiguous or nuanced about that assessment, and it is right on the money (to coin a phrase). While a huge segment of the Congress is now and has been for decades on the payroll of the insurance industry, something which a lot of us on the left have been pointing out for almost that long, few (if any) in the traditional media have found that particularly newsworthy. This time, however, Sen. Lieberman (who caucuses with the Democrats but has suggested he might run for re-election as a Republican) overplayed his hand, at least as far as the Times is concerned.

It's about time somebody noticed.

Now the question becomes, "And just what is anybody going to do about it?"

On that I am not so optimistic, but the signs of life shown by the editorial board of one of the nation's most influential newspapers is, at the very least, encouraging.

Joe's Gig

Joe Lieberman, the Connecticut independent, got himself a very nice committee chairmanship by promising to caucus with the Democrats in the Senate and to vote with the Democrats on everything but "the war." The fact that Mr. Lieberman has broken that promise over and over again, most recently when he threatened to join the Republicans in filibustering the Senate health care reform bill, doesn't appear to disturb Majority Leader Harry Reid and the Democratic leadership a whit. Lieberman still chairs the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs.

Now Mr. Lieberman has an issue he can run wild with, and he is doing just that. Tim Rutten, a Los Angeles Times columnist, notes with disgust the senator's unerring instinct for opportunism.

Sen. Joe Lieberman insists on pushing ahead with a Senate inquiry into the mass murder at Ft. Hood, despite White House and Pentagon anxieties that the probe could compromise the prosecution of alleged killer Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan.

It's always interesting to see how many friends due process has in times of extreme stress. Given what looks like the security authorities' wretched mishandling of the Hasan case -- the guy appears to have done everything but paste an "Osama bin Laden Rocks" bumper sticker on his car -- there's every reason for the administration and the FBI to want to put off a legislative reckoning for as long as possible. "We want to guarantee everyone a fair trial" is always good cover. But in this case, it has the additional virtue of being true.

For Lieberman's part, the Connecticut independent -- funny how that latter noun seems synonymous with "opportunist" in his case -- has an unerring instinct for plucking the political moment's low-hanging fruit. The chairman of the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs told Fox News that he wants to know whether Hasan's signs of "Islamic extremism" were "missed or ignored."

Those of us who have followed this terrible story can answer "yes" -- a conclusion we've reached even without the benefit of subpoena power. But these aren't questions that should be addressed in the politically charged, highly partisan atmosphere of Capitol Hill.

Of course, the concept of a fair trial doesn't matter to Mr. Lieberman. He has already convicted Major Hasan and is ready to construct the gallows. But then, for Joe, it isn't about a fair trial, it's only about Joe: getting Joe face time on the Sunday Morning Talk Shoes, getting Joe's mug plastered all over the front pages of daily newspapers, getting Joe quoted as often as possible. If it messes up a criminal investigation, too bad.

That Joe Lieberman still has a committee chairmanship is a testimonial to the kind of leadership Democrats have in the Senate and what they consider important. And that is both disappointing and scary.