Why they call it the "Party of New Ideas"

The first 100 days of the Obama Administration were devastating to what remains of the GOP. The Party appeared quaint, outdated and rudderless. Maybe even angry and frazzled.

But the GOP is back! With new ideas.

For instance: while Democrats in Congress fussed with legislation to curb the voracious appetites of the credit card companies, Republicans were conflicted. Sure, it was good to help consumers, but their dwindling base includes: the credit card companies.

That’s when the party’s “new ideas” people came up with a two-fer: an amendment Democrats hate that warms the hearts and holsters of the GOP’s gun lobby constituency. Their amendment to the credit card bill allows loaded weapons in national parks. Now when you pack for Yellowstone, you can really be “packing”. Thanks to the GOP “new ideas”, gun-toting vacationers with frayed nerves can erupt right along with Old Faithful.

That was just a start. The “new ideas” keep bubbling for the GOP.

This week they came up with their own health care reform proposal. What is exciting about their new healthcare system is that it keeps in place the same winners and losers of the old system. And unlike the auto bailout where UAW members must take pay cuts, insurance company executives will continue to make humongous salaries with the usual year-end bonuses for denying coverage for sick people.

The “Patients Choice Act of 2009” was introduced by Senators Tom Coburn of Oklahoma and Richard Burr of North Carolina. It provides a refundable tax credit of $5,710 per family. Okay, so health insurance for a family of four costs $12,700, but no plan is perfect. “This puts Republican ideas in the middle of the fight,” boasted Rep. Paul Ryan of Wisconsin, a House sponsor of the bill. Sen. Lamar Alexander of Tennessee proudly called it “a health care plan worthy of the party of Abraham Lincoln.”

Inside the conference hall the most appreciated “new idea” was for Republicans to quit dwelling on their own weaknesses and begin analyzing what’s wrong with the Democrats. There was a huge sigh of relief and thunderous applause when internal bickering and navel-gazing gave way to renaming the opposition the “Democrat Socialist Movement” or some such. With help from Texas secessionists and Fox News, this little PR stunt could, just possibly, have all the impact of the Tea Bag rebellion.

Perhaps the biggest “new idea” came from GOP Party Chair Michael Steele. Fighting for his job, he came up with a suggestion that left the party faithful gasping: No more pussyfooting around President Obama’s personal popularity--said Steele,“Let’s take him on!”

At this writing, party strategists aren’t quite sure how this will work. Obama is a gifted speaker with an approval rating in the high 70s whose message exudes an optimism and confidence that the American people appear to need.

The Steele plan features a rebuttal lineup of such GOP stalwarts as former Vice President Cheney, Newt Gingrich and Rush Limbaugh, each with poll numbers in the single digits and sinking. It doesn’t get any better in the Congress where minority leaders John Boehner and Mitch McConnell are known as Gloom and Doom. Even conservatives get suicidal following their many funereal press conferences claiming Obama’s policies will end western civilization as we know it.

That’s the challenge Steele threw at them, and it was so staggering, so unexpected, that it had its desired result: GOP national committee members were so nonplussed they went home without throwing him under the bus.

How to save the GOP

There is growing concern over the recent loss of such American icons as Circuit City, the Pontiac Firebird and the Republican Party.

Circuit City and the Firebird are gone, done in by a weak economy. The GOP has been done in by much more than the economy, but there are those who believe the party can be saved, perhaps should be saved, if you really believe our country is better off with two political parties even if one of them has spent the past two decades bad-mouthing the federal government it wants to run.

It is not a pretty picture.

Among Republicans, there are 15 million true believers. They listen to Rush Limbaugh every day, believe everything he says and worship the airwaves he unbalances.

Then there are the moderates, thoughtful, hopeful their party will come to grips with problems that trouble average citizens. At last count, there were nine of these (eight, if Rush has his way with Colin Powell).

Even though the numbers favor Rush and the ditto-heads, Republicans on Capitol Hill don’t want to write off the moderates. Losing a “liberal” like Arlen Specter was okay, but those two women Senators up in Maine should be saved if the East Coast is not to be abandoned altogether.

Southern officeholders, those with the safe seats who can and do say the most outrageous things that leave GOP voters elsewhere gasping and changing their registration, are to do what they were taught as children: to be silent and let the adults speak.

The party has to get some new, attractive, young leaders. Newt Gingrich has been around for such a long time people often forget why they don’t like him. Minority whip Eric Cantor is a bright young man who has good ideas but comes across as someone about to foreclose on your house. He and the party also need reminding that while “no” may be a tactic, it is not a policy for rebuilding America.

Above all, the party must put a “cone of silence” over Dick Cheney. They’ve got to get the man to shut up. During his last year in office, Cheney was rarely heard from, and when the economy came apart at the seams he had nothing to say, leaving all the heavy-thinking to W (and we know how that turned out).

When they left the White House, W’s approval ratings were the lowest of any president, ever, but compared to Cheney he was FDR. A tight-lipped W went back to Texas, leaving his legacy to the Ari Fleishers and Fox News. Cheney bounded out of his bunker as if on steroids, appearing on more channels than “Law and Order” re-runs, praising torture and expressing disgust at Republicans like Powell.

Finally, Republicans have to get a grip on taxes. Despite everything Grover Norquist has told them, cutting taxes does not solve every problem. The party needs to understand that our government can’t function without taxes. Despite what Rush tells you, taxes are needed for more than just Medicaid and food stamps. Taxes pay for schools and highways and sewer systems. Taxes pay for our military war machine that the GOP leadership can’t have enough of—they keep throwing money (taxpayer money) at new weapons systems the Pentagon says it doesn’t need.

While the GOP picture may look grim now, we Democrats have been there. We know they just might be one obscure community organizer away from turning it around.

At Last

At last, Republicans have a healthcare plan. Carefully crafted by master spinner Frank Luntz, their plan is how to kill the Democratic healthcare plan.

President Obama has made health care his top legislative issue. He wants a plan that provides affordable health care for every American. Polls show that the American people like that idea and feel it can’t come too soon.

Of course, on an issue where the concerns of average people are at odds with a profit-making industry, the GOP feels compelled to step in and protect the industry.

This is in their tradition. It’s why they fought Social Security and Medicare and Medicaid. Often there are repercussions at the polls, but Republicans must be true to their principals, or at least the ones who fund their campaigns.

I, for one, am flabbergasted that Obama and this Congress s are this close to what we’ve been dreaming of and hallucinating about ever since President Truman first proposed universal health care in 1948.

We’re almost there, and it’s kind of scary.

You know how I first knew we might actually win? This week when Karen Ignagni, head honcho of the insurance lobby, practically begged the Congress to slap the industry with new regulations, forcing them to behave. “We have to have a complete overhaul of the rules,” she implored. Stop us before we gouge again! There wasn’t a dry eye among onlookers or the Senate Finance Committee.

Little wonder that Republicans want our dysfunctional healthcare system to stay just the way it is, even though it bankrupts families and leaves 46 million without coverage. America is the only country in the world to use a business model to provide health care. The purpose of business is to make a profit. Billions in profit. Now those profits are at risk.

Enter Frank Luntz, silver-tongued devil who can make “pre-existing condition” sound like you won the lottery. He gave desperate Congressional Republicans a 26-page memo telling them now to stop legislation that everyone wants. Pretend to be “vocally and passionately on the side of reform”, he advises, but then mislead like crazy with arguments like these:

· “It could lead to the government rationing care, making people stand in line.” (46 million people are asking where the line forms so they can get in it).
· “Scare people. Especially about their children.” (I don’t think this involves Bristol Palin, but it might).
· “Leave Obama out of it.” Luntz concedes the President is too popular even for smoke & mirrors to work.
· “It could lead to the government setting standards of care. Do you want a bureaucrat standing between you and your doctor?” Interesting he should ask. With our current system, it’s the insurance company standing between patients and their doctors. In her testimony to the Senate Finance Committee this week, Dr. Margaret Flowers observed that “health insurance administrators are practicing medicine without a medical license.”

What Republicans worry about most is the “public option” that Democrats consider essential to genuine reform. GOP leaders told reporters that government-run coverage would drive private insurers out of business. The government, they complain, could undercut private insurers with lower prices…

That’s their best argument against?

Better get back to the Luntz playbook: “Let’s talk about those long lines in Canada…”

Anyone in Canada want to trade their healthcare system for ours?

Didn’t think so.

Say goodnight, Frank.

Gunds and good health

The Party of No continues to lose moderates and independents. The GOP alternative budget drew more snickers than votes. But as their base shrinks, two well-heeled supporters-- the National Rifle Association and the health insurance industry--
have nowhere else to go.

These are two of the most powerful lobbies in Washington, and probably the most reviled.

No one knows who kills more in America: guns, or a dysfunctional healthcare system that allows thousands of uninsured to die every year for lack of medical care.

Guns are recession-proof. The worse things are, the more people want guns. The business is booming, literally.

In the past month there have been seven mass shootings. Average people going loony over home foreclosures and lost jobs are more likely to seek assault weapons than counseling.

GOP policies have helped create a society where it is easier to buy an AK 47 than a birth control pill. The party champions 2nd Amendment rights while strident voices on cable TV and talk radio demonize elected leadership and cry for armed rebellion. As someone said, “strong words appeal to weak minds” and that appears to be true with both guns and health care.

Democrats in Congress are trying to solve a healthcare crisis that is not only killing us but bankrupting our economy. President Obama is pushing for the biggest healthcare reform since Lyndon Johnson pushed through Medicare in 1965. LBJ did that with minimal Republican support in Congress and Obama will have to do the same this year.

Republicans appear more concerned about the welfare of the health insurance companies than the health of their constituents. Sen. Minority Leader Mitch McConnell is bitterly opposed to Obama’s idea of a public insurance option that would drive down prices and keep private insurers in check.

The good news is that Democratic chairs of five key congressional committees support it and are willing to go the reconciliation route to get it passed.

In opposition, the weakest crutch the GOP leadership has to lean on is a “citizens” campaign headed up by a guy named Rick Scott. As has been reported all over town, Scott is a charlatan. He is the best evidence we have that the health insurance industry needs reform.

Scott headed up Columbia/HCA, the largest health care company in the world, until he was ousted by his own board of directors in 1997 for over-billing state and federal Medicare and Medicaid programs. The company pled guilty and paid $1.7 billion to settle.

Would you buy a healthcare policy from this man? Congressman Mike Burgess, Republican of Texas and a member of the House health subcommittee, just might.

Burgess said in a recent interview that he had invited Scott to meet with him because he liked what he had been saying.

Strong words appeal to weak minds? Stay tuned.

Southern Pork

Even with the economy reeling, conservatives in Congress are demanding a boost in military spending; confirming once again that the largest special interest group in Washington is the Department of Defense.

Republicans use patriotism and fear to bludgeon Democrats into supporting bigger and bigger defense expenditures. Southern senators –including the Democrat’s Blue Dogs --view military spending as a jobs program.

They want to devote tens of billions of the stimulus package to the military. “If bridges need fixing, so too do the tools with which our military fights,” wrote a military analyst at the American Enterprise Institute.

U.S. military spending is close to $1 trillion a year. No other nation spends even one-tenth as much. The costs for our war machine equal the military spending of the globe combined. You could put together the next 13 largest navies and ours would still be larger. Not to mention that 11 of those navies are our allies.

And do we really need military bases all over the world?

Military spending increased 60% since George W took office in 2001, not including the costs of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan that he kept off the books.

At a press conference earlier this month, President Obama took aim at the Pentagon when he said “we are spending money on things that we don’t need, and we are paying more than we need to pay.”

DOD is legendary for its cost overruns. A 2008 GAO report showed that from 2000-07 the cost of major new defense programs had grown some $300 billion over original estimates. Army Times notes the typical defense system was 26% over budget and 21 months behind schedule, but its Tim Geithner the GOP hawks scream at for wasting taxpayer dollars.

The amount we waste on unnecessary weapons systems would pave miles of highways and build thousands of new classrooms. We’ve spent zillions on missile systems that in tests are successful only 50% of the time even when we know the exact flight path of the missile.

Some make the point that lavish new weapons systems aren’t needed to fight a foe that has relied on box-cutters for its most destructive attack.

But you won’t hear that from Republicans in Congress. They prefer to rant and rail about money Democrats want to spend to provide every American with health care. As Rep. Joe Barton of Texas put it before Obama’s healthcare summit: “Not all of the Democrats’ ideas are objectionable. Just nearly all.”

Stuck in their ideology

With medical bills bankrupting one American every 30 seconds, strangling business and wrecking family budgets, the cry for healthcare reform is heard loud and clear coast to coast.

On the east coast, here is President Obama speaking to a joint session of Congress: “The cost of our health care has weighed down our economy and the conscience of our nation long enough. So let there be no doubt—healthcare reform cannot wait, it must not wait, and it will not wait another year.”

On the West Coast, here is an exasperated Republican Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger venting to the world at large: “You’ve got to listen to the people. If the nation is screaming out loud: ‘We need healthcare reform’. ‘We want to have universal care’. ‘We want to have everyone insured’. ‘We want to bring the costs down’. ‘We want everyone to have access.’ I mean, that’s what they want; that’s what you do. So you’ve got to do what the people want you to do rather than getting stuck in your ideology.”

And of course here’s the response from GOP House Minority Leader John (stuck in his ideology) Boehner: “We can’t have a health system run by the government.”

Why not?

That’s what the rest of the industrialized world has and they spend half what we do for health care and they cover everyone while our system leaves nearly 50 million Americans with no coverage and millions more underinsured.

President Obama has made healthcare his top fiscal priority, linking health reform to a strong economy: “There are some people who are making the argument that we can’t do anything about health care because the economy comes first. They don’t understand that health care is the biggest component of our economy and, when it’s broken, that affects everything.”

That view is shared by America’s Agenda: Health Care for All, a non-profit organization of labor and business leaders created to support statewide healthcare reform campaigns. Their efforts over the past several years have produced useful models for national reform legislation.

America’s Agenda is sponsoring a series of “Summit Conversations” designed to highlight the emerging national consensus on key components of a 21st century healthcare system. The first Summit was held Feb. 28 at the University of Miami, hosted by President Donna Shalala. An impressive panel of experts agreed we can’t have economic recovery without reforming health care.

“This will sink the economy permanently if we don’t solve it now,” said Billy Tauzin, CEO of PhRMA.

“We’re going to lose our entire auto industry,” said former House Majority Leader Dick Gephardt.

Doug Dority, president of America’s Agenda and former head of the United Food & Commercial Workers, put the issue in perspective for the people he used to argue with across the bargaining table: “No employer can sustain a double-digit growth in healthcare costs year after year after year. The system we have is destined to collapse.”

This week when President Obama invited leaders of both parties to a White House Summit on Health Care, talks of compromise were drowned out by rampant ideology. Obama is proposing a solution that gives Americans the choice of keeping their existing insurance plan or enrolling in a new public option. That’s a no-no for conservatives. The very notion of government competing with private insurers drives them crazy. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell says he’s willing to work with Democrats but “no public option” was where he drew his ideological line in the sand.

Further roiling the ideological waters is a new multimillion dollar ad campaign against government-run health care launched by Conservatives for Patients Rights. This group is headed by Richard Scott who obviously knows something about the cause of soaring healthcare costs. In 1997 he was forced to resign as CEO of HCA after a federal investigation of Medicare fraud resulted in $1.7 billion in fines.

Among the potential areas of compromise, this could be one:

President Obama put $20 billion in his stimulus package to improve health information technology. Efficiency alone will save money and save lives. If Congress is looking for an IT model, look no further than the Veterans Administration. Veterans who become ill while away from home can go into any VA hospital in the country and doctors electronically can pull up their medical records and know how to treat them.

VA, of course, is government-run.

The 'suits' and their fight for workers

If laws were made by working men and women who punch time clocks, Right to Work would be a sick joke and unions would prosper. Unions give workers rights on the job, guaranteed in writing. Workers know that without a contract every aspect of their employment can be changed, at any time for any reason, by the boss.

But laws are made by guys in three-piece suits who have no idea what it’s like to work for a living.

Big business is spending millions to defeat the Employee Free Choice Act, legislation that would make it easier for workers to join unions. Tom Donahue, president of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, calls the card-check bill “payback” that unions expect in return for supporting Barack Obama’s presidential campaign.

Obama sees strong unions not as payback but an essential part of his effort to rebuild the middle class, the chief bulwark of a strong American economy.

Opponents wrap themselves in the flag, shocked, shocked, that card-check would deprive workers of secret ballot elections. Which sounds reasonable except for the fact employers openly violate federal law governing election campaigning.

This is what employers don’t want to give up during the interval before the “secret ballot” elections: The opportunity to intimidate or even fire union supporters and ban organizers from entering the premises or even posting union materials while requiring workers to attend meetings where only the company’s side is presented. The election is held on the employer’s property with workers escorted to the polls by management supervisors.

Obama put it best during the presidential campaign: “If a majority of workers want a union, they should get a union. It’s that simple. That’s why I’ve been fighting for it in the Senate and that’s why I’ll make it the law of the land when I’m president of the United States.”

It is uncertain how soon he will push for passage of the bill, knowing the havoc it will wreak with business support of his other legislative goals. But appointing California Rep. Hilda Solis as his Labor Secretary is a good sign. “Unions are vital to the health and strength of our communities, and our workers are the bedrock of our economy,” said Solis, who co-sponsored the card-check bill in the House.

Solis believes in the “American Dream” because she lived it. She is the daughter of immigrants who were blue-collar union workers. She credits unions with securing the wages and benefits that allowed her parents to move their family into the middle class, send their children to college and raise a daughter who was elected to Congress.

As Labor Secretary, she inherits a department that for eight years abandoned its mission to protect workers. A good example is OSHA, where the Bush administration director said “employers, not workers”, were the agency’s real customers.

One thing is clear: our nation will never climb out of the abyss of economic meltdown by pushing harder on its citizens for cheaper wages. Rebuilding our infrastructure begins with rebuilding our middle class. Beating up on auto workers in bailout hearings and demanding they take less pay if their corporations are to survive is a defeatist message.

Passage of the Employee Free Choice Act will revitalize and invigorate not only organized labor but the American economy.