Right Wing Nut House

Ezra Klein, blogger for the Washington Post, appears to be a conduit for the Obama administration to both Congress and the American people as he apparently has gotten information on what the White House wants us to believe they are thinking regarding how they are going to rescue health care reform.

There are wheels turning within wheels here, so it is as important to note what isn’t being said as much as what message the White House wants Klein to be sending.

According to Klein there are two camps in the White House on what kind of reform package the president will actually put down on paper and highlight in his joint session speech next Wednesday:

The first camp could be called “universal-lite.” They’re focused on preserving the basic shape of the bill. They think a universal plan is necessary for a number of reasons: For one thing, the insurance market regulations don’t work without universality, as you can’t really ask insurers to offer standard prices if the healthy and the young don’t have to enter the system. For another, it will be easier to change subsidies or improve the benefit package down the road if the initial offerings prove inadequate. New numbers are easier than new features. Creating a robust structure is the most important thing. This camp seems to be largely headed by the policy people.

The second camp is not universal at all. This camp believes the bill needs to be scaled back sharply in order to ensure passage. Covering 20 million people isn’t as good as covering 40 million people, but it’s a whole lot better than letting the bill fall apart and covering no one at all. It’s also a success of some sort, and it gives you something to build on. What that sacrifices in terms of structure it gains in terms of political appeal. This camp is largely headed by members of the political team.

Both camps accept that the administration’s proposal will be less generous than what has emerged from either the HELP or House Committees. The question, it seems, is how much less generous.

For the administration to admit that there is a split into two camps probably means that there are not only more than two but that reform is causing the Obama administration to slowly unravel. There seems to be a rift between the far left, and the practical left, with the ideologues more numerous, but lacking the clout of the Rahmbo wing in the administration.

It is also significant that the ideologues are still pushing a strong public option. I referred to the public option as a “Zombie” on my radio show because it’s still walking around, not realizing it has been killed. The numbers are just not adding up in the Senate for any kind of a public option, but it continues to be pressed because the ideological base of the Democratic party refuses to sign off on any reform that doesn’t include it.

The bottom line is that it is a very difficult uphill climb for Obama to achieve any kind of legislative success on health care reform. At the moment, he just can’t get there from here. The practical left realizes that but will have an enormously difficult time convincing the ideologues to drop the public option and go for more modest reforms.

A couple of thing are certain; Obama going before Congress means that the process will not be shut down, that there will be bills emerging from both the House and the Senate, that there will almost certainly be votes on those bills, and that passage in the House of a more liberal bill is almost assured.

The senate process apparently hinges on one lone senator - Republican liberal Olympia Snowe - who has taken it upon herself to negotiate for the entire party:

The answer appears to hinge on Sen. Olympia Snowe. “I’m a Snowe-ite,” joked one official. Her instincts on health care have proven quite a bit more liberal than those of many Democrats. In the Gang of Six meetings, she joined Sen. Jeff Bingaman in focusing on affordability and coverage - putting her, in practice, somewhat to the left of Conrad and Baucus. The problem is that Snowe is scared to be the sole Republican supporting this bill, not to mention the Republican who ensures the passage of this bill. The reprisals within her caucus could be tremendous.

If Snowe drops off the bill, using the budget reconciliation process will probably be a necessity. The bill then goes through Sen. Kent Conrad’s Budget Committee, giving him much more power over the product. The absence of any Republicans repels at least a couple of conservative Democrats. Passage becomes much less certain, which means a scaled-back bill becomes much more likely. This is the irony of the health-care endgame: The bill becomes much more conservative if it loses its final Republican.

I don’t think Snowe will still be a Republican by the end of the year - especially if she is responsible for the passage of the kind of reform being contemplated. Even on judges, she has become an unreliable vote. The question is going to be asked why she didn’t leave sooner.

At this point, it appears the senate will use reconciliation to pass their version of health care - a considerably more “conservative” version than will be passed by the House. At that point, the real headknocking will begin and we’ll see some blood on the floor in the Democratic caucus. I’d say the chances are no better than 60-40 for any kind of bill by the end of the year. I base this on the fact that the president has failed to show leadership on the issue to this point, and expecting him to suddenly acquire the skills to ram this thing through Congress when he has shown no such ability previously is taking a lot on faith.

A couple of other things.

1. Cost “savings” in any White House package will be nothing more than smoke and mirrors. They will try to sell their version of reform as almost revenue neutral through dishonest accounting, hiding some costs in out years of the budget, as well as grossly exaggerating the dollar amounts that would be saved in specific provisions. Any CBO estimates will be ignored. Even in a scaled down version of reform, it will be the only way to fulfill Obama’s promise of not signing a bill that adds to the deficit.

2. The chances of the White House and the Democratic party imploding over reform are fading as Obama becomes more engaged on the issue. Differences will be papered over to the extent that they can because all sides realize the enormous stakes involved. The president’s defenders may dismiss the idea that his administration would be castrated by a failure to vote out a reform bill, but  the rest of Obama’s agenda is in deep peril unless he can deliver. He is asking his party to go far, far out on a very thin limb. There are enough vulnerable members who would likely not forget being left to hang if the president can’t get anything done.

The posting at Obama’s “Organizing for America” website that referred to conservative opponents of health care reform as “Right-Wing Domestic Terrorists who are subverting the American Democratic Process, whipped to a frenzy by their Fox Propaganda Network ceaselessly re-seizing power for their treacherous leaders” has, unfortunately been taken down. No explanation has been forthcoming for why it was allowed to go up in the first place but, hey! Stuff happens, right? Forgive and forget, eh? No harm, no foul.

But I must confess to being a little disappointed. Not because the opposition sees conservatives as “Right Wing Domestic Terrorists.”

We are.

But because I haven’t been whipped into a frenzy yet by that famous television network Fox Propaganda Network. (Did anyone else notice the weird, bizarrely haphazard manner in which the author capitalized letters? “American Democratic Process” but not “treacherous leaders?”)

Given how boring my life has been lately, a little frenzy would be a welcome break. I could really dig getting all lathered up, foaming at the mouth, ranting incoherently at the Communists who are trying to impose Marxist-Leninist ideals and programs on America.

I guess I’ll have to settle for a night of passion with my Zsu-Zsu. And although I often foam at the mouth and get lathered up when in the throes of connubial bliss with my love, I draw the line at ranting incoherently about Communism. Kinda kills the mood, if you know what I mean.

Frenzy or no, the attraction to being a domestic terrorist lies in the sublime effect that the terrorist lifestyle has on one’s outlook toward political opponents. No need to argue logically, or even call liberals dirty names. Just blow the bastards up if they disagree.

Simple, but quite effective judging by the reaction by many to the Mohamed cartoons. Nobody cares if you suspend Jesus on the cross in a glass jar full of urine. But put a funny hat and a comical beard on the Prophet (PBUH) and KABOOM! No more critics of Mohamed. Note the extreme care Yale Press just took to avoid such a fate when they decreed a book about the reaction to the Mohamed cartoons would be published without…the Mohamed cartoons.

Roger Kimball writing at PJ Media a few weeks ago:

I’d like to second the desideratum expressed by the British journalist Charles Moore at the time: “I wish,” Moore wrote in the Telegraph, “someone would mention the word that dominates Western culture in the face of militant Islam — fear. And then I wish someone would face it down.”

Is Yale stepping up to the plate? “Good idea!” you say. “About time someone had the courage to investigate that episode of insanity. I mean, really: you publish a handful of satirical cartoons and then adherents of the ostentatiously misnamed ‘religion of peace’ go postal, start burning down Danish embassies across the globe, issuing death threats to the cartoonists, etc.”

How great would it be to strike that kind of fear in the breast of liberals every time they felt like writing some nonsensical screed about conservatives? The effect a little terror would have on their delicate psyches would be positively delicious.

Unfortunately, I know nothing of explosives and, given my coarse mechanical aptitude, I’d probably end up blowing myself up like Bill Ayers’ terrorist buddies back in the day. Back then, we had real domestic terrorists - or at least they played one on TV. The whole Weather Underground thing always had the stink of sanctimony about it rather than the religious fanaticism, and belief in a higher cause that al-Qaeda demonstrates on a regular basis.

Lefty terrorists at that time were not suicide bombers. It is doubtful the idea even occurred to them. They were too selfish, too self centered to die for anything greater than their own heroic image of themselves. Spoiled rich kids throwing a tantrum with home made dynamite and C-4 instead of flinging their Erector Set through the window. Lethal, but something of a bizarre parody of dedicated Marxists or wacko Islamists.

No matter. I must report that real right wing terrorists are equally pathetic creatures. McVeigh and his buddies may have had a better idea of what they were doing thanks to their military training, but demonstrated similar cluelessness about how to be truly terrifying. Yes, blowing up the federal building in Oklahoma city was a heinous crime but Clinton didn’t blame the bombers, he blamed Rush Limbaugh. I wonder how McVeigh felt about that?

I guess we better face it. We Americans just don’t do terrorism very well. We’re not ignorant enough to be as fanatical, dedicated, and determined to die as al-Qaeda. Apparently, however, the OFA believes that we on the right may indeed possess the right stuff to at least approximate what Islamists pulled off on 9/11. Their confidence in us is inspiring and if they’re very lucky, like those liberals who try to appease the Islamists by not trying to annoy them, we will blow them to smithereens last.

I only hope I can live up to their expectations.

I suggest rather than waiting until we right wing terrorists make it to heaven to enjoy those 72 virgins, we skip the formalities of killing ourselves and indulge our fantasies today. Think of the inducement to recruiting fellow right wing domestic terrorists that would have! We’d be beating potentials off with a stick. I daresay even conservative women would want to get in the act if they had the opportunity to enjoy 72 young, studly men.

Except with all that taking our heavenly reward here on earth, there would barely be enough time left over to blow anything up. I mean, how long would it take you to make your way through 72 virgins? And forget our conservative women terrorists. They’d want to be wined and dined, insist on foreplay, want to cuddle and have a cigarette afterwards, and maybe even go another round with their boy toys. Some of them may even want a second date! The horror.

I want to thank OFA but thinking about it, I think it best to decline the honor of being designated a right wing domestic terrorist. Fox Propaganda Network will just have to muddle through without me. I am much too old and far too large to be playing the internationally wanted, dangerous and desperate terrorist.

I suppose I could always make myself into a terrorist mouthpiece…

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Tonight, my special guests are Cassy Fiano of AIP and Fausta Wertz. We’ll talk about Afghanistan, health care reform, and some politics.

The show will air from 7:00 - 8:00 PM Central time. You can access the live stream here. A podcast will be available for streaming or download shortly after the end of the broadcast.

Click on the stream below and join in on what one wag called a “Wayne’s World for adults.”

The Chat Room will open around 15 minutes before the show opens,

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Winston Churchill is quoted as saying, ““There is nothing wrong with change, if it is in the right direction.” Indeed, many have the wrong idea about conservatism in that they assume we don’t believe in “change” as it is generally understood.

Nothing could be further from the truth, as those of us who have read and understand Russell Kirk know:

The conservative is not opposed to social improvement, although he doubts whether there is any such force as a mystical Progress, with a Roman P, at work in the world. When a society is progressing in some respects, usually it is declining in other respects. The conservative knows that any healthy society is influenced by two forces, which Samuel Taylor Coleridge called its Permanence and its Progression. The Permanence of a society is formed by those enduring interests and convictions that gives us stability and continuity; without that Permanence, the fountains of the great deep are broken up, society slipping into anarchy. The Progression in a society is that spirit and that body of talents which urge us on to prudent reform and improvement; without that Progression, a people stagnate.

Therefore the intelligent conservative endeavors to reconcile the claims of Permanence and the claims of Progression.

Careful, prudent change, solidly based on tradition and “permanence”, is a positive good, says Kirk.

I might add that Edmund Burke had a lot to say about “change” as well. His critique of the French Revolution (and his support for the institution of the British Monarchy) made it easy for his critics to denounce him as a reactionary. But one of Burke’s most famous quotations - “A state without the means of some change is without the means of its conservation” - makes the valid point that change is necessary when the institutions and traditions of the state are at risk. Preserving them at the cost of change is necessary and good.

Why all this blathering about “change?” First, it gives me a chance to quote Kirk and Burke and aren’t you mightily impressed at that, dear reader?

Secondly, it serves as prologue to my sad experience from yesterday after I posted my piece “Angry Ideologues vs. The Statists” on my diary page at RedState. The reaction to the piece from Moe Lane, who is a regular poster and one of the site’s moderators, as well as other commenters flummoxed me.

A brief background: I used to cross-post my RWNH pieces quite regularly at RedState, having joined the community there almost as soon as I began blogging nearly 5 years ago. It was a good way to promote me and my blog and it was good exposure for my writing.

A about a year ago, I virtually stopped cross posting basically because I got lazy about the promotion thing and rarely visited after that unless directed by a link on Memeorandum or some other blog.

Recently, it occurred to me that my laziness about promoting myself and my writing was costing me potential readers (as well as potential revenue) so I decided to make an effort to learn the Twitter thing, and rededicate myself to get out of the rut I’ve been in since the election.

Hence, my triumphant re-appearance at RedState - or not. Many of my diary posts had been heavily criticized in the past so I was not unused to the notion that I was not a popular poster there. And the diary in question was heavily critical of some conservatives - “angry ideologues” - so I expected the usual mindless name calling from, who else, angry ideologues.

Enter Mr. Lane into our little drama. Here is a comment exchange between the two of us that made me realize that RedState was not a very conservative site anymore - at least not so far as I understand the meaning of conservatism:

Lane: That’s nice, Rick. What did your local GOP chair say…
Moe Lane Monday, August 31st at 3:22PM EDT (link)

…when you explained this to him or her?

Me: “Conservative” not “Republican”
Rick Moran Monday, August 31st at 4:28PM EDT (link)

If I mention the party at all in the piece - and I don’t reference it specifically - it is as a vessel to carry conservative principles.

I am not a party man. I am concerned with conservatism. As far as Republicans are concerned, I feel if I can help reform conservatism, that helps the party.

Lane: In other words, you didn’t.
Moe Lane Monday, August 31st at 4:50PM EDT (link)

Now, did you have anything useful to contribute, or are you just going to waste my site’s bandwidth some more with complaints that do nothing but annoy actual activists and drive down their diaries?

If Mr. Lane’s intent was to give me a pep talk about getting with the program and cheerleading for our side, I’m afraid it fell rather flat.

But I don’t think that was his intent, do you? Trotting out the old “chickenhawk” argument used by the left against Iraq War supporters was surprising enough (if I haven’t told my local GOP chair that he’s a raving, right wing ideologue, then my critique is worthless). But then, to actually set a standard for acceptable speech about whether something is “useful” or not was the real kicker. And I told him so:

Me: I believe my views are indeed useful
Rick Moran Monday, August 31st at 5:18PM EDT (link)

And I’m afraid annoying people is the price paid for revealing unpleasant truths that many conservative ideologues resist believing.

So I’m sure you welcome all viewpoints that are reasonably argued, and can be responded to in a reasonable way. Thank you for that.

Mr. Lane chose not to answer - as he also failed to address any single point made in my diary that he considered “useless” or that “annoy[ed] actual activists” - and proceeded to remind me of blog policy about cross posting:

Lane: That would be another “No,” then.
Monday, August 31st at 5:24PM EDT (link)

So noted.

PS: I note that this is a reprint of something that was originally from your site. While RedState permits full reproductions of posts and articles by the author, we expect the post to link back to the original source. Please do so in the future.

Obviously, a man of few words - and little else. Of course, he needn’t worry about the future since after this post hits the tubes, my name will be mud at RedState and even if I were allowed to, the prospect of posting on a site with such anti-conservative moderators and commenters (read the rest of what passes for criticism) has lost its allure.

What drives a person to close off their mind so completely, so determinedly, to where challenging orthodoxy is a transgression worthy of such contempt? No, I possess no thunderbolts of truth and wisdom to hurl at my detractors and open their eyes to new vistas, new ways of thinking. All I have are opinions that differ from theirs.

I suppose I should be used to it by now, but it never fails to amaze me how truly remarkable is our capacity as humans to subsume our natural ability to think, and slavishly, doltishly, mindlessly allow our critical thinking skills to fall into slothful disuse. I am not immune from committing this sin as my regular readers know. It takes real effort to break through the clutter of your own lazy thought processes, and thankfully, the few readers I have left at this site never let me go for long without letting me know of my backsliding.

Not challenging your own beliefs by constantly re-energizing and reinvigorating the underlying assumptions that form the bedrock of your thinking by exposing yourself to alternative viewpoints leads to the kind of knee-jerk nonsense espoused by Mr. Lane and most of his fellow RedState commenters who never engaged me on the substance of what I wrote, choosing instead to simply try and outdo each other with their invective.

It is a decidedly unconservative attitude to hold and proves to me that, although there are many fine conservative writers still at the site - Eric Erickson, Warner Todd Huston, and Pejman Yousefzadeh to name just a few - the community that is RedState has degenerated into a barbarous brew of angry yawpers.

A pity, that. What was once a vibrant, stimulating place has become a gray ghost of its former self - a place where orthodoxy trumps almost all and where new ideas go to to die.