Evan Bayh complains now that health reform was a big political mistake. The Beltway, Sunday-morning chorus naturally agrees: those dumb libruls should listen to Evan Bayh! He understands these things!
Here's the rub:
Jim Messina and Axelrod visited the Senate just before the August recess to brief Democrats on health care. It made the members feel better. The moderates seemed capable of grasping the core political reality. Evan Bayh of Indiana, who voted with the Republicans on everything from Bush's tax cuts to blocking Obama's budget, was adamant. "We're all screwed if you don't get something real on health care," he said. Democrats realized that their base would be totally demoralized without it. The only way Obama had carried Indiana or any other state was with the intensity of core supporters; that would evaporate if health care lost.
That's from page 398 of "The Promise."
Does Sen. Bayh's sarcastic critique of health reform as a "noble aspiration" (but really a horrible liberal overreach) apply to himself pushing for it? Or does it only apply to people who take responsibility for their policy decisions?
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Evan Bayh is a quisling.
sorry Rachel, but HCR was an overreach that put business on the defensive. It was too much too soon. Too many unpredictables, too antagonistic towards business on top of attacks you and others in the far left media leveled at industry after industry, month after month, thinking that it would have no impact on hiring decisions. These sort of pie in the sky thought bubbles from the left put into action result in a capital strike, which results in sub par domestic growth, sub par hiring, and as we saw Tuesday night, sub par performance by liberals in congress. Guys like Bayh and Mark Warner speak the language of business, give them the confidence to take risk and invest. People like you in economic terms, as noble as your goals are, have the opposite effect, and end up being self-defeating.
I have an idea. Why don't we take health care out of the hands of business. One less thing for them to worry about. That's what Democrats outside of DC wanted, but not the corrupt Senate. And you do know what happens when you have to pass everything by business first means, right?
"It was too much too soon." Spoken just like someone who has never been without health insurance. Tell that to my college-educated daughter with Type I Diabetes who hasn't been able to find a job WITH health care for the last 5 years. Even if she could afford to buy her own health care, SHE IS DENIED. In that time, she has already suffered damage to her health because of lack of medical care. Too much too soon? Not for her and millions like her.
But you go ahead and "speak the language of business." Maybe when you have a larger population of US citizens living like a third world country, the businesses will start to bring jobs back.
And I thought businesses wanted to lower labor costs. You learn something new everyday.
I'm sure Boehner will do what he can to increase costs for both businesses and the insured. And the victims who are Republican will even be happy about it.
Evan Bayh has never been of any value to the Democrat party. He, like Blanch, are better left gone talking about how they hated the affiliation but never had a problem taking the check when it was offered.
Shame they hated the values of medical rights and a sustainable life for all rather than their rich buddies.
Hated the affiliation but never had a problem taking the check. Kind of like what Republican officials did with Stimulus money after the Stimulus bill was passed.
Sorry Jeff, but this isn't about the value of HCR -- that ship has sailed (thank god! I loves me some overreach to help ordinary Americans). It's about Bayh's hypocrisy.
Good lord, Evan Bayh, go away! And don't let the door hit your fanny on the way out.
HCR didn't cause the widespread defeats last night. History and the economy were against the Dems from the word go.
That and the messaging problem: No one seems to realize they got a tax cut.
pParker Finally someone who "gets it"!
...not to mention "Citizens United"... nobody won last night (imho) but the Corporations...
Nothing more sickening than a politically correct politician! pParkerT, I am with you...this is no time for Evan's milquetoast fencesitter hollow complaints. What the heck is he running for now? Obama needs his own Sorenson to spread the message...soon and loudly.
No one realises they got a tax cut because it was given in small amounts in hopes that the money would go straight into the economy gradually and not all at once wich is what would have happened if big checks were given out.
or maybe a visionary ???
There's just no way that someone who has followed and sympathized with the trials and hopes of the Democratic party over the last, well, forever can make this ridiculous "they shouldna dun healthcare" claim. Bayh and others who traffic in this tut-tutting will be a footnote in history; future readers will chuckle at his brand of foresight deprived Democrat for a moment and then forget them.
Indiana is a conservative place, even when it musters up the strength to vote blue (I know, I lived there the first 41 years of my life). It is a fluke that Obama carried Indiana in the first place. I think he did that by connection to the over-the-top love of basketball in Indiana. He went to every basketball-lovin' high school in the state and shot a few hoops, talked b-ball, mentioned being Christian, etc.
And myself and many others connected to the place guilted our family members and friends who currently live there into voting with charisma instead of fear.
As for Evan, he's always been uber-conservative, and I think his contempt had a lot to do with his term being his last and whatever his future aspirations are. He knows Hoosiers refuse to wander very far from the trough.
He is right and it is overreaching and frankly the one who really wanted it was Obama himself. Evan knows just how much will get done in Congress now and wishes he were part of that instead of this.
FDR, Truman, Eisenhower, Nixon, LBJ and millions and millions of Americans really wanted this, many people die waiting to get what they could have be afforded living in England ,France, Germany, Japan, Canada. How sad that we reward those members of congress with the courage to do the right thing, with contempt and lies.The first group in 60 years to actually get us the foot in the door, hardly over reaching. Obama didn't need it, he did it for us. if Evan knows how much he can get done in congress now. Why didn't he ever do anything for us? He risked nothing , stood for nothing and now is sorry he never will be regarded as well as those who spent the last two years getting screamed at, who were looking out for us and did what 30 other congresses could not. What has he done in all his years in goverment that wasn't for his gain? Obama has done what we needed, and none of it helped him.
Nonsense ! Most people were angry because it did'nt include a public option. Just work in an emergency room for a few years & you would see just how expensive the current system is when we the public pay the tab for the uninsured who have no other recourse but to use expensive E.R.'s for their health care. I'm tired of the insurance companies dictating our health care. There are some things governments do better. Think infrastructure.
317718 -
I agree with you and Sen Bayh pertaining to the "overreach."
Independent data shows that most Americans don't like / want HCR as it stands. I think there are elements of it that most Americans would absolutely agree are fantastic (e.g. coverage options for more Americans; no denial based upon pre-existing conditions). However, I think the biggest concerns / issues were re: the scope and the timing (not HCR vs. no HCR).
Focusing on implementing a big program, rather than jobs, at a time when the economy is the main concern of most Americans is a tough sell; and cost alot of political capital.
Absolutely nothing will get done in Congress now, thanks to the lack of education in the tea party.
...and to think he was considered a candidate for VP for both Kerry and Obama... what a nightmare that would have been.
If Obama had made him VP, he wouldn't have become the first Democrat to threaten to filibuster a Democratic piece of legislation, because he wouldn't have been in the Senate.
Rachel is great, wonderful, spot on with her observations on the million things that make up life in the political arena. Yes, Bayh is hypocritical. Spend a lifetime in the political arena and most will be hypocrites. You won point again, Rachel.
But we're losing the war! Healthcare reform was sooooo watered down, we really won just a medium sized battle. But the Big War is over the long term viability of carrying on the American dream... and without hammering home to viewers night in, night out the fiscal insanity and history of Reaganomics, charting its dooming of Americans... Republican voters will never have that narrative seep into their mindsets how they vote against their interests. They watch Fox, yes, but other could eventually pick up on the narrative and echo it. The Tea Party is PISSED at what things have become... and their republican party is 1000% to blame! Do you think they realize that? No, because there is not a talking head out there other than maybe Dylan Ratigan, buried in the daytime hours by MSNBC, that hammers this narrative home day in, day out... and even Dylan could use some schooling on charting, and "best graphics ever" (Rachel's term) in visually documenting the damage republicans have done to our country via their greedy focus on tax cutting us as a nation to death. And now Obama wants to coopt the damage! "Permanant Bush tax cuts for 98% of all Americans". !!!! We're sunk until others like Rachel start focusing. Obama is losing it.... giving it to the Repubs. We'll be sunk as a nation FOREVER tax cuts take hold once again.
My problem with Evan Bayh is that he likes point fingers after the fact. He published a long Op-Ed about how to fix congress AFTER he announced his resignation. Now he decides he should to lay out a plan for revitalizing the Democratic base even though he has made himself largely irrelevant by sneaking out the back door after taking a hard vote.
If he really thought it was this easy he would have stuck around to do it. Since he didn't I don't much care to hear his thoughts on anything.
Rachael,
Evan Bayh got his retirement now it is easy to be a sunday morning quarterback.
Health-care reform is VERY necessary, the middle class continue to get squeezed from all directions. The businesses are again holding us hostage to get their way. Thanks to Citizens United, they have a MEGAPHONE against the middle class & they can do extortion. Meanwhile banks will continue to do proprietary trades & create more wealth to the same group of people who can afford anything they ever want, including the best health-care in the world.
BTW Love the show!
As someone who works in Indiana politics, I can say that none of us have any respect for Evan Bayh. He burnt a lot of bridges, and many of us without jobs now (largely because of him) are already committed to ending whatever political career he hopes to resurrect in this state. Of course, money and power will get him far, and buy a few friends, but most of the foot soldiers in Indiana are absolutely sick of him. Whatever he tries to run for next, most of the talented staff will immediately go to a primary challenger.
The fact that Birch Bayh lost office for being pro-choice has haunted Evan Bayh. In his heart of hearts, he's always viewed anything even vaguely to the left of whatever line he draws in his head as a plot to deprive him, personally, of his Senate seat. He thinks gays and single payer advocates and the blogosphere are like the three witches on Macbeth's blasted heath, and he'd better ride on fast and not even stop to talk to them.
I think, from years of observing Evan Bayh, that he blames his father's defeat, not on the people who would prefer that a woman bear her rapist's child, but on the people who think she shouldn't have to. Nothing is really the fault of Republicans as long as Bayh can blame liberals for repeatedly asking him not to act like a Republican.
For example, Bayh is already blaming the losses on the Democratic party being too nice to gays. Not from where I sit, they haven't been. We still have DADT, and we're still defending it in court. And we still have a President who opposes gay marriage. Bayh clearly thinks the party should have stiff-armed all the gay people who helped Obama get elected, abandoned the promises made to them (part of the platform Obama campaigned on) and avoided them like the plague. Oh, and we also shouldn't have done health care.
Bayh is one of those "centrists" who think self-described moderates are just conservatives by another name, and that the country is thus overwhelmingly conservative, polls be damned. His notion that somehow moderates are ticked off at the Democrats about gays in the military (as if Obama hadn't been dragging his feet about that in every possible way for 8 months) ignores the fact that not only a large majority of the country but even a small majority of Republicans favor repealing DADT. Bayh is right to retire. The country has moved on, and he has not.
One striking thing he says is that we shouldn't blame the people for voting for our opponents, that the voters "were not addled." Like hell they weren't. Polls showed that they thought the TARP had never been paid back (and that Obama, not Bush, proposed it), that the stimulus had created no jobs, and all sorts of things that are the exact opposite of the truth. Not only did the fools not know their own taxes had gone down under Obama, they thought they'd gone up. Addled is exactly what they were.
The one place every politician needs to start is with the idea that every citizen is responsible for his and her own vote, and for casting it responsibly. That includes Evan Bayh. Telling the voters they had nothing to do with causing this country's problems, after decades of electing irresponsible and venal Republicans to put us into the ditch, is pandering.
Well spoken and spot on.
John Bottorff
Dubois County, Indiana
Democratic Chair
An Indiana Democrat would be a Republican in most other states. It was pointless to vote for the Democratic candidate for the Senate, as his issues statement was pure party line...of the Republican party.
Imagine you're sitting in the back seat of a car. The driver has been red-lining the engine for the last 120 miles driving as fast as he can, its running low on coolant and the hood is starting to steam. Through the mist, you see a cliff appear. The guy in the front passenger seat wrestles control away, slams on the brakes, and gets the car stopped with the front tires over the edge of the cliff. Once that's done, they move the car back and stop, getting out some more coolant from the trunk and starts dealing with the engine problems created by the irresponsible driving. Now, the original driver gets back in and guns the engine. Never mind that the car is still pointed at the cliff, and the "momentary savior" is under the hood of the car. We just want to go dammit! There's no cliff there - just a hood blocking the view!
Remind you of anything? This is how I feel America is being run at the moment. And this election has given the keys back over to the group that sent us to the brink. The only way we didn't end up in oblivion is because a few Democrats had the foresight to get us stopped in time (barely). And now the Republicans just want to slam on the gas again, and go back to speeding over a financial cliff. Why is it that I'm the only one I know of seeing this?
That is how I see it too, why is it we are in the minority? Was some kool-aid passed around we missed?
You aren't alone. I have been preaching this very thing over and over to deaf ears myself.
Me Too. I Still Don't Understand How You (They Republicans)Vote Against Your Own Interest.
You are not alone. I, too, wonder about the Kool-Aid.
it's not Kool-Aid, it's false consciousness. the people who vote for the corporate greedmeisters think they are voting in their own interests. Sad.
He's a schmuck. No surprise.
Yep.
We agree with you, Rachel. Bayh is a do*che.
Gridlock is inevitable , for the next two years. Most Americans are just shaking there heads. Just think of the time wasted! You think most American citizens have short attention spans! and I wonder why? One can only hope .
Evan Bayh is about one thing...Evan Bayh. Thanks to his decision not to seek reelection, Dan Coats slinked back to Indiana and easily beat Brad Ellsworth who had very little time to prepare for a Senate run. NOW Bayh is toying with the idea of running for governor! Please...just go away!
Good grief. The "Government" is the adminstration of a country... as in Executive Branch... that "executes" policies. The legislative body is pretty much only a great debating society. Obama still has the keys, the wheel, is still driving. His acceleration, braking, and steering are now more limited, but it will be Obama who agrees to or vetoes any and every congressional bill.
What scare the heck of me is Obama saying he is now for making permanant the Bush tax cuts for 98% of all Americans when $20 Trillion in debt costs have BURIED us the last 30 years.... after only $1 Trillion in National Debt our first 205 years, 1776 - 1981. Obama just doesn't weigh the gravity of the burden Reaganomics has placed us under.
Thank you Rachel for calling Evan Bayh a Punk, because that what he is.
@TalkingPoints - Bayh is a punk ass punk. Just sayin...
Thank you Rachel for calling Evan Bayh a Punk, because that what he is. He is a true Lite Weight. A opportunity that was squandered.
The real question is why didn't the White House make it clear that Health Insurance Reform was always a jobs issue. Without solving the underlying issue of the spiraling cost of health insurance for full-time workers, any other attempt would have been putting a band-aid over a gushing wound. Of course, that would have required Health Care Reform and we were only going to get Health Insurance Reform because that's all that Evan Bayh and the other conservaDems would ever approve of.