Eric Cantor: Only Route To Bipartisan Cooperation Is If Dems Fully Embrace GOP Plan

Greg once again snags the nut graphs-

Eric Cantor’s office responds to Obama’s announcement of a bipartisan summit on health care with the most explicit and direct assertion I’ve seen yet that the only way Dems can win bipartisan cooperation is to fully embrace the GOP health care plan and nothing more:

After going it alone on health care reform for nearly a year, President Obama has decided he wants to bring Republicans into the conversation. Here’s the problem: unless the President and Speaker Pelosi are willing to scrap their government take over and hit the reset button, there’s not much to talk about.

Republicans believe the status quo is unacceptable, but so is any health reform package that spends money we don’t have or raises taxes on small businesses and working families in a recession. To that point, House Republicans have offered the only plan , that will lower health care costs, which is what the President said was the goal at the start of this debate.

I’m not sure if it could be made any more explicit than that.

No it couldn't Greg, but there are apparently some synapses that fail to fire when you enter the rarefied air in D.C. because this olive branch should have never been offered, no matter how kick ass you think your argument is. Too many opportunities for this to blow up in our faces.

Not enough votes for the bill, but the smart people say don't panic

So far, Greg, McJoan and Josh all say don't panic.

Pelosi’s claims are going to sound awful to those who want the House to pass the Senate bill already. But let’s be as clear as possible: Pelosi did not rule this option out.

The key is that Pelosi said the bill can’t pass the House “at this time” or “right now.” What’s more, this doesn’t address another possibility being studied by House leaders right now: Passing the Senate bill while simultaneously creating a mechanism that would make it possible, or even mandatory, to fix the bill later through reconciliation, meaning those fixes would only require 51 votes in the Senate.

If such a mechanism were created, it might — repeat, might — induce enough House Dems to reconsider, making it possible for them to pass the Senate bill. No one knows how feasible such a mechanism would be. But it’s being studied as we speak.

Video- Greg Sargent Picks the Top Online News Stories of 2009

Via Jed. In case you're not familiar with it, The Plum Line is one of the top "don't miss" blogs out there.

What Greg Said

* Interesting number in the new WaPo poll: More than six in 10, by 63%-33%, favor expanding Medicare to those 55 and up. Remarkable that the only provisions that can’t get through the Senate are those with clear majority support.

Poll: One Third Of Dems Less Likely To Vote In 2010 If Public Option Dies

I truly have a burning hatred of Joe Lieberman now. Via Greg-

I was sent an advance look at these numbers by the Progressive Change Campaign Committee and Democracy for America, which commissioned the poll from the nonpartisan Research 2000 and will release the results later this morning. The poll asks:

If Congress does not pass a public option as part of health care reform, will that make you more likely or less likely to vote in the 2010 general election, or no effect?

Among Dems, 33% say it would make them less likely, while less than one fourth that amount, 7%, say it would make them more likely. Sixty percent say it would have no effect.

Among independent voters, 21% say it would make them less likely, and 13% say it would make them more likely, with 66% saying it would have no effect, suggesting that passing a public option would have a marginal impact among indys.

Separately, in other advance excerpts of the same poll obtained by Sam Stein, 81% of Dems want Joe Lieberman punished if he filibusters health care reform.

Poll Suggests Virginia Gov Race Not A Referendum On Obama

But that's not what the Villagers say, and they're always right. See, sometimes if you look behind the conventional wisdom like Greg does, the silly inconvenient facts shine thru.

But the internals of the new Washington Post poll in Virginia suggest that Obama may not really be an important factor at all. It finds:

* Seventy percent of likely voters say Obama is “not a factor” in ther choice. Only 15% say opposition to Obama is a factor, while 14%, say support for him is a factor.

* Seventy one percent say it makes “no difference” if the governor is from the same political party as the president. More people say it’s good to have a governor from the same party, 16%-13%.

* Obama’s approval rating in Virginia is 54%, in line with many national polls.

McDonnell is leading in this poll by 11 points, and if he wins, there will be a dull roar of commentary about what this means for Obama and his presidency. Obama has inserted himself into the race, and perhaps he’s more of an influence than these numbers suggest. Still, it’s unclear how you square these numbers with the notion that Obama is a major factor in any way.

Palin’s Popularity Sinks To A New Low

Sargent strikes again. Where does he find the time in the day?

A fun nugget buried in some new Gallup numbers suggests the slow and clumsy rollout of the new Sarah Palin isn’t going all that well:

Palin became a bit of a sensation after John McCain tapped her as his running mate last August. But over the course of the campaign, her image suffered, going from a 53% favorable rating immediately after the 2008 Republican National Convention to 42% by the end of the campaign.

Palin’s ratings have not recovered, and her current 40% favorable rating is the lowest for her since she became widely known after last year’s Republican convention.

Not only is Palin at her lowest favorability yet, her unfavorability ratings have hit a high of 50%. She’s also tanking among independents: Only 41% view her favorably, versus 48% who view her unfavorably.

Nearly Three-Fourths Of House Dems Support Robust Public Option

Greg's got the skinny-

Still more grounds for cautious optimism about the public option:

I’ve got the latest internal whip count numbers from Dem Rep. Raul Grijalva, the co-chair of the Congressional Progressional Caucus, who tells me that nearly three-fourths of House Dems will support a health care reform bill with the most robust version of the public option. That’s the one that would reimburse providers at Medicare rates plus five percent.

“I am confident that we have the support of over 70% of the Democratic Caucus,” Grivalva said in a statement emailed my way. That means according to him, around 180 of the 256 Dems in the House are prepared to back the robust public option right now.

Rasmussen Games Polling To Suggest Public Opposes Dems Doing Health Care Alone

Once again, Greg finds the nut.

Rasmussen Reports, which often skews its presentation of polling for conservative media pickup, has a funny new poll that’s clearly designed to suggest public opposition to Dems going it alone on health care. The poll’s headline: “24% Say Democrats Should Pass Health Care Reform Without GOP Votes.”

Wow, that’s pretty low, right? But now take a look at the question wording:

Suppose that Democrats agreed on a health care reform bill that is opposed by all Republicans in Congress. Should the Democrats pass that bill or should they change the bill to win support from a reasonable number of Republicans?

24% They should pass the bill
58% They should change the bill
19% Not sure

Fifty eight percent say Dems should craft health care in order to get support from a “reasonable” number of Republicans. Yet the poll also includes the amusing caveat that the pollster did not quantify what constitutes “a reasonable number” of Republican supporters. Clever, eh?

New Ad Targets Palin’s Facebook Supporters, Tells Them She’s A Liar

I'm thinking it'll just make her supporters dig in their heels more, I mean really, if they wanted truth they wouldn't be Palintards now would they? Click to enlarge, via Greg.

Hard to say if this’ll work, but nothing else has killed the death panel lie, so why not try this?

Americans United For Change, the labor-backed White House ally, is attempting a new one: Running an ad on Facebook — one directly targeted to Sarah Palin’s hundreds of thousands of Facebook supporters — telling them Palin has been lying to them.

Starting today, thanks to the wonders of the Internets, hundreds of thousands of Palin supporters will see this image on whatever Facebook page they visit...

Poll: Majority Of Republicans Believes Health Reform Bill Will Force Elderly To Decide When To Die

Greg gets advance look at poll, Paddy feels the need to scream.

I’ve now obtained a new poll that finds a majority of Republicans believe the health care reform bill will force old people to decide in advance how and when they meet their maker.

The new poll, to be released later this morning, was sent my way by the Indiana University Center for Health Policy and Professionalism Research, and here’s a chart of this key finding (click to enlarge):

The poll finds that 53% of Republicans believe that “the government will require the elderly to make decisions about how and when they will die.” By contrast, only 31% of independents and 14% of Democrats believe this, according to this poll of 600 adults nationwide.

Note the word “require.” A majority of Republicans believes that the health care reform will force old people to decide in advance “how and when they will die.” This is far more out there than anything we’ve seen polled before.

My emphasis added.

New Ad Bashes GOP For Blocking Health Care Reform — For 15 Years

h/t Greg.

New GOP Phrase For Detainee Pictures: “Terrorist Propaganda Photos”

Greg catches the new meme.

Get ready to hear Republicans and conservative opinion-makers using a new phrase to describe the unreleased photos of detainees that are at the center of a white-hot political war right now: “Terrorist propaganda photos.”

The House GOP leadership just used the phrase for the first time this morning in a statement they sent to me. The phrase was cooked up in hopes that it will catch on with other GOPers, and it probably will do just that.

(snip)

The new phrase is a reference to the GOP claim that such photos help terrorist recruitment, and signals that Republicans think they can milk this one for all it’s worth. Get ready to hear it again, and again, and…

Gingrich Recycles Year-Old McCain Attack On Obama

Greg spots Newtie so strapped for ideas that he has to recycle McCain's failed ones-

As many others have noted, during his speech the other night, Gingrich said, to applause:

Let me be clear, I am not a citizen of the world. I think that the entire concept is intellectual nonsense and stunningly dangerous. There is no world sovereignty, there is no world system of law — there is in fact no circumstance under which I would like to be a citizen of North Korea, Zimbabwe, Venezuela, Cuba, or Russia. I am a citizen — I am a citizen of the United States of America.

The line was an apparent reference to Obama’s speech last summer in Berlin, in which he introduced himself to his audience as a “fellow citizen of the world.”

As it happens, the McCain camp attacked the speech at the time in terms similar to those used by Gingrich the other night, contrasting Obama’s self-proclaimed world citizenship with the fact that “John McCain has dedicated his life to serving, improving and protecting America.”

If Dems are eager to cast the GOP as lacking in new ideas and trapped in the past, Newt’s recycling of year-old attacks from losing campaigns can only help, obviously.

Did Obama Really Call America A Muslim Country? Nope.

Damn Greg gets up and at it early. I just noticed the wacky convergence on Memeorandum, and he's already debunked it.

Indeed, critics are already grabbing on to the comment as it was reported in the New York Times write-up:

In an interview with Laura Haim on Canal Plus, a French television station, Mr. Obama noted that the United States also could be considered as “one of the largest Muslim countries in the world.” He sought to downplay the expectations of the speech, but he said he hoped the address would raise awareness about Muslims.

The Times piece is already spreading rapidly on the right. PowerLineBlog, for instance, asked: “In what possible sense can any rational person consider the United States to be a Muslim country?” But here’s what Obama actually said:

Now, the flip side is I think that the United States and the West generally, we have to educate ourselves more effectively on Islam. And one of the points I want to make is, is that if you actually took the number of Muslims Americans, we’d be one of the largest Muslim countries in the world. And so there’s got to be a better dialogue and a better understanding between the two peoples.

They just can't help themselves.

Bush’s FBI Director Said Torture Didn’t Foil Any Terror Plots

I am now refusing to think anymore today about torture because I am truly finding the whole twisted travesty sickening and demoralizing. Thank you Greg-

Robert Mueller, who was appointed by Bush in 2001 and remains FBI director under Obama, delivered that assessment at the end of this December 2008 article in Vanity Fair on torture:

I ask Mueller: So far as he is aware, have any attacks on America been disrupted thanks to intelligence obtained through what the administration still calls “enhanced techniques”?

“I’m really reluctant to answer that,” Mueller says. He pauses, looks at an aide, and then says quietly, declining to elaborate: “I don’t believe that has been the case.”

That stands in direct contrast to Dick Cheney’s recent claim that torture has been “enormously valuable” in terms of “preventing another mass-casualty attack against the United States.”

And in direct contrast to what is being said by 3/4's of the talking heads. Oh, this guy agrees with Mueller.