Going Along To Get Along On Obamacare

WaPo's Ceci Connolly drops a stern warning from the White House Village Sensible Democratic Party Centrists that "liberal advocacy groups" (a.k.a. Those Dirty F'ckin Hippies at MoveOn.org) are not helping, and should really just shut the hell up and go away.

In a pre-holiday call with half a dozen top House and Senate Democrats, Obama expressed his concern over advertisements and online campaigns targeting moderate Democrats, whom they criticize for not being fully devoted to "true" health-care reform.

"We shouldn't be focusing resources on each other," Obama opined in the call, according to three sources who participated in or listened to the conversation. "We ought to be focused on winning this debate."

Specifically, Obama said he is hoping left-leaning organizations that worked on his behalf in the presidential campaign will now rally support for "advancing legislation" that fulfills his goal of expanding coverage, controlling rising costs and modernizing the health system.

In the call, leaders of both chambers expressed optimism that they will hold floor votes on legislation to overhaul the $2.2 trillion health system before Congress breaks in early August.

For his part, the president vowed to use his strong approval rating with voters to continue making the case for sweeping reform, according to one congressional staffer with knowledge of the conversation. Obama also hinted that efforts are under way to discourage allies from future attacks on Democrats, according to the source, who did not have permission to speak on the record about the discussion.

The White House had no comment on the president's call.

In recent weeks, liberal bloggers and grass-roots groups such as MoveOn.org, Democracy for America, Service Employees International Union and Progressive Change Campaign Committee have targeted Democratic Sens. Ben Nelson (Neb.), Mary Landrieu (La.), Arlen Specter (Pa.), Ron Wyden (Ore.) and Dianne Feinstein (Calif.).

A fundraising video produced by Democracy for America suggests Landrieu is a "sellout" because she has received $1.6 million in campaign contributions from the health-care industry and has yet to endorse the concept of a government-run health insurance plan to compete against the private companies. The public-option concept, which Obama supports, has become a litmus test for many pro-reform activists who accuse the insurance industry of failing to deliver affordable, accessible care.

Needless to say, What Digby Said:

All you have to do is read the paper to know that the people standing in the way of any workable health care reform are mushy, centrist robots and insurance company whores in the Democratic Party. We have the majority, the Republicans are imploding, there is no debate at the moment among anyone but Democrats. In the middle of this hot negotiation, putting ads on the air that say "let's get some health care!" is a joke.

I suspect that the truth is that he thinks he's clumsily triangulating. But the groups that he's criticizing are actually trying to support his position on the public plan and attacking them undermines the public plan as well. (Of course, it's always possible that's the intention, but I hope not.)

The problem is that triangulation is for the purpose of positioning the president between two poles in the debate. He's just set one of the poles as the public plan, which says to certain wobbly Senators that it's negotiable. I would have thought the better way to deal with this is to assure these congressional twits (who gladly ate tremendous amounts of shit from right wingers for years, but get livid at the tiniest criticism from the left) that he isn't endorsing any of these attacks, but that there's not much he can do about it. It's a free country. These waverers might just realize that he's serious about getting a public plan without him having to explicitly tell them so.

By now it's obvious that dismissing and humiliating the base is a conscious White House strategy and I'm sure it's sometimes quite useful, even though it's a distinctly unsavory political tactic (and one that erodes support over time.) But in this case, if they really want health reform, it's counterproductive. He needs the outside groups to play this role and by publicly reprimanding them he's undermining these groups with their already skittish donors --- and the cause itself.

I'm sure Obama has several people telling him "Look, the liberals are going to support you anyway, so screw them. Go ahead, attack them. It makes you look like a centrist. People will respect you."

The real problem is the people aren't overly concerned with how centrist Obama looks. They want affordable health care coverage with a public option because they are tired of getting reamed by insurance companies. The blockade is not being manned by Republicans. It's being manned by Senate Dems who are in the pocket of the health insurance companies, period.

The Centrists are telling him "The liberals are the enemy. Listen to us. If you listen to them, well, you won't get health care reform." The liberals are telling him the opposite, that it's the Centrists who are trying to sink this.

72% of Americans are on the side of the liberals here. The Obama administration has made it quite clear however that the progressives that helped him get into the White House are no longer necessary or even welcome.

Should Obamacare fall apart, remember that.