9/9: Just Say No To Triggers

In anticipation of Pres. Obama's address to Congress tonight, liberal bloggers are stepping up their demands that members of the House progressive caucus vote against any health care bill that doesn't include a public option. As they've said many times before, the netroots don't consider a "trigger" mechanism to be an acceptable compromise. Consequently, they're urging House progressives to hold their ground, especially now that Blue Dog Dems are holding theirs. In fact, some lefty bloggers are advocating primary challenges for House progressives who say that they're open to triggers.

What else is happening in the blogosphere?

• Liberal bloggers (Benen, Cole, Sudbay, Gardner, Marshall) are slamming Sen. Saxby Chambliss (R-GA) for saying that Obama needs to "express some humility" during tonight's address to Congress.
• Liberal bloggers (Willis, DougJ) are buzzing about a video of Rep. Jean Schmidt (R-OH) whispering "I agree with you" to a woman who told her that Obama isn't a citizen and is therefore ineligible to be President.
• Liberal bloggers (Bink, Transplanted Texan) are pleased that Sen. Chris Dodd (D-CT) decided to remain Chairman of the Banking Committee, thereby preventing Sen. Tim Johnson (D-SD) from ascending to the chairmanship.
• RedState editor Erick Erickson is furious that NRSC Chair John Cornyn released a memo praising CA SEN candidate Carly Fiorina (R), whom Erickson describes as "a vetting nightmare" who "will be destroyed by [Sen. Barbara] Boxer." Erickson goes on to tell his readers that "[GOP SEN candidate Chuck] Devore is one of us. Fiorina is not."
• Although some conservative bloggers are urging senators to block the confirmation of "down-right kooky" Obama nominee Cass Sunstein, others contend that Sunstein is a "mainstream liberal" who ought to be confirmed.

HEALTH CARE REFORM: Hold Your Ground, Progressives!

Liberal bloggers continue to demand that members of the House progressive caucus vote against any health care bill that doesn't include a public option:

• Firedoglake's Jane Hamsher: "Tuesday was 'trigger' day. Progressive members of Congress who promised to hold the line on a public option were suddenly floating 'trigger' trial balloons this morning, paving the way for [Speaker] Nancy Pelosi and [Senate Maj. Leader] Harry Reid to revisit them in the afternoon. [...] I'm happy that [AZ Rep.] Raul Grijalva is cracking the whip on the 60 members who signed the letter saying they would vote against any bill that does not have a public plan. I think it's great that he says that 'triggers' mean 'surrender.' But we need to hear that from everyone else who signed the letter. Saying nothing is not fair. The people whose lives are deeply affected by what happens here, their constituents and their supporters, deserve better than these half-assed trial balloons and ambiguous statements. They need to state once and for all, every one of them, that they understand 'triggers' are a sell-out. Anything short of that is unacceptable."
• AMERICAblog's Joe Sudbay: "Based on past performance, the DC-based political elite (a.k.a. The Villagers) don't expect the progressives to stand strong on this issue. If the House progressives do, they change the political dynamic in Congress. Already, it's big news that one of the leaders of the Blue Dogs, [AR Rep.] Mike Ross, won't vote for a public option. The DC pundits all think the Blue Dogs rule the world. But, this is a chance for the progressive caucus to show its power. Grijalva is leading the way for them. This is about more than just the health care bill. This is about progressives having a real voice in policy -- and real power."

Meanwhile, Hamsher is pleased to report that Dem Reps. Betty Sutton, John Conyers, and Yvette Clarke have all pledged to vote against any bill that doesn't include a public option. Hamsher also advocates primary challenges for progressive Dems such as CA Rep. Sam Farr and MA Rep. Michael Capuano, who say they're open to the "trigger" compromise.

On the other hand, Digby doubts that House progressive will really vote against a compromise bill: "I'm afraid that as much as we like to think we can 'hold the progressives' feet to the fire' on health care reform, it's always been highly unlikely that at the end of the day progressive Democrats would vote against their new president on his signature piece of domestic legislation (which also happens to have been the Liberal Holy Grail for the past 60 years) no matter how much we might scream and yell and issue threats. Health care is not going to be the issue on which the left defies Barack Obama and bands together with Republicans to defeat him. If Obama wants to pass a Health Care reform bill that opens up Medicaid to more poor people, ostensibly regulates the insurance industry and provides some modest subsidies to the uninsured middle class, even if its a rube Goldberg set-up that is unlikely to be sustained, progressives are not going to be the ones to stop it. I'm sorry, they just aren't. Obama himself must be persuaded that the public option is in his own and the country's best interest for it to pass. And even then it might fail at the hands of the 'centrist' corporate shills for whom this paltry effort goes too far."

Conservative blogger Jim Geraghty agrees with Digby: "[W]hy should the president take their 'veto threat' seriously? If their choices are a health-care reform bill without the public option or no health-care reform bill, will they really choose the latter option? They know that a failure to get something passed would be a body blow to Obama's teetering approval rating, right? They know that it would launch a thousand premature political obituaries. They know that it would probably start serious talk about a Democratic primary challenge in 2012. And they know that there's a risk that many grassroots Democrats would look at their party's inability to pass legislation with 59 senators, 256 House members, and control of the White House and decide that political activism is a waste of time."

While some liberal bloggers (namely, Ezra Klein) think the left is placing too much emphasis on the public option, most liberal bloggers (Krugman, Moulitsas, Llorens) disagree.

THOUGHT OF THE DAY: Paranoia, Paranoia, Everybody's Comin' To Get Me

TAPPED's Adam Serwer:

"In an ideal world, the folks who spent the last two weeks screeching about how President Obama would 'indoctrinate' America's children by urging them to work hard and stay in school would suffer a loss in influence and stature once those charges turned out to be completely and utterly unfounded. While these kinds of speeches have always been subject to partisan criticisms, the qualitative difference between accusing the President of 'indoctrination' and of campaigning on the job is massive.

The 'indoctrination' accusation also has to be viewed in the context of the larger far right narrative -- which is that the elected leader of this country is in fact, some kind of traitor, an outsider who is subverting the nation to his own villainous ends. This is the core feeling animating everything from birtherism to the cries of 'socialism' from Republicans who demand government keep its hands off their medicare. Even when it isn't tied to the obvious hysteria of birtherism, the subtext of conservative criticisms of the President's legitimacy are fairly similar, which is that, for one reason or another, Obama isn't a legitimate President."

LEST WE FORGET: Of A Sort

From Overheard in New York:

American tourist #1: Wow, your English is really good!
Scottish tourist: Um, thank you.
American tourist #2: Yes, it's really very good. You sound like a native speaker. What language do you normally speak in Scotland, anyway?
Scottish tourist: English.