11/11: Snowed In

On a relatively quiet Veterans Day in the blogosphere, the biggest topic is a Public Policy Polling (D) survey which found that 59% of likely GOP voters in ME would vote for "a more conservative challenger" over Sen. Olympia Snowe in the 2012 GOP primary. Liberal bloggers (and at least one conservative blogger) see this poll as evidence that Snowe's career as a GOPer will soon be over. Consequently, lefty bloggers are urging her to vote for health care reform and start caucusing with the Dems. Matthew Yglesias thinks the choice is an easy one:

"Based on this polling, a Snowe who votes for a comprehensive health care overhaul is basically not going to be viable as a GOP primary candidate. Conversely, a Snowe who votes for comprehensive health reform and switches parties would remain a very popular general election candidate with a safe seat."

What else is happening in the blogosphere?

• Liberal bloggers (Gardner, Fernholz, Fallows) are praising Pres. Obama's speech at the memorial service for the 13 Americans killed at Fort Hood. Conservative bloggers (McCarthy, Rubin) are criticizing Obama for not talking about Islam in his speech.
• Liberal bloggers (Benen, Klein, Black) are discussing Sen. Joe Lieberman's (I-CT) apparent objection to any type of public option, including Snowe's "trigger" compromise. One lefty blogger thinks Senate Maj. Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) made a strategic mistake by including an opt-out public option in the merged Senate bill.
• Conservative bloggers (Lane, Morrissey, Rubin) are buzzing about the new Gallup poll showing GOPers leading Dems 48% to 44% on the 2010 generic cong. ballot. Liberal bloggers (Sudbay, Armstrong) are concerned about these numbers.
• RedState editor Erick Erickson continues to hammer FL Gov. (and SEN candidate) Charlie Crist (R).

SNOWE: Will She Pull A Specter?

Liberal bloggers think the new PPP poll suggests that Snowe should join the Dems and vote for health care reform if she wants to have a future in politics:

• Think Progress' Yglesias: "I don't know whether these results are 'surprising' or not, but I think they ought to change our understanding of the prospects of bipartisanship in health reform. This means that when you're thinking about whether Snowe will support a bill or not, the issue ultimately comes down to not triggers versus non-triggers, or employer mandates versus free rider fees, but whether Snowe wants to remain a Republican or not. Based on this polling, a Snowe who votes for a comprehensive health care overhaul is basically not going to be viable as a GOP primary candidate. Conversely, a Snowe who votes for comprehensive health reform and switches parties would remain a very popular general election candidate with a safe seat."
• Daily Kos' Jed Lewison: "Snowe no longer fits in the modern 'teabagging' GOP and will lose a primary in 2012. Even if she opposed health care reform, she'll never live down her vote for the stimulus. Between this poll and Dede Scozzafava's experience [in] NY-23, Snowe should realize that her career as a Republican is over. [...] Snowe is not up for re-election until 2012. If she waits until her re-election, any switch will be viewed with suspicion, but if she decides to switch now, she can claim to have done so based on principle. Democrats will welcome her with open arms as long as she doesn't play the 'Lieberman obstructionist' role. She doesn't even need to vote for a public option -- she just needs to support cloture."

Open Left's Chris Bowers thinks it's inevitable that Snowe will eventually leave the GOP: "It is a rock-solid guarantee that conservatives will primary Snowe from the right in 2012. Not only is she pro-choice, but her lifetime Progressive Punch score on critical votes is identical to [PA Sen.] Arlen Specter's (27%). If they are not going to primary challenge Snowe, they are not going to primary challenge anyone. And we all know they will keep running primary challenges. [...] Without establishment support in her own party, trailing badly in the polls, and with an offer to join the Democratic caucus, Snowe will bolt the Republican Party and join the Democratic Senate caucus by June 12th, 2012, at the very latest. So, sometime in the next 945 days, Senate Democrats will pick up another seat."

Conservative blogger Allahpundit agrees with Bowers: "Her overall approval rating is fine -- 51/36 -- but among GOPers she's 40/46, which makes me think it won't be long before she has a Specter-esque 'awakening.'"

On the other hand, The Washington Post's Ezra Klein argues that people shouldn't read too much into this poll: "Snowe isn't up for reelection until 2012. This polling shows that in 2009, at a moment of maximal heterodoxy, Snowe isn't popular among her state's Republican voters. But if she shapes up in 2011 and really nails the Obama administration? Hard to say. I can think of a lot of senators who have lost reelection in recent years. I can't think of any who lost because of a vote they cast three years before the campaign."

THOUGHT OF THE DAY: Bargaining 101

Yglesias thinks liberals need to become better negotiators:

"A persistent liberal failure in terms of legislative tactics seems to me to be the repeated belief that if you try to make a compromise proposal, that the compromise will be adopted and then you'll get half a loaf. The reality of the way the legislative bargaining process works, it seems to me, is that you make a proposal and then a bloc of moderate legislators demands concessions. Whatever you propose, you then have to make concessions since the moderates wouldn't be moderate if they didn't make the liberals make concessions. So you might as well have had the [House health care reform] bill start with a sweeping expansion of abortion rights -- require that all Exchange plans offer a full suite of reproductive health services. Then you start bargaining.

Would that have worked? I don't know. But the public option example strikes me as encouraging. It looks like if there's a public option in the final bill, it'll be a shadow of its original self. But had the proposal started with something like the 'level playing field' public option then there'd be nothing left."

LEST WE FORGET: Increasingly Horrified Man Listens To Self Explain What He Does For A Living

From The Onion:

"CHARLOTTE, NC -- Dawning horror tinged with self-loathing crept slowly over the face of claims adjuster Robert Pettlebaum, 42, as he described his job and by extension his life to others during a seemingly innocuous Tuesday lunch meeting. 'Mostly what I do is I seek out discrepancies in the property appraisal versus the claimant's estimate of worth and then I...then I defer outpays...with...oh, God...,' Pettlebaum said as shadows of unspeakable self-realization flickered across his increasingly desperate eyes. 'Wait, no, that can't be right. I don't...do I?' Pettlebaum's mounting terror was met with incomprehension and nervous laughter from his companions, who sources indicated have anywhere between three weeks and 27 years before realizing their own existences are as desolate and barren as his."