It ain’t gonna happen all at once. For about twenty years, the Dems were reshaping themselves as Republican Lite, business-friendly, triangulated in the Clintonista way. The Dems aren’t the left wing, how many Wellstones can you count?
Health reform is a threat to Big Money, and Big Money protects itself with the ferocity of a rabid velociraptor. Who do you think is paying for the lies flowing out of your TV like electronic sewage?
But here’s the thing: the anti-reform guys have to sweep the table, they have to win everything, they are forced into a take-no-prisoners stance that does not afford them any opportunity for compromise, they must win all.
If there is any…any!..meaningful reform, people will benefit. And they will be grateful to the Dems. And so will their friends and relations. And they will remember who fought tooth and nail to stop them. And the people who benefit will fall into the Everybody demographic: white, black, northern, southern, gay, straight, curly-haired and bald.
That was the mistake, if there was one. Some Dems were expecting to have a reasonable discussion on wonk-turf, numbers, studies, reason, that sort of thing. They failed to take into account the sheer ferocity of money.
There will be health care reform simply because there has to be, either now, or later when it breaks down even more obviously. So either we win now, and the Dems get the credit, or it gets much worse, and the Pubbies get the blame.
From a realpolitik point of view, six of one against half-a-dozen. Only difference, is people are suffering right now, and we can help them. If they aren’t our people, these Americans, who’s people are they?
