All of Sunday, the political blogosphere was alight with activity stemming from the titillating rumor circulating around the Washington Beltway that the White House was willing to drop public-option from President Obama’s health care reform proposal. The Drudge Report accompanied the headline with an image of a white flag. Politico led off with the caption, “White House has backedway.” Others, particularly those on the right, aren’t so convinced. Conservative bloggers like Michelle Malkin are skeptical, believing this not to be a retreat by the Obama administration, but rather a “trial balloon [in which] to measure the potential nutroots backlash versus the potential Senate pick-ups.”

In terms of a ‘potential nutroots backlash’ from the far-left side of the political blogosphere, the results so far have to be less then encouraging for the White House. Doug Ross @ Journal examined one blog in particular, America Blog, which seemed to suggest the fight over health care reform was either public-option or bust.

Contributor Joe Sudbay had these words to say:

“I don’t understand why Democrats are always so willing and desperate to compromise with themselves. The GOPers don’t want any reform bill. Their base, comprised of the teabaggers, birthers and deathers, won’t let them negotiate. So, Democrats compromise with themselves, again — and sell out their principles, again. Just like they did on the stimulus package - they gave the GOP nearly 40% of the package in tax cuts, and how many votes did it get them in the entire Congress? Three”

Ahem, excuse me? The ‘Democrats’ are the ones who are “always so willing and desperate to compromise with themselves?” Surely he must be joking. No, he isn’t … but you can still call him Shirley if you like. But in all seriousness how could Joe Sudbay have written this statement with a straight face? So far in the health care debate this summer we have seen the White House tell supporters of the president’s health care proposal – in particular ACORN and SEIU – to ‘punch back twice as hard’ against tea party protestors, progressive Democrats threaten a leading moderate Democrat in the health care reform fight with losing his chairmanship if he didn’t stop talking to Congressional Republicans, and the Democratic leadership forcing moderate ‘Blue Dog’ Democrats to submit to their rule. That’s always compromising?

But wait, the comment section for the article is even better. Jimfromthefoothills writes, “Remember, we are going to rebuild every school, bridge and road in the country. We will fix healthcare. We will restore the constitution, end illegal wars [and] reduce emissions of greenhouse gasses.” … and then we shall rule the world! Umm, if people like Joe Sudbay say that we shouldn’t listen to uneducated conservative Southern bumpkins then why should we listen to the same kind only on the left? Jim returns later in the comment section to insult Obama, referring to him as ‘Choco-Bush.’ And to think some people believed racism existed only on the right side of the political spectrum.

Jersey asks, “Can we convince Howard Dean to run against Obama in 2012?” Jim returns yet again to add, “Dean\Krugman, Reich\Waters, ANYBODY BUT OBAMA.”

Chairman of the progressive Democracy for America, Jim Dean, chimed in with an e-mail sent to supporters on Monday, August 17^th,which told them to “fight any effort to remove a government-run health insurance plan in place of non-profit ‘cooperatives’.” He goes on to suggest that “insider Democrats and the insurance industry are behind the effort to kill a government-run plan.” You mean the same “private insurers and the for-profit health care industry” that donated more to the president and his party “than even Republicans, with the president taking $19 million in the 2008 election cycle alone, more than all his Repubican, Democratic and independent rivals combined?” That same industry?

Tags: ACORN, America Blog, birther, Blue Dog, Blue Dog Democrats, Congress, Congressional Republicans, Democracy for America, Drudge Report, GOP, headline, Howard Dean, Jim Dean, Michelle Malkin, Politico, private insurance, public-option, SEIU, white house

This entry was posted on Tuesday, August 18th, 2009 at 1:12 am and is filed under Horserace. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.