The final push for a midterm wake-up call.

Often, one finds excellent writing skills being delivered here at the Lake, and it’s with this in mind that “mary” deserves to be recognized for ‘marrying’ the writing skill that equals an excellent observation, and done via an analogy.

The AP recently released poll results on how people feel about the health care reform bill. Commenting on it, Kevin Drum says:

The Affordable Care Act was a tremendous Democratic victory, so why all the grousing from the left?

Over 1 million Californians are getting shafted with double-digit health insurance premium rate hikes. Tell Congress to pass the Public Option Act.

For those of you who’ve been disenchanted with the Democratic Party, consider these options for the 2010 Midterm elections.

This is a reply I wrote to Bryce Covert, MJ, and Richard Kirsch, formerly of HCAN, at the New Deal 2.0 (ND20) site.

MJ expressed the view that both the private sector and Government are corrupt these days and that neither can be trusted. I agree with MJ about corruption in Government these days, but I think one has to distinguish among the branches of Government when it comes to corruption, and also the kind of corruption involved. The most corrupt branch of Government is Congress, because its members need huge contributions for re-election,and the sources of those funds are now drafting legislation in many cases.

Some executive departments such as The Defense Department appear to be more corrupt than others, because they are subject to influence from powerful defense contractor lobbyists. The electoral system has been corrupted over time to create a bias against the success of third parties. When combined with the development of a Supreme Court that is not defending individual liberty, there a great danger of the development of a plutocracy whose hard shell we won’t be able to crack to allow democracy to emerge from below. Perhaps the development of Information technology can provide a way around the institutions by giving people a way to self-organize that gets around the need for large quantities of money.

Once again, Republicans (this time in the Senate) are waving around what they think is a really scary chart supposedly explaining what the new health care system looks like under the Affordable Care Act passed this spring. Much like a chart they waved around while trying to kill the bill, this one bears little resemblance to reality. It’s kind of fun to look at, though.

On Wednesday, Representative Lynn Woolsey (D-CA) introduced H.R. 5808. The text of the bill can be read here on Thomas. The bill is titled “To amend the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act to establish a public health insurance option.” Woolsey has procured 128 co-sponsors for the bill.

But the Los Angeles Times “reassures” us the bill has little chance of passing and is just a back door attempt at getting single payer.

Senator Michael Bennet promised to introduce the Public Option during reconciliation. When he didn’t he promised us all he’d introduce it later as an amendment or bill.