Does his campaign rely on contributions from the medical insurance industry or is he one of the Congressional Dems that's spine-challenged??

It's a good reminder of the collective paralysis that we have to overcome. Obama didn't show a whole lot of relish for taking on health care (both Clinton and Edwards had better plans in the primary) but Daschle is serious and Rahm is doubly so about this issue. Clyburn is scared because our side still feels beaten up and it's hard to overcome the psychological damage a bully (like Newt) can cause, but Rahm will tell him to buck up.

ya know. i am so fucking sick and tired of these congressional assholes who've been collecting taxpayer-funded paychecks and bennies for decades, taking their slow, sweet time providing healthcare coverage for the rest of us.

I can sympathize with Clyburn's post-traumatic stress disorder to a certain extent, but the times are desperate and we have to stop looking backward. We are strong now and all we need is enough spine to use our power wisely.

This might be a good time to send in the Obama Bayonet Platoon (OBP) of committed activists to let Clyburn know that he'd better start growing a pair in a big fat hurry or his own future may start looking questionable.

I don't like having to do that but if these old water buffalo won't help with the program on their own then they should get a little shove to get them moving. The country can't afford to wait.

The health care system is one of several institutions that need to been torn down to the foundations and rebuilt in order to function. If we try to fix the system "incrementally" we'll probably end up with something that will only make things worse -- like the 2003 prescription drug coverage bill.

Obama and Congress will need to get everyone on board.

- People can't afford to buy health coverage on their own, and employers can't subsidize their workers anymore and remain competitive with the rest of the world.

- There still aren't enough general practitioners. Doctors come out of medical school half a million dollars in debt and can't afford to open a family practice.

- With a shortage of almost every type of doctor except cosmetic surgeons, medical schools still turn away five qualified applicants for every one that they accept.

- Hospitals are losing money, even though many of them offer sub-standard care.

- Doctors can't afford liability insurance and too many patients think that a doctor's honest mistake is the equivalent of hitting the lottery. On the other hand, state medical boards don't discipline doctors and hospitals that make preventable mistakes, so lawsuits are the injured patient's only remedy.

Those are only a few of the problems. We need to get doctors, nurses, state medical boards, medical schools and hospitals together and figure this mess out. Personally, I'd leave out private insurance companies because I'd like to get rid of them altogether, but that's just me.

CLYBURN HITTING THE BREAKS ON HEALTHCARE

Ummm, "brakes"?

[Ack! Teach me to go to lunch! Spell checkers don't catch homophone errors. Anyway, thanks for the nudge. It is fixed now. -Mod]

Cut the guy some slack, he obviously slept through 2006 and 2008 when the Democrats won their sizable majorities on promises of sweeping reforms.

I guess he enjoys being the minority party.

Can someone please explain to me how a Democrat from South Carolina becomes majority whip? To borrow an oft used phrase from Steve, the mind reels.

If he remembers '94, so well, why doesn't he remember '93, when Hillary's healthcare plan was stopped. As she took such a long time holding extended meetings, it allowed the insurance companies to use Rush Limbaugh and set up a "grass root" attack, not withstanding the TV ads. In that time, I saw many a letter to an op-ed editor, with the same construction, but, with different signatures saying that the US had the greatest health care system in the world. It was, precisely, the failure to move swiftly which wrecked Clinton's plans. If, he is trying to say this led to Newt's overturning the House in '94, that is incorrect. The passage of the Brady Bill brought the NRA out en masse to defeat Foley and anyone else who had voted for that needed bill.

Clyburn needs a memory adjustment and a spine.

Sorry. Just not that upset.

Provide coverage for all uninsured people by expanding Medicare. Thsi includes employees of companies that drop their plans.

When the unemployed get better care than the lowest bidder care provided by strapped small businesses, they'll drop the coverage and compel private insurers to provide better packages and less grief for legit claims.

I can cope if they're serious about this.

Add some icing? Allow people to join medicare and opt out of private. Light a fire under the private companies.

[Ack! Teach me to go to lunch! Spell checkers don't catch homophone errors. Anyway, thanks for the nudge. It is fixed now. -Mod]

Uh, no it isn't.

[Try hitting refresh - On my screen it's fixed, but if it isn'f correct on the display, I need to find out why. -Mod]

Here is incremental ... in the next phase of the bailout require the Detroit Auto companies to switch their workers to Medicare.

Perhaps require a 10% surtax on all salaries above 100k.
Also of course require no Exec bonuses, no Dividends and fully fund the pension plans.

Fixed now. But I refreshed a few times, and it was stuck on the breaks.

"I would much rather see it done that way, incrementally, than to go out and just bite something you can't chew," Clyburn said on C-SPAN. "We've been down that road. I still remember 1994."

In 1993-94, enough Congressional Democrats, favoring incrementalism, sided with Republicans, favoring doing nothing, to prevent the Democratic President from passing a comprehensive healthcare program that was a signature component of his Presidential campaign, which was a big factor in in the Democrats losing their majority in Congress in 1994.

It seems to me that by standing up against comprehensive reform in favor of incrementalism, Clyburn, rather than learning any lesson from 1994, is setting up the stage for a repeat of it.

A move like this makes sense and would be easier to control and change if need be.
I suggest that the administration start with the uninsured first and go from there.
I would also suggest major regulations on ALL drug companies and insurance companies. Doing this will give them leverage to monitor cost and keep a cap on out of control costs.

I'm not terribly in favor of doing it all at once. My belief is that we often botch big things and that something like this healthcare which we want to be around a long time needs to be done right. So, I've suggested phasing it in over a few years, so we can see if the early parts do indeed save us money and so we can check the feedback on whether it's improving real health care.

Given that, if the vast majority of the Congress and administration want to do it NOW, then I say GO FOR IT. Then work hard to make sure it actually works.

In these trying days there is also probable benefit in doing it to stimulate the economy. I hope it does.

Clyburn out of leadership if he can't get with the program.

We'll see how long he's whip.

"Incremental".

That's how we got on the metric system.

Shocking, just SHOCKING!!! That a conservative would fear anything other than status quo, here we go!

Maybe he didn't get the memo....

"Psssssst! You lost the election, Mr. Clyburn, just as we all lost the last 8 years."