Discussion for article #230566
Fuck you Chuck.
63 Likes
Schumer can be so full of shit at times. It was clear from the start of 2009 that no matter what the Democrats wanted to do, the GOP would use every tool at its disposal (the GOP is full of tools) to kill it.
With healthcare: if not then, when?
48 Likes
Hindsight from one of the partyâs hind ends.
30 Likes
Youâre going to have to say Fuck you, Rahm, as well because itâs the same advice Rahm Emanuel who was the presidentâs top adviser at the time gave him. In fact Emanuel has said he âbeggedâ him in 2009 to postpone going after health care reform. We Democrats wouldnât be in a world of hurt as we are now if the president had moved on economic issues instead, particularly unemployment.
6 Likes
As if the repugs would not have fought tooth and nail against whatever the DEMs tried to do. I do agree though, that DEMs missed their chance to help the middle class in 2009 and 2010 and have not had an opportunity since then.
2 Likes
"âshould have come laterâ
Iâm with Dr. Coyote here. The Dems had a small window before midterms that traditionally involves losing seats. They actually had a filibuster proof majority â and even that wasnât in place some of the time giving illness and the Franken election lawsuits. Health care reform failed for decades including in the '70s where some Dems rejected it in hope for more. When is this âlater,â moron? Does NY have to have an âassholeâ senator or something? Thank goodness for Sen. Gillibrand.
33 Likes
Curious â what would Dems have done then that they didnât do if they hadnât done healthcare reform? What does it mean to say âWe should have fixed the economy?â Particularly for Senator Citibank?
The reason the Dems didnât do more on the economy is because financial industry proxies like Chuck wouldnât let them do more. And the reason the Democrats havenât moved more real policy advances over the past 40 years (and therefore won more elections) is because thereâs always a chorus of Chucks counseling ânow, now, letâs just hold off on doing anything too major until after the next electionâŚâ
43 Likes
Shut up Chuck. For my best friend with congestive heart failure who had NO insurance prior to the ACA, it was the right decision.
30 Likes
Their not mutually exclusive, Chuck. The structure of health care financing has been fundamentally flawed for decades. Its long term trend towards unsustainability (structured around subsidizing employer-sponsored insurance while the proportion of people with traditional long-term employment relationships is declining) was greatly accelerated by the âGreat Recession.â The inability of people to get health insurance that is not affordable and portable is the biggest hindrance to labor mobility for people who are lower-income and for tens of millions of workers older-but-too-young-for-Medicare.
22 Likes
Sorry, but no. But since you asked, okay, FUCK YOU RAHM.
15 Likes
Because Congress would have been so willing to deal with it after the midterms, right. Idiot. When you have barely the majority you need, you get moving on what you campaigned on. The problem was letting Max Baucus stop it for months in his committee when a better bill had passed the House and another Senate committee. It could and should have been done before the August recess in 2009, but stupid people among the Senate Democrats screwed up almost every way possible. I wish Schumer would get lost.
18 Likes
So why canât the two things have been done at the same time? What was stopping Democrats from going after the banks and wall street criminals? Oh! I Know! They put the best buddies of wall street incharge. I didnât hear Schumer complain about it then. Heâs been in the senate forever. Didnât it occur to him that something needed to be done about the economy? Or was he too busy saving wall street and screwing main street to notice?
17 Likes
I agree with Tom J. I respectfully disagree with Sen Schumer on this one. Fixing healthcare by itself goes a long ways to fixing the economy for the middle class. Certainly hindsight concludes that there was a very small window of opportunity for the Democrats to accomplish anything and Iâm grateful they went âbigâ. The GOP charges of âpoisoning the wellâ are a comic farce. They would have to prove to me that there ever was any good intention of working together to save the economy from disaster- the audaciousness of partisan fighting on this score is still stunning to me. The GOP has a lot to prove that they are a good faith partner in serving the American people.
11 Likes
Perhaps the economic initiatives did not get the attention that they deserved but it seems the administration dealt with both those and the ACA concurrently. What is the Senatorâs trying to accomplish by suggesting what âshould have been doneâ in 2010? To what end?
4 Likes
What Emanuel proposed was a smaller reform package which would have covered about 10 million people, mostly women and children, and it was believed it would have been passed easily. I hope your friend enjoys his renewed good health and his health care coverage is not stripped away but the Rs do want to strip it away piecemeal, and I think thatâs the context of Schumerâs remarks.
Youâre right. âFuck you, Rahm.â 
6 Likes
$2 buck chuck donât go down well
Goddamit!!! Heâs my Senator and he REALLY needs to be primaried. It wonât happen (read: ties to Wall Street and AIPAC) but it needs to. He conveniently forgets that the WH pushed through a stimulus package that was fought tooth and nail by the Repubs with claims that it was outrageous, etc.
Turns out, it was mostly tax cuts that did nothing for the economy (just the 1%) with some other funding sprinkled in. He thinks that more stimulus was going to happen??
8 Likes
I concur. According to Sen Chuck, tisâ better to stay as a high-ranking Senate Majority leader than to help uninsured citizens that may or not be able to return the favor with votes. Seriously, that quote just sent me over the bend. We donât elect politicians so that they can merely stay in power. We elect them to get things done and solve problems. Our health care system, with its inadequate coverage and merciless policies needed fixing and, to the great credit of the Democrats in the 111th Congress, they did it. Oh, and BTW, the ACAâs reforms did not merely extend to the poor and previously uninsured. Even if you get your insurance through your employer, you are still impacted by rate hikes. Moreover, the most far-reaching reforms (no more pre-existing conditions, the end of yearly and lifetime reimbursement caps, the ability to keep oneâs adult children on your plan until age 26) impact ALL insurance holders!
16 Likes