With a health care reform bill poised to pass, I thought I would mosy on over to DKos to see what the climate was like.  And that’s when I came across this:

People are so quick to rush to embrace a bill that’s not set in stone, which has been consistently eroded over the past year, at an exponentially accelerated pace, with each major concessions not just making the bill worse, but emboldening critics to make further demands. As crappy as the bill is now, it’s inevitably getting worse, and then, it’ll get even worse after that.And every time progressives shrug their shoulders and say, “all right, we’ll take whatever we can get”, you empower those critics. Rather than draw a line in the sand and bolster the efforts of true reformists, you are leaving them high and dry. And the weaker progressives get, the more Ben Nelson and Joe Lieberman and Blanche Lincoln and the rest of that bunch can do to make this not just a bad bill politically, but a bad bill policy wise. [...]

We’re at the point, I think, where you strip this thing of anything remotely controversial and pass whatever is left — maybe tougher rules against rescissions, some regulatory reform, etc. But as far as substantive reform, we live in a legislative world were a majority can’t accomplish shit because idiotic rules prevent government from governing. And we can’t resort to reconciliation because we live in a world in which procedural tactics that were okay for Republicans, are somehow off limits for Democrats.

Nate Silver has a very well detailed take down of this kind of attitude, which I basically agree with unconditionally.

The bottom line is that the bill currently under consideration in the Senate (with the Executive Amendments and Nelson’s support) is still a good bill.  Is it a great bill?  No.  Is it my favorite bill?  No.  Would I like to see a robust public option?  Yes.  Am I pissed off that procedural rules give the keys to the palace over to the likes of Joe Lieberman and Ben Nelson?  Absolutely.  But the take-away is that this bill is significantly better than the status quo.

To sit in your corner and stamp your feet because the bad men threw your bill in the dirt is beyond childish.  This bill will improve the lives of millions of Americans.  Ron Wyden’s bill will not.  The House bill will not.  Why?  Because they won’t pass the Senate.  Period.  Not even with reconciliation.

It’s time to grow up and pass a bill.

With “death panel” rumors abound, it far past due to have a simple explanation of what the health care reform proposal on the Hill is all about.  Enter Nick Beaudrot:

When put into this context, we can see that the nefarious public option is relatively minor in scope.  The real big reforms are the added consumer protections, coupled with employer mandates and health care exchanges.  Not to say that the public option should be dropped, because I think it would be a significant upgrade to the system, but I wouldn’t want a bill to get killed simply because it didn’t contain one.

Having said that, it becomes even more clear that all those grannies out there have nothing to fear, because there will be no change to Medicare.  That is, there’s no change anymore, now that expanding Medicare benefits to cover end-of-life counseling has been stricken from the bill, because that was obviously unacceptable.

On a much larger note, it blows my mind that a political party can be continued to be taken seriously after knowingly and maliciously lying to the American people.  In this particular case, lying to little old ladies.

These people cannot be allowed to shape policy in this country.  It’s time to boycott the GOP and completely shut them out of the legislative process.  I have no interest whatsoever in bipartisanship unless both sides are acting in good faith, and it’s clear that the GOP has no intention of that.

Republican Party, you’re dead to me.