Nelson Playing Possum?

Chuck Schumer remarked yesterday on the dynamic facing moderate Dems with respect to health care and the public option:

So if you have a conference committee where the House has it strongly, almost rock solid, in their bill, and the Senate...if we don't have it in the bill there are 54, 55, 56 Democratic senators for it, how are they going to report back a bill without it?

This is the key question. Everybody wants to agree on jettisoning the public option, but the debate got so far away from the White House and Congress that the public option became synonymous with reform, and now nobody wants to be the one to excise it from the bill. You've even got Shep Smith going off script and slamming Republicans for distorting the public option debate. Nobody wants to put the stake through its heart.

But before everyone congratulates themselves on how health care reform "won" because conservaDems wouldn't dare to kill it, check out what Ben Nelson told Brian Beutler earlier today:

With a 60-seat majority in the Senate, Democrats are poised, theoretically, to prevent Republicans from filibustering key agenda items. Liberals and health care reformers see that as a potential bulwark against Republican obstruction and are pressuring party leaders to enforce unanimity on key cloture votes, so that nominations and major bills (like health care) can be decided by a simple majority. And just how are they doing on that score?

Sen. Ben Nelson (D-NE), one of the Senate's most visible centrists, tells me leadership hasn't said anything about it to him.

I asked, "Has leadership been in discussions with you and other moderates about voting with the party on procedural votes?"

In a statement that will bedevil liberals, he responded, "I don't know about others, but not with me."

There's almost no way that's true. And if it is, the Democratic leadership should collectively resign. There's almost nobody in the caucus whose vote needs to be assured OTHER than Ben Nelson. My suspicion is that Nelson is deliberately misreading what's been said to him to set himself up with the ability to leverage his opposition into concessions. With 60 Democratic votes, it really only takes one to vote down cloture. Everybody has the potential to demand something from reform. And Nelson is just allowing that to continue.

Meanwhile, he's being smartly squeezed back at home:

The Nebraska Democratic Party put the state's senior senator, Ben Nelson, in an awkward spot on Saturday by passing a resolution making support for a government-run insurance option a central aspect of its platform.

In a nearly unanimous vote at a committee meeting in Fort Omaha Metro Community College, about 70 attendees approved language that urges members of Congress "to vote for such health care reform proposals that contain a robust public option at all stages of the legislative process including conference and reconciliation, and encourage legislators to pass such reform."

Nelson remains one of the highest-profiled U.S. Senate Democratic holdouts on the public plan, even recently declining to commit to voting against a Republican filibuster of legislation that included the provision.

Officials at the Nebraska Democratic Party said the committee vote was not meant as a rebuke of the senator, who has historically taken a conservative approach to public policy issues. More an encouragement to all Democratic state legislators.

North Dakota Democrats just did the same thing, putting pressure on Kent Conrad - the resolution actually supports single payer with a public option as a "fallback". I don't know if these Senators are reachable, even by their home states, but it's worth a shot.

Point being, I don't think we can just assume that the Dems have 60 locked up for cloture just yet. There's a long way to go.

The Nelson/Landrieu Conundrum

A recent AARP poll shows 79% support for a public option competing with private insurance companies, although the poll question is kind of odd and doesn't reflect what's on offer. Nevertheless, other polls that accurately depict the public option show support in that range. However, that is not equally spread throughout the country. For instance, in a conservative state like Nebraska, more people don't support a public option (by a plurality) in health care reform, for whatever reason, and Democrat Ben Nelson gets 56% support for his handling of health care thus far. We don't have hard data on Louisiana, but Mary Landrieu, who has actually more strongly opposed a public insurance option than Nelson, may also be more in line with the interests of her state than some realize.

Speaking before what was described as a friendly crowd at the Monroe Chamber of Commerce yesterday, Sen. Mary Landrieu said she was opposed to much of the Democrats' legislative agenda.

Asked under what circumstances she would support a public option, Landrieu responded, "[v]ery few, if any. I'd prefer a private market-based approach to any health care reform that would extend coverage," according to the Monroe News Star.

"I'd like to cover everyone -- that would be the moral thing to do -- but it would be immoral to bankrupt the country while doing so," Landrieu said. The public option as currently conceived is expected to be a deficit reducer.

Dishonest? Absolutely. But out of step? Perhaps not.

What can we realistically expect from Democrats like this in red states? Obviously, under a "split the bill" scenario, they could signal support for the more broadly popular elements of reform, like insurance regulations, while opting out of the more controversial elements that only require a 60-vote standard. Or, they could simply opt to allow cloture, the wish of the majority of their caucus, while voting against the final bill. Markos polled this in the case of Nelson:

If Ben Nelson joined Republican Senators in filibustering and killing a final health care bill because it had a public health insurance option would that make you more or less likely to vote for him or would it have no real effect on your vote?

	More	Less
All	21	15
Dem	7	24
GOP	31	9
Ind	19	15

We can assume Nelson will vote against any bill with a robust public option. The big question is whether he will join Republicans in filibustering such a bill. Nebraska Republicans would sure love that, but at the end of the day, they'll vote for a real Republican in a contested election. Nelson would gain a small sliver from Independents, per this poll, but his real danger is among Democrats -- where he would lose a full 17 points of support [...]

If Nelson was to play this properly, he'd vote against any robust public option (and be justified doing so, given his constituency), but allow an up-or-down vote on the bill. Given the political realities of his state, that's the best we could hope for.

How can we position this so that Nelson comes around to this reality? I would look at how Republicans are pressuring Chuck Grassley. Grassley has something only the caucus can give him - the ranking membership of the Senate Judiciary Committee or the Budget Committee. And so he feels the pull from his members to not join in any bipartisan deal. Nelson and Landrieu both have pretty low seniority at the moment, although there's been a near-historic amount of turnover in the Senate recently. But if they have any designs on better committee assignments, or eventual chairmanships, the caucus should inform them of how they would do best to stay in their good graces. This pressure, by the way, should theoretically be much stronger on a Max Baucus or Kent Conrad, who already have that seniority. In addition, Landrieu and Nelson should be asked, pointedly, if they want to go down in history as having stopped access to health care for all Americans for a generation.

365, +21, +8?

Obama did indeed grab that extra electoral vote from Nebraska-02. So make it 365 EVs, with great moves into previously red territory in Indiana, North Carolina, and Nebraska.

As Jon Stewart said on his show this week, "So he won the election by 6 percentage points, but 2-1 in the electoral college. Yes, the Electoral College makes perfect sense!" Which is true, and we need the National Popular Vote, but just like in the primary, Obama's campaign worked with the playing field that they had. They knew how to microtarget at the state and even district level to maximize the votes they needed. And it was incredibly successful.

Meanwhile, we have two more calls for Democrats in the House: Frank Kratovil in MD-01, and Tom Perriello in VA-05. Kratovil's going to be a Blue Dog, but it's notable that he won the seat occupied by Wayne Gilchrest, an antiwar Republican who was primaried out by the Club for Growth. Gilchrest then supported and campaigned for the Democrat and helped him win the seat. As for Perriello, this is a glorious upset. Virgil Goode was a grade-A wingnut, and Perriello is a smart progressive who helped found Avaaz.org, the global MoveOn. He was a Responsible Plan endorser, too. He ran a come-from-behind race that made up maybe 30 points in the final months.

And in the Senate, Al Franken keeps closing the gap on Norm Coleman - it's down to 221 votes. That's going to hit a recount. Plus, Nate Silver has done an analysis of the uncounted votes in the Alaska Senate race, and he thinks Mark Begich could still pull it out. Don't underestimate the Silver.

Like I said, it's hard to evaluate Election Day until all these races are called. It's rounding into a very good night.

North Carolina, Nebraska; Obama Country

On top of Obama capturing North Carolina's electoral votes, it appears he has snagged one electoral vote from Omaha, as well:

Good news for Barack Obama supporters.

His odds of bagging an electoral vote in Nebraska grew stronger this morning, with word that 10,000 to 12,000 early ballots and 5,200 provisional ballots are left to count in Douglas County.

Obama won about 61 percent of the early votes counted before Tuesday's election. If that percentage holds with the early ballots left to count, Obama stands a strong chance of winning the Omaha-area 2nd Congressional District.

Republicans did not concede defeat this morning, but they acknowledged the long odds.

This would be the first time any state has split their electoral votes, and it would get Obama up to 365 EVs with Missouri still uncalled (though McCain is likely to win there). Obama won pretty much all the swing states, by the way, some with very narrow margins. That's the power of the ground game, and it worked to perfection. Indiana and North Carolina and NE-02 would not have gone to Obama without those efforts.

They all laughed when Howard Dean said we could change the map and compete in places Democrats never competed. 90% of this was just showing up, saying who you were and what you stood for, and letting people make up their own minds. They chose against fear and division, and chose Barack Obama.

Now he must be worthy of their choice. But at some point, you'd think somebody would thank Howard Dean.

You can right here.

Small-Ball and Scrounging

Looks like the McCain campaign is going after Maine-02, while the Obama campaign is looking to flip Nebraska-02. Those are the only states that split electoral votes.

I'm pretty sure they never have split them, so the chances of this are remote. What I'm more interested in is the fact that, with Michigan off the table, McCain's team appears to have conceded Colorado, as I suspected yesterday:

Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) now must win Pennsylvania, Wisconsin or Minnesota in order to get enough electoral votes to win the presidency, his campaign says.

Those were considered swing states in 2000 and 2004, but George W. Bush lost them both times.

"Our ability to pick off one of those three states is where our fortunes are largely held," a McCain official said. "These are states where Barack Obama is on the defense."

McCain doesn't need to win any of these as long as he holds the Bush states, in theory. But Iowa and New Mexico are trending away from him, and if he thinks that he has to win one of the above states, they must feel that Colorado and/or Nevada is lost, too.

Wow.

Meanwhile McCain's campaign has gone 100% negative.

Obama's First 100 Days

As Digby mentioned, Barack Obama at a fundraiser said that a priority of his first 100 days would be to scrutinize all executive orderspassed by George Bush and overturn those which he and his advisors deem unconstitutional. This is crucially important - as The Poor Man notes, the Cheney Administration has set little traps and landmines inside the government to ensure that radical executive power survives, and an Obama Administration, in order to be successful, will need to at least partially root out the garbage and the rot that will crop up to undermine his Presidency.

But Obama had another answer to the question of how he would fill out his first 100 days. He said that he'd get his health care plan moving. "We need a bill...by March or April to get going before the political season sets in."

That's particularly astute, as Ezra Klein notes. One problem with the Clinton health care debacle was that it took so long to get around to it, while the Administration had their honeymoon period tied up with NAFTA and gays in the military. Obama appears to recognize the need to act quickly on the potential mandate for change in the biggest domestic policy challenge facing the country.

For those of us into the politics of this issue, that timetable is big news. Doing health care quickly is crucial. You can't lose your momentum. You can't get bogged down in the endless unknown events and unexpected crises of a presidency. You need a strategy and you need momentum and in order to preserve those things, you need to move [...]

That time spent dithering was time that enemies of the plan spent organizing. The rest, as they say, is history. Last night, Obama said he's uninterested in repeating it.

I know that a lot of people have concerns about Obama's plan, and I share them to an extent. But acting quickly and getting a plan through that goes a good bit of the way toward reform is far better than waiting around and ending up attaining nothing. Like Obama, I believe that if we were starting from scratch, single payer would absolutely be the way to go, and any reform movement ought to see whatever is passed as part of a gradual shift to that goal, mindful of the fact that dislocating a major industry of 3 million people and their jobs is not something that can be done with a snap of the fingers without a major shock to the economic system. And I think that Obama is willing to let the process play out and have the lawmakers who will craft the bill get the leeway they need to improve upon his program within the broad goals that he's set out - lower costs, mandating all children with coverage, and an affordable option for everyone without pre-existing conditions.

The entire country wants this, make no mistake. A recent survey in Nebraska - Nebraska - showed that 94% favor affordable, quality coverage for all and 75% would agree with mandating coverage, because they've experienced the current system and they really don't like it:

Other findings published in “Nebraskans on Health Care Issues”:

* 31 percent of the people surveyed said they had postponed or skipped medical services in the past year to save money.

* 31 percent said they had problems paying for medical services in the past year, including 26 percent of insured Nebraskans.

* 18 percent spent at least $5,000 on health care last year.

Among the state’s more than 200,000 uninsured people:

* 76 percent had trouble paying for a medical service last year.

* 66 percent postponed or skipped care to save money.

* 40 percent were denied health care coverage.

There is a real desire to reform the health care system, which I believe can be translated into a bottom-up movement that any member of Congress who wants to keep his job will have to listen to. This is a hopeful time but it's going to take a lot of hard work, not to mention that little election in November. And if Obama does get in, he'd better hope he has his evangelist Teddy Kennedy in the well of the Senate helping him close the deal.

Republicans Losing All Hope Update

Yes, you're going to see a thumpin' provided by Hillary Clinton to Barack Obama in West Virginia today. But there are some other notable elections being held across the country today, including one that could really send Republicans into a tailspin.

In Nebraska, the Senate primary to replace the seat held by Chuck Hagel features a Democratic contest between former Republican Tony Raimondo and netroots hero Scott Kleeb. Here's Kleeb's closing ad, which has a whiff of Obama's message to it:



Jane Fleming Kleeb, the candidate's wife, is posting all day from her MTV blog about the race. Kleeb is a strong candidate and a nice guy who could actually make Nebraska competitive. At the least he should beat self-funding Republican in sheep's clothing Tony Raimondo.

But the big race is in Mississippi, where Democrat Travis Childers may end up beating Republican Greg Davis in a special election. This is a very Republican seat, and a loss here would really signal the disgust with which the entire country sees the GOP. The country is nearly united in its belief that the country is seriously on the wrong track, and Republicans are very late to the game in recognizing this. Indeed, even while they are desperately trying to rebrand the party as offering "change you deserve" (is that a threat?), a slogan that's actually already used for an antidepressant, the Republicans are trying to win in Mississippi by using the same old tired techniques of demonization.

Hoping to hang on to a Congressional seat in a tight special election here on Tuesday, Republicans in this mostly white and very conservative district are trying to make the vote more a referendum on Senator Barack Obama than on the candidates themselves.

In advertisements and speeches, Republicans have repeatedly associated Travis Childers, the white Democrat threatening to take the seat away from the Republican Party, with Mr. Obama. Republicans say Mr. Obama’s liberal values are out of place in the district. But for many Democratic veterans here, the tactic is a throwback to the old and unwelcome politics of race, a standby in Mississippi campaigning.

Former Gov. William Winter, a Democrat, expressed shock at the current campaign.

“I am appalled that this blatant appeal to racial prejudice is still being employed,” said Mr. Winter, who lost the 1967 governor’s race after his segregationist opponent circulated handbills showing blacks listening to one of his speeches. Mr. Winter went on to win the governor’s office 12 years later.

The new branding is just a cover for this conduct, which is way too explicit. Republicans have no ideas to move the country and simply want to tell voters the horrors of what the Democrats would present. I'm convinced that's not a victory strategy given what we face in this country right now, and we'll see if I'm right tonight in MS-01.

(The other part of that WaPo poll shows Obama up 51-44 over McCain, and this is right at the beginning of him actually campaigning in the general election. 44 is the high-water mark for McCain, in my view - he hasn't gotten very far past it in any national poll.)

Something that Rhymes With Obama Connoting Excitement

Looks like Obama swept Washington state, Nebraska, the Virgin Islands (!) and Louisiana yesterday. And all of them were dominant victories in all areas of the states. Maine might be the only stand Clinton can take between now and March 4. And the Cleveland Plain Dealer, Ohio's largest paper, just endorsed Obama, although I don't think newspaper endorsements much matter.

The Obama camp claims they're now up in total delegates, and even if they're not right now, they will be by Tuesday. I really think Ohio and Texas will be extremely significant, and if Obama sweeps, I can't see how Hillary stays in the race. That's supposed to be her firewall. There's an extremely detailed analysis of the Texas delegate situation at the Burnt Orange Report, and Obama has some natural advantages in the delegate fight. But he would need clear, 5-10 point victories in both states to end this on March 4. If Hillary wins both, she has the momentum back. For political junkies this is truly like the Lakers vs. the Celtics in the 1980s.

I haven't seen Obama's whole speech at the Jefferson-Jackson dinner in Virginia, but you can:



I have to say that this part is tremendous:

It’s also time to bring the cost of living down for working families who are struggling in this economy like never before. They’re facing rising costs and falling wages, and we owe it to them to end the Bush-McCain tax cuts for the wealthiest 2% and put a tax cut into the pockets of the families who need it.

Lovin' it.

"...and nothing but the truth, so help you, You?"

A state Senator in Nebraska is suing God.

State Sen. Ernie Chambers sued God last week. Angered by another lawsuit he considers frivolous, Chambers says he’s trying to make the point that anybody can file a lawsuit against anybody.

Chambers says in his lawsuit that God has made terrorist threats against the senator and his constituents, inspired fear and caused “widespread death, destruction and terrorization of millions upon millions of the Earth’s inhabitants.”

The Omaha senator, who skips morning prayers during the legislative session and often criticizes Christians, also says God has caused “fearsome floods ... horrendous hurricanes, terrifying tornadoes.”

He’s seeking a permanent injunction against the Almighty.

Of course, this isn't fair at all, because God can assemble the ultimate Dream Team to represent him, including John Marshall, Clarence Darrow, the drafters of the Magna Carta, and Johnnie Cochran.

This actually mirrors a book by James Morrow called Blameless in Abaddon where God is put on trial, but I won't tell you the outcome because it'd spoil the ending. Of the trial, I mean.