I have three unrelated thoughts for you all.

1. Yesterday the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) released cost estimates for defense spending in the upcoming decade. The numbers are staggering. If the Department of Defense’s (DoD) 2009 budget for 2010 moves forward, and it will, the cost will be $573 billion annually. That doesn’t even include our continuing wars in Afghanistan, Iraq, etc. The CBO also notes that these numbers don’t factor in weapons systems that may end up costing more than they are supposed to. Now, let’s compare that to the Senate health care bill (the only one we can conceivably get right now), which will cost a grand total of $850 billion in its first ten years, meaning about $85 billion a year. Yet politicians in D.C. cower in fear at the mention of health-care reform, which would cover tens of millions of America’s uninsured, and save tens of thousands of lives. Too expensive. More than six times that price for fancy new bombs to use in unpopular wars that serve no practical purpose? No problem. I’ll lay odds that no one who counts will make a peep about the cost of the DoD’s grandiose plans, in either the mainstream media or Congress. Unbelievable.

2. Via Kevin Drum at Mother Jones: Now is the time to call your Congresspeople and tell them to pass the damn health-care bill already. Washington’s Congressional reform are solidly behind reform, but many of them including but many of them, including Jim McDermott, have indicated that they would not vote for a bill without the public option. Given the fact that we have to go for the Senate bill or nothing right now, they may need some convincing. I’ve already called, and if you are polite and to the point, the receptionists are quite, well, receptive. Read Drum’s post for more.

3. This music has been making the rounds throughout the blogosphere, and I think you’ll enjoy it no matter where your sympathies lie, macro-economically speaking. Some super cool, super-dorks at George Mason University put this video together, pitting F.A. Hayek and John Maynard Keynes against each other in a hip-hop contest. Who says economics is the dismal science? That’s good stuff. If you’d like a brief intellectual dissection of the piece, Matt Yglesias is your man.

7 replies on “Call Your Congresspeople; Economists Rapping; Guns, Not Health Care”

  1. Washington’s Congressional [delegation is] solidly behind reform, but many of them including but many of them, including Jim McDermott, have indicated that they would not vote for a bill without the public option.

    Jim McDermott strikes me as the kind of guy who, if the current compromise featured a public option, would insist on nothing less than single payer. Y’know, never miss a chance to snatch a noble defeat you can grandstand on from the jaws of a victory that would actually improve people’s lives.

  2. So here’s who you should call. Won’t take more than 10 minutes.

    Representative Jay Inslee (D – 01) 202-225-6311
    Representative Rick Larsen (D – 02) 202-225-2605
    Representative Brian Baird (D – 03) 202-225-3536
    Representative Doc Hastings (R – 04) 202-225-5816
    Representative Cathy McMorris Rodgers (R – 05) 202-225-2006
    Representative Norm Dicks (D – 06) 202-225-5916
    Representative Jim McDermott (D – 07) 202-225-3106
    Representative Dave Reichert (R – 08) 202-225-7761
    Representative Adam Smith (D – 09) 202-225-8901

  3. I’ll lay odds that no one who counts will make a peep about the cost of the DoD’s grandiose plans, in either the mainstream media or Congress. Unbelievable.

    And this is what is known as “controlling the terms of debate.” Since neither party will entertain discussions about reducing profligate spending on “defense” the public does not get to vote on it at all.

  4. DO NOT DO NOT DO NOT pass this horribly shitty health care “reform” bill. It’s NOTHING more than corporate welfare on a massive scale that doesn’t improve the quality of or the access to health care. It’s repulsive that the Stranger’s staff is so completely ignorant of what they are cheerleading people to support. That’s exactly what we’ve come to expect from the goose-stepping Democratic Party: do not question, do not second guess! If the Democratic Party leadership commands you to do something, you obey without question! Seig Heil! All hail the Democratic Party!

  5. If you’re going to push the Senate bill as the primary strategic option, at least get the option right. See this HuffPo piece by Darcy Burner (currently Exec. Dir. of the American Progressive Caucus Policy Foundation), which reflects the focal option currently in play.

    If you’re going to talk about where McDermott stands, keep track of where he stands. It’s true Rep. McDermott signed a July 31, 2009 letter in which House progressives objected to Rep. Waxman’s weak public option compromise with the Blue Dogs, but that’s miles back in the rear-view mirror. Recent comments indicate (1) he will support whatever the Congress can pass, and (2) among several tactical options, he declines to lay down specific demands in advance of tomorrow’s SOTU – which presumably defines a singular tactical focus for Democrats in the White House and Congress.

  6. The current House and Senate bills essentially institutionalize and make mandatory the most costly, wasteful, parasitic healthcare system on the planet. They contain no genuine cost controls, don’t reduce administrative waste, leave millions uninsured, and have laughably high limits on out-of-pocket expenditures. Their primary objective is to make as much money as possible for the current system’s big players, all else being sacrificed to that end to the extent political puffery can sell it to the public. They are, in short, exactly what the for-profit healthcare sector has lobbied, bribed, threatened, advertised, astroturfed, shilled, punditized, and editorialized by proxy for, with money they gouged out of us.

    Sure, if you want reform in name only, go ahead and tell your legislators to pass the damn bill already. It will be like telling Neville Chamberlain to make peace with Hitler. But if you want real healthcare reform — comprehensive. permanent coverage, complete freedom of physician choice, genuine protection from financial ruin — tell them you want a single-payer system like Taiwan’s and that you will not compromise for anything less than a rigidly regulated non-profit multi-payer system like Switzerland’s. Switzerland has the second most expensive healthcare system in the world and leaves room for profit-making in complementary coverage. For Congress’s true constituency, that’s better than nothing.

  7. Hey, Dirty Jackass Jake, when are you going to call Liz or Yoko at the Guild and organize the scab Stranger?

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