What has prevented the passage of Obamacare? Here's the blame it on Rahm explanation reported by Alexander Bolton of The Hill:
Democrats in Congress are holding White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel accountable for his part in the collapse of healthcare reform.Brute force, indiscriminately applied, seems to be the modus operandi of this White House. No doubt Emanuel's heavy hand was at times a detriment to the cause. Other opinions on who botched what and how are presented in Bolton's piece, including a view that too much time was wasted on faux bipartisanship, and another that Obama didn't spend enough time promoting his pet project on the stump (though he seemed to do little else but campaign and speechify).The emerging consensus among critics in both chambers is that Emanuel’s lack of Senate experience slowed President Barack Obama’s top domestic priority.
The share of the blame comes as cracks are beginning to show in Emanuel’s once-impregnable political armor. Last week he had to apologize after a report surfaced that he called liberal groups “retarded” in a private meeting.
While Emanuel has quelled that controversy by meeting with advocates for people with disabilities, on Capitol Hill he’s under fire for poor execution of the president’s healthcare agenda in the Senate.
"I think Rahm ran the play his boss called; once Obama called the play, Rahm did everything he could to pass it, scorched-earth and all that,” said a senior lawmaker, who added that Emanuel didn’t seek a broader base of Senate Republicans. “I think he did miscalculate the Senate. He did what he thought he had to do to win." [. . . ]
A liberal House Democrat who served with Emanuel during his entire career in Congress said: "I don't think the skills that are attributed to him — muscling things through — are well-suited to the Senate.
"The House is like an Australian-rules rugby match,” the lawmaker added. “The Senate is like a march at a men’s club in imperial Britain. They're a bunch of barons over there."
No mention is made of the fact that the content of each and every misbegotten, gargantuan piece of legislation crafted by Congress was solidly unpopular with the American people. And guess what -- now they're angry. Obama didn't see that train coming but he's going to jump out of the way now by morphing into a "populist," which consists of trying to trick Americans into thinking they're mad at someone else -- Bush, "obstructionist" Republicans, various "fatcats" and "special interests," "Washington," Rush, cable news and "the blogs" -- anyone but him. Good luck with that.
A few days ago I quoted from David Catron's piece on what went wrong with Obamacare. It's now ancient history by internet standards (Feb. 5) but we might refer back to it as the post-mortems roll out:
Wh0 Killed Obamacare? Obama did it himself, and here's how:
He has broken virtually every campaign promise he made concerning reform, presided over a series of shady back room deals, and treated the voters like an irritating group of poorly behaved and dull-witted children.Read the rest.
*Updated to add another explanatory article about the failure of Obama's first year:
A fearsome foursome by Edward Luce
Linked at Michelle Malkin (buzzworthy) -- thanks!
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