There are many times I really do not envy our US Representative Gene Taylor. On the coast we know Gene as a straight shooting guy that hangs his hat with the democrats while nationally Gene is known as a conservative southern democrat that represents one of the most conservative congressional districts in this country. It is an amazing feat considering he routinely wins re-election with 75 plus percent of the vote. He does that despite being stuck between the proverbial rock of modern-day progressive ideology and the hard place of being in a district populated by folks with a strong predisposition to vote republican. The voters are attracted to Gene because he is, as Steve would say, a man of the people in that he truly represents the folks in his district over special interests. That stance makes Gene enemies with the special interests in DC and occasionally that manifest itself in weird ways such as in an article published at Politico where a member of the house democratic caucus took a cheap shot at Gene instead of a hard look in the mirror and it is there we begin: (h/t Alan Lange)
Massachusetts Rep. Mike Capuano kicked things off by telling colleagues that health care reform wasn’t the only reason Democrat Martha Coakley, who beat him in the primary, lost the general election. Capuano said his party failed to explain to voters what the legislation means for average Americans, saying they should never have passed a 2,000-page bill.
“The health care bill is too complicated, and it looks like too many backroom deals,” Capuano said in an interview with POLITICO. “We need to do a much better job explaining what we are trying to do.”
Mississippi Rep. Gene Taylor got up after Capuano and said Congress should do a bill a week and have a pep rally, according to people present at the meeting.
Pennsylvania Rep. Mike Doyle told fellow Democrats that people in his district support insurance reform but hate the gamesmanship in this debate, citing Nebraska Sen. Ben Nelson’s deal to shield his state from future changes to Medicaid and taxing benefits.
“They hate the devious stuff,” Doyle said. “They hate when we do something slick.”
Now I guess the authors of this piece have seen enough crazy and perverted things out of this nation’s politicians to believe about anything they are told on what happens at these closed door meetings but it just didn’t sound like Gene to me so I did what they could have done and contacted Gene’s office. This is the text of the reply I received from Brian Martin, Gene’s policy director:
I don’t know what the “pep rally” reference is about.
He said he got up after Pelosi and a few others insisted that they would still pass the health care bill. Gene got up and said he was having flashbacks to the aftermath of Katrina when he returned to the Kiln after taking his boat to check out the damage. He told everyone there that all their houses were gone, but they were all in denial.
“What about my house?” “It’s gone.”
“The roof is gone?” “No, it’s all gone. They are all gone.”
“But you can’t see my house. It’s behind Corky’s house.” “Corky’s house is gone and your house is gone. They are all gone.”
He told the Democratic Caucus that they need to accept that the big health care bill is gone. It is over.
Then he recommended taking out the parts that are publicly popular and voting on them as separate bills. He mentioned four things: repeal the insurance antitrust exemption, repeal the “Tauzin deal” that prohibits Medicare from negotiating prices with drug companies, require generic drugs in Medicare unless the doctor certifies that a brand name drug is medically necessary, and require insurance plans to offer parents the option to cover their children up to age 27.
The only thing worse about an ideologue is an ideologue in denial. You see these types have no compunction mindlessly captaining the good ship Lollipop or in the case of democrats and health care reform, The Titanic, but there has been one democrat that has called this thing straight down the pipes since the beginning in our own Gene Taylor. The House Democratic leadership would do well to seek Gene’s sage advice more often and maybe then they would not have pissed away an entire year pretending the Titanic was seaworthy.
sop
Great post Sop. Can you help me with he remains a democrat when he acts like a republican?
It really doesnt matter as they are all corrupt. Just today Barney Frank has suggested the Congress do away with Fannie and Freddie. This sounds like Drew Peterson trying to dispose of the corpse after he committed the murder.
Yep you got it Sup six of one, half dozen of the other. Most people here understand that and don’t hold it against him.
sop
PBS NewsHour
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/politics/jan-june10/sb_01-22.html
DAVID BROOKS: You just look at all the different avenues through which it could pass, the House passing the Senate bill, then breaking it apart, using reconciliation, all of them have severe barriers.
And then you get the general sense of anxiety. Gene Taylor, who is a Democrat from Mississippi — there was a big meeting of House Democrats. And as it was described to me, Gene Taylor said, “After Katrina, I had to tell the people in my district — I went to the beach — and I had to tell them, I’m sorry your house is gone. I’m sorry your house is gone.”
And then he said, before everybody, all the Democrats, “Madam Speaker, let me tell you, your house is gone,” referring to the health care bill. And that is the sentiment that one hears. Now, I wouldn’t say for sure, but if you talk about the consensus among the experts and people who follow this, a lot of people think it’s gone.
One reason it’s gone, Brian, is that people didn’t understand it – including people like me with years of experience working with federally subsidized health programs who should have caught on quickly.
Another reason is the “powers that be” made the connection to Medicaid and Medicare but never were able to grasp the concept that “insurance” is “insurance by any name” – including the NFIP.