In case you didn't catch it, reusing "Waterloo" was meant to brand US as the same as the R's

[rudy23]

To me this latest comment from the "unnamed senior WH aide" (cough, cough, RAHM, cough) shows that they're out to vilify the "left of the left" when the truth of these healthcare negotiations comes out.

They're going to try and paint the Progressive Caucus as the irrational obstructors, instead of the Blue Dogs. And why wouldn't they---the Blue Dogs are on Rahm's team. He recruited the Blue Dogs, then Obama recruited him. First man hired, in fact. Why would they be on the same side as "the left of the left"?

This, along with Rahm recent declaration of "war" against the GOP is all groundwork for defining their base as the rational "centrist" pragmatists who understand the importance of selling out to insurance companies, and seperating themselves from the Progressives, who only want to undermine healthcare reform for the same reason the Republicans do---to hurt the president politically. To make this bill his "Waterloo."

That's how I read this latest spin. They're trying to paint us as being just as irrational and politically selfish as the gun toters on the right. They think it will work because Obama's that damn smooth (and we're that damn stupid).

[KittyWampus]

1. this conspiracy crap involving Rahm is getting ridiculous and you look foolish

[rudy23]

4. It really doesn't matter who said it--the fact that they rank as WH senior adviser

should be alarming enough. If it wasn't Rahm, it may as well be. Isn't it alarming that someone close to the president is this tone deaf about what the Dem base wants, and was "surprised" by our insistence on a public option (along with the GOP's stubborn opposition to whatever they propose)?

Got any other ideas on which high ranking senior adviser said "the left of the left" insisted on a public option so they could make this Obama's Waterloo? Does it even matter who it was?

Still, I'm about 99% sure it's Rahm, based on the statements he has signed his name to in the past.

[Political Heretic]

6. It's not exactly conspiracy, when he's been totally forthright about where he stands.

:shrug:

[Kansas Wyatt]

2. So is Rahm also going to make unions look foolish as well?

Wouldn't that be more like 'Custer's Last Stand' if Rahm allied the White House with the Blue Dogs and the Insurance Industry, directly opposing what unions are calling for?

[JDPriestly]

3. Rahm Emmanuel needs to get with the program.

The big challenge is the demographic bubble -- the baby boomers now starting to qualify for Medicare.

Every man, woman and child has to be merged into one big health care pool in order to avoid submerging Medicare. Do the math, Rahm. It's single payer or sink. Why not come out and just admit it?

Our industrial base has dwindled and with it wages. The Medicare and Social Security wage deductions of the younger generations will never cover the Medicare and Social Security costs of the older generations -- unless we move toward Medicare for all.

Republicans are actually the ones who want to let grandma die. Because the only way to get money into the insurance pool to pay for grandma's hip replacement in the future will be to use the money that the great-grandkids pay for the healthcare they don't need. The ultimate choice is single payer or rationed care for the elderly. Those are our choices.

I don't hear any proposal from any side that deals with the real problem: the huge demographic bubble of people 50 and over.

[Individualist]

5. The only program Rahm is with is DLC.

[onyourleft]

7. We haven't heard any proposals from any side to...

...deal with the demographic bubble and we have only known that this might be a problem for 50+ years.