E.J. Dionne's warning that far right views are skewering the debate is well taken. Keith Olbermann should take it to heart -- focusing so much on a few right media voices is self-defeating at some point. It reinforces the idea that Newt Gingrich should be taken seriously, which to me was a dubious thing when he was Speaker of the House;* it surely is the case now:
While the right wing's rants get wall-to-wall airtime, you almost never hear from the sort of progressive members of Congress who were on an America's Future panel on Tuesday. Reps. Jared Polis of Colorado, Donna Edwards of Maryland and Raul Grijalva of Arizona all said warm things about the president -- they are Democrats, after all -- but also took issue with some of his policies. ...
But Edwards noted that if the public plan, already a compromise from single-payer, is defined as the left's position in the health-care debate, the entire discussion gets skewed to the right. This makes it far more likely that any public option included in a final bill will be a pale version of the original idea.
Rep. Edwards ran against an establishment Democrat, she is one of the new breed of progressives who want to provide a strong voice against tired ideas, at times dangerous ideas, that come from both parties. To quote one of Obama's favorite phrases, "Let there be no doubt," this is a good thing, and their voice -- which at times will provide loyal opposition to Obama's program (btw, his Cairo speech was pretty good) -- should be heard from more.
It is not an either/or.
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* I still remember first reading about the guy. Yes, a guy named after an amphibian, which in time was shown to be rather fitting.