Checking In On 'Chief Health Care Guy' Chuck Grassley's Good-Faith Negotiations

Senatorial grumpus Chuck Grassley really wants a solid, bipartisan health care reform bill to pass, you guys. This is why he has been refusing to compromise on a single thing for eight months -- and more recently, spreading toxic falsehoods and suggesting he'll vote against his own bill -- in his role as chief Republican health care negotiator! We can gauge his powerful commitment towards reaching a satisfying agreement in the near future, too, by reading one of his recent fundraising letters, dated August 10: "I had to rush you this Air-Gram today to set the record straight on my firm and unwavering opposition to government-run health care... And ask your immediate support in helping me defeat 'Obama-care.'" (It's his hasty ellipsis -- he was really rushing to send that Air-Gram!)

He even dares to implicitly criticize Ted Kennedy, several weeks before his death.

I'm sure you've been following this issue closely. If the legislation sponsored by Speaker Nancy Pelosi in the House of Representatives and Chairman Ted Kennedy in the Senate is passed it would be a pathway to a government takeover of the health care svstem. lt wouldturn over control of your health care decisions to a federal bureaucrat... and take it away from you and your personal physician.

It would meangovernment rationing in the name of cost controls.

[...]

The simple truth is that I am and always have been opposed to the Obama administration's plan to nationalize health care.Period.

Thank god he was able to squeeze in those underlines before the Air-Gram hawk came for pick-up! Otherwise, who would've known which parts to read?

Somewhere amid all this bluster, though, Grassley does write, "I am working in the Senate to develop a viable alternative that is free-market based and rejects the pitfalls of government-run insurance." Ha ha? Everyone knows that the best legislative compromises tend to come after you'vescared everyone mind-numbingly shitlessabout the entire goddamned enterprise.

In related news, the White House has something vague to say! 

Meanwhile, Obama returned from his vacation in Massachusetts on Martha's Vineyard and, after a few days at Camp David, will redouble his efforts "toward getting a bipartisan result" on health care overhaul, said deputy White House press secretary Bill Burton. "After he gets a little time to recharge his batteries...he's going to come back as rip-roaring as he was before," Burton said.

As "rip-roaring" as he was before? We have never quite felt this confident! Obama will come back just as he was,stronglysupporting and strong-arming those Senators for, uh, various undefined health care things.

 Chuck Grassley Fundraises Against Health-Care Reform [Ezra Klein]