An article by Eric Bradner in today's Evansville Courier & Press features telling comments from a local political science professor that pretty much sums up the question progressives need to ask of Evan Bayh: What's more important, meaningful progress on health care or getting Evan Bayh re-elected.
Because I think all of us here know the answer to that question.
From the article:
The Democrat, who campaigned last year for Obama and the mantra of "change," in March formed a group of more than a dozen centrist Senate Democrats. That group now sits at the fulcrum of the Democratic-led Senate's deliberations, and Bayh finds himself positioned as someone who could clear the path for legislation that tops the president's agenda or act as a roadblock.
Robert Dion, a political science professor at the University of Evansville, provided the reporter with some spot-on comments - including the following:
"He has not been especially friendly to the health insurance discussion that's been going on. He's been cool to the idea," Dion said. "But he's not rejected it outright."
Bayh walks a fine line in the Hoosier State. Indiana may have gone to Obama by a narrow margin in the last presidential, but anyone with the slightest political sense knows the state is much more red than blue, and hosts significant segments that run the gamut of right-wing politics. It's home to Republican Reps. Mike Pence and Dan Burton, after all. The fact is Bayh is a United States Frickin' Senator only because some Hoosier Republicans are willing to actually forego casting a straight ticket for the opportunity to send their former Governor back to Washington.
But that support - always tenuous at best - could evaporate if he were to support the public option. Were he to support the progessive agenda, and actually vote for real and meaningful change that would benefit all Americans, he could well be vulnerable in the next election. And that's one reason why the Republican leadership has worked hard to frame the discussion about this vital issue with their duplicitous chicanery.
From the article:
Thus, if Bayh's vote angers Republicans, Dion said Bayh risks jeopardizing the bipartisan electoral support he has enjoyed in previous elections.
If Bayh angers Democrats, though, the party's voters could stay home, but by doing so they would risk handing a safe Senate seat over to a Republican.
Is keeping Evan Bayh in Congress more important than passing legislation to provide every citizen of the United States of America affordable and effective health care?
I urge every Hoosier voter to contact their junior senator and ask that very question, and to respond to his answer at the polls in November of 2010. Because the time has come for the son of Birch Bayh. The time has come.