As I watch this healthcare fiasco unfold, as I listen to the far left cry that Obama has sold out, and the far right cry "Insurance companies rule!", I can’t help but wonder if some huge game is going on beyond this: a 3-D chess game like Spock played. That while everybody is watching one level, plotting and planning and working out the angles for a "sure thing", Obama and his team have their eyes on all levels, waiting for just the right moment to jump his queen to a superior position that negates all the opposition’s one-dimensional defenses. Hear me out on this.
If nothing else, modern Republicans have made the insincere attempt (some call it "deceptive advertising") a major staple of American politics. Say one thing, yet do another. Call for some common action; pervert it to the ends of a select few. Ignore and disregard any of the rules they agreed to. What if Obama and crew are plotting the same strategy? What if they have been making deals (or "selling out" as some lefties claim), agreeing to bargains with big insurance and drug companies -- only they plan to drop the agreement at the last moment and rush ahead with a new positive agenda that leaves the opposition fuming and sputtering and unable to respond quickly? What if the White House fakes right and goes left, passes to the man in front of the basket, and scores?
Imagine this scene: the big business reps and their toady Congressmen all getting together for a press conference with the Prez to announce the weak, worthless, "guaranteed gold mine" Baucus bill and Obama says:
"Hey, you know what, guys? I decided to change the deal. So everything we agreed to give each other is now null and void. I’m going to do what I think is right, and I’m going to get it done today. Since it will take you bloated overmanaged companies six months to react, I expect to win easily. Sorry for the inconvenience."
Thus he changes the rules in his favor. As long as it’s for the good of the country, nobody can touch him. Bush pulled this shit to mire us in Iraq, and that was nothing close to good for the USA. I think Obama can do it to kick the fat "healthcare" industry right in the ass.
NOTE: I’m a little late, but I hope everybody remembers that last month was the 10th anniversary of the start of the greatest political TV show in our generation, "The West Wing". Sometimes it seems like Obama is following those old scripts, or am I hallucinating?....