All right, "lying" may be too strong a word, I suppose, for what Dennis Kucinich is doing regarding his intentions with respect to the health care bill. I'm pretty comfortable with "dissembling," though. I believe that no matter what Kucinich says publicly, he knows (and Pelosi knows, and Obama knows) that he is ready to cast the deciding vote for health care reform if there truly is no other way for it to pass -- something that is not likely to happen, by the way. I believe that he knows that he would need a substantial face-saving concession from Obama or Pelosi in order for him to justify his vote -- and that he will walk into the final vote with a "secret deal" to get it if the odds require him to do so. (It would be a policy that most of us would probably celebrate, by the way, even if it has nothing to do with health care reform itself.)
And, by the way, I think that all of this is great.
Why am I so unwilling to take Saint (or Demon!) Dennis at his word? I suppose that I owe you an explanation.
Here's my analysis:
(1) Read nothing into Kucinich not being willing to commit to supporting the bill now.
I suppose that some of you out there may think that Kucinich is an idiot, but I certainly don't. What he is is someone who plays hardball. Those who want him to commit to supporting the bill now are asking him to, among other things, give up all of his leverage. If he supports the bill, as much as he hates it (and I do believe that he does), it will only be because he wants to support the Democratic Party's interests and because he gets something good in return. This wouldn't be a bribe -- Kucinich isn't the type, especially given that most of the country would like nothing better than to nail him -- but a concession on policy of the sort given the Marjorie Margolies-Mezvinsky when she turned out to be the deciding vote in favor of Clinton's 1994 budget.
You want Kucinich to give up his leverage right now so that he won't get that concession? Why would he do that?
(2) Kucinich's opposition to the bill is predicated on the absence of such a concession.
Yes, he says that he's willing to be the deciding vote against the health care reform bill -- in what I suggest above is a negotiation posture. Let's see what he says:
"This bill represents a giveaway to the insurance industry," Kucinich told MSNBC's Lawrence O'Donnell. "$70 billion a year, and no guarantees of any control over premiums, forcing people to buy private insurance...I'm sorry, I just don't see that this bill is the solution."
Asked, "Did we just get a "no" there?" Kucinich confirmed.
"If that sounded like a "no" you're correct," Kucinich said.
Yeah, Kucinich doesn't plan to vote for this bill because it doesn't do enough. However, what if Obama and Pelosi promise him that something he wants that will help ameliorate his concerns will be inserted into a "must-pass" budget bill -- say, some increase in subsidies or improvement in regulation or a windfall tax on insurance company profits. (Or maybe it will be something dealing with banking reform or housing. The Does this statement prevent him from voting for the bill under that circumstance? No, it doesn't. And even if it later gets stripped out of the budget bill -- which it may well not -- it's a concession that both Democratic leaders and us here should welcome. And people who want to see the bill passed would have to accept that Obama and Pelosi did it only under duress, so they can't be blamed for being "too liberal" -- if they only did it to save the bill.
Again -- why would Kucinich give up his leverage to achieve such an end this early?
Oh, and by the way -- if Pelosi and Obama let one of those wavering Blue Dogs know that if they don't cast the deciding vote, they're going to have to give into Kucinich -- that may give them cover with their constituents, to whom that person can brag about what "horrors" they prevented. In fact, they may be able to pull this stunt on several Blue Dogs.
(3) Kucinich is currently serving several important functions -- that he gives up if he capitulates
By holding down the left corner of the Democratic Big Tent, Kucinich is performing several important functions. Unless he is forced to deal, given one of the above scenarios, he'll continue serving those functions. He thinks -- and I think he has a good case -- that those functions are worth preserving.
For one thing, he's a flak catcher. Yes, he's someone that many people (even occasionally me) love to not-love. There ought to be someone in Congress who is so far out that it makes everyone else seem more moderate by comparison. It's a useful role to have written into the play. Kucinich does it, he does it well, and I hope he does it for decades more.
For another thing, he's a lure. For people who think that the Democratic Party is corrupt -- as I know many people here do -- the fact that Kucinich remains within the Democratic Party rather than sliding out to one side like Ralph Nader is important. It's a sign that it's OK to still be a Democrat. Kucinich is not hostile to the Democratic Party, unlike Nader; he is proof that you can be tough and uncompromising and still remain in the fold. He's speaking the truth about many things -- even though I think that he misses out on one big thing that I address below. Is this truly a voice that we want muzzled? I'd hope to find a way to pass the bill that lets Kucinich continue to be Kucinich. He's making a case that deserves to be heard ... and damn, right now people are listening. Good for him.
(4) Fundamentally, Kucinich believes in the Democratic Party as a means of reform.
This is, I think, the clincher. Kucinich -- a smart guy -- knows that if this bill goes down, it's not going to be replaced by a single payer system or a public option, but by nothing. He knows that it will be seen as the Waterloo for Obama that the Republicans promised, a bellyflop of historic proportions.
Does that advance Kucinich's agenda? No, it doesn't. He knows it. He knows that the Party needs a success here -- and he is, I propose, more loyal to the Party than such stalwarts as the Blue Dogs and the Stu Pack that promise to withhold their own votes. He is not, in the final analysis, going to stick the shiv in Pelosi's ribs. For one thing, he knows that it ends his political career. For another, he -- unlike Nader -- does not believe that the parties are equally corrupt. He will just need a face-saving reason to vote, and we should be agitating for Obama and Pelosi to, if need be, provide him with one. (How about the Senate passing the overwhelmingly supported repeal of the insurers' anti-trust exemption? Maybe that would win him over.)
CONCLUSION
The odds are that we will never know whether I am right, because the vote probably won't come down to one or two brave Members of Congress like Reps. Marjorie Margolies-Mezvinsky and Don Johnson holding hands and jumping off of a cliff to support a bill that they know will destroy their political futures. It's possible, but it's not the way to bet. If it doesn't happen, then Kucinich will be able to maintain to his dying day that he was not going to vote for the bill no matter what. But I will never believe him.
People make the mistake of believing the politicians always mean what they say about their future actions. They can't, OK? Kucinich has now twice, if memory serves, promised that he was not going to back out of a Presidential race and run for his House seat again -- and twice, he has done exactly that. I don't begrudge his taking that negotiating position; what the hell else is he supposed to say, "I'm just dipping my toe in the water to see if I get any traction?" He's promoting an agenda -- an agenda that by and large I think ought to be heard, and I just have no problem with his dissembling a little about his intentions. Would that all politicians' sins were so minor.
Kucinich, I'm told by people who watch C-SPAN, is known for holding back in close votes where he plans to oppose the party, waiting until the outcome is determined before he casts his vote. Someone only does that if they are willing, in the final analysis, to come through for their team in dire straits. You may think that that's horrible, lying, etc. I think that for someone who wants to promote an agenda that is neither nearly as popular nor often enough heard on the national stage, it's more than OK. It's admirable. It's beautiful.
So spare me the dumping on Kucinich. I care about what he does when his vote matters. And he, like me, apparently expects that his vote won't matter when push comes to shove. He thinks that they'll pass this bill without him and that his proper role is to remind us, while he has the microphone, of its deficiencies.
One of two things is true: either he's willing to let reform die, if push comes to shove -- in which case there is obviously nothing that we can say to dissuade him from what would have to be a very committed position -- or he's willing to come through if need be. If the latter, as I believe is true, do us all a favor:
Don't make him admit it now. We're truly better off it he doesn't. We'd be missing something if he did. For one thing, we too would be missing his leverage and the good use to which it would be put.
Is he lying a little, dissembling a bit? Good for him. It's for a good cause.
[UPDATE, 3/16/10: Ha Ha!]