What blogs / bloggers / jounos, etc. have steadfastly refused to dignify the meaningless "public option" as a legitimate agenda?

It's a bummer going to sites I like and then seeing otherwise sensible people acting as though "the/a public option" refers to some specific thing worth wishing / hoping / fighting for.

I challenge them on it, on fundamental questions that could drive a truck through this big zero, and they got nuthin'. But they keep chasing that pony, like Roger McGuinn jonesing for the chestnut mare.

This typist, 12/9/09:

The vacuum created by a vapid agenda and zero criticism for a process in which Dems lied to high heaven about being open and transparent and considering all options is leading to essential policy being decided in a panicky clusterfuck for the ages.

Shit and sausage everywhere, and not a health inspector in sight.

Something's going to be slapped on the plate NOW NOW NOW, with the barest deliberation and even less — surprise! — transparency.

Stephen Lynch (D-MA):

...Lynch said he is opposed because the measure does not go far enough. “We’ve paid the ransom, but at the end of the day the insurance companies are still holding the hostages,’’ Lynch said in an interview with the Globe yesterday. “This is a very good bill for insurance companies and pharmaceutical companies. It might be good for Nebraska, I don’t know. Or Florida residents. But it’s not good for the average American, and it’s not good for my district. Or for Massachusetts.’’

NYT headline:

Dems woo abortion foes in push for health bill

iPhone app store e-mail:

Riding the buzz from SXSW, Six-String is the hot new guitar game challenging you to play several difficult tracks as well as ones by Peter Frampton, Tom Petty, and others for an authentic guitar experience.

Here's hoping.

He's under siege by MoveOn and other "progressives," and no doubt he's getting a dose of Chicago-style "influence."

In classic fashion, even my GBCW is locked because of other people's snark.

Yup:

[I]f this bill (which almost every "progressive" has declared is a misbegotten, corruption-ridden, botulistic glop of indigestible legislative sausage -- even as they threaten to wage holy war against anyone who votes against it) is defeated, then the ground will be cleared for genuine reform. A real leader could then say: "OK, we tried it your way. We brought in the corporations. We courted the Republicans shamelessly. We gave away the game on day one, took all our cards off the table, compromised every value we profess to hold. We backed down, we turned tail, we sold out. And it didn't work. Now, we're going to do it for real.

Short and to the point:

You get good bills by making a case for them and fighting for them. The White House didn't do that because they did not want to. Period. Quit making excuses for these monsters.

When a user at Something Awful posted my "Obama Admirer System" American Extremists strip, some other goons (as SA users self-describe) assumed it was from a rightwing point-of-view.

Nomenklatura's response warms the cockles of my heart:

The fact that people still literally cannot understand how and when people would criticize Obama from the left just makes that image absolutely perfect, doesn't it?

From TPM, emphasis mine:

A few hours after Rep. Dennis Kucinich switched his support to become a critical vote for the health care bill, he took to the House floor to ask wavering colleagues to join him. Astonished colleagues pointed to Kucinich (D-OH) darting from member to member on the House floor yesterday, saying privately they'd never seen him get so involved in whipping a vote.

Our Transformative Progressive Leader:

Now, we can fix this in a way that is sensible, that is centrist. I have rejected a whole bunch of provisions that the left wanted that are — you know, they were very adamant about because I thought it would be too disruptive to the system.

More on this interview later....

New Kotex ads take a liberating approach, but they were forced to delete the offending V-word.

From DU user "MadHound":

So my question for those of you in the moderate, centerist, DLC camp. Ten years from now, when the shit is hitting the fan, and these Obama initiatives are driving this country further and further into the ground, will you folks do one thing?

I just received this from a fellow DUer:

Team Obama here on DU has been alerting the mods like mad on every poster that objects to the HCR and the DLC agenda. After nine years of posting with only one deleted message I suddenly had 24 deleted in one week and was given a warning. The admins said that I had attacked pro-Obama posters "viciously"; apparently naming an obvious DLCer a DLCer is verboten, as is calling out anyone who relentlessly pushes a DLC/ neocon agenda. It's quite sad. Who would have ever though that having a Dem in office could divide us so dramatically.

Remember when Obama was the healing alternative to a "polarizing" candidate who was "going to tear the party apart"?

From the man who "won" 59 Michigan primary (half-) delegates without getting any, y'know, votes:

President Barack Obama indicated Wednesday that he does not oppose plans by House Democrats to pass his much-challenged health care overhaul without a direct vote.

"I don't spend a lot of time worrying about what the procedural rules are in the House or Senate.

The inside baseballers insist that citizens won't get worked up about a procedural issue. Besides, all's fair in shit and sausage.

Bulk e-mail from Barack Obama:

I wanted to take a moment to thank you directly for the outstanding work you've been doing for health reform. I can tell you that your voice is heard in Washington every day. I see how your efforts are moving us toward victory.

But I also know that with just days remaining, the final vote is shaping up to be extremely close. Everything we've worked for is on the line, and your voice is needed now more than ever before.

Raise your voice today: We must all speak out together to finish the job.

In these final, crucial days, much more will be asked of us. Our resolve will be tested.

I don't even know how to describe this.

In the first panel of this strip about HCR, Tomorrow concludes that single-payer was impossible because it would be decried by the rightwing as socialism. Thus, the meaningless "public option" was, he suggests, a proper substitute.

No matter, apparently, that:

* Single-payer -- but not "public option" -- is a proven, coherent approach that would address the problems at hand
* Whatever the Dems proposed would be (and has been) decried by Republicans as a Red Menace
* The Republicans lost big in 2006 and 2008

So, even as the official shit-sandwich bill is being served up, "progressives" are still trying to whet our appetite for a different shit-sandwich formulation.

I don't even know how to process this:

Barack Obama threatens to withdraw support from wavering Democrats

To Obama's credit, he rarely wavers. He consistently ratifies Reagan frames and Reaganesque policies. He means what Ronnie said and he says what Ronnie meant. No wavering Democrat he!

Changification we can believe in:

... Mr. Obama sent to Congress his eagerly awaited blueprint for education reform. The plan – which would replace the initially praised, but increasingly disparaged No Child Left Behind policy adopted by George W. Bush in 2001 – would put even more onus on teachers to raise student performance or bear the consequences.