Quote of the Day

Two Democratic Senators decided to fire the first official salvos in what I'm sure will be the mass movement to get "Sacrificing the public option meant that we got to keep all the other awesome stuff, so this all worked out perfectly", "Actually the bill is really, really, totally good", "An important step...", and "This was a win for progressives" all subsumed into the collective wisdom of the health care battle:

“If you compared it to the alternative, it looks good,” said Senator Sheldon Whitehouse, Democrat of Rhode Island, about the prospect of moving ahead with a measure that does not have a public health insurance option. “If you compare it to the possibilities, it looks pretty sad.”
...
“There is enough good in this bill that we ought to move it” even without the Medicare buy-in, Mr. Harkin said.

Well sure Sheldon, if you compare this bill to filling American's mouths in with cement as a cackling madman kills our family pets, then this bill is staggeringly awesome. Otherwise.... eh.

And Senator Harkin, if you consider "enough good" to be no real cost containment alternatives to provide competition to the private plans we're all going to be forced to buy, meaning we'll have to rely on the goodness of insurance companies not to gouge our eyes out and skullfuck us, well then I shudder to think of the rude awakening you'll receive when you don't have the government negotiating your health care plan. Actually, you'll probably be on Medicare by the time that happens, so no worries.

I know you're trying to ease the blow of biting into eat a shit sandwich, but "No, it actually tastes good" isn't really doing it for me.