Dean: Is Obamacare "keep your plan" fix even legal?

[Mr. Morden]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GkHFsbWJYO0

[Lief 🗽]

Yes. Next question.

The betrayal of Obama by Democrats here is disgusting.

[TheDeadFlagBlues]

Kick him out of the party, true Democrats stand by our President and his chief policy achievement.

[bedstuy]

Complicated regulatory rules get delayed all the time. 

File this under the Ron Paul corollary: Doctors know jack about the law.

[Oakvale]

Kick him out of the party, true Democrats stand by our President and his chief policy achievement.

This. Clinton and Dean should be expelled from the party.

[Maxwell]

I thought everyone here was against the "Keep your plan" stuff?

[Lief 🗽]

I thought everyone here was against the "Keep your plan" stuff?

Regardless of whether or not you're against it, it's obviously not illegal. Dean is just concern trolling here.

[Lambsbread]

I thought everyone here was against the "Keep your plan" stuff?

Regardless of whether or not you're against it, it's obviously not illegal. Dean is just concern trolling here.

^^^

[ElectionsGuy]

The executive branch obviously can't just "fix" a law created by the legislative branch. That's not how our government works. Unless we've actually decided as a society that its acceptable for a president to do what he wants when he wants it. Dean is only slightly criticizing Obama here, I don't know what this "kick him out of the party" nonsense is. That actually sounds more like the Tea Party than democrats.

[bedstuy]

The executive branch obviously can't just "fix" a law created by the legislative branch. That's not how our government works. Unless we've actually decided as a society that its acceptable for a president to do what he wants when he wants it. Dean is only slightly criticizing Obama here, I don't know what this "kick him out of the party" nonsense is. That actually sounds more like the Tea Party than democrats.

No offense, but you have no idea how our government works.  This is within the regulatory power of the executive under the relevant statutes.  Administrative law, the APA, federal regulations and such may not be in your high school civics textbooks, but they actually exist. 

[Likely Voter]

What does this have to do with 2016?  Just because Dean is willing to critique Obama doesn't mean he is running. He has already stated he wont run against Hillary. I guess it is possible he would run in an open field, but not sure this statement really has any factor in that.

[Mr. Morden]

What does this have to do with 2016?

Dean has publicly said that he's thinking about running, so any daylight he's trying to put between himself and Obama is of relevance.  Or really, anything that he says or does that might have bearing on a potential campaign is of interest, just like we talked about the machinations of Cuomo, O'Malley, etc. here.

[Likely Voter]

well politically I don't see how in any way Dean's comments could be calculated to benefit him in any potential 2016 primary run. It doesn't differentiate him among any of the other potential 2016ers (except maybe Biden) but mainly only pits him against Obama which is seen as disloyal so that doesn't help (as some of the above comments demonstrate).

Dean seems to be speaking non-politically but more as a long time advocate of health reform and purity on that issue.

[Snowstalker Mk. II]

And of course the Obamabots rush to defend their messiah's Heritage Foundation plan. Obamacare is an utter joke, an insult to advocates of actual health care reform (i.e. nationalization) and I hope it fails. The neoliberal cancer needs to be exterminated, even if cutting it off may hurt.

[IceSpear]

And of course the Obamabots rush to defend their messiah's Heritage Foundation plan. Obamacare is an utter joke, an insult to advocates of actual health care reform (i.e. nationalization) and I hope it fails. The neoliberal cancer needs to be exterminated, even if cutting it off may hurt.

I pretty much agree with this, except the "hope it fails" part. Even though it is a crappy Republican plan, the country will be much better off if it succeeds.

[barfbag]

Kick him out of the party, true Democrats stand by our President and his chief policy achievement.

That sounds pretty extreme. It's almost like saying you're un-American for disagreeing with Bush's foreign policy after 9/11. It's attitudes like this that allowed such division in the first place.

[Oakvale]

And of course the Obamabots rush to defend their messiah's Heritage Foundation plan. Obamacare is an utter joke, an insult to advocates of actual health care reform (i.e. nationalization) and I hope it fails. The neoliberal cancer needs to be exterminated, even if cutting it off may hurt.

The casual sociopathy of sheltered rich kids who'll never have to worry about losing their health insurance.

[Eraserhead]

I'm not a big fan of Obamacare but prominent Democrats should not go out in public attacking it when it's already in trouble. You people do realize that we're not going to get anything better than this anytime soon, right?

Dean doesn't really matter that much at the moment but what the Clintons are doing is unconscionable.

[Oakvale]

I'm not a big fan of Obamacare but prominent Democrats should not go out in public attacking it when it's already in trouble. You people do realize that we're not going to get anything better than this anytime soon, right?

Dean doesn't really matter that much at the moment but what the Clinton's are doing is unconscionable.

The Clintons still think Obama should be "getting [them] coffee" so it's not surprising that they'd resort to dirty tricks (again) to set up Hillary's candidacy. Maybe next they'll compare Obama to Jesse Jackson again.

[Grumpier Than Uncle Joe]

I'm not a big fan of Obamacare but prominent Democrats should not go out in public attacking it when it's already in trouble. You people do realize that we're not going to get anything better than this anytime soon, right?

Dean doesn't really matter that much at the moment but what the Clinton's are doing is unconscionable.

The Clintons still think Obama should be "getting [them] coffee" so it's not surprising that they'd resort to dirty tricks (again) to set up Hillary's candidacy. Maybe next they'll compare Obama to Jesse Jackson again.

Team Clinton is a force majerue.

[Beet]

For some reason when I saw this thread I thought it referred to Dean Baker.

[Frozen Sky Ever Why]

Kick him out of the party, true Democrats stand by our President and his chief policy achievement.

I thought this was a troll post at first, kind of frightening that it isn't.

[Mr. Morden]

In January, in the "Who is running?" thread, I noted how Dean has always been down on Obamacare:

Dean belongs squarely in the category of Democrats who get along with neither the Clinton nor Obama political teams.  The Clintons didn't like his handling of the 2008 primary process controversies, and then Dean seemed to have something of a falling out with the Obama team in the following year, perhaps related to Obama passing him over for Sebelius at HHS.

Dean criticized Obamacare when it moving through Congress, saying that the country needed single payer instead:

http://www.gohealthinsurance.com/blog/coverage/entry/20091216

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In 2012, he even went so far as to say that he hoped the Supreme Court struck down the individual mandate:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/06/19/howard-dean-individual-mandate_n_1609171.html

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In 2011, he said that many Obama administration aides had treated progressives "with contempt":

http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Politics/monitor_breakfast/2011/0105/Howard-Dean-blasts-White-House-for-treating-liberals-with-contempt

[hopper]

Dean actually seems like one of the saner politicians out there and I wouldn't have said that a few years ago either. I thought the guy was a hard-core lefty but I don't think he is currently. Maybe just on Health Care he is hard-core left because he wants single-payer.

[Queen Mum Inks.LWC]

Kick him out of the party, true Democrats stand by our President and his chief policy achievement.

Or you could argue that decent politicians don't stand behind something they think is an affront to the Constitution.

That being said, I don't think it's unconstitutional.  Look - Obama is one of the worst Presidents we've had from a PR standpoint.  He says things he shouldn't say and guarantees things he shouldn't guarantee.  His Press Secretary can't keep a lid on things.  At this point, why go down with the ship and cost yourselves in 2016?  Admit that Obama screwed up, distance yourselves from him, and mitigate the damage.