Montani Semper Liberi

The Republicans are said to be courting Joe Manchin. They won't get anywhere, but that shouldn't stop him from playing them, and I'm sure that it won't, although of course they will know that they are being played.

He should make it clear that he will work with them specifically as a pro-life Catholic, as a member of the NRA, as a strong supporter of coal, and as someone whose candidacy was endorsed by the AFL-CIO. What is the GOP offering in those interests? If it is, then it will have his support. As a Democrat. And as a Democrat, he can and must be presented with exactly how fiscally conservative, fiscally responsible, and indeed pro-life, pro-family, patriotic, and generally conservative morally, socially and culturally, neoliberal economics and neoconservative foreign policy are not. He is already a long way there, and is potentially a national voice of the first importance for this absolutely vital understanding.

Another such voice is needed in the Democratic Leadership in the House, and preferably as Leader. Defeated House Dems who aspire to re-election in 2012 are already said be preparing an open letter to Nancy Pelosi, imploring her not to run for Minority Leader. Where is the candidate who will make it his or her number one priority, with everything that it bespeaks about underlying philosophy and therefore about wider agenda, to ensure the replacement of the enacted Senate Healthcare Bill with the abandoned House Bill, both because the public option is fiscally more responsible than the never-ending taxpayer subsidy of private insurance companies, and because the Stupak-Pitts Amendment is even more pro-life than the safeguards already in place?