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Avatar – Lots of tech, not much spirit [Movie Reviews]
The Good: Special effects are among the best of the decade, with beautiful attention to art design in the Pandora forests and bad-ass mecha-military designs. The Na’Vi are depicted with vibrancy and enough attention to detail to distract from their still-clearly 3-D rendered bodies. Cool concept in the form of the Avatar. Well-done final battle scenes. Sigourney Weaver. Michelle Rodriguez a.k.a. Ana Lucia from Lost. Giant pterodactyl-like sky critters.
The Bad: Underdeveloped dialogue and thin character motivations. Pacing of plot causes movie to drag before its final third. A lack of character-building moments or slices of day-to-day life. Contrived romance. Sam Worthington’s bad-boy Marine fails to be compelling, particularly as his Avatar.
The Bottom Line: Avatar is certainly a breakthrough in the practice of 3-D filmmaking and special effects in general, but at its heart it’s missing the real elements that should make a movie truly great: a compelling script and singular acting performances.
Avatar was a mere blip on my radar when I first heard of it and that was when I figured the movie version of the animated series by the same name would be a bigger deal. It was touted as James Cameron’s return to cinema and a film that would change movies substantially, much as Titanic and his sci-fi franchise entries Aliens and the first two Terminators did. And, since Terminator, Terminator 2, and especially Aliens were, in fact, awesome films that integrated special effects well into the story, I was willing to shell over the $14 for a 3-D screening at the theater.
I don’t regret that decision, because if there’s anything that is must-see about Avatar it’s the 3-D effects. The entire movie feels like the most intriguing and elaborate Disney 3-D theme park attraction. Spears and guns pop out of the screen, characters and machines in the foreground are floating in front of you, and the alien creatures of Pandora, often luminescent and beautiful, spin and float in the theater. One of the best details is the ash from a burning forest spiraling out of the movie screen.
But “elaborate theme park attractions” is unfortunately the only category in which Avatar truly excels.
The year is 2154 and, once again, humans have raped and pillaged nature on Earth until there were no natural resources left. The protagonist is Jake Sully (Sam Worthington, Terminator Salvation), an ex-marine confined to a wheelchair after a tour in Venezuela (presumably an oil war), who is given an opportunity to fix his spine by coming under the employ of RDA, a company that is trying to extract a rare and highly demanded mineral (actually called unobtuniam, ha-ha-ha) from the lush moon, Pandora. RDA’s hiccup comes in the form of the Na’Vi (hey! listen!), a race of tall blue aliens indigenous to Pandora who aren’t keen on having the humans bulldoze forests and take what they want. Jake’s role is to replace his identical twin brother, Tommy, whose genome was mapped to an Avatar, or a lab-grown organic Na’Vi shell which Jake can control with his mind thanks to that biological fact and old sci-fi trope: identical twins have the same DNA.
Do I have to wear the ponytail?
Jake quickly learns to like being 9 feet tall and able to run again, though he has little interest in what the Avatar program is about: research and diplomacy. He soon gets lost and introduced to a Na’Vi clan by the smoking-hot-by-alien-standards Neytiri (Zoë Saldaña, Star Trek). This meeting leads to the requisite crisis of conscience Jake experiences as he is tutored in the ways of the Na’Vi — does he help RDA forcibly relocate the clan or turn on his own race for luv?
The movie doesn’t really bother creating much suspense about that point, but I’ll let you guess what he picks.
With beautiful neon forests, campy heartless antagonists, and a cast that is mostly computer animated, Avatar feels like the most expensive Disney movie in history and that’s because it kind of is. This familiar plot was already covered in two children’s classics, Pocahontas and Ferngully (the latter actually produced by Fox, but whatever). It’s the well-known “White Man stumbles into native naturalist society and learns that killing nature is wrong” storyline. And that’s not necessarily a problem, since Avatar’s future setting and interesting questions about identity set it up for a unique interpretation. The problem is that the movie comes up short in actually exploring the aspects that could have made it mind-blowing.
Well...at least Avatar's sequel has to be better than these.
In fact, there was a time when Avatar could have been considered the best children’s movie ever made, if you cut back on some of the bloodshed and cursing. But even by those standards, we now live in the age of post-Pixar, whose movies actually do a better job of exploring human frailties than James Cameron’s script. It seems that Cameron spent so long on making the film that he stopped paying attention to the evolution of storytelling since the 90’s (or at least, I hope there was an evolution of storytelling since the 90’s).
Moving on, in the vein of talking about how visually appealing Avatar is…
BabeWatch
Avatar has three babes to witness in their bad-assery.
Zoë Saldaña already got full marks from Phil the Pill for her performance as Uhura in Star Trek. So she’ll get an honorable mention here as Neytiri, the slinky and deadly hunter naturalist who guides Jake on his path of becoming Na’Vi. While the face-mapping technology Cameron uses conveys everyone’s Na’Vi acting quite convincingly, Saldaña’s performance is particularly impressive, especially when she’s angry or grieving.
My fellow Latina Michelle Rodriguez has a significant role as the pilot Trudy Chacon. Lost fans know her as Ana Lucia from Lost and she’s pretty much playing the same character — a tough bitch with a heart of gold. I’m not sure if Rodriguez minds being typecast as the latin wildcat, but she plays the role comfortably. And she’s very purty.
But the ultimate Babe award goes to Sigourney Weaver and not because of her somewhat awkwardly-expanded role as Dr. Grace Augustine. She’s entertaining and interesting at the beginning as the scientist resistant to RDA’s violent encroachment, but her character unnecessarily sidetracks the plot in the last half. Still, it’s Sigourney Weaver. Ellen Ripley herself. And she still looks like she could punch a hole in a Xenomorph’s chest. So, for being the Queen of Sci-Fi Ass-Kicking, Sigourney wins top honors.
Ripley could take 'em all on...even herself.
The Politics
Naturally, the media couldn’t let the most expensive movie EVAR simply be about an acclaimed director telling a story. It wasn’t even enough that it had an environmental message right in time for Copenhagen (I guess the Chinese should have gotten an advanced screening). One of the articles I read focused on “some conservative groups” being angry because Avatar was clearly a critique on the Iraq War and American interventionism.
You should click on that link for the headline alone: “Avatar is a Big, Dull, America-Hating PC Revenge Fantasy.”
All right, Cameron is on-record as being a “liberal,” because he thinks it’s at the very least morally ambiguous that we bomb and missile other nations while going about our day buying $14 movie tickets. And yes, even without some of his quotes on the film, there is some influence of the times on Avatar. The RDA Security Chief played by Stephen Lang is clearly the warmongering archetype those “big Hollywood softies” have taught us to hate and their philosophy about Pandora bears some constructed analogy to our foreign policy.
Still, if you’re not looking for that type of politics, you won’t necessarily find it. The stronger message here is about preservation of nature. And while that’s certainly offensive to today’s conservatives, it’s a far-cry from “America is the devil, all soldiers are DICKS” controversy that Fox News would love to stoke.
In my opinion, if you see this is a blistering critique on the Afghanistan and Iraq Wars, then you’re more likely projecting some inner guilt about what your country does. Yes, killing innocent people to achieve your ends is wrong, plain and simple. If you think that a movie that holds this tenant is somehow hating on America, then you can’t have that much more faith in the righteousness of our wars than those stinking commie liberals, can you?
In other news, conservatives are realizing that the original Star Wars was critiquing America when the Empire destroyed Alderaan.
Besides, it’s not like the movie doesn’t spend plenty of time glorifying 22nd century war machines and the thrill of war.
Below the Bottom Line
The irony in Avatar is that it’s a movie about a highly technological society ignoring the value of natural life and spirituality. Similarly, the creators of this cut of Avatar obviously paid a lot of attention to the technological spectacle — the face-capture, the 3-D, the realistic design of machine and creature — but they failed to nurture the elements of a film that reside at its natural core — acting, dialogue, and truly creative moments.
I walked into Avatar with the knowledge that people (people being the increasingly senile Roger Ebert) were claiming it was one of the best movies since Star Wars. But this isn’t in the same league as the original Star Wars movies. This is, disturbingly, the evolution of the genre George Lucas created with the Star Wars prequels. Despite being incapable of holding a candle to the writing, acting and direction of the first three films, the prequel trilogy made a lot of money and, ultimately, that’s all the Movie Machines that can afford to create sci-fi epics care about. We’re quickly losing a frame of reference constructed by the soul of cinema when touting Avatar as a revolutionary film.
There is certainly a place and a need for cutting-edge effects in sci-fi spectacles like these. And there are moments in Avatar that shed some hope for the marriage of big-budget technology and traditionally solid performance. On the whole, however, Avatar is simply a big, loud, shiny flick with a simple message. It’s fun and it does it better than many in the blockbuster category. But don’t mistake “most expensive movie” for “best movie.”
But...but...THREE-DEE!
Verdict: 7 out of 10 Ikrans
Avatar
Directed by James Cameron
Cinematography by Mauro Fiore
Edited by James Cameron, John Refoua, and Stephen E. Rivkin
Music by James Horner
Studios: Lightstorm Entertainment, Dune Entertainment, Ingenious Film Partners
Distributed by 20th Century Fox
Links:
RottenTomatoes
Wikipedia
IMDB
Iraq and a Hard Place: Obama’s Afghanistan Decision
Oh, no, I’ve gone and made a terrible Middle East geography pun.
Subject: The War in Afghanistan
Ongoing conflict officially begun in October 2001 following the September 11 attacks
On December 1, 2009, President Barack Obama makes a televised speech from West Point academy declaring a 30,000 troop surge to begin in 2010. He also announces plans to begin drawing down in “eighteen months.” He estimates the operation at $30 billion.
Obama is criticized by the Left for committing more soliders to a war liberals are beginning to liken to Vietnam.
Obama is criticzed by the Right for not making this decision earlier and for drawing a timetable that “sends mixed messages” to Afghanis.
Facts: Candidate Obama ran on a platform of decreasing troops in Iraq and increasing troops in Afghanistan.
Obama states in his speech that there has been no proposal by his generals to take this action before 2010, responding preemptively to former vice president Dick Cheney’s “dithering” criticism.
According to NBC news, since taking office, Obama had already approved a troop increase from 31,800 to 71,000. This next increase will result in Obama having approved approximately 60,000 additional troops since taking office.
Links:
Wikipedia – War in Afghanistan (2001-Present)
White House – Full text of December 1, 2009 Obama speech
AP – Gates: “Severe consequences” for Afghan failure
—-
Who do you trust more? The guy who knows why he’s right or the guy who knows how he may be wrong?
My answer is unequivocally the latter.
Too much of our modern political discourse is dominated by people who know they’re right. They know every decision made by the President they personally hate is wrong. They know what the mistake is in our foreign policy. They know what the right answer is.
Everyone can’t be right. And when the two dominating opinions are at extreme polls, most people are probably wrong.
Obama could be called out on many things, but changing course on Afghanistan isn’t one of them. Those of us who were paying attention knew this would happen. So anyone who decries this is as a betrayal to those who voted for him is in ignorant denial and probably shouldn’t be trusted to provide legitimate suggestions, given their disregard for the facts.
Do you really want to be the new “war president”? If you go to West Point tomorrow night (Tuesday, 8pm) and announce that you are increasing, rather than withdrawing, the troops in Afghanistan, you are the new war president. Pure and simple. And with that you will do the worst possible thing you could do — destroy the hopes and dreams so many millions have placed in you. With just one speech tomorrow night you will turn a multitude of young people who were the backbone of your campaign into disillusioned cynics. You will teach them what they’ve always heard is true — that all politicians are alike. I simply can’t believe you’re about to do what they say you are going to do. Please say it isn’t so. — Michael Moore
All Obama is teaching Doves who voted for him thinking that our military interests would magically turn a 180 is that they need to clean the wax out from their ears and pay attention.
The decision to invade Iraq diverted resources from the war in Afghanistan, making it harder for us to kill or capture Osama Bin Laden and others involved in the 9/11 attacks. Nearly seven years later, the Taliban has reemerged in southern Afghanistan while Al Qaeda has used the space provided by the Iraq war to regroup, train and plan for another attack on the United States. 2007 was the most violent year in Afghanistan since the invasion in 2001. The scale of our deployments in Iraq continues to set back our ability to finish the fight in Afghanistan, producing unacceptable strategic risks. — Organizing for America, Barack Obama’s campaign homepage
Sounds like your war president was also your war candidate.
Obama, conveniently, was not in the Senate to have a voting record on Iraq in 2003. Given the national attitude and his party’s need to distinguish themselves from Dubya, he was able to rail against Iraq as a “distraction” from something most of the population was, at one time, supporting: the War on “Terror.”
Obama was against Iraq. He was never against Afghanistan. And, while the drawdown was already being worked on at the end of Bush’s term, it was Obama who announced a final timetable for withdrawal of most troops from Iraq — August 2010, a little less than a year before the planned end to the Afghanistan surge.
So, if all goes according to plan, and that’s a very big If, we’ll have effectively ended the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan by 2012, right when you have to decide whether to vote for Barack again.
What were Doves expecting? For the U.S. to just drop the casserole and let it smash to 1,000 pieces? We’re setting the casserole down. It takes some time. And in the case of Afghanistan, it takes some more cooking.
Terrible military metaphors, ho!
I don’t understand how a grown man like Michael Moore can believe that the President has the only say in military operations. What was one of his chief complaints against George W. Bush again? Stop me if this sounds familiar, but wasn’t the Fahrenheit 9/11 crowd decrying Bush for not listening? Not listening to the U.N., not listening to proper intelligence, not listening to diplomats and military strategist, not listening to the people? But when Barack Obama makes a decision weighing the inputs of people who probably know a smidge more about the realities of Afghanistan than Michael Moore, he’s obviously the second coming of Dubya.
It’s also willful ignorance of the apparent true threat to U.S. secruity in the area: Pakistan. More specfically, instability in Pakistan, a nuclear power. And this is nothing new.
The Soviet invasion of Afghanistan made Pakistan a country of paramount geostrategic importance. In a matter of days, the United States declared Pakistan a “frontline state” against Soviet aggression and offered to reopen aid and military assistance deliveries. When the Reagan administration took office in January 1981, the level of assistance increased substantially. Presidential waivers for several of the amendments were required. The initial package from the United States was for US$3.2 billion over six years, equally divided between economic and military assistance. A separate arrangement was made for the purchase of forty F-16 fighter aircraft….
….
President Bush formally lifted sanctions against India and Pakistan 22 September 2001 in a special memorandum to Secretary of State Colin Powell. The sanctions were imposed in response to the Indian and Pakistani nuclear weapons programs and testing. Powell said on NBC’s “Meet the Press” September 23 that lifting these sanctions, which had been under consideration for some time, sends an important signal that “we will stand by our friends who stand by us.”
In March 2003 President Bush lifted sanctions against Pakistan that were imposed following the 1999 bloodless coup that brought President Pervez Musharraf to power. A White House statement said President Bush decided to lift the sanctions because it will “facilitate the transition to democratic rule in Pakistan” and help in efforts to fight international terrorism. Pakistani cooperation was key to US military action against the Taleban government in neighboring Afghanistan and al-Qaida terrorists thought responsible for the September 2001 attacks in New York and Washington.
By December 2003 Pakistani government had launched an investigation into whether figures in Pakistan’s nuclear program may have provided nuclear-weapons technology to Iran or other countries. The US State Department said Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf assured the United States more than a year earlier that any such activity had ceased. Officials were reluctant to speak about what nuclear-export activity the United States believes Pakistan was engaged in before the Bush administration took office. But officials at both the State Department and White House said the United States continued to accept at face value an assurance made in 2003 by President Musharraf that Pakistan was no longer involved in such proliferation. — Globalsecurity.org
So the Bush administration extended a courtesy to Pakistan that it wouldn’t extend to Iran or Iraq: it lifted sanctions. Now, gee, why would Mr. No Compromise ease up on a nation with a patchy history of abetting terrorism when he took such a hard line on Saddam and Ahmadenijad? Could it be because we didn’t want to piss off a nuclear power right when were committing troops into two countries?
Why it's not called the War in Pakistan.
Rachel Maddow, the Left’s less pathologically partisan Sean Hannity, clearly agrees with me that Pakistan is the real motivation behind a troop surge in Afghanistan. She said this on her show following Obama’s speech:
To the extent, though, that this war is not about some potential future threat but a real current one, like the president described tonight, a current one that—he didn‘t say it bluntly, but he meant it—one that exists in Pakistan. To the extent that our 100,000 troops in Afghanistan are there simply to backstop and contain the real war against the real threat next door in Pakistan, then tell me this—how are we fighting our war in Pakistan?
We‘re fighting it using the CIA, which effectively functions as a fifth secret branch of the U.S. military now. They even have their own Air Force. They‘re a fifth secret branch of the military now which our civilian leaders as a matter of policy do not answer for. They don‘t even bother explaining what they‘re doing….
If the real war is Pakistan and we‘re fighting this war not to prevent some threat to us in the future, not as an extension of the Bush doctrine, but rather than to respond to a real threat now, why are we fighting it with our secret military that we don‘t admit to? Why are we fighting it with our CIA?
BECAUSE YOU CAN’T INVADE A NUCLEAR POWER WITH YOUR MILITARY AND EXPECT A FAVORABLE CONSEQUENCE!
I understand the question was semi-rhetorical, but you can use some logic. The CIA exists primarily for this very reason. We can’t officially intervene in every threat to U.S. security without setting off Armageddon. And yet, without the CIA, that is also very well what we could be facing. Honestly, I don’t understand the point that Maddow was making besides saying, “Man, we’re a bunch of warmonering assholes.”
And that may be true, but completely turning a blind eye to an unstable region harboring anti-U.S. hostility doesn’t produce a protective bubble against attack.
Listen, I agree that a lot of what we’ve done with our military and with the CIA, particularly when it comes to Predator Drone attacks is despicable and inhumane. It’s not how we should be handling the situation. But I’m not going to be so presumptuous to assume that any operation in that area has to be scrapped as a result. There’s a middle ground between indiscriminately killing civilians / destabilizing nations and completely abandoning all presence in a hostile area.
Obama clearly understands the threat we’re trying to contain in this godforsaken operation.
The people and governments of both Afghanistan and Pakistan are endangered. And the stakes are even higher within a nuclear-armed Pakistan, because we know that al Qaeda and other extremists seek nuclear weapons, and we have every reason to believe that they would use them….
In the past, we too often defined our relationship with Pakistan narrowly. Those days are over. Moving forward, we are committed to a partnership with Pakistan that is built on a foundation of mutual interest, mutual respect, and mutual trust. We will strengthen Pakistan’s capacity to target those groups that threaten our countries, and have made it clear that we cannot tolerate a safe haven for terrorists whose location is known and whose intentions are clear. America is also providing substantial resources to support Pakistan’s democracy and development. We are the largest international supporter for those Pakistanis displaced by the fighting. And going forward, the Pakistan people must know America will remain a strong supporter of Pakistan’s security and prosperity long after the guns have fallen silent, so that the great potential of its people can be unleashed.
The speech itself is even titled “Remarks by the President in Address to the Nation on the Way Forward in Afghanistan and Pakistan.” Anyone who believes that we’re staying in Afghanistan simply to pick off the “less than 100” remaining al-Qaeda members is a fool (I’m looking at you, Michael).
That’s why Obama mentions his stance on nuclear disarmament. That’s the real threat. And it’s something even Doves should take into account when considering what to do with our military.
So you’ve got the Bleeding Hearts screaming at the President from the Left, but of course, you can always count on good old Uncle Dick to somehow find Obama too weak on terrorism.
Honestly, I can’t find a single substantial criticism of Obama’s troop surge plan in Dick Cheney’s response.
It amounts to “they’re calling us names and saying we did things badly, it’s not fair!”
The truth often isn’t fair to malicious incompetents, asshole.
From what I can ascertain, the Right claims that Obama should have A) accepted whatever General McChrystal said without demanding an exit strategy a-la his predecessor and B) not made the Afghani government feel “abandoned” by announcing the fact that we plan to leave in 2011.
Except we know that they’re full of shit.
Obama could have sent every single soldier he had, drafted all the liberals and minorities, and bombed the crap out of the Axis of Evil and the Right Wing would suddenly jump up and down and claim that they’re anti-War. There was never a chance of Obama making a move that wouldn’t be criticized by the Coalition for Insane TeaBagging. No matter what Obama does to try to “win” the war or save American soldiers, he’s still a black Democrat. And that’s all these people care about.
In light of this, practically none of their criticisms are worth responding to. I will, however, say this about Obama announcing the timetable:
An end date to this mess has been long overdue.
Fox News likes to pretend that the supervillain terrorists will take this as an opportunity to throw on their invisibility cloaks for 18 months while the 30,000 additional troops wander the Afghanistan-Pakistan border with their thumbs up their asses.
Man, I hope this won't start smelling bad after 18 months.
Whenever the end is in sight, your military is hopefully going to know. And here’s a news flash: If the troops know, the media will know. What the Right Wing is really saying is that Obama shouldn’t have an exit plan. Hell, remember John McCain, the candidate Doves now like to claim is exactly the same as Obama?
Sen. John McCain said he supports the build up but thinks it’s wrong to signal in advance when a troop withdrawal might start. “We don’t want to sound an uncertain trumpet to our friends in the region,” the Arizona Republican said. – The Associated Press
Nah, we don’t want to sound an uncertain trumpet. Let’s make them feel better by basically committing to decades of funneling American soldiers into this conflict, without a goal in sight. This was the difference between John McCain and Barack Obama. It wasn’t whether the President would wage war. It was whether the President would set up a policy to end it. McCain was perfectly content fighting in Afghanistan beyond his term. Obama is sending this message: “We can’t and won’t do this forever. We’re going to commit to securing our interests and then you’d best have your shit together, because we’re out.”
Pretty certain trumpet, if you ask me.
Now, if you’ve read all that and if you know anything about my past commentary on war, you’re thinking one of two things:
1) Phil is an Obama loyalist hypocrite who renounces his values to support the Party
2) Phil has been brainwashed into supporting war feeding off his own hatred of TeaBaggers
Not quite.
I hate this damn war. I hate all of them. I hate how we handled everything the past 8 years, including Obama’s decisions. I don’t believe you can kill every terrorist who wants to do this country harm. Not without five more popping up per martyr. I don’t believe that the ultimate answer to our security and the world’s lies in men with guns.
She Who Shall Not Be Nicknamed remarked after Obama’s speech that she didn’t think nation-building was a bad idea. Now, the connotation Obama was speaking out against implied that we’d be there to hold Afghanistan’s hand indefinitely. That would be fruitless. But she’s right that the best way to deal with terrorism is to provide people with stability of their own. Can we win the War in Afghanistan? Sure.
Just not with bombs.
As it currently stands, neither you nor I can stand up to the military industrial complex. It’s real and it’s hard at work. The United States has never known a more efficient way of dealing with a threat than intimidation through force. So, given the realities of our world and our nation, conventional war will continue. I don’t know a soul that actually believes we’ll make this 18-month timeline. It’s not realistic, to be honest. Somehow, War will find a way to perservere.
But we can put an end to it.
I support the President’s plan, within the context of the way our country works. If this is the only way we know how to protect ourselves, then it’s something we have to adapt to. But we all know that when the populace finally pressures the Complex to bring our soldiers home that the real enemy won’t have disappeared. And that’s where we have to step in.
If the free market is as beneficial to society as capitalists claim, it should acknowledge that there is an opportunity in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq, Iran and the entire Middle East. People need help. People need jobs. They need education. And in the areas where we’ve destroyed everything they have, they need infrastructure. This will put a stop to terrorism, this will make American safer.
And if Obama’s half as smart as he makes himself out to be, this is what we will commit to after drawing the troops down.
Think of this Afghan child as the embodiment of "hope" and "change" that we were harping on last year.
“As your Commander-in-Chief, I owe you a mission that is clearly defined, and worthy of your service.”
The mission of rebuilding what we helped to destroy rather than continuing our rampage out of fear?
I can’t think of anything more worthy.
Blue Dogs that hijacked health care support War
Well, yesterday was an exciting day. And potentially the peak viewership for Phil the Pill. To sum it up, after an entire night/morning of procrastination, homework, and watching Daily Show/Colbert on Hulu, I decided I finally had time to write a letter to Virignia’s senators about passing health care reform. After essentially writing an ideological speech, I felt very worked up about and attempted to pimp it on the social media sites.
It worked. And I’m glad it got attention, because I do believe in two main things: 1) the private health insurance industry has played with people’s lives and health and should not be allowed in a civilized society and 2) people don’t tell their representatives to do their job or lose their seat often enough.
Getting that much attention made me somewhat insecure too. I didn’t really analyze this issue as thoroughly as I think people should. There are legitimate concerns with the bill supported by House democrats. On one level you could aruge that it doesn’t do enough. On the other you have a serious question of whether the government can manage this properly.
I’m not sidestepping the fact that it’s a complex. But I do support legislators doing something rather than nothing and I believe they should be listening to individual citizens and not lobbyists to conclude what it is that we need. And that’s why I mailed those letters. To send a strong message that I want cheaper, affordable healthcare and that I’m willing to vote for someone who does if they won’t.
Picture related.
On the health care front, mainstream Democrats made deals with the Blue Dog Democrats to tool the House bill on health care. Some concessions have been made which should appeal to some fiscal conservatives.
House Democrats pushed ahead with a compromise health overhaul Thursday over liberals’ complaints, intent on achieving tangible — if modest — success on President Barack Obama’s top domestic priority ahead of a monthlong summer recess.
But the concessions Waxman made to the so-called Blue Dog Democrats infuriated House liberals. They denounced the proposed new structure of the public plan, which was originally designed to be based on Medicare rates. The new structure says rates would be negotiated with providers as occurs now with private companies, which could result in more expensive care.
“This agreement is not a step forward toward a good health care bill, but a large step backwards,” 53 Progressive Caucus members said in a letter to House leaders Thursday. “Any bill that does not provide, at a minimum, for a public option with reimbursement rates based on Medicare rates — not negotiated rates — is unacceptable.”
Some details of the deal remained murky. As part of the agreement the Blue Dogs are insisting they won’t vote for a bill that costs more than $1 trillion over 10 years, but that would require Democrats to make more cuts or raise more money. It wasn’t clear how much, or how it would be accomplished.
I’m not terribly offended by negotiating rates as opposed to imposing rates by law, but who are these “providers” that are separate from doctors? I’ll put it at the list of questions at the bottom.
As long as there is a public option, subsidized for those who truly can’t afford it, I’m happy. But as far as Blue Dogs voting against something that costs more than a $1 trillion over 10 years what about something that will cost over $1 trillion in two years?
Military-Industrial Complex Watch
Crooks and Liars discussed the Defense Appropriations Act of 2010, citing this Washington Post article:
The Democratic-controlled House is poised to give the Pentagon dozens of new ships, planes, helicopters and armored vehicles that Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates says the military does not need to fund next year, acting in many cases in response to defense industry pressures and campaign contributions under an approach he has decried as “business as usual” and vowed to help end.
The unwanted equipment in a military spending bill expected to come to a vote on the House floor Thursday or Friday has a price tag of at least $6.9 billion.
The White House has said that some but not all of the extra expenditures could draw a presidential veto of the Defense Department’s entire $636 billion budget for 2010, and it sent a message to House lawmakers Tuesday urging them to cut expenditures for items that “duplicate existing programs, or that have outlived their usefulness.”
Roughly $2.75 billion of the extra funds — all of which were unanimously approved in an 18-minute markup Monday by the House Appropriations Committee — would finance “earmarks,” or projects demanded by individual lawmakers that the Pentagon did not request. About half of that amount reflects spending requested by private firms, including 95 companies or related political action committees that donated a total of $789,190 in the past 2 1/2 years to members of the appropriations subcommittee on defense, according to an analysis by Taxpayers for Common Sense, a nonprofit watchdog group.
The White House criticized the addition of $80 million for the Kinetic Energy Interceptor program, which Gates and other Pentagon officials have said is technically troubled, behind schedule, and billions of dollars over budget. But Northrop Grumman, the principal contractor, is building a technology center in Murtha‘s district that would bring 150 related jobs, and Murtha’s subcommittee sought its continuation as a way “to recoup the technology,” according to an appropriations staff member, who was not authorized to speak on the record.
A spokesman for Murtha did not reply to a request for comment.
The latest vote on the has been, surprise, overwhelmingly in favor. Those opposed included Barney Frank, Ron Paul, and Dennis Kucinich. None of them are Blue Dogs. C&L questioned whether the BDs helped this pork-barrel legislation too. I wondered if perhaps they weren’t talking out of their ass. So I looked up the list of Blue Dog Democrats in the House.
Okay, get your buzzers ready. How many of the 49 Blue Dog Democrats in the House opposed this bill with at least $6.9 billion in earmarks and, one could argue, wasted money in campaigns to kill innocent people and lose hearts and minds in the Middle East?
Time’s up. One. Representative Parker Griffith of Alabama.
Congratulations, represenative Griifith! You win the Consistency in the Face of Mind-Boggling Hypocrisy Award!
So, I get it. Healthcare spending? Wasteful. Defense spending? AMURRRIKUH!
I tried to avoid criticism of the Blue Dogs until now. But now it’s clear that they should just stop posing as “fiscal conservatives” and just admit it – they’re neocons trying to get gay, black votes. Well, any candidate campaigning as a “Blue Dog” in my districit isn’t getting THIS gay, black vote.
Er…straight, Latino vote.
I leave you on the political note with a 10-minute video on what we have money for.
The video, from the American Friends Service Committe points out how one day of the Iraq war costs $720 million per day. In addition to health care, that could be 6,482 homes, 34,904 scholarships for four year universities, higher pay for teachers, 1,274,336 homes with alternative energy, or 1,153,846 free lunches for children.
It’s enough to make you consider voting for Ron Paul.
All right, it’s late. I wonder where I can find funny pictures…maybe 4chan…OH, DEAR, GOD, NO!
Quote of the Day
Suicidal glory is the luxury of the irresponsible. We’re not giving up. We’re waiting for a better opportunity to win. – Lois McMaster Bujold
Questions for Readers
What “providers” are being referenced in the amendments to the health care bill? Who do we need to worry about paying their fair share other than doctors?
Is Robert Gates a good Secretary of Defense?
How much do you think we could be saving on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan?
If Blue Dogs are fiscal conservatives, why are they voting for this much spending in the defense budget?
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