And now a few more tidbits to update stories I’ve discussed in the past on this blog.I wrote yesterday,
I continue to agree with thinkers including Paul Krugman who argue that the president’s lack of leadership is a serious obstacle to progressive change at this troubled point in our nation’s history. Krugman continues to lament Mr. Obama’s lack of passion for the moral imperatives he articulated so courageously and clearly during his campaign. And I share the lament.
If you click on the label “moral imperative” at the end of that posting, you’ll see this is a theme I have been following since the beginning of this presidency—with constant concern.
And so I’m interested to read Jonathan Weisman saying at Wall Street Journal today,
President Barack Obama, trying to regain control of the health-care debate, will likely shift his pitch in September, White House and Democratic officials said, as he faces pressure from supporters to talk more about the moral imperative to provide health insurance to all Americans.
And I completely agree with Robert L. Borosage at Huffington Post, when he says,
There are a lot of talking heads out arguing that the "left" shouldn't be so extreme as to risk health care reform by insisting on the public option or the lifting of the absurd ban on negotiating lower drug prices. The reality is exactly the reverse. It is the handful of Blue Dogs and conservative Democrats in the House and Senate that are standing in the way of the majority in favor of a comprehensive plan. The question isn't whether the progressive majority is unreasonably resisting reform to save the public option. The question is whether a small minority of conservative Democrats will sabotage reform simply to stop the public option.
72% of Americans want a public option. It’s high time that “centrists” get with the program and recognize that the center has shifted, and that many of us are growing exceptionally weary of their politics of obstruction and of the way in which they do the right’s dirty work while pretending to be in the center.
And I also blogged yesterday about the request of the Leadership Conference of Women Religious that the Vatican disclose who is funding its probe of American nuns.
Since I wrote that posting, the National Catholic Reporter website has put up an excellent summary of this story by Daniel Burke, which I’d now like to recommend.
