Message to Sen. Snowe: Forget about defecting from the GOP

In the Akira Kurosawa film Ran, brothers Taro and Jiro, both of them regional warlords, are fighting each other in a bloody battle for control of their declining father's domain. Thousands on both sides are falling dead as the family descends into chaos - and then elder brother Taro is shot in the back. There's a twist, though. The musket used to kill Taro was wielded by one of his own men.

The assassin and his accomplice are summoned to Jiro's palace, where Jiro bestows a reward on them for their betrayal of Taro. As it turns out, their reward is also a farewell gift. While Jiro is grateful to the traitors for handing him victory on the battlefield, Jiro's advisor informs the traitors that Jiro is mindful of the possibility that if they could turn on their own lord, they could just as easily double-cross Jiro. Unless they can find some other warlord to show pity on them and take them into his employ, the money they've been awarded will have to last the traitors for the rest of their lives.

Which brings us to today's vote in the Senate Finance Committee on the Baucus bill. Senator Olympia Snowe (R-ME) was the only Republican to vote for the bill, but only after doing everything she could to keep a public insurance option from becoming part of the finished product.

So now the House version of the bill is going to have to be reconciled with a Senate bill that has no public option, that requires virtually every American to purchase health insurance or face significant fines, that still leaves approximately 18,000,000 Americans without any safety net, and that imposes virtually no restraints on predatory health insurance companies who seek to raise their rates to astronomical levels.

Some are already saying that Sen. Snowe's career with the Republican Party is over. All I have to say is that we don't want her knocking on the DNC's front door, asking to change her party affiliation.

You could say that she betrayed the Republicans, and if that notion comforts you, so be it. But she also betrayed the American family by denying access to a public option that would keep costs down and keep CIGNA, UnitedHealthCare, and Blue Cross Blue Shield honest.

Sen. Snowe has made her bed; now let her lie in it and leave the Democratic Party alone.

As a postscript, in Ran, the two traitors were leaving Jiro's fortress when they paused for a single backwards glance at what could have been, not unlike Lot's wife. This was answered by a warning shot fired by one of Jiro's retainers, which scattered the traitors to the hills. The point is that we cannot necessarily make the Democratic majority stronger by stealing players from the other team if they still insist on playing by the other team's rules and therefore diluting our strength. We are better off without them.

women would be part of what has become the republican party

I just didn't want my fellow Democrats getting any ideas about trying to woo her into joining our side. There's so much flak about Specter doing it that he's facing a strong primary challenge from Joe Sestak as a result.

but I also would like to think because of the medical issues he has been through himself that he did it for that reason also

The cogent response:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=389&topic_id=6766907&mesg_id=6766986

"She goes from the person who makes bipartisna solutions to Evan Bayh." :rofl: