The Village Dems are engaged in a strange exercise today - insisting on a "Progressive" parade in favor of the health bills. It is strange because all of the progressive votes have already been rounded up - the President patted some heads. At this point, insisting on proclaiming that the health bills are great progressive achievements actually undermines the drive to pass the damn bills - the Blue Dogs will be less inclined to vote for it.

Seizing on Chris Bowers' defensive post (Chris fancies himself a left wing stalwart) extolling the progressive virtues of the bills, such as they are, is counterproductive to passage of the bills. Better to point to the 'dirty f*ckin hippies' discontent, not punch them for it.

The only line of critique that seems logical is the Theda Skopcol attack on feminists - properly endorsed by Village Dems Matt Yglesias and Kevin Drum. After all, the progressives still have one more devastating punch in the gut to take - the Stupak Amendment.

Speaking for me only

Chris Bowers has a long post arguing that there are progressive wins in the health bills. At this point, there is not much more to say. Either you will believe it is so as Chris does and as the Village Dems will argue. Or you don't. This part made me chuckle though:

Medicaid--Even wash
Progressive proposal (House bill): 150% FPL eligibility with no exceptions; $425 billion in outlays; 15 million people covered

[. . .] How did it happen? By an odd circumlocution, [Ben] Nelson actually did something good for the bill. [. . .] Just about every state gets Ben Nelson's deal for Nebraska, now. The proposed outlays from the White House might exceed those in the House bill.

A big progressive win for Ben Nelson! Of course it wasn't. It was an escape hatch from the Cornhusker Kickback. I have advocated for a similar type of progressive win on the Stupak Problem. Chris has a different take:

Time to get back to real life after the Oscars. I've got a big court hearing Weds. in a 20 defendant case I'll be prepping for until then, and going to see Bon Jovi tomorrow night. This should my final week of having no time to be online or read the news. Hopefully, BTD will be around, and I'm sure I'll check in from time to time.

If there's news your interested in talking about, here's a place to do it. This is an open thread, all topics welcome.

A first in Oscar history: Kathryn Bigelow wins Best Director for The Hurt Locker, which also won big picture.

Sandra Bullock takes Best Actress on a night when Precious seemed to rule. Mo'Nique wins for best supporting actress.

Jeff Bridges for best actor in Crazy Heart -- I really liked Michelle Pfeiffer's introduction of Jeff Bridges.

Christoph Waltz was one of my favorite performances of the year, I'm so glad he won for best supporting actor for Inglorious Basterds.

Steve Martin and Alec Baldwin as co-hosts are getting good reviews. I didn't think they were funny or memorable. [More...]

The Red Carpet at tonight's Oscars 2010 has an hour left.

Who do you think looks great and who miscalculated? Too much beige for my taste, but I'm just tuning in.

Sarah Jessica Parker's dress is pretty but it fits her like a sack. Sandra Bullock looks great, many think she'll win Best Actress tonight. Here are the nominees.

Update: Please hold the spoilers as to who wins until all time zones have aired. They start at 6:30 MT (8:00 ET) (Not sure about the west coast, feel free to let us know in comments.)

Dennis Hartley's 10 Best Films list reminded me of Danny Peary's 1993 book Alternate Oscars (his picks here. Anyway, I thought I would add my own 10 favorites:

(1) Chinatown (1974)
(2) Once Upon A Time In The West (1969)
(3) Casablanca (1942)
(4) Annie Hall (1977)
(5) The Godfather (1972)
(6) Dr. Strangelove (1964)
(7) 8 1/2 (1963)
(8) Sugata Sanjiro (1943)
(9) Rear Window (1954)
(10) Bridge On the River Kwai (1957)

So many favorites left off this list. No John Ford? No Peckinpaugh? No Scorsese? No Coen Brothers? No Billy Wilder? No Robert Altman? But you have to pick 10. BTW, I like Avatar for Best Picture tonight. Pedestrian story? Sure. Technical achievement was transformational imo.

Speaking for me only

The LA Times has an article on Justice Clarence's rejection of prisoner brutality claims under the theory the inmates hadn't show substantial physical damage.

According to Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, a prisoner who was slammed to a concrete floor and punched and kicked by a guard after asking for a grievance form -- but suffered neither serious nor permanent harm -- has no claim that his constitutional rights were violated.

The Times notes that at one time, John Yoo was Justice Thomas' law clerk.

Thomas' consistent record of dismissing claims of prison brutality, most of them joined by Justice Antonin Scalia, shows that Yoo's view of torture was not that of a rogue lawyer. Instead, it represents a strain of conservative thinking that looks back in history to define cruelty and torture, rather than toward what the court has called the "evolving standards of decency."

[More...]

The ACLU has an ad in today's New York Times, asking President Obama, "What will it be, change or more of the same?". You can view it here.

Shorter version: Keep your promises, Mr. President. Try the 9/11 suspects in federal criminal court.

Remind the world that American stands for due process, justice and the rule of law.

There's still time to weigh in. You can send the President a message here. Obama needs to listen. For many of us, this could be his "pink slip" moment.

NYTimes live blog.

The US is scheduled to withdraw from a combat role in Iraq in 3 months.

Après moi le déluge. But it was always to be so. It was always just a question of when.

In sporting news, the Paris-Nice cycling race begins today. Podium Cafe is the place to discuss it.

This is an Open Thread.

If I were in Congress, and the price to pay for passing the health bills was accepting the Stupak Amendment, I think I probably would swallow it. But before I did that, I would search for solutions that would obviate that need. The heart of the problem is the federal subsidies for the purchase of private insurance through state based exchanges. While it is true that the new bill does not change existing law (the Hyde amendments of course apply to the expansion of Medicaid), Stupak has seized on the federal subsidies for the purchase of private insurance to argue that new restrictions must be placed on insurance policies offered in these state based exchanges. Stupak is not satisfied by the Nelson Amendment, that permits states to prohibit the sale of private insurance policies that offer abortion in their exchanges.

The obvious solution stares us all in the face - shift the federal subsidies for the purchase of private insurance to federal subsidies for the purchase of public insurance (Medicaid, Medicare or a new public insurance option.) More . . .

Thanks to Disney, 3.1 million cablevision customers in New York won't be able to watch the Oscars (or anything else) on ABC. Disney pulled the plug just after midnight when negotiations with the cable company over a contract dispute didn't get resolved.

Regardless of who's right in the overall dispute, there was no reason for Disney to take it out on the customers the day of the Academy Awards.

The current contract expired more than two years ago but has been maintained on a month-by-month basis since.

The strategy to placate Stupak is emerging, and it is an interesting one:

[T]he Catholic bishops want to show a measure of dominance over the US government, and they want their way on this. And they have convinced Stupak to reject the “third bill” strategy, which House leaders offered to him.

What they want to do is to put the changes to the abortion language in a reconciliation sidecar bill, the second bill. This ensures that it will get passed as part of the package, since the President and Senate leaders have already promised that the sidecar will become part of the agreement. [. . .] How could the Stupak amendment language on abortion survive the inevitable point of order on the Byrd rule? Well, the bishops want [. . .] 60 votes from the Senate to waive the point of order.

I think this is an unrealistic approach as it would undermine the Republican strategy of treating reconciliation as some sort of illegal power grab (and they will need a lot of GOP votes for it as too many Dems will vote to NOT waive the point of order.) I still think a separate Stupak bill is the more likely strategy.

Speaking for me only