Let's Not Allow the Perfect to Be the Enemy of the Abominable

After weeks of perusing liberal websites whose writers have been whistling past the graveyard of health care reform, insisting that this "historic" moment is only a launching pad for the really good reform that everyone will come to a consensus on and create in a couple years, and after posting my own pessimistic take on the matter, I have looked over the final Senate product and see that my worst fears have come to pass. Perhaps the most egregiously obvious sign that it heralds more business-as-usual is this:

The (Senate) legislation would not strip health insurance companies of their longstanding exemption from federal antitrust laws.

Good news. If you're Ronald Williams. Or a stockholder. The soup is on.

I wish I could think we were finally done with the divisive recriminations that have torn the liberal wing apart these past weeks, but I'm afraid it's only just starting, now that the House and Senate bills must be reconciled. The House bill, with all its flaws, is a piece of humanitarian genius compared to the Piece Of Shit (as Charles Pierce calls it) the Millionaires' Club finally extruded from their constipated asses. There will be an inevitable mitosis within the Democratic party as a result of this, and I'm beginning to think that may be the healthiest way for us to finally begin to represent the poor and disenfranchised again. God knows the Democratic Party as it now stands has long since given up even pretending it cares about those.