Now That Health Care's Been Decided, A Preview Of The High Voltage Fights Ahead (Joe Rothstein's Commentary)

August 24, 2009

By Joe Rothstein
Editor, EINNEWS.COM

I'm going to take President Obama's advice. I've decided to no longer be wee-weed up about health care.

The way all of this will turn out, after all, is pretty much decided. Congress just needs time to go through the motions.

The House will pass a health care bill with a lot of good reform stuff in it, including the public option. The Senate will also pass a health care bill with a lot of good stuff in it. But it won't have a public option. The compromise will be co-ops and triggers to kick in a public option if the co-op goals aren't met.

In the end most of us will consider this a fundamental improvement over what's been, for decades, an extremely faulty and expensive health care system.

So now that health care's behind us, we can exhale. Well...not really.

Let's not forget that the Senate has yet to vote on the new energy bill with cap and trade as its highly controversial beating heart. While that outcome remains very murky, you can be sure that the White House will be pressing hard for climate change legislation this year.

In December, representatives of most countries will gather in Copenhagen for a long-planned follow-up to Kyoto. The Obama administration will be hugely embarrassed if it has to go to that meeting empty-handed----with nothing substantive to contribute to the cause of slowing global warming. Once the health care inferno dies down, expect the fight over carbon emissions to keep things enflamed.

And behind health and energy come a murderers' row of high voltage battles, each of them guaranteed to raise cable talking head ratings and increase the number of democracy-is-in-peril protesters at public events. Here's a preview of coming attractions.

Democrats cannot go through most of 2010 with unemployment in the 8 to 10% range and expect to survive next year's election without serious damage. So there will be mounting pressure early next year for a second stimulus focused almost entirely on job creation and extension of unemployment benefits.

Neither can the Democrats go through next year's elections facing forecasts of huge deficits for as far ahead as the eye can see.

The only realistic course out of this financial morass will be a major overhaul of the nation's tax system. The kind of overhaul that rebalances the tax load and repairs the injustices done to progressive taxation during the years of Republican control. The kind of overhaul that cleans up a lot of messy tax avoidance that the wealthy found so popular during the high-five days. The kind of tax overhaul that makes it more attractive for U.S. business and industry to stay in the U.S. rather than to move offshore.

In addition to the social engineering involved in the reworked tax system, it should emerge simpler for most people, fairer for most people, and give the U.S. more revenue by taxing people and companies that now essentially walk away from their responsibility to help support the nation's costs.

Since just about every institution in America will be affected by tax reform, expect one doozy of a battle on this next year.

As a corollary, let's not forget that Congress has yet to take on the financial reforms needed to make responsible adults out of Wall Street and the financial industry. After all, most Americans are still living with the adverse consequences of the money brokers' gambling habits. It's likely that much of the anger expressed by voters lately over health care and other issues is really fueled by the noxious brew of taxpayer-funded bank bailouts and unseemly bonuses.

You haven't heard much about it---yet---but Congress has created a 9/11-style commission to get to the root causes of the financial meltdown. That commission has its first public meeting September 17. Expect some serious fireworks as the commission retraces the mistakes/stupidity/fraud that came so close to destroying the capitalist system, and creates imperatives for Congress to throw a harness over the financial free wheelers.

What else?

How about immigration reform, which President Obama has promised to propose in 2010.

How about organized labor's must-have card-check fixes to restore labor's balance against management?

What about the investigation of Karl Rove, Harriett Miers and others in the White House that seems headed for a showdown over the political corruption of the Bush Justice Department?

If you've got health care debate fatigue, lighten up. That fight is almost entirely behind us. But the battles waiting in line will keep everyone's blood running hot for a long time to come.

As a nation, the U.S. voted for change. Now we're seeing what's behind that curtain.

(Joe Rothstein can be contacted at joe@einnews.com)