Will The Health Care Reform Battle Wipe Out The Blue Dogs?

Yesterday I mentioned a conference call with three of the most respected pollsters in the country. Today Anzalone-Liszt Research followed up a question I had asked about how strongly the public option is being supported by likely voters in Blue Dog districts by sending me a polling memo. They polled in all 52 congressional districts represented by Blue Dogs, from health care reform supporters like Mike Michaud in Maine and Patrick Murphy in the Bucks County 'burbs north of Philly to the worst and most implacable foes of working families toiling mightily against reform-- bad faith players like Parker Griffith and Bobby Bright in Alabama, John Barrow and Jim Marshall in Georgia, Dan Boren in Oklahoma, and Heath Shuler in North Carolina.

A majority of voters in even the conservative Blue Dog districts favor reform that includes a public option. In fact "a majority (57%) of likely 2010 voters in blue Dog districts favor 'creating a public health insurance option to compete with private insurance companies.' Just 37% are opposed." This isn't in New York City or L.A. or Chicago or Boston; this is in districts where voters have backed McCain and Bush and pick reactionary Blue Dogs to represent them in Congress. Further, those figures and that support cut across regional lines. "There is majority support for a public health insurance option in Southern districts (55% favor), Western districts (57% favor), Central districts (545 favor), and Eastern districts (59% favor)."

For me the biggest takeaway from the research was that over two-thirds of voters in Blue Dog districts want the choice that a health insurance exchange and a public option would provide. It should offer no comfort to Blue Dog opponents of meaningful health care reform like Mike Ross (AR), Jim Cooper (TN), Jim Matheson (UT), Charlie Melancon (LA), John Barrow (GA), Travis Childers (MS), Jim Costa (CA), Allen Boyd (FL) and Frank Kratovil (MD) that "68% of likely 2010 voters in Blue Dog districts favor 'creating a health insurance exchange where people can choose between their private insurance and a public health insurance option' and that only 26% of these voters join them in their opposition. These support is overwhelming in Blue Dog districts in every region of the country.


Yesterday we looked at the duplicitous role Jane Harman is playing in the debate over health care reform, loudly proclaiming her advocacy of the public option, while secretly telling the House whips to count her as a "no" vote. Yesterday thousands of families in Torrance, Redondo Beach, Manhattan Beach, Venice, Mar Vista, El Segundo and San Pedro received an expensive mailer from PhRMA telling them how wonderful their congresswoman, Jane Harman is. This could be likened to Mussolini's air force scattering fliers around Addis Ababa in the spring on 1935 encouraging the population to rebel against Emperor Haile Selassie and support the "true Emperor Iyasu V," just as his troops invaded and conquered Ethiopia. No one rebelled and the Ethiopian Army was doing pretty well until the Italians started using chemical weapons and poison gas on them.

Meanwhile in GA-12, Barrow is under immense pressure from local Democrats infuriated that their congressman was one of only three Blue Dogs-- the others being Melancon and Matheson-- to vote against HR 3200 in the House Energy and Commerce Committee. The Chatham County Democratic Committee is on the verge of recognizing that he isn't really a Democrat at all any more and that they've been backing the wrong horse. Although Obama did badly in Georgia last year-- he only took 47% of the vote-- he actually did very well in GA-12, winning 54%, higher not only than either Kerry or Gore, but better than Bush did in either election. It was certainly Obama's ill-advised endorsement of Barrow before the primary that allowed him to win renomination as a Democrat against progressive state Senator Regina Thomas. Since getting back to Congress Barrow has been one of the worst of the aisle crossing Blue Dogs and this year he has voted with Republicans on substantive matters more than twice as often as when he votes with Democrats. His abysmal 32.5 score on the ProgressivePunch scale is identical to Chris Carney's, Mike McIntyre's and Heath Shuler's. The difference is that Carney, McIntyre and Shuler all represent Republican districts where Obama lost. GA-12 is a strongly Democratic district. With support for him among labor and local Democratic activists crumbling, Barrow is looking like one Blue Dog who will face a strong primary challenge in 2010, one he will have a very hard time winning, especially if he votes against health care reform.

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