Yesterday Glenn Greenwald was interviewed on Democracy Now. In the wide ranging interview Greenwald was very critical Obama's Afghanistan policy, Obama's decision not to try and peruse prosecutions of war crimes committed by the Bush Administration. Greenwald leveled especially scathing criticism at Joe Lieberman for accepting millions from the insurance industry during his career, and Hadassah Lieberman's work for the pharmaceutical division of Hill & Knowlton, then adopting a pro industry stance at odds with strong public support for a Public Option in Connecticut.
The thing I found most striking was Greenwald's analysis of how the White House with the Democratic congressional leadership were taking a very industry friendly approach to structuring Health Care Reform legislation. Greenwald also singled out for criticism some of the diaries attacking the Obama White House's critics that were featured on the Rec List here on D-Kos recently.
Note: Democracy Now allows longer excepts with clear attribution when they are not used for commercial purposes. All emphasis are mine:
Glenn Greenwald on Afghanistan, State Secrets, Healthcare and the Media -democracynow.org
JUAN GONZALEZ: And speaking of that lip service to placate the progressive base, you’ve also shown a light on the debate among the progressive publications over this issue of how serious the Obama administration is about the public option, in the battles between Daily Kos, on the one hand, and the Huffington Post and The Nation. Could you talk about how this is affecting the progressive media?
GLENN GREENWALD: Well, I think one of the most significant issues of the Obama administration has been what role progressives—the progressive infrastructure has played in applying pressure on the Obama administration. One of the very first things that the Obama administration did—and Rahm Emanuel has specialized in trying to control and silence the left; I mean, that’s how he built his power base—in the House of Representatives was, they created these weekly meetings called Unity ’09 and Common Purpose, where members of all of the allegedly progressive groups devoted to progressive causes meet every week on Tuesday, often with members of the White House communications team, including oftentimes Rahm Emanuel, and they coordinate their messaging. So, instead of being devoted to, for example, pressuring the administration on issues relating to labor or to choice or to gay issues or to war, instead they’re coordinating their messaging to insure that their real allegiance is to serve the interest and the agenda of the Obama administration. And it’s really enabled the Obama administration to annex large aspects of the progressive infrastructure and to remove what ought to be an important pressure point.
I think they’ve done the same with lots of progressive pundits, who aren’t necessarily attending these meetings, but who have voluntarily ceded their role in the progressive world and in progressive opinion making and activism. And you see this conflict more and more, I think. For example, the Huffington Post had an article critical of the Obama administration, reporting, for example, that they were working behind the scenes, in contrast to what Obama was saying, to sabotage the public option. And you saw in various places, on Daily Kos and others, suddenly declarations that the Huffington Post was suspect, and they were right wing, and they were the enemy, because anyone who reflects negatively on Obama has to be discredited. And I think you see that conflict, and I hope it will continue to grow, because it’s healthier than having progressives devote themselves to cheerleading for the President.
AMY GOODMAN: But explain why they’re against the public option, the Obama administration. The Obama administration, who—well, Obama was for single payer for years, and we have all the video that we keep playing of him endorsing it.
GLENN GREENWALD: Well, one of the interesting—most interesting aspects of what has happened here—and I think it illustrates the point I was just making—is, when Obama was running for president, he not only vowed, in general, to have the most transparent administration ever, talked about how secrecy was the toxin of Washington, but specifically with regard to the healthcare debate, he said the problem has always been in the past, that all the stakeholders get in the meetings, and they get accommodated, and nobody knows what’s actually happening, because it’s all done in secret. And he vowed that healthcare negotiations that he’s involved in, not only wouldn’t they be conducted in secret, they would be put on C-SPAN. Instead, as it turned out, the White House, early on in this process, beginning in March and April, were meeting with pharmaceutical and healthcare industry representatives and reaching secret deals with them to insure that they would not sabotage the healthcare plan.
And they made two deals, one with the pharmaceutical industry, not to negotiate for bulk prices, to pay full prices, even though they’re going to be the largest purchaser of pharmaceutical products; and one with the healthcare industry, not to have a public option to compete with what it was that they would be able to charge. So, essentially, they would force and mandate healthy, young Americans to buy the products of the insurance company without providing a public option to keep costs low. It was a huge gift to the healthcare industry. And I think one reason was they were afraid that the healthcare and pharmaceutical industry would advertise against the program. But I think the more important concern is, right now, most healthcare money and pharmaceutical money goes to the Democrats—it went to the Obama campaign, it went to help Democrats take over control of the Congress—and they want that to continue. They don’t want that money to go to Republican coffers to take over the Congress in 2010. And so, one of their principal priorities was to make sure that whatever happened was not a threat to the pharmaceutical and healthcare industry. And that’s why, I think, that early on they bargained the public option away.
It would be well worth your while to read or watch the whole interview. The portion about the Liebermans shouldn't be missed either.
Here is the HufPo's piece that Greenwald writes about above: Leaderless: Senate Pushes For Public Option Without Obama's Support
I think Greenwald's analysis comes uncomfortably close to the mark. We at D-Kos like to pride ourselves on being a reality based community. It would be a shame to let our collective investment in getting a Democrat in the White House and a Democratic Majority in the Congress obscure that laudable goal.