Priceless: Retiring Centrist Sen. Olympia Snowe (R-Maine) gives Obama a failing grade for bipartisanship

Retiring Sen. Olympia Snowe claims Obama hasn't met with her in over two years. So much for bringing a new atmosphere to Washington.

(The Hill)- Sen. Olympia Snowe (R-Maine) hasn’t met with President Obama in two years, she said in an interview on Tuesday.

“I think it was during the healthcare debate,” the centrist senator told ABC News. “There was a meeting on energy, a meeting in the spring of 2010.”

Asked to give Obama a grade on his outreach to legislators, she said it would be “close to failing.”

“A president should be reaching out to many on the opposite side of the aisle. You know, to many Republicans, on a bipartisan basis,” the three-term senator said.

Most Partisan President Ever Wants Republicans to Put Politics Aside and Work With Him…

When President Obama had control of the House and a filibusterer-proof majority in the Senate, his position was "I won." now that Republicans have won, he wants them to put politics aside and work with him.

WASHINGTON (AP) – Ending a two-week vacation, President Barack Obama is appealing to newly-empowered Republicans to resist jockeying for the White House in 2012 and work with him to get the economy growing and the jobless back to work.

Facing anything but a political soft landing after his holiday stay in Hawaii, Obama told reporters en route to the capital Tuesday that he understands Republicans, who recaptured the House in last fall’s elections, “are going to play to their base for a certain period of time.”

Bipartisanship fail: Shoutfest on 'Face the Nation'

The next two years are going to be interesting to say the least.

Reps. Bachmann, Wiener, Wasserman Schultz And Kelly Go At It

Democrats Diss McCain's Call to Reform Bipartisan ‘Gang of 14’ to Stop 'Nuclear Option'

(click image for larger view)

In 2005, Senator McCain helped form the bipartisan 'Gang of 14' to stop Republicans from using the 'nuclear option' to force President George W. Bush’s judicial nominees through with a simple majority vote. Now, McCain is trying to reform the bipartisan 'Gang of 14' and stop President Obama and Harry Reid from using the 'nuclear option' to pass Obamacare. So far, no Democrat is interested.

Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) is seeking bipartisan support to block Senate Democrats from using special parliamentary tactics to pass healthcare reform....

And McCain reminded Democrats that he was a member of the bipartisan Gang of 14, which stopped Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-Tenn.) from using the so-called nuclear option in 2005.
It's time for a similar gang, he said. So far, he’s had no takers.

Nancy Pelosi: "A bill can be bipartisan without bipartisan votes"

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said Sunday, "A bill can be bipartisan without bipartisan votes." That has to be the most asinine statement ever from a Speaker of the House.

From The Hill:

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said Sunday that Republicans have left their mark on the healthcare bill and should accept that the bill will go forward.

"They've had plenty of opportunity to make their voices heard," she said on CNN's "State of the Union" Sunday morning. "Bipartisanship is a two-way street. A bill can be bipartisan without bipartisan votes. Republicans have left their imprint."

The only thing related to 'Obamacare' with a 'mark' on it is the butts of the hapless 'Blue Dog' Democrats Nancy Pelosi kicked into voting for this monstrosity the first time through.

Rush Limbaugh: "Bipartisanship means Republicans compromising their core beliefs to agree with Democrats" (video)

Rush Limbaugh tells Republicans President Obama's offer of bipartisan health care negotiations is a "trap."

Rush to Republicans:

"Bipartisanship means Republicans compromising their core beliefs to agree with Democrats."

Harry Reid is still threatening reconciliation

Senate majority leader Harry Reid is still threatening to cram Obamacare down America's throat by use of the budget reconciliation process to bypass a Republican filibuster. During the August break, Reid didn't get the message Americans don't want this bill. The reason Reid missed the message is he was to spineless to face his constituents at a town hall and answer their questions. According to Reid, the bill is 90% done. Senator Reid has this to say about bipartisanship:

From CBS News Political Hotsheet:

"We still, after all these months, still have a place at the the table for Republicans," he said. "We do not want to do reconciliation unless we have no alternative."

Republicans can either agree to the health care bill Democrats want or they can have it rammed down their throats by reconciliation. Isn't bipartisanship great?

Democrats drop illusion of bipartisanship on health care reform

Democrats appear ready to drop all pretense of trying to work with Republicans on a health care reform bill. The weekend disaster where HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius hinted the Obama administration was ready to drop the public option from health care reform legislation has caused the Democrats to rethink their strategy. The left wing of the democratic Party went "bonkers" when they heard their "beloved" government run insurance option might be dropped from the final bill. President Obama is failing on his promise of bipartisanship. Here is what he said in his victory speech.

"In this country, we rise or fall as one nation, as one people," Obama said. "Let's resist the temptation to fall back on the same partisanship and pettiness and immaturity that has poisoned our politics for so long."

Here is what is actually happening today.

WASHINGTON — Given hardening Republican opposition to congressional health care proposals, Democrats now say they see little chance for the minority's cooperation in approving any overhaul, and are increasingly focused on drawing support for a final plan from within their own ranks.

Top Democrats said Tuesday that their go-it-alone view was being shaped by what they saw as Republicans' purposely strident tone against health care legislation during this month's congressional recess, as well as remarks by leading Republicans that current proposals were flawed beyond repair.

The White House spokesman, Robert Gibbs, said of Republican lawmakers, "Only a handful seem interested in the type of comprehensive reform that so many people believe is necessary to ensure the principles and the goals that the president has laid out."

The Democratic shift may not make producing a final bill much easier. The party must still reconcile the views of moderate and conservative Democrats worried about the cost and scope of the legislation with those of more progressive lawmakers determined to win a government-run insurance option to compete with private insurers.

Democrats thought bipartisanship was good when Bush was in power, but it is a trap now

From PajamasMedia:

Peter Wehner writes that the Washington Post’s E.J. Dionne, Jr. “has emerged as one of the most vocal critics of bipartisanship in the Age of Obama. It is a trap that Democrats can easily fall into and be snared by, so E.J. has decided to use his column to warn of its evils. In his column yesterday, for example, he wrote this:”

Where did we get the idea that the only good health care bill is a bipartisan bill? Is bipartisanship more important than whether a proposal is practical and effective?… Trying to achieve full bipartisanship by squaring those two views [held by Democrats and Republicans] is a recipe for incoherence…

Of course, as Wehner notes, prior to 2009, Dionne was writing passages such as this:

if the president were genuinely interested in a bipartisan compromise, he would put everything on the table – including his own tax cuts that have added to the budget deficit. (The Washington Post, 2/4/05)

Not to mention:

If ‘getting over’ the divisive and troubling endgame of the [2000] election is supposed to be in the national interest, doesn’t the president have an obligation to help? Is it unfair to insist that he pursue a more moderate course? (The Washington Post, 1/28/01)