On the Bus with Pong Plus! American Prospect 's Paul Starr gets on the Pong bandwagon . ... P.S.: Can the Dems combine "ratification" and "reconciliation"? In other words, have the House just pass whatever the Senate passes, without change. Presto, Obama signs and health care reform is law. Then the Dems can use the "reconciliation" trick to improve the law--or maybe just change the parts they don't like--without having to jump the Senate's 60-vote hurdle. ... P.S.: Ambinder says  Dems are actually thinking along these lines . ...  Update: William Galston is on board. ... 7:35 P.M.

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I think I understand the difference between the Phenomenal World and the Noumenal World. I understand the difference between Apollonian and Dionysian. I understand the difference between French laundry and Chinese laundry. I do not understand the difference between Facebook 's "News Feed" and "Live Feed." ...  7:36 P.M.

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If, as Karen Tumulty suggests , Ron Brownstein's  ode to the Reid bill's cost-cutting power completely missed Reid's emasculation of the independent "Medicare Advisory Board" (the so called "Fed" for Medicare)--then so did Jonathan Gruber, the enthusiastic expert Brownstein cites, no? ... What else did Brownstein miss? ... 7:37 P.M.

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Now even the Hair Club for Men has rejected me: Nicholas Lemann thinks someone should try to fit Washington Monthly esque "neoliberal" arguments " together into a larger whole." Good idea . ...  7:38 P.M.

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The Monthly 's founder  Charlie Peters laments that on health care Obama has unnecessarily lost the support of seniors.  But Peters suggests the solution would have been for Obama to have introduced "his own bill" instead of letting Congress write the legislation. I'm not sure about that. If seniors are scared of cost-control talk about denying end of life treatments, etc--well, it's not Congressmen and Senators who have been talking like that. It's Obama and his Rasputin, OMB Director Orszag. They seem to really believe this stuff. If they'd written their own bill, it would have scared seniors even more. There are numbers lower than 33% . ... 7:44 P.M.

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An Army of Andrews-- Andrew Sullivan's doppelbloggers : "Bylines would fracture the solitary voice of the blog." I guess they would! ... P.S.:  That's the Andrew Sullivan I remember working for. ... [ via Insta ]  12:46 P.M.

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