Posted on 10/16/2009 8:48:36 PM PDT by Libloather
Health-care reform adds to troubles of Sens. Reid and Dodd
By Gail Russell Chaddock
Published Fri, Oct 16 2009 9:23 am
WASHINGTON, D.C. — Two of the three Democrats charged with producing a Senate healthcare bill to take to the floor - Senate majority leader Harry Reid of Nevada and Sen. Christopher Dodd of Connecticut - face tough reelection bids in 2010.
Senate leaders are used to being lightening rods. But the overhaul of the US healthcare system sets up a perfect storm of competing interests, especially for Democrats.
As leader of a 60-member majority, Senator Reid has the votes to move major legislation. But his caucus is divided on issues ranging from costs of the plan to the scope of a public option.
This week, progressive activists rallied outside Senator Reid’s office building to call for the expulsion of moderates who vote against the bill. Liberal bloggers ramped up calls for Reid’s dismissal if he fails to include a robust public option. Labor unions called on Democrats to reject a proposed tax on generous health plans - something moderate Democrats deem essential.
At the same time, Reid has to keep an eye on politics at home, where constituents face one of the highest unemployment and foreclosure rates in the nation.
Last month, Reid improved the health bill for Nevada by winning assurances that Nevada would be one of only four states to be fully funded by the federal government for the first five years of expansion of Medicaid - a key element in plans to expand health coverage.
Reid pledged to Nevadans that state budgets would not be hard hit by this new requirement.
Asked today whether carrying the load for the Democrats as majority was worth ending his career in the Senate, Reid said, “All my polling numbers are fine, and I’m continuing to do the best I can for the people of this country and the people of Nevada.”
But political analysts say that Reid’s approval ratings are are registering only in the mid-30s against lesser known challengers. On Sunday, a Mason Dixon poll commissioned by the Las Vegas Review Journal had Reid losing to Nevada Republican chairwoman Sue Lowden by 10 points and to GOP businessman Danny Tarkanian by 5 points.
“His poll numbers are terrible. Why else would he go to the air 383 days before the election?” says Nevada political analyst Jon Ralston.
Reid’s campaign launched its first television ads Thursday in Las Vegas and Reno. Vice President Joseph Biden joins Reid for a fundraiser in Reno on Friday.
The last Democrat to serve as Senate majority leader, Sen. Tom Daschle (D) of South Dakota, lost his 2004 reelection bid - an outcome that stunned Senate Democrats. The last Senate Democratic leader to lose a reelection bid had been in 1952.
“Senator Reid and Daschle share a problem. One of them is that when you have to lead your party at a national level, it’s hard to go home and run as a moderate,” says Jennifer Duffy, who analyzes Senate races for the Cook Political Report.
Senator Dodd, who led the markup of healthcare reform legislation in the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee, also faces the race of his life in Connecticut.
As chair of the Banking, House, and Urban Affairs Committee, he is also leading negotiations over financial regulation that could also play in his reelection campaign.
Dodd’s poll numbers are improving, but his approval ratings are still below 50 percent. He trails former US Rep. Rob Simmons 44 to 39 percent in a possible matchup, according to a Quinnipiac University poll last month.
“A lot of his problems stem from actions he’s already taken,” says Cook Political Report analyst Ms. Duffy. He’s hearing from voters that “you were supposed to be watching and instead you were off running for president and kind of abandoned the ship. This happened on your watch.”
Healthcare is another high profile opportunity to shine at home - or not, she says.
“This year alone, 28,000 people in the state of Connecticut have lost their health care because of unemployment. In the last nine years in my state, premium costs have gone from around $6,000 for a family of four to around $12,000 a year, and every indication is those numbers are going to keep going up,” Dodd said at a briefing with reporters on Wednesday, as closed-door talks began.
“We have no other choice than to get this accomplished,” he said.
UH...I do NOT think it is JUST Health Care.....NOT hardly!
How about Barbara Boxer as Senate dem minority leader 2011??? Boxer and Pelosi!
Which of the two Republicans is more conservative, in your estimation?
Dingy and SweetieDeal: on their way under the bus?
“I gave my all, including my congressional seat, for obamacare.”
Fools!
No, it can't be the product that sucks, it must be marketing. Remame, repackage, put a whole new "spin" on it.
How 'bout if they make a "nurse sandwich"?
Both were told this would lead to their defeat. They have nobody to blame but themselves for IGNORING the will of the voters. The majority of voters want them to leave healthcare alone.....get their corrupt hands off it.
She has been in Republican politics, locally, for years.
The other candidate, so far, is Danny Tarkanien. I watched that boy play great round-ball for his Dad, Jerry.
I do not know about his politics / views, like I do about Sue Loudon. He might be a great candidate, just don't know.
Reid has a big war chest, but people here are real tired of the ass hole and the crap he does......
This looks like a job for ACORN!
Thanks!
I believe both Reid and Dodd will be sitting there that evening....after the election results...and both wondering just how they got so convinced into supporting the White House. Dodd is the easiest candidate to beat and if he collects more than 40 percent of the state vote...he’ll be lucky. Reid is going to count on Obama likely making two appearances in his state toward October and pumping up the union vote in Vegas. Beyond that....I can’t see Reid getting past the 45 percent point. If a debate is arranged...he’ll likely avoid it because he can’t readily defend the administration’s programs.
Respectfully,
If anyone thinks that those two are going to have a difficult time being re-elected, take a look at the antics of so-called independents.
They get their self-esteem by voting for democrats; brilliance is theirs when they pull the lever for the local progressive because they think it’s cool and it makes them feel cool. Voting for any conservative would make them feel sick about themselves.
One should dispel any illusion that independents think through their electoral choices. They say they do but they are still Democrats in that they “feel”. They will always “feel” that Democrats are best for the country.
IMHO
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Wondering how you can eject mod/lib Dems from office? Here's the supersonic release lever.
THE SUPERSONIC RELEASE LEVER: "Senator, do you support imposing a fee on Americans who don't sign up for ObamaCare?"
Polling suggests that any lawmaker that supports ObamaCare's idea of imposing a fee on Americans who don't sign up for health care (under whatever reform bill that might emerge) might be performing the political equivalent of swallowing a time-release poison capsule.
How 'bout that, America? ObamaCare's death panels---but working in the opposite way Ohaha intended.
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REFERENCE : Swing State Senators Face Health Care Reform Threat -- Losing Next Election
Townhall.com | October 16, 2009 | Matt Lowery
FR Posted on Friday, October 16, by Kaslin
EXCERPT By and large, the pundit class has it that momentum now favors passage of a national health care program. There's a fly in the ointment, however. Too many of the Senate Democrats needed to pass such legislation hail from states where even if the concept of health care reform is tepidly endorsed by the people, that support breaks down when ways of actually paying for reform are considered. So ultimate passage of any bill is problematic.
Most amazing is that Congress continues to fret feverishly on a potentially unworkable and even disastrous health care bill while so many other pressing issues go unaddressed. The suddenly resurgent stock market may be misleading Washington into thinking our economy has at last passed "Go" again. Tell that to the people in most states, like Sen. Nelson's Florida. Voters there continue to say the recession has negatively affected them. A majority says Florida's economy is either as bad as or worse than it was six months ago.
My bet is that the oh-so-critical-vote in the Senate Finance Committee for a health care reform bill by the lone Republican to do so, Olympia Snowe of Maine, will melt like a snow cone in July before this whole reform movement plays out. Snowe tied her vote to enough caveats to allow her plenty of room to back away from whatever the final bill entails.
Recently, Newsweek extolled the virtues of Vice President Joe Biden. (Biden does seem to be one of the more likeable people in the administration.) The magazine noted that Biden had cautioned President Obama early on that it might not be wise to take on health care reform in his first year in office. That's likely because Biden's deep institutional knowledge of the Senate told him that no matter how excited the Democratically controlled House might get over a health care reform effort, his more moderate colleagues in the Senate would be given pause by being placed in the ultimate political pickle.
As of late this week, the pickle jar was still full of moderate Democratic senators. They continue to praise some form of national health care bill, but one by one, they're all coming to the realization that erasing the potential perils and pitfalls of such legislation may not be possible. They're right. The plan is too ambitious. No matter how the pundits try to tell us that a significant bill will pass this year, I have trouble buying it.
Too many polls in too many states -- states represented by moderate senators -- say that while the notion of health care reform is marginally palatable, the details turn the stomach. Polling suggests that any lawmaker that supports
ObamaCare's idea of imposing a fee on Americans who don't sign up for health care (under whatever reform bill that might emerge) might be performing the political equivalent of swallowing a time-release poison capsule.
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