Posted on 12/14/2009 4:20:21 PM PST by Free ThinkerNY
Major Garrett’s in the hall outside the Democratic caucus room and tweeting the word from Tom Harkin. Can’t really call this good news, as it makes passage much more likely, so let’s call it slightly-better-than-worst-case-scenario news. No more public option:
Asked by a reporter if the Medicare buy-in will be pulled out, Harkin said “looks that way,” before praising a Democratic health care bill without the two public option compromises.
“There’s enough good in this bill that even without those two, we gotta move,” he said. “All the insurance reforms, all the stuff we wrote so hard for prevention and wellness in there, the workforce development issues that we have in there, the reimbursement based on quality not on quantity — there’s good stuff in this bill. It’s a giant step forward, changing the paradigm of health care in America.”
Lieberman said he can (read: will) vote for the bill without the public plan provisions. Reaction, straight off the top of my head: (1) Kind of surprising that neither Snowe nor Collins defected to bail Reid out, eh? Now that he’s back to 60-ish, I wonder if they or Nelson, Bayh, Lincoln, etc. will suddenly ramp up their own demands. (2) The Democrats are so frantic to pass something at this point — e.g., there was a rumor floated earlier today that Emanuel was pressuring Reid to use reconciliation — that Pelosi will almost certainly want to ping-pong the Senate bill. Will the absence of a public option convince Blue Dogs who voted no on the House bill to vote yes this time or will the gruesome polling scare them away?
(Excerpt) Read more at hotair.com ...
Technically, Pelosi got what she wants, but it doesn’t matter unless the Senate buckles. Right now, the RINOs in the Senate are the only thing that’s stopping this junk from landing on Obama’s desk.
IF we ever have a majority again, the dems will whine and cry about “fairness and sharing of power” and will guilt the Republicans into playing nice, therefore the Repubs will DO NOTHING to fix this mess.
The alternative will be worse.
Just called my senators. Was able to get through the Capitol Hill switchboard 202-224-3121... that means that we have not jammed the lines as yet.
Everyone, please turn up the heat. Today is critical.
lieberman doesn’t ‘win’ anyhting- He KNOWS fulkl welll it’s just goign to be written into the bill AFTER the bill passes- as will abortion, single payer etc etc etc- ANY RINO that goes along with htis bill or is swayed by ‘compromises’ and payoffs isn’t worthy of their office job
118 posted on Tuesday, December 15, 2009 12:26:18 AM by CottShop
You’re bang on. They’ll push this version through with 60, then will put all the crap back in during reconciliation with the House. At the end of the day it will only take 51 Senate votes, so Landreiu, Lieberman, Lincoln, Nelson, will get to vote “against” the final version, after ensuring that there could be no filibuster. Typical Dem hypocrisy and double-dealing.
That's an excellent and obvious point that I missed.”
The point may be obvious, but it isn't excellent. The pro-abortion Dems will die in the last ditch to keep the Stupak language out of the final legislative product, public option or no. The bill provides for extensive insurance subsidies. The Stupak language would prohibit paying for abortion coverage with those subsidies. People would have to buy abortion coverage separately with their own funds. The left won't swallow that easily, if they swallow it at all.
They’re just putting more lipstick on the pig to shove it through.
I was watching Morning Joe a few minutes ago and heard Andrea Mitchell make one of the most hillarious and outrageous statements she’s ever uttered. She was actually praising Reid’s latest bill, no Medicare buy in, saying that even though the Senate’s bill contains no public option and lacks many other key provisions contained in the House’s more liberal bill that Pelosi will see to it that it clears the House because the Speaker “is the smartest and toughest politician in Washington.” Pelosi is the “smartest and toughest politician in Washington?” Wow, that’s a good one.
As you yourself might say — get a grip. The camel's nose, and a number of other body parts, have been inside the tent for decades. Medicare, Medicaid, and SCHIP are just a few of the programs which, collectively have already socialized more than a third of our health care system. The very worst that can happen with Obamacare as they start to pare it back in search of 60 votes in an incremental deterioration in an already unsustainable situation.
If the Dem's ultimately win something (which is far from certain) they won't be able to keep it because they can't pay for it. The game is up; the money is gone. We are going to spend the next 50 years unraveling the welfare state. It doesn't make a lot of difference in the long run whether one more health care entitlement passes before the unraveling or not.
It's a shame so many of us are too worked up over Harry Reid's daily machinations to enjoy the spectacle of Democrats imploding as they desperately try to do the impossible and fail.
Hear, hear. This should never have gotten out of committee.
That’s passage folks.
With the worst provisions gone, the mod Dems will vote for it.
Just hope for repeal in a couple years.
I'm not so sure. Lieberman's banishment of the public option and the lowering of medicare eligibility may have saved the Dems from a virulent voter backlash and worse election disaster in 2010.
No public option means it is dead in the House.
Do you REALLY BELIEIVE the “eunuch” Republicans in Congress will suddenly “grow some” and gut this later?
IF we ever have a majority again, the dems will whine and cry about “fairness and sharing of power” and will guilt the Republicans into playing nice, therefore the Repubs will DO NOTHING to fix this mess.
+++++++++++++++
If they DON’T, the TEA PARTY will be a REALITY. BELIEVE that.
No public option means it is dead in the House.
+++++++++++++++++++
And if they add it back in (some Saturday night when they think fewer of us terrorists are watching :)), then it will be dead in the Senate...oh, they’ve got themselves all wee wee’d up, don’t they?
Keep prayin’, workin’, fightin’...I know it’s been a long slog...think about our boys and girls overseas and the slog they’ve had since 9/2001..
+++++++++++++++++++ And if they add it back in (some Saturday night when they think fewer of us terrorists are watching :)), then it will be dead in the Senate...oh, they’ve got themselves all wee wee’d up, don’t they? Keep prayin’, workin’, fightin’...I know it’s been a long slog...think about our boys and girls overseas and the slog they’ve had since 9/2001..
The problem the Democrats are having is constructing a bill that will be accepted by another vote in the House.
The Liberals have stated they won't accept a bill without a public option and with a pro-life amendment.
The 'moderates' have stated that they won't vote for a Bill without an amendment forbidding public paid abortions.
When a bill passes by the narrow margin that the House Bill did, it is unlikely that any Bill from the Senate that makes any changes, will be accepted the final House vote.
There is no 'cushion' for them to lose any votes.
When a bill passes by the narrow margin that the House Bill did, it is unlikely that any Bill from the Senate that makes any changes, will be accepted the final House vote.
There is no ‘cushion’ for them to lose any votes.
+++++++++++++++++
I want to be hopeful with you. That is a hopeful scenario. Here’s the not quite as hopeful scenario. The 38 odd blue dogs - what some few dozen of them voted with the Pubbies on this, more of them peel away to ‘pass something’ and save Barack’s presidency...
When you’ve done NOTHING, this is desperation time...
We’ll see how much arm twisting, public cajoling, and outright bribing (how can Landreaux live down what she’s done?) will happen. So let’s say it passes 219 - 217, with some watered down anti-abortion thing in it, and then goes back to the Senate and idiot boy harry decides to go nuclear on our butts...OK, worst case scenario.
Mebbe we then gut it in 11/2010 with a veto proof vote - Since a 2/3 vote is required to override, a veto-proof majority is 290 in the House and 67 in the Senate. Hmmm... a pretty tall order, but maybe do-able in 2012, if not in 2010, even if this monster passes. And if the Pubbies don’t do it then, we’ll revolt and take over in 2014 and 2016...This is a LONG TERM fight, don’t ya know.
Is that ideal. No. Kill the bill. But we must be ready with plan B, C and D. This fight is not over, and the RATS haven’t even played fair...wait til 11/2010. Now I feel hopeful thinking about that. Currently RATS all over the country are fleeing ahead of the TAKEDOWN.
I think Lieberman still has a big problem with federally funded abortions. As an Orthodox Jew this is not something he can abide or compromise about.
I still think even the clowns in DC know the vast majority of thinking and voting Americans are against Onadacare. Just participated in a telephone town hall with Rep. (D) Adler for my district. I have to say he has been aggressive about holding “live” town meetings. I’ve been invited to at least three that I can think of. And then his people contacted me about the telephone town hall.
Surprisingly I like most of what Adler said—and I’m conservative. But the point I want to make is that of the six or seven people who actually got to ask him a question there was not one positive comment conserning Onadacare. Based on the speech of the folks who asked questions I would say they were a fairly good cross section of the population. Retired, working (professional and manual labor), male and female. As far as I could tell there were no noncaucasions. But Adler’s district is mostly white.
I think, when it comes down to the vote that counts, Reid will not find the votes he needs to get it done. The usual ploy of bribing people with taxpayer plums for their districts will not trump being voted out of office.
The system put into place was meant to stop a simple majority (the House) from simply putting in whatever it could pass.
The Senate is the stop-gap on the simple Democratic rule that the House represents.
Even though they hold all the cards, the system itself is giving them fits.
The Bill must be liberal enough to keep the liberal votes and 'moderate' enough to keep the moderates.
This Bill will be neither.
If a final version comes back to the Senate for a revote with the pro-life amendment on it, it will be defeated.
Time is against this Bill ever passing.
By November, the Democrats know they will have no chance to pass such a Bill again.
“When you’ve done NOTHING, this is desperation time...”
See:
http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2009/12/025161.php
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