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Truth and Reconciliation (WSJ: We get Health Care by Force)
The Wall St Journal ^ | Feb 13, 2010 | editorial

Posted on 02/13/2010 2:36:11 AM PST by The Raven

Those unversed in the arcana of Congressional procedure should familiarize themselves with "reconciliation." It's just another word for nothing left to lose—that is, it's the tactic Democrats seem increasingly likely to use to bypass the ordinary legislative rules and railroad Obama Care into law with a bare partisan majority of 50 Senators, plus Vice President Joe Biden.

...

(Excerpt) Read more at online.wsj.com ...


TOPICS: Editorial
KEYWORDS: mittbringsdeath; reparationmedicine; rino; rombott; romney; romney4aliens; romney4illegals; romneycare; romneydeathpanels; romneykilledgrandma; socializedmedicine
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Last line:

"So even as Democrats themselves acknowledge that one reason the public hates ObamaCare so much is the corrupt tactics they have used to advance it through Congress, they still plan to try to land this Pelosian triple-handspring-quadruple pole vault to passage."

1 posted on 02/13/2010 2:36:11 AM PST by The Raven
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To: The Raven

Isn’t there some way of getting one more vote to break ranks?


2 posted on 02/13/2010 2:49:05 AM PST by greeneyes (Moderation in defense of your country is NO virtue. Let Freedom Ring.)
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To: The Raven
Somewhere a 'bi-partisan' RINO is laughing


3 posted on 02/13/2010 2:51:32 AM PST by Leisler (We are in the best of hands)
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To: The Raven
Not a surprise. For many, they have shown their true colors in the past year, and understand that voters are waking up to the misery that our grandkids have been saddled with. And once a person has said, "I'm a pro-0 'progressive', there's really not a much deeper level of shame that they have to worry about getting to.

The political winds are blowing against prostigressive politicians right now. Seeing that the positions of their past will catch up with them in the near term, they need to get hell-th care through before they are dumped, to earn their post-political slots on corporate boards or as 'consultants'.

Since they are already going down, might as well burn the barn on the way out and dance in the light of the fire.

4 posted on 02/13/2010 2:51:35 AM PST by Quiller (When you're fighting to survive, there is no "try" -- there is only do, or do not.)
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To: Quiller
(snip)

The political winds are blowing against prostigressive politicians right now. Seeing that the positions of their past will catch up with them in the near term, they need to get hell-th care through before they are dumped, to earn their post-political slots on corporate boards or as 'consultants'."(snip)

Then they need to be made to fear the personal consequences of future congressional investigations, tea party members demonstrating in front of their houses, publication of where they live and what they do for all to see and take actions, etc. If they want a scorched earth policy, give it to them.

5 posted on 02/13/2010 3:01:59 AM PST by Truth29
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To: The Raven

Bring it...


6 posted on 02/13/2010 3:02:38 AM PST by Trailerpark Badass (One good thing about music, when it hits you feel no pain.)
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To: The Raven

The Congress may or may not at this point be afraid of the people, but the Whitehouse sure as hell isn’t. Zero would rather crash and burn taking us all with him rather than lose! And with so many in the House and Senate retiring if Zero can offer them a more lucrative ‘retirement’ package or arrange for a new and better paying job is waiting for them most of these thieves will be more than happy to feather their nest at our expense. Anyone who thinks that they are hearing the wailing and nashing of teeth coming from this Whitehouse needs to listen again, because its not the sound of lamenting their are hearing its the sounds of El Degüello.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QKD5TgHWyxM&feature=related


7 posted on 02/13/2010 3:07:26 AM PST by Kartographer (".. we mutually pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor.")
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To: The Raven


8 posted on 02/13/2010 3:14:08 AM PST by Diogenesis (Alea iacta est.)
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To: Diogenesis

I need to photoshop those two golved pictures together. Maybe Sunday.

Are there any non socialists that go to Harvard?


9 posted on 02/13/2010 3:17:15 AM PST by Leisler (We are in the best of hands)
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To: The Raven

Tin foil hat alert! (I’m warning ahead of time, LOL)

The Dems are so gosh darned determined to push things through, things that they know will lose them seats in 2010.

Could it be (this is the tin foil part) that going into 2012 Obama does not want to have a majority in the Senate, or possibly the House?

Reason: As it stands now, the Democrats are taking all the heat of the American electorate w/their unpopular decisions as witnessed through the elections in MA, NJ, and VA, and polls hinting to their problems in 2010. If the GOP were to regain one of the chambers of Congress, attention would/could be focused on them as the reason for unpopular decisions, averting some of the electorate’s rage from Obama and giving him a better chance of being re-elected.

Of course, a “thinking” voter would be wise to the trick, but many voters don’t “think” and blame can be placed through the MSM with people believing it. (example...the Dems took the majority in 2006, but according to the MSM, all the problems from 2006-2008 were Bush’s...the media can paint it anyway they want.)

Okay, taking off the tin foil hat and backing away from the keyboard for another cup of coffee.


10 posted on 02/13/2010 3:21:02 AM PST by dawn53
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To: dawn53; All
Some recent relevant quotes from here and there:

The Obama administration resembles nothing so much as a big house in the suburbs where the parents are away for the weekend.
-Greg Lewis, American Thinker

The palpable whiff given off by the White House inner circle is that they're the last people on the planet still besotted by Barack Obama, and that they're having such a cool time starring in their own reality-show remake of “The West Wing” they can only conceive of the public – and, indeed, the world – as crowd-scene extras in “The Barack Obama Show.” They expect you to cheer and wave flags when the floor manager tells you to, but the notion that, in return, he should be able to persuade you of the merits of his policies seems entirely to have eluded them
- Mark Steyn, Feb 5, 2010

Obama says he's not a Bolshevik, and he says he's not an ideologue. That leaves one other possibility, he's an idiot, a full-fledged idiot..
-Rush Limbaugh, Feb 4, 2010

The president has a reality problem. He's crafted a fantasy universe where he and his friends can live unperturbed by our center-right country, comforted by just-so stories. The rest of us can only, like Justice Alito, crinkle our noses and mutter, “Not true.”
-Rich Lowry, Salt Lake City Tribune Jan ‘10 after Obama’s first state-of-the-union

Obama’s leitmotif is: Washington is disappointing, Washington is annoying, Washington is dysfunctional, Washington is corrupt, verily Washington is toxic — yet Washington should conscript a substantially larger share of GDP, and Washington should exercise vast new controls over health care, energy, K-12 education, etc.
-George Will after Obama’s first state-of-the-union address

There's usually a reason for a presidency lasting a single term, as Mr. Obama’s slow-motion train wreck is demonstrating
-Wash. Times editorial on the eve of Obama’s first state-of-the-union address

You want a competent chief executive with a deep and shrewd sense of the people. Americans want him to be on the same page as they are. But he's on a different page, and he may in fact be reading a different book.
- Peggy Noonan


11 posted on 02/13/2010 3:29:14 AM PST by The Raven
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To: The Raven

They know they are going to be gone. I hope we do something to prevent them from getting their pensions and bar them from government participation for life.


12 posted on 02/13/2010 3:30:30 AM PST by freekitty (Give me back my conservative vote; then find me a real conservative to vote for)
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To: The Raven
“Mr. Romney's subsidized coverage is meanwhile doing what entitlements do: crowding
out private insurers, compounding the cost explosion, walking the state toward rationing.
So long as the former governor clings to these central points of his health plan, he's on
the wrong side of free-market policy and public opinion.

This isn't going away for Mr. Romney either, which is why he'd do better by writing off
his own plan as a mistake that Democrats have made worse, and replacing it with a
proposal that deregulates and reforms the private market to lower insurance costs
(thereby achieving greater coverage).”


“Health Care Speechwriter for Edwards, Obama & Clinton Now Without Health Insurance”
I'm a critic because what Washington is talking about doing
has made health insurance unaffordable in Massachusetts.



“Small businesses bridle at health insurance hikes (Romneycare strangles Mass. businesses)
some really bad news from Blue Cross-Blue Shield: His company’s health insurance rates are going up 47 percent in January.”


“ Rationing medicine has already begun
… government-
run health care has introduced rationing and waiting lists and cost the lives of the people under its provisions.”


“DEATH PANELS OPEN FOR BUSINESS IN MASSACHUSETTS”


“President Obama's newly confirmed regulatory czar defended the
possibility of removing organs from terminally ill patients without their permission.”


“You can’t reap these savings without limiting patients’ choices in some way," said Paul Levy, CEO of Beth Israel Deaconess.”


“State plan may place limits on patients’ hospital options( Mass. RomneyCare )”


"Romney Visits Nebraska, Talks Health Care [where he defends Romneycare] “


"Paying the Health Tax in Massachusetts [Romneycare]
Massachusetts requires every resident to have health insurance, and this
year, without informing us directly, the state had changed the rules in a way that made
our bare-bones policy no longer acceptable. Unless we ponied up for a pricier policy we
neither need nor want—or enrolled in a government-sponsored insurance plan—we
would have to pay $1,000 each year to the state.
How did we become outlaws? “


"National Health Preview - The Massachusetts debacle, coming soon to your neighborhood."
It was only a matter of time.
They're trying to manage the huge costs of the subsidized middle-class insurance program that is gradually swallowing the state budget.
The program provides low- or no-cost coverage to about 165,000 residents, or three-fifths of the newly insured, and is budgeted at $880 million for 2010, a 7.3% single-year increase that is likely to be optimistic.
The state's overall costs on health programs have increased by 42% (!) since 2006."


A Very Sick Health Plan; Bay State’s ‘Grand Experiment’ Fails [RomneyCare]
"Initiated on Mr. Romney’s gubernatorial watch in 2006, this “experiment” has fallen on hard times, and predictably so. “


Health care in Massachusetts: a warning for America [Romney brings Mass. to its knees]
The Bay State's mandatory insurance law is raising costs, limiting access, and lowering care.

Three years ago, Massachusetts adopted a plan requiring all residents to purchase health
insurance, with state subsidies for lower-income residents. But rather than creating a
utopia of high-quality affordable healthcare, the result has been the exact opposite –
skyrocketing costs, worsened access, and lower quality care."


"‘Severe’ doc shortage seen hiking wait time
“The shortage is getting more severe”"


“Health costs to rise again.( RomneyCare )
The state’s major health insurers plan to raise premiums by about 10 percent next year,
prompting many employers to reduce benefits and shift additional costs to workers.”


“Nation’s ill-advised to follow Mass. plan [Health plan a failure]
September 17, 2009 The canary is dead.
Massachusetts, the model for the ObamaCare universal insurance plan, is the canary in
the health care coal mine. Yesterday, its obit appeared on the front page of both The Wall
Street Journal and The Boston Globe-Democrat “


"Bay State Insurance Premiums Highest in Country - Boston Globe August 22, 2009
Massachusetts has the most expensive family health insurance premiums in the country,
according to a new analysis that highlights the state’s challenge in trying to rein in medical costs
40 percent higher than in 2003. Over the same period, premiums nationwide rose an average of 33 percent..."


"Massachusetts: the laboratory for ObamaCare“


"Massachusetts' Obama-like reforms increase health costs, wait times [RomneyCare]
Premiums are growing 21 to 46 percent faster than the national average"


"Mass. Pushes Rationing to Control Universal Healthcare Costs (RomneyCare)
A 10-member Massachusetts state healthcare advisory board unanimously recommended
that the state begin rationing healthcare to keep the state’s marquee universal health care program afloat financially.


"1,000 cancer patients 'refused treatment'"


"Massachusetts Universal Healthcare System Breaking Down Already
ERs in Massachusetts have not seen a downturn in visits. On the contrary, it seems that ER visits are actually on the upswing in the Bay State. In fact, in 2007 they were higher than the national average by 20 percent...”


"Hospital patients 'left in agony'"


"National Health Preview - The Massachusetts debacle, coming soon to your neighborhood.
In Massachusetts's latest crisis,
They're trying to manage the huge costs of the subsidized middle-class insurance program that is gradually swallowing the state budget.
The program provides low- or no-cost coverage to about 165,000 residents, or three-fifths of the newly insured, and is budgeted at $880 million for 2010, a 7.3% single-year increase that is likely to be optimistic.
The state's overall costs on health programs have increased by 42% (!) since 2006
Mr. Romney should have known better before signing on to this not-so-grand experiment, especially since the state's "free market" reforms that he boasts about have proven to be irrelevant when not fictional.
Only 21,000 people have used the "connector" that was supposed to link individuals to private insurers."


A Very Sick Health Plan; Bay State’s ‘Grand Experiment’ Fails [RomneyCare]
… fiscal troubles aplenty within Repubican Mitt Romney’s brainchild, Massachusetts’ “grand experiment” in “universal” health care."
"Initiated on Mr. Romney’s gubernatorial watch in 2006, this “experiment” has fallen on hard times, and predictably so.
Even though the Bay State commenced its program with a far smaller percentage of uninsured residents than exists nationwide,
“RomneyCare” is threatening to bankrupt the state.“


"Dem Congresswoman Admits Obama Health Care Plan Will Destroy Private Health Insurance Industry"

13 posted on 02/13/2010 3:38:06 AM PST by Diogenesis (Alea iacta est.)
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To: Trailerpark Badass

A poster on the WSJ blogs said that this was just a ploy by the Democrats to scare Republicans into negotiating a slightly better deal, so that they could call the bill bi-partisan. Ramming this through with reconciliation would be political suicide for the Democrats. Negotiating with the Democrats would be political suicide for the Republicans.


14 posted on 02/13/2010 3:39:37 AM PST by Eva (Obama bin Lyin)
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To: greeneyes

They only need 50 Senators plus Biden since it’s a reconciliation vote. On a happier note, Pelosi may not have the votes in the House.


15 posted on 02/13/2010 3:50:08 AM PST by saganite (What happens to taglines? Is there a termination date?)
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To: Eva

Sounds plausible. Makes sense even. And the stupid party will certainly fall for it.


16 posted on 02/13/2010 3:52:42 AM PST by saganite (What happens to taglines? Is there a termination date?)
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To: saganite

It is being said that it would be political suicide for the Democrats to pull this reconciliation trick. Conversely, it would be political suicide for any Republican to negotiate a deal on Obamacare. We need to get that message through to all Republican Congressmen and Senators.


17 posted on 02/13/2010 3:57:34 AM PST by Eva (Obama bin Lyin)
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To: The Raven

Great quotes!


18 posted on 02/13/2010 4:17:53 AM PST by livius
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To: Leisler

They may go but I doubt if they come out.


19 posted on 02/13/2010 5:03:38 AM PST by screaminsunshine
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Comment #20 Removed by Moderator


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