The HayRide Update 3-19, 11:51 PM (from MacAoidh):
According to POLITICO, Obama will address the House Democratic Caucus at the Capitol at 3 PM Eastern time tomorrow. Harry Reid will be there as well.
That’s going to make for an interesting crowd-control situation, as the Tea Party Patriots, Americans For Tax Reform and FreedomWorks, among others, have a sizable rally planned for noon at the Capitol’s West Lawn, with Steve King, Michele Bachmann and actor Jon Voigt set to speak. Does anybody worry that things might get a little dicey?
Update 3-19, 11:15 PM: Tony Perkins and Steny Hoyer, two men with very little in common, both say that Stupak’s deal won’t work. We’ll see tomorrow. I’m going to bed.
Link:http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0310/34731_Page2.html
Update 3-19, 10:50 PM: I was going to update my complete vote count tonight, but I’ve decided that would be a waste of time.
It is clear that Obamacare will fail if a Pelosi-Stupak deal does not successfully take place. What is not clear is whether such a purported deal can succeed, either technically, or within the Democratic caucus.
What I still find astonishing is the timing. Anyone who actually looked at the individual votes and counted them could see that the votes to pass Obamacare simply were not there. Incredibly, no one else did this — least of all Nancy Pelosi.
The damage that she has done to her own caucus is substantial, and she could lose the Speaker’s post over this. What was the point, for example, of forcing Rep. Ellsworth to seriously damage his U.S. Senate campaign earlier today by forcing him to declare his support for the bill? If she were going to make a deal with Stupak, she could have let Ellsworth keep his pro-life credentials instead of exposing him as a fraud.
I think a lot of Democratic members are going to be very, very angry with her for her incompetent handling of this situation, no matter whether Obamacare ends up passing or not. This is going to have lasting consequences for congressional Democrats.
is CSpan covering our people?