HCR Will Pass.

I think everyone here knows its pretty much a done deal. Most of the opposition on the Dem side has been beaten into submission and the vote is about to take place. We'll see it pass by about 20 votes or so in the House, at least that's my guess.

So we're going to be stuck with a bad bill, or at least a mediocre bill depending on your viewpoint. So now the question becomes do we sit back and just let it go or do we attack the worst parts of it and try our Damnedest to make these politicians fix it?

I know where I stand and none of the Rahmian tactics are going to stop those of us who care more about people than party. We'll continue to fight.

Just letting you know. ;)

Something like this was said after that POS Senate bill was first produced - and it was a full choral from members in the House.

But now --- meh.

This is going to get tucked away with NAFTA in the *gotta fix* shelf that is a foot deep in dust and cobwebs.

Myself, I plan to vote against every Democrat who supports it in the primary and then vote Green if they make it to the general. I've already stopped any donations to the DNC and will stop donations to any Dem who supports this. It is only when they see our disapproval in terms of cash and votes that they will listen.

My guess is that the republicans will take the house in 2010 and the senate in 2012 along with the presidency. At that point they'll strip out the very few good things this bill provided leaving us with mandatory payments for even fewer services.

You're right. Sounds like NAFTA.

but seems like you should belong to the Green Party now instead of waiting.

DU is for the support of Democrats the last time I checked.

I still do. That's more than can be said for our president.

Rahm was against this from the start. He got the features he wanted, and excluded the ones he didn't. There ain't gonna be no "fixing", because the fix is in.

I just saw Rep Chris Van Hollen, Dem from Maryland, on CNN in an interview.

Van Hollen admitted to 2 things that are VERY IMPORTANT to know:

1) The House plans to use "deem and pass" on Sunday instead of an up or down vote in passing the Senate HCR bill. They don't have the guts to vote for this garbage bill in the sunshine.

2) Van Hollen admitted to Blitzer that they do not have a guaranteed 51 votes in the Senate to pass a reconcillation bill.

THEY DON'T HAVE THE VOTES OR A GUARANTEE THAT A RECONCILLATION BILL WILL BE PASSED if they "deem and pass" the Senate bill.

If the House passes this without a Senate guarantee of votes, then WHAT YOU SEE IN THE SENATE BILL IS WHAT YOU WILL HAVE TO LIVE WITH.


The Senate bill already has had stripped out of it all of the important reasons for health care reform in the 1st place:

1) They gave up single-payer before the debate even started, then even a weak public option.

2) They gave up anti-trust legislation.

3) They gave up regulation of the premiums thru a Rate Authority or Review Board.

4) Pre-existing coverage, admitted by Gibbs, won't kick in for 4 to 6 years and insurance companies can charge whatever they want for premiums.

5) They gave up drug price negotiations and re-importation of affordable drugs from Canada and Europe.

6) The insurance exchanges will be state exchanges, not national, so negotiating power with the insurance corporations will be limited.

This is just the tip of the iceberg of what was left out, negotiated away or sold to the highest bidder (lobbyists).


How anyone can celebrate THIS as a health care reform victory, is beyond me.

The American public has been had.

We prod our reps to introduce bills to kill the mandate, to add a public option, to move up the schedule for eliminating pre-exisiting conditions clauses and lifetime caps. And we keep pushing for single payer. We don't let HCR die just because one stinking bill has become law.

Been there.Done that. got a crappy T shirt.

I think the only way we get this changed is with CHANGE at the ballot box. Actually, the definitive word would not be change - it would be PURGE.

:shrug:

This is politics, unfortunately.

Republicans will relish every opportunity to weaken, undermine, and break it further from now until the end of time, while democratic congressional leadership never wants to hear the words "health care reform" in the same sentence again.

The HCR bill will never be substantially "fixed," but it is guaranteed to worsen.

It's either that or roll over and die.

Just take the Cadillac tax for example. It doesn't even kick in until 2018 because they know it's so unpopular that it will likely never actually happen. The regulations have been so severely weakened as to be meaningless. And tell me, will people willingly accept the mandates when they see nothing has changed in terms of how the insurance companies operate?

Democrats need to get this behind them as quickly as possible. They've wasted over a year and will end up accomplishing nothing, either way. In the process, they've alienated much of the left and given too much political ammunition to the right. Not sure what we can do to recover from this in time to avoid severe losses in the midterms.