Will 51 Senators keep their promise and add a public option amendment to reconciliation bill?

The health care reform bill isn't over yet, just the bulk of it that deals with private insurance.

http://whipcongress.com/">51 senators pledged to vote for an amendment adding a public option.

Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi have been playing a pretty obvious game of keep away with the public option, tossing blame for who won't allow it back and forth and expecting us not to notice that at one time or another, both have claimed to be for it, but gosh darn it, the other chamber won't allow it.

They have one last chance to http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/10/19/AR2009101902451.html">add some democracy to their health care reform--the health insurance industry got their say in the main bill.

But Lieberman tweeted that he's voting yes.

But call your Senators!

But his twitter name is @JoeLieberman, I do believe.

They put up a facsimile of his 'tweeet'
Fucking snake wants it both ways.
But a vote is a vote.:shrug:

it shouldn't matter whether it came to them from the house or through an amendment one of them proposes.

as he voted for the Senate bill in December. That's not a pledge to support the PO.

Another Pledge is Durbin... who openly does not support the PO.

Whipcongress is full of shit.

blames the House it isn't there, and the House blames the Senate it isn't there.

MISSION ACCOMPLISHED!

Plausible deniability, complete lack of accountability.

it is essential to keep the present bill intact, with no changes or additions. That is why republican senators are now trying to make additions and/or changes... to get the bill sent back to the house. Hopefully democratic senators will be able to prevent this, and certainly not monkey with the bill themselves.

A public option should be voted on later as a single bill. Now isn't the time.

and Democrats will have an excuse not to add it.

Since this is just amendments anyway, not much is at risk if they change it.

I'm hardly surprised. "We'll fix it later" was a lie.

ANY CHANGE - ANY CHANGE - WOULD SEND THE BILL BACK TO THE STARTING LINE.

THIS BILL MUST PASS AS IS WITHOUT ANY AMMENDMENTS, OR IT WILL NOT PASS AT ALL...

Our problem was needing 60 to break the Republican filibuster. Most believe the Medicare expansion that Lieberman killed had 59 votes, worst case scenario 58.

the opinion back in August, September, October that the problem was trying to reach 60. I can tell you this much. I know Harry Reid believes there's at least 50 votes for it. His problem is how to get it to the floor under some sort of reconciliation bill and he is working on that. He's never been very happy about the Medicare expansion tanking.

Question for you: if we could do it, would you support it?

After the public option with an opt out for the states was failing to get 60 (although it had the support of well over 50) Reid then wrote an expansion of Medicare into the bill. It went to CBO for scoring and, while waiting for it to come back, Lieberman went on FOX one Sunday morning and announced he would join the Republicans in their filibuster of the bill if any form of PO, including the Medicare expansion he had been stumping for in September, was in it. Rahm Emanuel showed up in Harry Reid's office that night and ordered him to make the deal with Lieberman and kill the expansion. Reid was pissed off about it but did it, nevertheless.

Most people believe there were 58 or 59 votes for the expansion prior to this happening.

1) if they amend the bill in any way it must return to the House for another vote. The House has passed the bill. If it passes the Senate without changes, it can go to the President's desk for his signature without returning to the House for a new vote

2) if they allow any amendments at all the Republicans will delay the process endlessly by offering hundreds of amendments which would then all have to be voted on.

My question is about Pelosi refusing to put it in the reconciliation bill. She gave her reason as the Senate not having the votes but I believe the Senate did have the votes and I believe the House had the votes.

I just hope we can see it introduced and passed before the exchanges go into effect.

adding a public option. Which they are.

I'm away from the news today but the plan has been to reject all amendments so the reconciliation bill does not have to return to the House for another vote.

Reid promised (yeah, I know) Sanders if he would drop his plan to offer an amendment creating a public option in this bill that he would bring a bill creating a public option under reconciliation in the next couple of months. We'll see.

If there was a way to get it to the floor for a vote under reconciliation I do believe it would pass. We were never under about 53 votes for it in the worst case scenario. As far as most people could tell we had 58 or 59 in favor of the Medicare expansion.

The odd thing is that the Senate probably has the votes to pass a PO at this point but the House doesn't. Send the bill back to the House with a PO and it will fail, thereby wiping out any fixes to the HCR that was signed into law yesterday.

And, side note. the GOP would be buried in the mid terms.

See how that works?

comes to nothing.

Stephanie Miller Show yesterday.

amended?

Any such amendment would force another vote in the House and could very easily send the whole process back to square one with NO progress made after more than a year of effort. It would also give the wingnuts another chance to kill it completely.

I'd rather see the public option stand on it's own bill or get amended to some other legislation.

They want to get this bill out and not have to go back to the house. Hopefully they will in the future, but I don't think that can be done by reconciliation.

have a chance.

Private Insurance will never let it happen. If you think they are not in control of Congress, you only have to read the internal memos sent to Democrats regarding Michael Moore's movie SICKO. They threatened them that if they did not marginalize MM or praised his movie in any way, they make sure they remained a minority party.

Bill Moyers, the only real journalist left in American, revealed the power they have in his interview with Wendall Potter which for anyone who cares, can be found here:

http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/07102009/watch2.html

BILL MOYERS: So what did you think when you saw that film?

WENDELL POTTER: I thought that he hit the nail on the head with his movie. But the industry, from the moment that the industry learned that Michael Moore was taking on the health care industry, it was really concerned.

BILL MOYERS: What were they afraid of?

WENDELL POTTER: They were afraid that people would believe Michael Moore.

BILL MOYERS: We obtained a copy of the game plan that was adopted by the industry's trade association, AHIP. And it spells out the industry strategies in gold letters. It says, "Highlight horror stories of government-run systems." What was that about?

......

BILL MOYERS: And there was a political strategy. "Position Sicko as a threat to Democrats' larger agenda." What does that mean?

WENDELL POTTER: That means that part of the effort to discredit this film was to use lobbyists and their own staff to go onto Capitol Hill and say, "Look, you don't want to believe this movie. You don't want to talk about it. You don't want to endorse it. And if you do, we can make things tough for you."

BILL MOYERS: How?

WENDELL POTTER: By running ads, commercials in your home district when you're running for reelection, not contributing to your campaigns again, or contributing to your competitor.

BILL MOYERS: This is fascinating. You know, "Build awareness among centrist Democratic policy organizations--"

WENDELL POTTER: Right.

BILL MOYERS: "--including the Democratic Leadership Council."

WENDELL POTTER: Absolutely.

BILL MOYERS: Then it says, "Message to Democratic insiders. Embracing Moore is one-way ticket back to minority party status."

WENDELL POTTER: Yeah.

BILL MOYERS: Now, that's exactly what they did, didn't they? They--

WENDELL POTTER: Absolutely.

BILL MOYERS: --radicalized Moore, so that his message was discredited because the messenger was seen to be radical.

WENDELL POTTER: Absolutely.

They bought this bill and they wrote it and one thing they made sure they got was no Public Option.

As can be seen from this insider information from Wendall Potter, when Big Business sends lobbyists to bribe Congress, they do not have the guts to throw them out of their offices and then go to the media and let the people know what is going on. But then, they like the perks and the money I suppose.

If they surprise me, I'll be more than willing to apologize, but I think it's safe to say there will be no need for that, and Lieberman is a snake, but he's in good company in the DC cesspool. The whole place needs a good cleaning out.

...and the Supreme Court.


We reformed the Democratic Party
The Old Fashioned Way!

We BOUGHT it!!!
Hahahahahahahaha

If you haven't already moved to The Woods, its probably too late.

WHICH IS EXACTLY WHAT THE REPUKE FUCKS WANT SO THEY CAN STOP THE RECONCILLIATION!!!

They can consider it UNDER SEPARATE BILLS once this one passes!!!

They'll try, but get no media coverage of or party recognition for their efforts.

by putting it back to the house and another round of bullshit. The deal is done and the sausage is wrapped. It is what it is.

The doooooorrrrrs wide open. Do it.