Democrats Must Pass the Senate HCR Bill
There is no possibility that reform survives another vote in the Senate. There will never be 60 votes in the Senate for reform again. Even if Dems had eked out a victory in MA, I doubt that the 60 votes could have been marshaled a second time.
But there's no way around the 60 vote threshold. The most important elements of the bill (the exchanges & the health insurance regulations) can't be done through reconciliation. 60 votes is necessary given the reality of the Senate, and they will not be obtained again. The only possibility of reform is for the House to pass the Senate bill and then revisit it to make improvements to the things that can be addressed in reconciliation.
If the Democrats can't get health reform under the conditions in 2009 (with 60 votes in the Senate, 255+ House seats, a new president, and an AMA endorsement), they should just stop campaigning on the issue because they will never succeed on it. Who should even bother to listen to them if they so much as mention the issue? It will be clear to everyone that they cannot govern.
(Sorry for the typo in my original post. It's the Senate bill that must be passed.)
posted by Frances @ 11:00 AM
2 Comments:
Amen. This is gut check time. Nobody ever said this wasn't going to be a battle. The voters Dems need to impress care more for action than ideology. Rally the base behind the Senate version and declare quick victory, changing the narrative of Dem panic and incompetence ASAP. Why is this so hard?
Oh, and stop nominating lame ass technocrats for US Senate slots.
Coakley was really lame, but since she was the Dems' candidate, someone in the party should have taken a cue from the late Houston Oilers head coach Bill Peterson. In a classic NFL Films clip, Peterson pulled a player over to ream him out after a lousy performance on a play and said, "Daggone it, you can't do that! Hell, you're in your home state!"
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