Did the President cave? Are we starting over?
Posted by Bill Dupray
on Mar 1 2010 Filed under Politics.
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We have been talking about health care for more than a year. Blood, sweat, and tears have been spilled, elections have been won and lost, and summits have been held. And yet, amid the fevered calls from the left to nuke the GOP and pass the thing through reconciliation, we learn today that the president will unveil a brand, new plan on Wednesday.
President Obama will soon propose a health care bill that will be “much smaller” than the House bill but “big enough” to put the country on a “path” toward health care reform, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said Monday.
“In a matter of days, we will have a proposal,” Pelosi said, pointing to Obama’s forthcoming bill.
“It will be a much smaller proposal than we had in the House bill because that’s where we can gain consensus. But it will be big enough to put us on a path of affordable, quality health care for all Americans that holds insurance companies accountable.”
A senior administration official told Fox Obama’s proposal will be introduced Wednesday.
Recall that the single loudest message presented by the Republicans to the president before, during, and after the health care summit last week was to start over. And it now appears that he is doing just that.
The unveiling of a new proposal reflects the reality that reconciliation would mean the electoral destruction of the Democrat Party in November. A Republican source in the Senate noted that passing the least popular domestic policy initiative in recent memory in that manner is highly unlikely given that, at the end of the day, politicians really do like their jobs more than any particular piece of legislation. So if they can’t do it through reconciliation, and they have to pass something, it seems only logical that the president has decided to start over.
The problem with starting over now is that (1) both the House and Senate would have to take up, debate, and vote on the new bill. That will certainly take a while, though it is hard to believe that the White House doesn’t already have some assurances of quick passage from Reid and Pelosi (then again, these were the folks who couldn’t even pass their own legislation, never mind somebody else’s) and (2) the bill will undoubtedly contain many of the same objectionable provisions that were in the first two bills. It could easily become The Bill that Ate the Obama Presidency.
It appears that the president has capitulated to the will of the American people, who overwhelmingly oppose the current plans and want him to try another approach. If, as the Democrats keep telling us, the American people support certain components of the existing bills, which is no doubt true, then the president has an opportunity to propose the popular parts and leave out the unpopular ones. If he had done this last summer, he could have avoided a lot of the political damage he inflicted on himself and his Party.
He is an inexperienced president. Maybe he is learning.
Related Posts
- Pelosi Confirms: Before Reconciliation House Must Pass Senate Bill; President Must Sign
- 12-hour online HC townhall with Repub US Reps Thurs 11/5 starting at 1PM
- Barone: Is the Obama health care proposal serious?
- Liberals Starting to Freak that the “Public Option” Will be Dropped From ObamaCare
- Excellent discussion of the HC legislative path
Short URL: http://libertypundits.net/?p=10989
You’re very generous, Bill.
If he’s learning anything, he’s learning to find a way to *still* get us to accept something the American people don’t want.
I know it’s all procedural, but it doesn’t seem right to pass a bill, only to manipulate it, modify it and change it completely later on, rather than take it back the drawing board and try for another vote in both the House and the Senate.
But .. we know how things “work” on the Hill.
I will never EVER trust this man. He never cared to talk to the “other side” until Brown.
We need to keep the pressure on and be relentless, forever keeping him and the dems on notice until they are out of office.
They hurt our country, not help it.
Thanks for the post!
The best starting point is the 10th Amendment to the Constitution, which is still the Law of the land.
Any questions? What words do they not understand.
This Constitution does not contain suggestions on how government could be run, if desired.
All powers are reserved to the states or the people unless the Feds have been permitted to do a task by the states.
The Feds are now done on Health Care.
A much smaller bill sounds like a reconciliation bill. That is why the Dems are so happy.
They plan on luring the Conservatives into a no win argument and tout they are the party of NO.
THEN push it through anyways.
Can’t you see what is coming? Since when has Nancy or Obama ever tried to work with the Conservatives? This is just a big set up to give them a boost come November.
Who thinks I am off target?
As a recovering democrat, I can assure you I DO NOT TRUST THESE FOOLS!
my family is staunch centrist democrats, they are pissed and do not trust ONE WORD THESE FOOLS SAY!
I don’t think these fools in the dem. party realise, the American people do not trust them! They can peddle all they want, no one believes them anymore!
(this includes dems and independents like me)
Oh, I think they will use every trick in the book to fool people that this is plan chocked full of GOP proposals, when it will be largely the same old thing. If they are willing to use reconciliation, they will cheat, steal, and lie to get it through. This is just another round of Three Card Monty.
I don’t trust him either. They lost this thing already, this is just different packaging and marketing.
I read somewhere about a week ago that the White House was quietly preparing an “alternate” health care bill in case the summit didn’t change anything, so this isn’t a surprise. Pelosi is already backtracking and saying the new bill is not really smaller.
“UPDATE: White House and Democratic sources hasten to add late today that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi did not mean to suggest the new plan would constitute a retreat from comprehensive health care reform. Pelosi has come to regard the Senate bill itself as “much smaller” than the House bill, Elshami said. White House officials also said Obama’s not dramatically scaling back his proposal. No one was prepared to discuss a price tag, but it appears the ballpark 10-year figure of $1 trillion remains.”
http://whitehouse.blogs.foxnews.com/2010/03/01/obama-to-introduce-health-care-bill-wednesday-much-smaller-than-house-version/
According to the article at the link, the new bill will incorporate ideas raised at the summit such as tort reform and allowing insurance to be sold across state lines. I think the White House is upping the stakes for Republicans. The bill is essentially the same except I bet a few of the more egregious items get dropped. However, I think they are including just enough red meat for the Republicans that it will be difficult to vote against. Obama will produce the new bill with a flourish, patting himself on the back and loudly proclaiming how bipartisan he is. If the new bill passes, the intense focus on the health care debate fades away. If Republicans oppose it and /or block its passage, Obama et al will howl and beat the Republicans up about it all the way to the midterm elections. It will be interesting to see what happens next.
56 votes in the Senate passes BO-CARE…
The Headlines read all across America’s News Papers that will be seen in Apr/May…
But what do I know…
Frankenstein