Sen. Joe Lieberman, the Democrat-turned-independent from Connecticut, said Tuesday that he will not vote for a healthcare reform bill that includes a government-run insurance plan.
This means that as things now stand, Democrats will not have enough votes to pass healthcare reform with a so-called public option unless Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) can pick up unexpected GOP votes.
Sen. Olympia Snowe (Maine), the only Republican to vote for the Senate Finance Committee’s healthcare bill, said Tueday that she would vote against bringing up a bill that included a government-run insurance program unless the implementation of such a program were set to a trigger.
Lieberman said he would vote with Reid and other Democrats on a motion to begin debate on a healthcare bill because he believes it is an important issue that needs to be considered. But he said he would not lend his support to an effort to cut off debate on a bill including a government-run insurance program.
Lieberman said he told Reid of his position in a recent conversation and that the leader “respected and understood.”
“We’re trying to do too much at once,” said Lieberman. “To put this government-created, government-run insurance company on top of everything else is just asking for trouble for the taxpayer, for the premium payer and for the national debt. I don’t think we need it now.”
Lieberman said he was not placated by allowing states to opt out of the public option “because it still creates a whole new federal government entitlement program, for which taxpayers will eventually be on the line.”
The motion to begin debate and the motion to move to a final vote are two actions that would require 60 votes and are considered the highest hurdles to passing a reform bill through the Senate.
Can we strip this traitor of his chairmanships already? I have several choice descriptors for Lieberman, but party/caucus loyalist is not one of them. Mr. Gang of 14/Up or Down Vote is more interested in letting insurance companies make a profit off you than helping Americans. He's afraid of doing "too much."
Too late. He already has done too much. Too much to ever be allowed to caucus with the Democrats again.
Unfortunately, there's still one big elephant in the reform room: There are no restrictions on increases based on age. Unless something changes drastically in the final version of the bill (and if you don't call your congress critter, it definitely won't), this is a giant shell game in which health insurers will get their profits from one new underwriting emphasis rather than another.
WASHINGTON -- Top Senate Democrats are close to finalizing their health bill and could unveil a measure as soon as early this week that would include stiffer penalties on employers who fail to provide health coverage.
Senate leaders plan to submit the bill to the Congressional Budget Office for a cost estimate as soon as Monday, and make the legislation public as soon as Tuesday, according to a person familiar with the negotiations.
Details of the legislation could change, but its broad outlines are becoming clear. Employers with more than 50 workers wouldn't be required to provide health insurance, but they would face fines of up to $750 per employee if even part of their work force received a government subsidy to buy health insurance, this person said. A bill passed by the Senate Finance Committee had a lower fine of up to $400 per employee.
The bill to be brought to the Senate floor would create a new public health-insurance plan, but would give states the choice of opting out of participating in it, a proposal that Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada backed last week.
The bill is expected to expand health coverage to tens of millions of Americans by giving low- and middle-income Americans subsidies to offset the cost of insurance, and expanding the Medicaid federal-state insurance program to cover a broader swath of the poor. Most people would be required to buy insurance or pay a fine, though exceptions would be made for those deemed unable to afford it.
Also expected are new rules on insurers to prevent them from denying coverage to people with pre-existing health conditions and from dropping customers' insurance once they become ill.
It's nice to hear some people are actually fighting for our interests. I was beginning to wonder if anyone was:
The forces in favor of a public health insurance option roared back Thursday on Capitol Hill after weeks when their cause looked bleak.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) looked closer than ever to including a robust U.S. government-run insurance program in the House bill — saying recent attempts by the health insurance industry to undercut reform prove insurers can’t be trusted.
And in the Senate, a weekly policy lunch turned into a heated debate when liberals went after the Senate Finance Committee bill and made clear they won’t roll over for legislation that doesn’t include a public option.
Reflecting deep divides within the caucus, the Senate luncheon turned tense, with voices elevated and senators venting. “In today’s lunch, it even involved a little performance theater,” Sen. Evan Bayh (D-Ind.) said, describing it as an “emotional catharsis.”
In a week when the Senate Finance Committee passed a bill without a public option — raising questions about whether that would prove the public option’s last gasp — progressives in both houses showed they won’t go down without a fight.
And Thursday proved that if President Barack Obama hoped the public option question would fade of its own accord, he probably won’t get that lucky — but will be forced to referee a compromise between liberals and moderates.
But in the House, moderates stand to suffer the most if Pelosi goes ahead with plans to include the most ambitious public option — forcing them into a tough vote that will surely be used by Republican opponents in 2010.
In the House, Pelosi told her rank and file Thursday that the time has come to “freeze the design,” meaning she wants unveil a completed House bill as early as next week.
Pelosi favors a public-option plan supported by liberals that reimburses doctors at rates that are 5 percent higher than Medicare — one of the strongest versions of the public option on the table.
Pelosi used the reports put out this week by the insurance lobby — which said reform would add thousands to family insurance premiums — to show the public needs some defense against the industry.
“Anyone who had any doubts about the need for such an option need only look at the behavior of the health insurance industry this week,” Pelosi said. “If you are going to mandate that people must buy insurance, why would you throw them into the lion’s den of the insurance industry without some leverage with a public option?”
This is just plain crazy. Why should one woman in the opposing party have so much power over our futures, just because Obama has a "bipartisan" fetish? This is about offering a protective cover to Blue Dogs; I get that. But man, it's galling that everything gets pulled down to the lowest common denominator by one woman who's been enjoying taxpayer-funded healthcare coverage for a very long time:
WASHINGTON — As the White House and Congressional leaders turned in earnest on Wednesday to working out big differences in the five health care bills, perhaps no issue loomed as a greater obstacle than whether to establish a government-run competitor to the insurance industry.
One day after the Senate Finance Committee approved a measure without a “public option,” the question on Capitol Hill was how President Obama could reconcile the deep divisions within his party on the issue. All eyes were on Senator Olympia J. Snowe, the Maine Republican whose call for a “trigger” that would establish a government plan as a fallback is one of the leading compromise ideas.
No "deep divisions" out here with the overwhelming majority of Democrats, or anyone else for that matter. It's only the Democratic Blue Dogs who have such "dainty" concerns. Oddly enough, the more those members got in contributions from the death-for-profit healthcare industry, the stronger those "concerns" are! Hmm.
Two senior administration officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the White House looked favorably on the Snowe plan. But liberal Democrats were maneuvering against it Wednesday, arguing that Ms. Snowe, the lone Republican to vote in favor of the Finance Committee’s bill, was gaining undue influence over the talks.
“It’s one vote, she won’t make the commitment on the final product, and she says she’s got to have the trigger,” said Representative Raúl M. Grijalva, Democrat of Arizona, who is leading an effort in the House to round up votes for a government plan akin to Medicare. “I think the administration has put her in the driver’s seat; it’s very disconcerting.”
Of the many difficult decisions remaining — including how to pay for an overhaul and how many people will be left uninsured — few carry as much political weight for the president as the public option. The plan, which would be for people who do not get health care through their employers, has become a proxy for a larger debate over where Mr. Obama is taking the country.
“What’s going on here is not simply health care and the public option,” said Kenneth M. Duberstein, a chief of staff in the Reagan White House. “In light of the auto bailout, the bank bailout, the stimulus package, the public option fight is a surrogate for how much government is too much.”
I wish all those Members who have such concerns would turn back the government-funded healthcare largesse they enjoy and turn instead to the free market. Perhaps I wouldn't despise them quite so much.
With Democrats split, an array of compromises are being floated — including the nonprofit cooperatives in the Finance Committee bill and the latest idea to capture some Democrats’ fancy, leaving the public option to the states. But economists say few would fulfill Mr. Obama’s stated goal of injecting “choice and competition” into the marketplace.
Mr. Obama’s health care adviser, Nancy-Ann DeParle, said she was convinced that Democrats could “find convergence.” She and several other officials, including Rahm Emanuel, the chief of staff, and Peter R. Orszag, the budget director, met Wednesday with Senator Harry Reid of Nevada, the Democratic leader, to discuss merging the Senate’s bills.
Aides say Mr. Obama has reviewed the alternatives to the public option but has not settled on which, if any, he prefers. And some Democrats say a backlash against insurers is creating renewed interest in a public plan. But in private conversations with Ms. Snowe, Mr. Obama has brought up her idea for a trigger that would create a government-run plan in states where at least 5 percent of residents lacked access to affordable care. One senior White House official called the idea “very reasonable.”
I can't help wondering: Do you suppose Obama actually believed the insurance industry was on his side? I can't tell if they're really surprised or just pretending. But I don't think anyone here was all that shocked by these developments:
As the Senate Finance Committee on Tuesday approved a 10-year, $829 billion bill to remake the health-care system, Obama's top advisers and the insurers moved into a more intense stage of conflict.
"The insurance industry has decided to lead the charge against health reform, and everyone recognizes their motives: profits," said White House deputy communications director Dan Pfeiffer. "We are going to make sure they can't sink this effort at the last minute."
Pfeiffer castigated the industry for releasing a report Monday that concluded that the finance panel's bill would increase costs for consumers. "They made themselves a very good foil," he said.
The insurers, however, showed no sign of being chastened. America's Health Insurance Plans, an industry trade group, opened a fresh line of attack with a multistate advertising campaign warning that senior citizens enrolled in private Medicare plans could lose benefits under the legislation.
"Is it right to ask 10 million seniors on Medicare Advantage for more than their fair share?" the television spot asks. "Congress is proposing $100 billion in cuts to Medicare Advantage. The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office says many seniors will see cuts in benefits."
The Finance Committee's bill would reduce spending on the plans AHIP cites by $113 billion over the next decade, which could mean reduced insurer profits, higher co-payments by beneficiaries or fewer extra benefits such as eyeglasses and gym memberships.
"We want to begin to build an awareness of the potential implications to seniors," said AHIP President Karen Ignagni.
She declined to say how much money would be spent on the commercials airing in six states, but one advertising analyst said the industry has enough cash to pose a serious threat. "They can spend whatever they feel they need to influence this," said Evan Tracey, president of the Campaign Media Analysis Group. "Seniors are a very important group politically."
The insurance sector and health maintenance organizations spent more than $116 million on lobbying in the first six months of this year, according to an analysis by the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics.
Sen. Olympia Snowe (R-Maine) was the lone Republican to support the package. "My vote today is my vote today. It doesn't forecast what my vote will be tomorrow," she said, although her vote does keep her at the negotiating table and at the center of the health care reform debate. Snowe risked marginalizing herself with a no vote.
The year after both Truman and Clinton's failed efforts, the Republican Party retook control of Congress and any hope of reform faded to minority status. President Obama intends to avoid the same fate.
With the bill having officially moved through the panel, deliberations will migrate to the Capitol, where Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid will huddle with Senate leaders to merge the finance bill with a more generous version from the health committee which passed earlier this year.
There are more votes to come in the Senate, so this thing is far from over.
From The Hill, "Sens: Snowe may be risking a high perch on healthcare reform vote":
Sen. Olympia Snowe (Maine) is risking a shot at becoming the top Republican on an influential Senate committee by backing Democratic healthcare legislation, according to senators on the panel.
..."A vote for healthcare would be something that would weigh on our minds when it came time to vote," said a Republican on Commerce, who said Snowe would otherwise be assured of the ranking member post if not for the healthcare debate.
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said Sunday he's still trying to keep Connecticut Sen. Joe Lieberman within the Democratic caucus despite anger over Lieberman's support of Republican presidential nominee John McCain.
While he has opposed Democratic efforts to end the war in Iraq, "Joe Lieberman votes with me a lot more than a lot of my senators," Reid told CNN's "Late Edition."
Sen. Joseph Lieberman affirmed on Tuesday what progressive health care reform advocates have long feared: At this juncture, he is likely to oppose a public option for health insurance coverage.
--
For Democrats, it was a shot to the gut -- the latest so-called centrist lawmaker from within their own party ranks speaking out against one of their most cherished aspects of health care reform. For all the angst Lieberman has caused within Democratic circles the past few years, he was supposed to be an ally on domestic issues.
The response from Reid’s No. 2, Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.): "We’ve never done that. We’re not going to do that."
Durbin said the petitioners needed to "count to 60 and understand we need to be together, and there are times when we need to work out our differences."
"This is a silly and unnecessary distraction that is not going to happen — period," added a Senate Democratic leadership aide. "Given how important this is to the rest of his agenda, it is up to President Obama to help the leadership to hold the caucus together."
The GOP threatens Snowe and the Dems do nothing to the appeasers of the obstructionist right. It's infuriating.
It's all about that up-or-down vote, and it's something we need to push hard on, as Digby says:
Anyway, those last comments probably tell us where the filibuster issue is, in my opinion. The leadership aide says that Obama needs to step up to twist those arms, which one assumes from the comment, he is not doing. And Dick Durbin, who is Obama's staunchest supporter in the Senate, is basically saying that nobody's going to play hardball. So, there you have it. At least for today.
As I've been writing for a while, it's all about cloture. There's no need for them to vote for the final bill, they just need to allow their president and the people of the United States to have a simple up or down vote on health care reform. And there is a cluster of egos in the centrist caucus (not the least of whom is Holy Joe) that is getting ready to stamp their little feet and hold their breath until they turn blue unless someone, goddamn it, finally understands that they are the most important people in the world.
If your unemployment ran out this week, you can thank Sen. Jon Kyl. Yes, the Republican whip objected to a quick vote that would have helped all those people. You can contact him here and thank him for his compassion:
Washington -- Key Senate Democrats tried unsuccessfully today to quickly pass legislation to give jobless workers in Michigan and other hard-hit states an additional 20 weeks of unemployment benefits.
That delays action on the high-stakes issue until at least next week.
Tom Clementson, a 58-year-old unemployed construction worker in Indian River, expressed frustration by the Senate's slow pace.
"So many people are out of work and need this extra money to put food on the table," said Clementson, who cashed his last check six weeks ago. "It seems like the Senate should spend more time on getting this passed."
Today's failed effort to quickly pass a bill followed the unveiling of a compromise bill by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada and key allies. The bill would give all states an extra 14 weeks of jobless benefits, plus an extra six weeks for states with unemployment rates of 8.5 percent or greater.
[...] Reid introduced the bill after reaching a deal with Sen. Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire, who had balked at the House-passed bill, which only gives extra benefits to the hardest-hit states.
[...] But when Reid asked senators to quickly pass the bill under a speedy procedure, Sen. Jon Kyl, R-Ariz., objected. That's enough to prevent a quick vote.
Kyl said he wanted to have time to look at the proposal and consider possible Republican amendments, and also ask the independent Congressional Budget Office to estimate its cost.
[...] While objecting to quick passage, Kyl said he expects "at the appropriate time," Republicans will "be able to work out some kind of agreement."
Kyl helped cause this mess. It's only good manners to help clean it up - but then, Republicans aren't big on personal responsibility, are they?
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(h/t Heather)
Keith Olbermann discussed how destructive Blanche Lincoln has been over her non-support of the public option as she sits on the Senate Finance Committee even though Arkansas residents favor the public option by a wide margin.
Olbermann: ...others who act like Republicans who still call themselves Democrats -- Senator Blanche Lincoln for instance telling Roll Call that she's all for the public option so long as it is not a pubic option, ostensibly so she can sell it back home in Arkansas. Her quotes: I'm not supportive of a government run and government supported public option. That would be the definition of a public option. She adds,
It's got to be competitive. It's got to create choice for people.
Last month 55% of those people in her state surveyed by Research 2000 were in favor of a public option. The public option is there to create choice and bring down the price of health care for Americans. What is she talking about?
Blue America was the first group to target Lincoln back in June with an ad campaign, and now, as the health-care reform debate winds down, we're buying another round of ads to run in her state for the next two weeks that will inform her constituents once again that she is not working for the people who elected her, but for the health industrial complex that sends funds to her campaign. It's not a coincidence that her poll numbers have dropped big time since we started our ad campaign -- and as time has gone by, she finally became more outspoken about her non-support for the public option. It wasn't a surprise that she tried to stay out of the spotlight as much as possible so that she could remain invisible until she cast her vote, but that was never going to happen.
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Wendell Potter takes Chuck Grassley to task on Democracy Now when asked about his reaction to his rejection of the public option amendment offered by Chuck Schumer.
AMY GOODMAN: I want to go back to yesterday’s debate in the Senate Finance Committee. Democratic Senator Charles Schumer, who introduced one of the public option amendments, questioned Republican Senator Chuck Grassley of Iowa over his rejection of government-run health insurance option.
SEN. CHARLES SCHUMER: I’d just like to know what you think of Medicare, a government-run program that’s far more government-run than what Senator Rockefeller has proposed? Do you think Medicare is a good program? Because most of the amendments on the other side have been aimed at preserving Medicare, a government-run program.
SEN. CHUCK GRASSLEY: I think that Medicare is part of the social fabric of America, after forty years, just like Social Security is. And I don’t say that because it’s perfect. There’s a lot of things that need to be changed, and a lot of the things in this legislation are changing a lot of things that’s wrong with Medicare. And to say that I support it is not to say that it’s the best system that it can be.
SEN. CHARLES SCHUMER: But it is a government-run plan, isn’t that right?
SEN. CHUCK GRASSLEY: It is a government-run plan.
SEN. CHARLES SCHUMER: Thank you.
SEN. CHUCK GRASSLEY: And not—and the reason I say it’s part of the social fabric of America is there are private health insurance plans and retirement plans that are connected with Medicare and Social Security, and it’s not easy to undo a Medicare plan without also hurting a lot of private initiatives that are coupled with it. But that does not make it perfect. And I’ll bet, based upon fifty years of experience, if we had to do it over again, we’d do it other ways, even if it were a government-run plan.
AMY GOODMAN: That was Chuck Grassley. Wendell Potter, your response?
WENDELL POTTER: Well, clearly, this senator has the insurance industry’s best interests at heart, not the American public and not his constituents. The Medicare program is, as he said, part of the social fabric of this country and has been for many years. And it is a government-run plan that has meant a great deal of difference to a lot of people in this country, including certainly his constituents.
He has said that he didn’t think a public plan would be fair, compete fairly with insurance companies who—the private insurance industry. I’d like to ask him what is fair about the way that the insurance industries operate today, the companies that dump sick people when they need insurance most. What is fair about the way the insurance industry operates, Senator Grassley?
AMY GOODMAN: Forty-five million new customers, that’s what the private insurance companies can now look forward to, if a bill like what came out of the Senate Finance Committee moves forward with the mandate. Explain how they will make out and how important, how significant, how profitable this is for the for-profit companies.
WENDELL POTTER: Yeah, this is the first time that the insurance industry has really seen great opportunity in healthcare reform, with an individual mandate, which would require all of us to buy insurance if we are not eligible for a public, government-run program, which, fortunately, many people are. We would have to buy it in the private market from insurance companies, many of whom—many of which are for-profit companies. We would not have the option of buying or getting insurance through a government-run program like the public option would create.
So, not only would our premium dollars go into this—into the private insurance industry, but a lot of tax dollars would. Most people who don’t have insurance can’t afford it, and they wouldn’t be able to afford it after healthcare reform is passed without the government subsidizing their premiums. So billions and billions of taxpayers’ dollars will flow right into the treasuries of these big for-profit insurance companies. So we will be essentially paying a tax that will help support these insurance companies. It will be an enormous bailout of the health insurance industry.
When in doubt, I turn to Chris Bowers. He didn't disappoint me - he had ready a step-by-step explanation of what needs to happen to get the public option in the bill sent to the Senate floor:
The bad news is that we learned today that the Senate Finance Committee will not report a public option in its version of health care reform. The good news is that we also learned today that there are 51 votes in favor of Schumer's public option. Here is how we get to 51:
Arguably, proving that there are 51 votes in favor of Schumer's public option is the bigger news. This is because everyone knew the public option would be defeated in committee, but claims that there were 51 votes in favor of a trigger-less public option were pretty much all based on a post I wrote two weeks ago.
Because Democrats are not going to pursue reconciliation for the public option (see why here), the next step in the process does not actually involve Kent Conrad's Budget Committee, as I had previously reported. Instead, a source on the Hill confirms to me that the Senate HELP and Senate Finance committees will be merged by an informal, behind the scenes process involving the four major players in the Senate: Tom Harkin (Chair of HELP), Max Baucus (Chair of Finance), Harry Reid (Majority Leader), and the White House. Together, these four will meet and decide what sort of bill to send to the Senate floor.
Yesterday, as expected, Lincoln voted against the public option in the Senate Finance Committee -- twice. She has a history of always sticking with her campaign donors when what they want conflicts with what Arkansas voters want. In this case only 38% of Arkansas voters -- almost all of them Republicans -- oppose the public option. 81% of Arkansas Democrats support the public option -- as do Arkansas voters. During the committee markup process yesterday, John Ensign taunted the Democrats on the committee by asking them why they couldn't pass a public option in the Senate with such large majorities in the country wanting it. Unlike almost everything Ensign said yesterday, this is a worthwhile question to ponder.
In fact, when polling companies have asked voters in conservative-leaning states and districts if they will be more or less likely to vote for a candidate who votes to kill the public option, the answer is consistently coming back that it would make them less likely to vote for that candidate. Lincoln can hardly afford to lose any of her base. Her unfavorability rating is 49% (favorables are down to 43%) and so far the only thing keeping her from joining the ranks of the political walking dead is the fact that the Republicans can't come up with a credible opponent. No one is polling the impact of the two independents in the race, Trevor Drown and Green Party nominee John Gray. Gray, a single payer advocate didn't mince words in his analysis of what happened yesterday in the Senate:
I’m not at all surprised. She has a rather large campaign chest, almost half of which is from the medical industries. The fact that she is loyal to her sponsors is not at all surprising... Eliminate the health care insurance industry ... and you would save enough money to cover every man woman and child in the United States. Nobody blinks an eyelash if we lay off 40,000 autoworkers, who actually produce something. These health insurance brokers, it’s hard to say what they produce.
This afternoon while Grassley was babbling on incoherently, I took a short break and ran down to the Blue America P.O. Box, where I found the latest report of our cable TV ads running, this time in Benton and Washington counties. The ads ran on a Thursday and Friday night when she was speaking in the area. They ran on Larry King Live, The Rachel Maddow Show, The Colbert Report, The O'Reilly Factor, Headline News Countdown With Keith Olberman, Hardball, The Chainsaw Massacre, Anderson Cooper 360, Showbiz Tonight, The Ed Show, Fast Money, CNN Newsroom and lots of other similar programs-- Nancy Grace and Shepard Smith but no Glenn Beck.
Keep in mind that Tom Harkin told The Hill yesterday that he feels he has enough Democrats now that Massachusetts has their second seat covered, to break the Republican filibuster, get a bill with a public option onto the floor and pass it with 51 votes. That isn't reconciliation; that's simple cloture and majority rule. Would anyone break from the party and vote with the Republicans to filibuster the bill? ben Nelson and Blanche Lincoln are the only two who could conceivably keep the public option from even reaching the floor. Lincoln, who also opposes climate and energy legislation and has already declared that she will join the Republicans in filibustering Employee Free Choice, is not a good player. She doesn't deserve another term. You say, "neither do Nelson, Baucus or Conrad?" I agree. But they're not up for election in 2010. Lincoln is.
We'd like to run some more ads. In fact, we're going to. If we raise enough money we'll put them on network TV. If not, we'll keep running them on cable. The 3 ads are on the Blue America Campaign For Health Care Choice page, which is also where you can donate to the cost of running more spots if you're so inclined.
John Amato:
Blue America helped bring Blanche's approval ratings down with our initial ad campaign against her months ago when nobody was talking about her and we want to keep her accountable. Campaign For Health Care Choice has rocked and I want to thank you. Keep helping if you can.
The Senate has the votes to pass a healthcare reform bill including a public option, a key Senate chairman said Tuesday.
Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa), the chairman of the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee, said that the Senate "comfortably" has a majority of votes to pass the public plan, and that he believes Democrats can muster 60 votes to break a filibuster.
"I have polled senators, and the vast majority of Democrats — maybe approaching 50 — support a public option," Harkin said told the liberal "Bill Press Radio Show." "So why shouldn't we have a public option? We have the votes.
"I believe we'll have the 60 votes, now that we have the new senator from Massachusetts, to at least get it on the Senate floor," Harkin later added. "But once we cross that hurdle, we only need 51 votes for the public option. And I believe there are, comfortably, 51 votes for a public option."
That's great news. Let's hope it plays out this way.
I have said before (most recently here) that the Senate Finance Committee was conservative, in fact the most conservative committee makeup in the Senate, and that we would be likely to lose these votes:
With numbers like this, and with the entire Democratic base mobilized intensely around the issue, you would have to be politically tone deaf as a Democrat to oppose this, but this is the Senate Finance Committee, so public option advocates are likely to lose these votes. The question, though, will be the margin. On a committee this conservative, far more conservative than the Senate as a whole, if we only get seven votes for the public option amendments, that would have to be considered a major political victory, and a sign that the public option can definitely get a majority vote on the floor.
So getting 10 votes on this is promising for those of us who believe a public option is essential. Baucus, Conrad, Lincoln, Carper, and Bill Nelson are five of the ten most conservative Dems in the Senate, and on the Schumer amendment, even two of them went with us. President Obama is for it, a majority in the House is for it, and the whip count we're running right here at OpenLeft.com shows that 51 Democrats are in favor of it. And today Tom Harkin confirmed that our whip count is right...
Will all this evidence, the public option will only be hard to beat if Democratic leaders decide they don't want to do it.
Carper and Nelson flipped on the Shumer public option amendment, leaving only Conrad, Lincoln and Baucus voting against it. This is good news believe it or not. It indicates that there are 51 votes for a public option in the senate.
The question most certainly is whether or not the president can change their minds. And frankly, if he doesn't have enough juice to at least hold them together for one cloture vote then I have to wonder if he has any real juice at all. Every one of these corporate lackeys can vote against the final bill if they dare. Assuming they can bring Byrd in to do it, all they need to do is break a Republican filibuster and "allow an up or down vote."
Now matter what FOX News says, the public option is not dead. I saw Schumer on with Tweety and he was ecstatic that he flipped a couple of votes. It sucks that he has to kowtow to Max Baucus, though. He was talking to him like he was the Duke of Westminster. All that royalty cannot be overlooked.
Tweety asked Schumer about those pesky liberal ads that are being run against Baucus, as if Matthews thought he was NOT going to defend his Senate brother. And during our President Obama blogger conference call, Obama told US to keep the pressure on everybody. He's got to push for the public option hard no matter what Rahm thinks.
In a late-game push to pass the public option, progressive groups are trying to convince Democrats that it would be political suicide to pass a bill requiring people to buy insurance coverage but not giving them the choice of a government-run plan.
A memo making the rounds on Capitol Hill makes the case that the current construct of the Senate Finance Committee's legislation - which includes an individual mandate but no public option - will be resoundingly opposed by the American public.
Commissioned by the progressive-leaning Health Care for America Now - and obtained by the Huffington Post - the piece is based on three new polls conducted by reputable polling firms in swing House districts and the state of Maine.
"Nationally," the memo reads, "voters oppose a mandate to purchase private insurance by 64% to 34% but support a mandate with a choice of private or public insurance by 60% to 37%... Each [survey] found that likely 2010 voters oppose 'requiring everyone to buy and be covered by a private health insurance plan' but support 'requiring everyone to buy and be covered by a health insurance plan with a choice between a public option and private insurance plans.'"
In a not-so-subtle message to Senate Democrats, the memo concludes with a warning shot at the Senate Finance Committee's legislation - which seems unlikely to include a public plan.
"All of the health care reform proposals that have passed Congressional committees to date, including three House committees and the Senate HELP Committee, include an individual mandate and the choice of private or public health insurance," the HCAN memo reads. "The Chairman's mark introduced into the Senate Finance Committee includes the individual mandate without the choice of a public health insurance option."
Why the media is focusing on the Baucus Dogs is a slap in the face to the four other bills and the rest of Congress, but this HCAN memo hammers home a point that was backed up by the new CBS/NY Times poll. Cancel the public option at your own peril. And that means without those death triggers.
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From The Ed Schultz Show, Jay Rockefeller says he is going to introduce an amendment for the public amendment in the Senate Finance Committee even though Baucus has said he's against it. He said we got some good news and that the Mayo Clinic has now come out in favor of a public option. When asked by Schultz if he knew for sure that what they were supporting was an independent government run public option Rockefeller could not say for sure that was the case but said he didn't know what else they could be supporting if they're in favor of a public option.
