Obama and the Democrats will not surrender the health care bill just because they lose their super majority in the Senate. Instead, they will move the legislation forward using one or more political tricks.
- They may choose having the House of Representatives adopt the Senate bill so that additional votes are not required by the Senate. The risk is that they lose many of the House moderates that supported the House bill. Additional bribery would be used to buy needed votes.
- They may choose to rush a compromise bill out of conference committee and vote before Scott Brown is seated. The risk is that would essentially ignore the will of a majority of Massachusetts voters who spoke loud and clear on Tuesday. That is a small risk since they have been ignoring the will of the entire country so far.
- They may delay the seating of Scott Brown. The risk is the same as above, but much more underhanded and egregious.
- They may use the parliamentary trick of reconciliation which would not require a super majority to pass in the Senate. The risk is that many parts of the bill considered essential by supporters would have to be removed. Reconciliation can only be used on bills related to raising or spending money, so they would need to omit much of the bill or face a constitutional challenge.
- They could recruit or bribe a RINO (Republican In Name Only) such as Olympia Snowe, to support the bill. The only risk would be adding fuel to the bribery fire. It appears that bribery is the tool of choice used to pass this legislation.
What is guaranteed to occur is the spin that Brown's win in Massachusetts was not about health care or Obama's radical liberal agenda. They will claim that Coakley was a poor candidate and that recession and unemployment clouded many voters minds. All of this is false. This special election is ALL about health care and Obama. Massachusetts has Romney-care, a state program that has led to increased cost. Residents are all too familiar with government run health care and are using this special election to send the message to Washington. The election is also about Obama. Even many liberals are becoming uncomfortable with the far left agenda. Obama risked personal political capital by travelling to Massachusetts to campaign for Coakley. Her loss is now his loss also.
The enormity of this upset can only be comprehended after understanding the voter registration in Massachusetts. Registered Republicans account for only 11% of of the population. Independents make up 51%. For Brown to win, he had to take an overwhelming majority of Independents in a state notorious for voting Democratic. This upset provides a glimpse of what may happen nationwide in November. Whatever Obama, Reid, Pelosi and Axelrod say, they cannot escape this obvious conclusion - Democrats are in a lot of trouble.
A Brown win means that Democrats across the country will moderate their positions in hopes of retaining their job come November. Their support for Obama will no doubt wane, effectively ending the rush to enact his agenda. Today marks the end of our nation's sudden lurch to the left, our dalliance in liberalism, and our journey toward socialism. For conservatives, this is a great day.
What should Obama and the Democrats do? Start over. A majority of reasonable people would support a bipartisan health care bill that actually tries to solve the problems in our health care system. Ideas that encouraging competition to bring cost down, and guarantee insurability would be supported by both sides of the aisle and could actually result in a better system. Will they do it? No, this administration only has shown the ability to use Chicago political tricks to get what they want.
No comments:
Post a Comment