Chris Bowers: Our Only Hope For The Public Option Is The White House
By Susie Madrak Wednesday Sep 30, 2009 4:00pmWhen 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:
- Take the 47 "yes" votes from the Washington Independent public option scorecard.
- Add Bill Nelson and Tom Carper, who both voted for Schumer's public option today;
- Add Claire McCaskill (who voted for Kennedy's HELP public option back in May);
- Add Joe Biden
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.
During this process, we can guarantee that Harkin will push for a HELP or Schumer-like public option to be sent to the floor, while Baucus will push for no public option to be in the bill at all. Given his recent statements, the best bet is that Reid will probably push against a public option too, and instead favor either triggers (which he has called a good idea) or co-ops (which seems to be the sort of public option he likes best). With two against and one in favor, this means that the only way a public option ends up in the bill that is sent to the Senate floor will be if the fourth major player, the White House, demands it.
It is all up to the White House now. If it pushes for a public option to be included in the health care bill sent to the Senate floor, then a public option will pass as part of health care reform (at that point, all we would need are 60 votes for cloture, and from what I hear we have 57 already). However, if it allows a health care bill to go to the floor without a public option, it is pretty unlikely that a public option will pass as part of health care reform. Here is why:
- Amendments won't work. There simply is not any good chance of adding a public option to the Senate bill through floor amendments, because the 60-vote process will be in effect for floor amendments. While we might have 60 votes for cloture on a health care bill that includes a public option, we do not have 60 votes for a public option all by itself.
- Conference committee (almost certainly) won't work. Even if the House passes a public option, which they are highly likely to do, do not expect them to overpower the Senate in conference committee. This is because the Senate will already have voted down adding a public option via amendment, and the White House will have already demonstrated that it isn't going to demand the public option in the final bill. It wil be difficult to convince them to change their mind by the conference committee.
So, it is all about the White House demanding a public option in the process of merging the Senate HELP and Senate Finance Committee. So, we are going to have to start putting pressure on the White House itself.
The best source of pressure the White House can feel on this will come from the Progressive Block. If they can produce a hard count of 39 Progressives who will vote against health care reform without a public option, it is difficult to imagine any amount of phone calls, faxes, emails and petitions to the White House that would equal that pressure. While we all need to bring whatever pressure we can, as expected all along, the Progressive Block taking a hard line is our best option for the public option.
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But does it have a ghost of a chance?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XdkMcLun1ok
Okay. I just ordered "The Time of Their Lives" on Netflix...
(I'll never forget you suckering me into watching "The Deadliest Game"....)
Answer: Yes. It has a ghost of a chance. The only problem is no one freakin' knows what "it" is.
Did you see my review?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jIiCtxXtVXY
You're wish is my command.
(Of course Netflix doesn't have it. I'll have to buy the used DVD on Amazon. I MUST own it!!)
Ha!!
P.S. What review???
I think Blithe Spirit's only available in Europe for some reason.
It's hard for me to imagine that's Rex Harrison. To me this will always be Rex Harrison.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GwBRBa5AyKY
this legislation is passed?
If we do get a public option onto the floor and Harry Reid can't get cloture then he needs to be replaced. Senate Dems don't have to vote for the bill but they SHOULD have to vote for cloture or face the cold shoulder of the Democratic leadership. I'm getting really sick of these Senate primadonnas and really wishing we had a unicameral system about now.
I heard that Schumer's PO was only for the unemployed.
That would be unacceptable. We would have people quitting their jobs in order to get critical health care.
Does anyone here know about this?
We know this: They are going to give us the crappiest PO they can come up with because if it is good for us then it will suck for the Insurance companies.
They're aiming at something that will SUCK for us.
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If you like to EAT sausage... then you probably don't want to watch it being made.
THIS legislation is a really good example of that metaphor. It's a messy process... but I'm really confident that the Democrats in both the House and the Senate are going to find a way to make the Public Option into law. THEY BETTER. It's the RIGHT THING for THE PEOPLE.
Stuff in the raw meat... Drain out the EXCESS... Tie off the ends... and then THROW IT ON THE GRILL!
Perhaps you could have a little pow-wow with John and Nicole and David and the rest of the gang and try to get someone like Rep. Anthony Weiner here to Crooksandliars.com to fill us all in on what EXACTLY THE PUBLIC OPTION IS!!!
1.) Who would be allowed to join it?
2.) What exactly would the coverage be? (As say, compared to Medicare coverage).
3.) How would it be paid for?
4.) Wendell Potter explains that the "subsidies" that might be provided by the federal government in order to supplement the payments for individuals in "The Public Option" or in various "Exchange" programs would obviously come from the taxpayers. THIS MEANS THAT THE TAXPAYERS WOULD BE FILLING THE COFFERS OF THE FOR-PROFIT INSURANCE CORPORATIONS.
Is this REALLY something that is in the best interests of the American people?
I beseech you Susie.
You are a reasonable and very intelligent woman.
Can you PLEASE get us some concrete answers to the above questions so we will know exactly what it is we are cheerleading for???
Thanks very much!!!
Abbybwood, R.N.
Thanks for being a nurse. No medical facility could run without nurses. Nurses know more about their patients than the doctors do in many cases.
One thing I DO know, I get health care from a public health hospital, and no one I have spoken to, from the hema-onc dept head (my doc) to the people that check me in, to the MSW who helps me fill out the reams of paperwork I must do every 6 months want the Public Option.
Thank you.
No. Don't want it. I think the Public Option will bring mandatory insurance purchase. That's fascism. Private citizens obliged to purchase insurance from private entities, by law (and before you go all car insurance, driving is a choice, health care is a basic human right).
The insurance companies helped bring about this nasty piece of work, and it'll be the poor, who just miss being qualified for the govt plan that will suffer the most. And the insurance companies will laugh their asses off, all the way to the bank. With mandates in place, they'll make even MORE money.
This conversation needs to be restarted, with the single payer, universal health care, national health and socialised medicine people at the table, and the insurance companies OUT. Private insurers have no business in health care. No company has any business telling our elected officials what to do. It's fascism.
Ooh where's the raving success I've been assured by Obama Kool-Aid drinkers? 8 months of dicking around on this issues to the detriment of job recovery, and it comes down to a squeaker? American politics always devovles into GOP evil, or Dem incompetence.
A 1,000 page bill? What is this, an amendment to the federal tax code? This POS was written by lobbyists, and all the amendment Band-aids that get slapped on will never prevent it from being fatally flawed.
Dems including Obama are desperate for a victory and will happily accept this POS legislation and say they've solved the problem. And Obama won't have the balls to veto a bad plan, because he is too much of a compromiser.
Ha ha! Yeah right! You are a very talented comedian.
The bastard is a corporatist from word go in addition to being a promise breaker, liar ... wouldn't surprise me that he is a thief like his master, Bush. Then again, given that trillions disappeared under Bush's brazen regime of theft, I seriously doubt that Obama is a match for Bush's theft. Bush got away with it because the media gave him a free pass regardless of what he did, idiocracy, corruption, hypocrisy, stupidity, lies, theft or murder. Last thing Obama gets from MSM is a free pass so he can't be as brazen about it. Obama would pass the public option if we, the left, broke both his legs and arms, and a few ribs too. My guess is he would rather die than do anything as Commie, Socialist, pinko, liberal, leftist as pass an effective public option.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xIFJLMyUwrg
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cvnCKJCgCD8&fe...
I am a life-long Democrat. I have never voted for anyone except Democrats. I have worked for every Democratic presidential campaign since Jimmy Carter.
If the public option doesn't pass, I will never vote for another Democrat as long as I live.
Every Democrat who cares about the party should write a letter to the five turncoats on Finance Committee stating the above. Then we will see some action.
I struggling with these feelings as well. Dick Durbin at one point said he could do without the public option (which is a sucky choice anyway) -- and if he will not fight for a strong (albeit SUCKY PO) -- I will never vote for him again.
Same goes for my congresswoman. Obama's pissing me off too.
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You gotta be kidding. You think this is the fault of Democrats? Hell, Baucus, Conrad and all those other "Blue Dogs" are no more Democrats than Newt Gingrich. These are crooked opportunists that posed as "Democrats" just long enough to get into office and start soliciting bribes from big corporations.
When it comes right down to it, a crooked politician doesn't really have a political philosophy. That's why the entire Republican party today is nothing more than an illusion. It doesn't really exist at all. In its place we have a gang of crooks looking to snooker enough rubes to keep them in office so they can get rich on corporate bribes, while the corporations get super-rich on government contracts. It's a self-perpetuating system of symbiotic criminality that has infected our system of government to the point where it is almost completely dysfunctional.
These crooks have no more plan for governing in office than you or I do. All they have is dirty, behind-the-scenes deals to keep themselves shielded from legal jeopardy and swimming in cash.
That's why assholes like Baucus and the other "Blue Dogs" don't give a rat's ass if we threaten them with money for their primary opponents. Max Baucus doesn't need to win political office; should he lose, he'll be well cared for by his corporate patrons, who will immediately hire him as a kept puppy with an astronomical salary.
If I'm wrong, somebody please explain how.
is in the White House.
Are you kidding me?
Obama has already said that the public option is optional. Obama has already made closed door deals with big pharma. There is no chance for the public option.
Our government has sold us down the river and they do not give one rats ass if you or I die because we do not have health care. They do not want us to have health care. If we have health care, that means we will still be around to squeeze a little more money out of their pockets by actually going to a hospital and getting the care that a minimum of 65% of Americans and a minimum of 70% of doctors agree that we should have.
Our congress has sold out to big business whether it be medical, manufacturing or war. Our congress will do whatever their constituants-being the lobbyists-want them to do. They do it because the lobbyists-through big business-give them MONEY!!!!! Did you realize that a candidate gets to keep the money given to that candidate after expenses are met?
The congress will do a good job of pretending to stand up for you and me but they will not do that. They want to leave the impression that they are trying to do something. Bull shit!
The democrats-who are supposedly pro-health care for all-have a solid majority that is bullet proof---if they want it to be bullet proof. They do not. Look at their donation records and tell me I am lying. Fuck every one of them.
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