For one thing, there’s no “double-cross” — Speaker Pelosi let him bring his measure up for a vote and it passed.

What he is talking about is if the language of his amendment is dropped in the final bill, if it is, he is calling that a double cross and is threatening 40 votes being removed from support of it in the House, enough to sink the bill with quite a few to spare. Even 10 votes would be more than enough. No clue how Mr. Benen didn't understand that in his article, its pretty darn obvious.

And Stupak could make it hell to pay, Pro-life democrats plus Republicans would constitute a majority in the House and Senate and could start passing new bills if the pro-life democrats felt “double-crossed”.

[pant, pant] Don't push your luck, Stupak, you disguised right-wing patriarchal bastard! [grrrr]

Karen — that's because you and I and others are in the real world. And, the issue isn't resolved yet. The militant fringe pro-abortion absolutists are joined by “progressive” Dems in the House who will fight to get the language in the health legislation liberalized, while also seeking to get it first liberalized by the Senate, if they can. There will no doubt be pushing in the the direction by those who won't accept any militant extremes (and don't forget, there is nothing “sacred” about creating a new federal entitlement to publicly-funded abortion; that, in fact, is fringist and controversial and opposed by most, obviously). Add to that, whatever muscle-flexing and bellowing we may hear from the currently-sidelined GOPers, notably the social conservatives (right on cue, if the extremist lefties keep howling too loudly; the latter will in fact have earned the bellowing of the former; “congratulations”!). Just as the public option is not anywhere near dead yet, nor is there a resolution or settlement yet of federal provision of or funding for abortion. Note that the fringist leftists, who routinely disgrace and embarrass themselves, once again do so to their own discredit if they choose to be stupidly obscessed and inflammatory about this trivial side issue, risking loss of the beachhead of a universal-entitlement-oriented federal role for health care now.

I see no problem with Stupak predicting that removing the language of the amendment might cause the bill to go down. If he's a loyal Democrat, isn't it his obligation to make that known so that such a defeat can be avoided?

Or it could be blackmail. I guess that's in the eye of the beholder. Either way, what he says doesn't matter. The only thing that matters is how many votes they can get.

When Benen mentions Stupak's record on women's reproductive rights I can't help but wonder about the degree to which misogyny might be playing a part in all of this. Yes, I know, this the 21st century, we don't have misogyny, or racism, or any of those old problems anymore.