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« Senate Passes Landmark Health Care Reform Via Narrow Partisan Margin (News and Blog Roundup) UPDATED
Health Care Reform: Now the Real Fun Begins
Posted by JILL MILLER ZIMON in Economy, Health, Miscellaneous, Politics, Science & Technology, Society.
Dec 24th, 2009 | 27 responses
Dec 24th, 2009 | 27 responses
Vice President Joe Biden led the Senate this morning while his colleagues voted from their seats in favor of Senate Bill 3590 (aka “Senate Health Care Bill” aka “The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act”). The vote was 60-39 along party lines, as expected.
Republican Jim Bunning of Kentucky, who is retiring at the end of the 111th session of Congress, failed to show up or vote for the second day in a row but no explanation was forthcoming.
As you head into serious holiday mode, enjoy some calorie-less food for thought to put perspective on what we’ve gotten ourselves into.
Read the full post here at BlogHer.com.
27 Responses to “Health Care Reform: Now the Real Fun Begins”
Just a quick note: The GOP hasn't gone any “deeper” into obstructionism or opposition. Their role is flat and shallow — and is that way not due to their dysfunctionality and self-made irrelevence, but due to being squashed flat by the Dems, about the only thing the Dems haven't bungled or neglected yet.
I'm looking forward to the conference to see if there's any last fight to move the legislation leftward, or if there's pressure instead just to hurry and get this done as soon as possible. (In reality it could be settled by only a few hours at most, if any conference was purposeful and uninterrupted, and a vote taken on that same day. Yes, it could be done today if the Dems chose, and they probably will do it before the end of next week.)
Hmm – interesting view but I don't think I agree. “Squashed flat”? I don't know, DLS – I think the GOP members removed themselves a long time ago. Maybe not all of them were ever “in” such as the ones we know never wanted to or want to have anything to do with a Dem-majority Congress and White House and cabinet. But squashed?
I just really object (not to you alone but others who use this nomenclature) to any descriptions of the situation that don't put the responsibility squarely on the shoulders of those who were elected – esp. when Republicans and Conservatives so often talk about the role of “personal responsibility” in government and society.
I've not even been sworn in yet but there've been a couple of situations already in which even though actions weren't mine, I was very clear in taking responsibility (there were also actions that others took that people wanted to attribute to me which I did not take responsibility for because the actors involved insisted on being held responsible themselves).
So – yeah – sure, the Dems used their 60 vote advantage to…their advantage. But some of the senators really played dead – no one squashed them.
“'Squashed flat'? [...] But squashed?”
OK, back to the conventional “sidelined,” then, which is nicer, albeit glossing over the Dems' role. The point is, the Dems have been the main players all this year, and they have worked to keep it that way.
“I think the GOP members removed themselves a long time ago.”
No argument whatsoever. Coincidentally, they have continued to be dysfunctional and offer nothing to voters. If you've noticed, they have receded from our attention (except among the far lefties who can't resist bashing them any time they want). They've been openly scoffed at (by me, included) as being no good these days. (Evidence, if not final proof, is that they didn't retake political ground in November. The voters could have switched from the Dems to — what? Nothing of value, as we all know, this year.)
” responsibility squarely on the shoulders of those who were elected”
I've not been evading the putting of blame on the GOP for what they've earned. I've been among the most frequent critics, and have stated before, they're deader than dead these days – self made. Or as you now said about being dead,
“some of the senators [and Representatives, in the House] really played dead” [or killed themselves]
But it's not all the GOP's fault. The Dems have deliberately seized and kept firm control over the legislative process all year. And as they are having things all their way (their setbacks are all arising from their own missteps), they cannot blame anybody but themselves (which includes blaming the GOP, as well as the idiotic attempts this late still to blame Bush and his administration once in a while).
(Both parties have worked to wreck themselves. The Dems let their left wing run rampant this year, while the GOP has continued its dysfunctionality that has been ongoing for multiple election cycles now, something I've noted before. This year has been the Democrats' year (largely the lib Dems' year), and it is they who are to answer for the legislation. (Hopefully they have learned from overreach and setback.)
Republican Jim Bunning of Kentucky, who is retiring at the end of the 111th session of Congress, failed to show up or vote for the second day in a row but no explanation was forthcoming.”
One of the most obnoxious people I have ever seen and heard. However, I hope he did NOT vote as a sign that he is as disgusted with the Reps. as he is with the Dems and the whole farce of politicians looking out for US. They don't, they just look to get elected, make grandiose speeches and line up book deals where they crow about all the good they have tried to do and how the other side thwarted all their good intentions.
Sorry to rant on this Xmas Eve. As Tiger would say, Ho, Ho, Ho.
“line up book deals”
All of those … people swirling around and swarming in DC are either releasing or working on books.
We real readers and book lovers find it repugnant.
It actually feels good and gives us some respite when we see some of them dumped later on clearance because they didn't sell well or far too many copies were stupidly ordered and offered.
Ho, ho, ho.
Dduck12 – I looked high and low and couldn't find any explanation for Bunning's absence – maybe he's on the Appalachian Trail?
Merry merry to you too.
My goodness – your comments today are understandable and tempered – must be the holiday.
Thanks. Yeah – I think you go for a bit more hyperbole than I might in describing each side but in general, I'd agree with what you've said. I do still believe however that a democracy depends upon all the stakeholders engaging, not just saying that they're fulfilling their public service by refusing to do what the majority seeks to accomplishment. That really was never how it was taught in civics – and I do think we need to think about that. Are we really talking about changing how we teach our kids to operate in a republic??
“your comments today are understandable and tempered”
They're always understandable (or should be). Tempered? I confess to striking (back) hard this year.
“I think you go for a bit more hyperbole than I might in describing each side”
The Dems have been overreaching this year, going too far left — the mainstream never voted for that. They have had their way this year with legislation, and have muscled the GOP aside. It's the Dems' year alone, the Dems' legislation alone, and the Dems' responsibility for it alone.
The GOP continues to be dysfunctional. They don't even put up what amounts to a fight at being suppressed in crafting legislation. (Getting their cooperation to leave Washington by Christmas doesn't count.)
“a democracy depends upon all the stakeholders engaging”
They've tried, but been prevented by the Dems. And don't forget the question of with their trying, how competent they are. That's aside from the rush to write off as “obstructionist” anything they seek that is a compromise, or what the Dems essentially are offering or seeking too, but less of it. (Or that is written off just because it has “R” stamped on it rather than “D”)
Obamacare is welfare for the insurance companies. Why would conservatives fight giving guaranteed profits to their buddies?
“Why would conservatives fight giving guaranteed profits to their buddies?”
Republicans have opposed it, but have been powerless in addition to being dysfunctional.
As for this,
“Obamacare is welfare for the insurance companies.”
Bash 'em all you want, but you also miss the key. This is incrementalist federal takeover. The insurers are allowed to remain as part of health care for now. They are to be subjected to more constraints and other legal attacks that drive them out of the market. (The “public option” was always meant to displace and replace, or “crowd out,” the private sector; not everyone was so feeble-minded as to have believed the various “competition” and “keep the insurers honest” pieces of nonsense.) As a general rule, so long as the insurance model and the bogus notion of comprehensive or general health care as “insurance” remains with us, that's as long (at most) as the insureres can be expected to remain. For now, it's easier to regulate heavily and gradually replace the private sector, while retaining as much of it as possible now so as to be able to reengineer it to conform to what some want under complete federal control (if not complete ownership) later. This has always been right before us and easy to grasp.
You just made FT happy. Merry Festus, FT.
“You just made FT happy”
I had seen his remarks earlier, and J. Spencer's laudatory note about his comments about “21st century Republicans” and I thought to be fun this evening, I'd go back and find the comment about the “which” question someone asked on-line, because I laughed. (I divide the GOP or conservatives into the two camps of “economic” or libertarian or Whig conservatives, and traditionalist-authoritarian or “social” or Tory conservatives and would see this as the big split if the Duopoly ended someday and the GOP were broken into at least two parties.) I looked but I couldn't find it. It went something like this:
“Which Republicans? The religious-nut Puritanican gun-crazy ones, or the corporate ass-kissing ones?”
(Merry Christmas, late, Father Time.)
Jill, I didn't know you held elective office. What level of government, and what's the position?
Or maybe he just doesn't care anymore — he's retiring at the end of this legislative session.
I ran for and was elected to the Pepper Pike City Council.
My first time running for anything, ever, unless you count the time I ran to be president of my law school's Student Public Interest Law Fellowship group. The other candidate and I tied twice and in the third vote, he won by 1 vote. He also happens to be a friend and the what goes around comes around part is that 1) he is an amazing criminal defense lawyer, won most favorite prof of the year at the law school as an adjunct of only a few years 2) just argued another case in SCOTUS against the Ohio AG and 3) his wife is a former county prosecutor (county next to mine) and it was when I read a small article in a local paper about how she was running for a township trustee position that I said, arghhh – I have to run now. 
She won too. It was great. (I get sworn in on 1/13/10).
That's the general sense I've gotten from the few pieces I could find re: Bunning not showing up. But still – that constituents would be okay with that. That's the kind of thing that baffles me – same w/people in S. Carolina or, frankly, Neveda. I don't think CT voters are like that and I think Lieberman is going to go down HARD.
Congratulations on your win. I like your measured and patient approach to matters. Non carborundum illegtemi.
That is so exciting, Jill! Congratulations!
I don't think CT voters are like that and I think Lieberman is going to go down HARD.
I certainly hope so. I know his poll numbers have taken a dive recently. I really hope after the final health care reform bill is passed, the Democrats take away his chairmanship of Homeland Security, but I'm not counting on it.
Thanks – it was quite the experience – to run for office, even in a small, privileged community. Being in office, I suspect, is going to be a rush too. /understatement
Thanks.
I really think CT voters have had enough. I lived there until I was 26, except while in college and I worked there, and interned for a CT congressman (one before Rosa DeLauro), my younger bro interned in Dodd's office. Talked to a number of politically savvy folks during the Lamont surge and really analyzed where Lamont's votes and Liebermans were coming from. I am quite sure that Lieberman's gone too far with the ones who either deserted him for Lamont and returned in the general, or supported him in the first place. Esp. in the face of reasonable alternatives. Lamont really had a credibility problem as far as being a political actor – he was like the CT version of Paul Hackett in many ways, if you're familiar w/him from Ohio politics (he dropped out when Sherrod Brown decided to run for US Senate in 2006).
Anyway – I don't see how anyone can really see anything but someone who'll go the way the wind blows in Lieberman now. It's very very unfortunate, to be honest.
Moral question: can you be a “good” (I don't know what that means) legislator and also be a crook? Dodd, certainly has been accused of short changing us on paying taxes, and has also been disingenuous with his explanations. And he was part of the problem leading up to the whole sub-prime/FNMA/FDMC problem. Should Lieberman be the only CT official vilified and a candidate for the tar and feather brigade? Does party affiliation have anything to do with it?
dduck12 – questions like that are always fascinating to me – but I don't think they're complicated at all. Of course one can carry out the duties of a legislator and also be a crook – but what is “good” is only as objective as the voters decide. For myself, I have ideas and ideals about that. But there's no question that there is not consensus on this. If there were, Ensign, Sanford and how many others would have been out of office months ago given their use of taxpayer money for their own good. Then there's the fact that the people we elect are also the people who define what is criminal, right? So there's that as well.
These are existential style questions I love, but when it comes down to Earth, it's hard to see how it matters. If we want it to matter, then we have to be willing to make choices that show that it does. But Americans, on the whole, aren't about sticking their necks out, sadly.
Have you ever seen the movie The Great Debaters? Very good movie that gets that message – about the reticence of so many even in the face of such obvious crookedness.
Not trying to be sanguine, just saying – if each of us were able to resist all the mitigating we inevitably do when we finally make decisions, the world would be a very different place.
Should Lieberman be the only CT official vilified and a candidate for the tar and feather brigade? Does party affiliation have anything to do with it?”
So, perhaps both will stay.
Anyone who reads what I write can predict my answer – that's up to the people of CT and every other state regarding their respective electeds. I'm just speculating based on my time in CT, my time w/legislators from CT and what I hear from people who are still there. I'm not about shoulda, woulda, coulda – not enough life left for that. All easy to ruminate on but too easy, to be honest.
Fair enough.