House Liberals To Pelosi: “We Cannot Support The Senate Bill. Period.”
In a private meeting in the Capitol just now, a dozen or more House liberals bluntly told Nancy Pelosi that there was no chance that they would vote to pass the Senate bill in its current form — making it all but certain that House Dems won’t opt for this approach, a top House liberal tells me.
“We cannot support the Senate bill — period,” is the message that liberals delivered to the Speaker, Dem Rep Raul Grijalva told me in an interview just now.
Some had hoped Pelosi would push liberals to get in line behind this approach, in hopes of expediting reform, but that didn’t appear to happen in this meeting. Pelosi mostly listened, Grijalva said, adding: “We didn’t get any declarative statement from her.”
The meeting, which was polite but blunt in tone, underscores the degree to which Dems are scrambling to figure out a way forward on health care in the wake of last night’s loss. The unwillingness of liberals, and some in labor, to support passing the Senate bill means House Dem leaders need to find another way forward — fast — and leadership aides are scouring procedural rules as we speak.
Tellingly, House liberals also urged Pelosi to consider passing individual pieces of reform through the House as individual bills, and sending them to the Senate to challenge the upper chamber to reject them, Grijalva tells me. Liberals said this approach would be preferable to passing the Senate bill.
For instance, Grijalva said, why not send the Senate individual bills that would, among other things, nix the “Cadillac” tax or close the donut hole, pressuring the Senate to deal with each provision separately?
“If the Senate chooses not to close the donut hole, that’s their damn problem,” Grijalva said. “They’ve had it too easy. One vote controls everything. Collectively, we’re tired of that.”
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“A bill to nix the Cadillac tax?” What the hell is he talking about? There is no Cadillac tax because health care reform hasn’t passed. You pass a law to change the bill you already killed?
I’m hoping that lib dems are finally using the hardball tactics of the senate blue dogs, so whatever companion reconciliation bill passed alongside the Senate HC bill has things like a strong public option and medicare buyin, etc. That is what they should be fighting for….
You Leftists crack me up. You think you’ve cornered the market on knowing what American’s want. You ignore the facts that stare you in the face.
Americans are not interested in Socialism yet you keep deluding yourselves into believing that is exactly what Americans want.
Sorry to tell you but the election of Obama was not a mandate to usher in Socialism. It was nothing more than a vote against the policies of Bush.For 100 years Leftists have been trying to force Socialist health care and for 100 years the people have said NO. What does that tell you? That we, the people DON’T WANT your communism. Maybe you Leftists will wake up someday.
But keep it up. I enjoy the comedy!
Phil Graves: “Conservatives and libertarians clearly live in a fantasy land of their own creation where everything is covered in Nerf, insulating them from impacts from the real world. People who have been in the real world are liberals.”…..excuse me while I LMFAO!!!!!! The C & L you refer to do live in the real world. The real hard world where if we stumble we get back up and don’t cry for the government to support us. We aren’t the ones with a hand out for our welfare check. We aren’t the hollywood liberals who make tons of money and then go about telling others what to do. we don’t see government as our parents, always there to hold our hands. The people you mentioned with negotiated health care are prodominately LIBERALS. Not the C & L’s you whine about. Two things I come away with from your comments 1) you are poorly informed/educated and 2) you have been drinking way too much koolaid.
Single payer is the only acceptable form of national health care. This bill is a handout to ins. companies and deserves to die.
Phil Graves wrote: “Conservatives and libertarians clearly live in a fantasy land of their own creation where everything is covered in Nerf, insulating them from impacts from the real world. People who have been in the real world are liberals.”
LMAO! We just saw a year of “real world” leftists try to jam a radical agenda down the throat of a country that wants nothing to do with it, with citizens rising up all over the country in protest. Even Massachusetts voters have struck back with a vengeance.
The left has never been more out of touch with the real world than at any time in recent history.
Conservatives BECOME conservatives because they’ve had to deal with the real world, not the fantasy world inhabited by the left. Never has that been more apparent than now.
Ever hear the expression “A conservative is a liberal who’s been mugged”? Yes, that metaphor captures the distinction between left and right quite well.
Massachusetts voters were mugged by leftist dogma, and even THEY reject it.
The bill’s been dead for months but no one wanted to see it.
Come January 2011, Republicans will retake Congress and the infamous circular firing squads inside the Democratic party will begin. This is gonna get messy and it’s gonna get racial…real quick. My wife commutes to San Francisco on a train that runs through Oakland and it scares the hell out of me.
Fantastic. Finally they are forced to listen to the majority of taxpayers WHO DO NOT WANT THIS BILL TO PASS. Break it down into small elements. Listen to the other side and work together. Eliminate all deals to everyone. Keep the bill about improving health coverage.
Poor Nancy! Whatever can she and Harry *** do about this canundrum? So sad that their backrooms deals are gonna fall through and they worked SO HARD behind closed doors. And now they’re out of money (unless China will buy more debt) and they can’t lift the debt ceiling, oh oo hoo. NOW they want to go across party lines to try to salvage this thing. Tell them where to shove it.
If Nancy Pelosi can’t get this passed she won’t be Speaker in a year. She should be telling the Democrats that anyone who votes against the Senate bill will lose all their committee appointments.
This battle was lost when we let the media consolidate to 7 corporations, killed the fairness doctrine, and gave the public dialog away to the private companies that lease the airwaves.
Ever since then, the gullible have believed outrageous things that they’re told, supported by utter illogic and fear-laced rhetoric. I’ve watch the change from debate to propagandized brainwashing in my lifetime.
If you want something better, considering the most recent supreme court decicion extending corporate rights, try another country.
It’s over. If people can’t see that they’re sicker and poorer due to a terrible health care system, the facts all in their very own personal experience, it is really over.
Scott
News Reference
Are you really, really, really so ignorant? Do you really believe that the US army (or any other army) is “socialist”? Is there any possibility of a human being in this era being so ingnorant? Do you really know in what kind of society are you?
Well written post, looks brilliant on my iPhone as well.
Hey fantastic post.
Conerning VW lemons, have you heard of the Volkswagen Phaeton? Did you realize it’s basically a chopped up Bentley Continental GT? Sad, but true.
The VW Phaeton was a absolute fail in my opinion, the worst vehicle made by Volkswagen!
Its Dangerous: VW Phaeton is a fail!