And this is precisely why the Senate should have no other business until the debt ceiling vote. Alright, who wants to vote against the liver? Anyone against the liver? Next, the kidney. One or a pair? How about one lung, one kidney? Can we agree on that civilly?
On the one hand, Republicans have had a major role in shaping [the healthcare reform, financial regulation, and climate change bills]. On the other hand, they haven’t had to vote for these bills, and so they could cleanly campaign against legislation that a member of their party helped write. And as an added bonus, Democrats are stuck trying to defend a bill that their base doesn’t like very much and that’s thick with compromises that annoy political elites.
Bernie Sanders’ “Audit the Fed” amendment passed today:
The 96-0 vote came after Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) modified an earlier version of the audit legislation that was strongly opposed by the White House and Federal Reserve. They argued the amendment would compromise the independence of U.S. monetary policy.
By this margin, even noted fucktard Orrin Hatch can declare himself “satisfied” that it is “good for the country.”
Likewise Ben Nelson, who was irrevocably aboard way back at 70 votes. The era of partisan bickering must be over.
NYT reports:
Senate Republicans ended three days of resistance on Wednesday and said they were ready to allow debate of legislation to overhaul regulation of the nation’s financial system. The Republicans, who were gathering to make their formal decision, appeared to back down after Democrats threatened to keep the Senate in session through the night to dramatize the the standoff.
It’s almost as though making them talk is a strateegery that might, you know, work.
But, of course, we’ll face the same exact obstructionist horse-shit whenever debate is declared “over” and a move to end it is taken. What then? Won’t somebody tell me what to do then?!?
Make them vote against the bill. No compromises, no walk-backs, no changes.
I’ll say it again, there are TWO CHOICES here. You vote for cloture or you talk about why you are not voting for cloture. Forever. Or until you vote for cloture. Your choice.
You then are rewarded with two similar choices: you vote for the bill or you vote against it. Period.
We have nothing else to do until November of 2010. We plan to make you eat shit every day until then either way. No breaks. Oh, Senator Bunning, you say you need to take a shit? Well, we’re pretty likely to move at that point too.
Of course, it must be noted that the prior paragraph has absolutely no meaning to the Democrat.
Mitch McConnell reports that he’s “heartened to hear that bipartisan talks have resumed in earnest” and, in response, Harry Reid says “I’m happy to hear my counterpart, my friend, Senator McConnell talk about the need for more negotiations. We don’t stand in the way of that.”
Now they’ll just repair to the negotiating table and make some laws! Finally, everyone will stop with the brazen lies about the financial reforms package! Truly it is a new day!
Or not.
Honestly, how many fucking times does this have to happen? The GOP as currently constituted is against it. “It” being anything the Democrat wants to do. Period. They love the idea of “negotiations.” It extends the sausage-making indefinitely. The American people hate the sausage-making. Anything that avoids bringing the bill to the floor in a decisive manner is a win for the GOP. This is why they keep on with the “back to the drawing board” jibber jabber. They want everything back at the drawing board. Forever.
Make them vote against the bill. No compromises, no negotiations, no changes, no fixes. Make them vote against the bill. To do that, you’ll also need to make them filibuster the bill. To do that, you’ll need to make them talk 24/7 about filibustering the bill. That is how you hurt the GOP. Make them stand up there and talk about the need to save Wall Street from scary scary regulations when all they ever did to us was drive the global fucking economy into the ditch and are aiming to do so again, posthaste. Make them talk, if necessary from now until the 2010 midterms. That, or they file a vote against cloture and we try again. More talking about how great Wall Street art. Two choices, no waiting.
All that back-room, closed-door, no-debate, unconstitutional wrangling has produced this epic fail of an outcome:
CBO has finished its work [scoring the “fix” sidecar and final healthcare reform bill] and will release the official preliminary score later today. But here are the basic numbers: The bill will cost $940 billion over the first 10 years and reduce the deficit by $130 billion during that period. In the second 10 years – so, 2020 to 2029 – it will reduce the deficit by $1.2 trillion. The legislation will cover 32 million Americans, or 95 percent of the legal population.
To put this in context, that’s more deficit reduction than either the House or Senate bill, and more coverage than the Senate bill.
But, by all means, let’s talk about the horror of “deem and pass” some more. Likewise, let’s attack and mock folks with Parkinson’s disease who currently can’t get insurance or afford treatment. Why can’t they all just exhibit some ‘Merican can-do attitude and Go Die in the Streets? And, for God’s sake, keep the Guvmint out of my Medicare!
Yglesias wants to know:
If Mitch McConnell & co were really so sure that passing health reform would be a political loser for Democrats and that organizing around repeal will be a big winner, then wouldn’t they be making it easier to pass the damn bill?
It’s not that if McConnell believed what he said he’d be voting for the bill. But if your opponents are determined to inflict a wound on themselves, why not just let them, in a procedural sense? Why not stop the bitching and moaning about reconciliation? Why not stop talking about gambits to stick the reconciliation process up?
Because the GOP true-believers know that if anything is potentially more destructive to The Democrat (as party in charge) than either passing or failing to pass something, it’s the spectacle of a slowly unfolding legislative FAIL itself (regardless of outcome; the long process is, in and of itself, a failure).
People hate the process of our government more than anything. The outcome, whether good, bad, or indifferent really is beside the point. The longer ‘Merica is forced to watch Washington in the act of gridlocking itself, the better the GOP thinks it looks. And the GOP is completely an unalterably right about this one thing. As Clinton once said, “It’s better to be strong and wrong, than right and weak”; these slow-rolling legislative fits are, to the polity at large, completely indistinguishable from weakness, both in terms of legislative will and of ideas. And, of course, the beauty is that the GOP is entirely responsible for the slow-roll and will never, ever be made to pay a price. Period. As in: Not in this lifetime. Just how it is. Like gravity.
The Democrat, utterly unaware of any of this for reasons that are beyond unclear, acts as a both implicit and explicit enabler of this sort of behavior. Again and again. And wonders why it gets the same results.
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Senator Judd Gregg holds forth on reconciliation. On March 16, 2005. Rest assured that, more in sadness than in anger, he’s changed his mind on this completely and unalterably on the subject.
Thus by my admittedly simple classification scheme, this would suggest that 14 of the 19 times reconciliation was used between FY1981 – FY2005, it was used to advance Republican interests. Or, to put this more precisely, it was used to advance bills that were signed by Republican presidents or vetoed by Democratic presidents.
Scott Brown, local imbecile, said through a spokesman yesterday that:
If the Democrats try to ram their health-care bill through Congress using reconciliation, they are sending a dangerous signal to the American people that they will stop at nothing to raise our taxes, increase premiums and slash Medicare. Using the nuclear option damages the concept of representative leadership and represents more of the politics-as-usual that voters have repeatedly rejected.
The problem is that using reconciliation is neither “the nuclear option” (that’d be this, a technique both invented and brandished by one Grand Old Party) nor is the use of said reconciliation in any way unprecedented, either in terms of budgetary measures (precisely the reason the damned thing was created in the first place) or healthcare reforms (which often are entirely or nearly entirely budgetary issues). NPR provides us with a partial listing of the many uses of reconciliation in recent years:
1982 — TEFRA: The Tax Equity and Fiscal Responsibility Act first opened Medicare to HMOs
1986 — COBRA: The Consolidated Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act allowed people who were laid off to keep their health coverage, and stopped hospitals from dumping ER patients unable to pay for their care
1987 — OBRA ‘87: Added nursing home protection rules to Medicare and Medicaid, created no-fault vaccine injury compensation program
1989 — OBRA ’89: Overhauled doctor payment system for Medicare, created new federal agency on research and quality of care
1990 — OBRA ’90: Added cancer screenings to Medicare, required providers to notify patients about advance directives and living wills, expanded Medicaid to all kids living below poverty level, required drug companies to provide discounts to Medicaid
1993 — OBRA ’93: created federal vaccine funding for all children
1996 — Welfare Reform: Separated Medicaid from welfare
1997 — BBA: The Balanced Budget Act created the state-federal childrens’ health program called CHIP
2005 — DRA: The Deficit Reduction Act reduced Medicaid spending, allowed parents of disabled children to buy into Medicaid
Conveniently left off that list are several that are specifically damaging to the GOP’s case for grievance here. Like both of the Bush tax cuts. Reconciliation. Additional oil drilling courtesy of W. Reconciliation. Medicare Part D (aka W Bush’s unfunded cost explosion). Reconciliation. Various W trade authorities. Reconciliation. And, of course, there’s this hypocrisy that’s never mentioned by the MSM:
the very senators who speak reverentially of the filibuster now, voted for reconciliation then. Judd Gregg, in fact, voted for reconciliation every time it was used in the Bush era.
Lemkin 