Through TPM, I learned that Congressman Nadler, who has been among the House liberals who have dismissed the Senate bill and have demanded changes even in the wake of Scott Brown's victory, issued a statement that suggests that the caucus is looking to find ways to complete the legislation rather than run for the hills.
http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/...
Nadler said,
"....we must not let....the election results in Massachusetts, cause us to abandon comprehensive health care reform. We must instead negotiate an agreement with the Senate to pass a few key changes to the Senate bill through the reconciliation process so that both Houses can pass a comprehensive bill."
He then goes on to say that the popular insurance reforms should be put into a separate bill and dare the GOP to filibuster, and pass other items through reconciliation.
The good news from this report is that Nadler has moved away from the ridiculous Weiner-Grijalva view of killing the bill and starting over. This suggests that the liberal caucus has been getting an earful from rank and file Dems (not the political junkies) who want to see something get done now.
The bad news is that Nadler's proposal is wholly unrealistic. If the Senate bill has good reforms in it, why not just simply pass the bill now with one vote, and then use reconciliation to fix the financing issues at a later date (say the FY 2011 budget bill or a supplemental FY 2010 bill)? Why would you allow popular reforms to become a political football that you know the GOP will filibuster when you have the opportunity right in front of you to take 1 vote and provide people health insurance that they would not otherwise dream of having in this lifetime unless they moved out of the country. Why is Congressman Nadler more interested in finding ways to blame the GOP for HCR failure when he has it within his power to make it a success irrespective of what the GOP does?
The answer is simple: Congressional Democrats are more interested in covering themselves with a big CYA band-aid than doing what is right for the people or what they promised to do when the won election in 2008.
I want to encourage Nadler's steps in the right direction, but he has not come to where we need the caucus to reach in order to do the right thing and pass the Senate bill now, without delay. The 100,000 voters in Massachusetts (Scott Brown's margin of victory) should not have an effective veto over the desires of 40 million uninusured Americans and millions more who struggle to pay their medical bills. That is effectively what is happening right now.
I also single out the President for a profound absence of leadership. He advocated for and celebrated passage of the Senate bill. Since Scott Brown won, all we hear from him is crickets. If the bill was good the day before Scott Brown's win, it is still good the day after and a real leader would get up on a podium and demand that the House give an up or down vote on the legislation that he believes is vital for the country. If Obama is not willing to make such a demand, then it does not speak well to the man's sense of conviction in the face of rather mild adversity. If there was ever a time for Obama to make that 3 AM call to Hillary or to Bill, now is that time.
We lost one special election. Big deal. That's politics. We won an election in Alaska by fluke and we lost one in Mass by fluke. A GOP controlled government would not be wetting their pants as the Democrats are if this had happened to them during the middle of a debate on a signature GOP issue. This is about whether Democrats can govern. This is about whether Obama can lead. This is about whether Democrats are going to fight for the people who voted for them, for the uninsured, for the middle class, or whether they are going to run to the hills and invite the GOP to take over.
Keep pushing your members of Congress to vote for the Senate bill. Paul Krugman has provided the most succinct argument as to why that needs to happen.