Reid says he wants a vote by Christmas, and has started the clock running, more or less, by putting HR 3962, the House bill, on the Senate calendar to begin debate on Tuesday. By then, the CBO should have scored whatever it was that Reid gave to them. We still haven't seen the melded Senate bill, and most speculation about what it contains beyond broad outlines has been just that, speculation. The only specific that we know is that it contains an opt-out public option. So that's a good place to start the discussion.
Ben Nelson says he'll block any bill that has a public option that looks like the House bill. Technically, the opt-out doesn't look like the House version of the public option, so his filibuster threat may or may not expand to include it. He's likely to continue to hold out, undoubtedly enjoying his position of being kowtowed to on this. He does, however, risk taking on the odor of the skunk at the picnic he's now associated himself with, Joe Lieberman. Once a Democrat starts throwing around a filibuster threat on a bill that is as critical to Democratic success as this one, he may as well become the second member of the Connecticut for Lieberman Party.
As for the remainder of the ConservaDems, no one is saying anything definite yet. Lincoln, Pryor, Landrieu and Bayh are all remaining uncommited, at least publicly, most using the excuse that they want to wait to see what the CBO scores say about the bill as a whole, and the public option in particular. In the meantime, Landrieu seems to be floating an idea almost as ridiculous as the useless Carper triggered co-op. A "private" public option that "would use federal seed money to fund an insurance plan that would eventually be run and operated by a private board." Yeah, that's a recipe for the prudent use of taxpayers' dollars. If it was truly regulated and truly non-profit, maybe it could really work, but what's the chance of this Senate actually supporting the language that would make it work?
And then there's the worst public option idea ever, Carper's triggered co-op, kept secret in fear that the scary liberal activists would kill it before the full Democratic caucus could realize it's brilliance. Good luck with that one.
Via Jon at FDL, First Read is speculating that Reid's going to try to head-fake the left, publicly pushing for the opt out public option while behind the scenes engineering a "compromise" a la Snowe's trigger or Carper's triggered co-ops. Now it's just speculation, but it's not out of the realm of possibility speculation. He's working furiously to find a compromise that will work, and if you're trying to compromise with the likes of Ben Nelson, half a loaf is more than you can even dream of getting. Echoing Jon, we're not gonna be fooled by that one, not when other options for enacting real reform exist.
On to the other potential sticking point, abortion. After an initial, uninformed and hasty embrace on the part of some Senate Democrats, and after Obama declared that Stupak was unacceptable, the initial support has been walked back.
Even Bob Casey has changed course from his initial vow to help Ben Nelson put Stupak on the Senate floor, saying through a spokesman he believes "health care reform should not be used to change longstanding policies regarding federal financing of abortion which has been in place since 1976." Of course, he could be counting on Nelson to do his dirty work for him, but symbolically this is major since Bob Casey is the face of pro-life Democrats. It's also an indication of what clear direction from a president can do on contentious issues: Casey issued this statement after Obama made clear that Stupak's Coathanger amendment was unacceptable.
The Senate's pro-choice Democrats are already working on staving off Nelson's Stupak attack, and have critical support.
On Tuesday, several women in the Senate, including Barbara A. Mikulski of Maryland and Dianne Feinstein of California, both Democrats, met to come up with a strategy for resisting major new restrictions on abortion...,
Senator Tom Harkin, Democrat of Iowa and chairman of the health committee, also said the House had gone too far. "I fear that the House-passed language," Mr. Harkin said, "will effectively prevent women from receiving abortion coverage under the new health exchanges, even if they are using their own money to buy insurance."
Mr. Reid said he believed a deal could be struck. "We’re going to continue to work with pro-choice folks, pro-life folks in the Senate and come up with something that’s fair and reasonable."
But if Ben Nelson seems determined to be a roadblock, and that roadblock is likely to be where these two issues converge. Yesterday, David W. speculated on the horse trade that could happen in the wake of the House passing that crappy, crappy Stupak amendment.
It's a plausible enough trade. As Marcy Wheeler theorized in an e-mail exchange, so long as the Senate side dynamics still appear to revolve around Olympia Snowe (R-ME). Snowe's both pro-choice and an opponent of the public option. So it makes for a great play: win Snowe's support, win the thanks of progressives who are at least picking up hints about the removal of the Stupak language in conference, and be rid of the public option and the nascent but pesky progressive bloc that had begun to coalesce around it.
That result, though, would represent something of a bailout of a permanent, professional pro-choice advocacy community that's become "too big to fail," even when they're caught flat-footed and do nothing in the way of preparation to fight the biggest and most visibly telegraphed attack on their position in decades. Meanwhile, outsider startup advocacy and legislative strategy efforts finally beginning to find their way and actually learn to enter the game have their first tiny win (if it is one) flushed down the toilet for big advocacy's comfort.
Add Ben Nelson into the mix now. Nelson's anti-choice and an opponent of the public option. He refuses to budge on his own Coathanger amendment unless the public option is stripped. Team Snow and Nelson up together, and the fix is in and there's no more public option. The left is fighting on two fronts, the establishment choice groups on the single issue, the grassroots/netroots/activist coalition on both. We're going to be told to make a Sophie's choice, sell out women, or sell out the only real hope of eventual affordable, universal coverage. Both groups are going to end up hugely dissatisfied and completely disengaged and a really crappy bill that doesn't help the vast majority of Americans passes and they call it reform. A formula for electoral disaster for Democrats.
Or Reid and Obama get serious about passing something real. Obama can say once and for all what an acceptable public option will be, preferably using the House's model, and start using the power he demonstrated on the Stupak issue and start lobbying for this. And Reid can do what should have been done the minute Lieberman warbled his first threat, and start threatening back by vowing to split the bill and use reconciliation to pass the public option, using the regular process on the other parts of the bill.
What is really essential in the Senate bill? The insurance reforms. Hell, throw in the repeal of the anti-trust exemption to make that look more serious. But since the regulatory structure for enforcing those reforms is unlikely to be up to the task, the other necessary ingredient is a mechanism for making those reforms stick through market forces--the public option, designed to provide competition to keep them honest. Pass the first bill through regular process, pass the second through reconciliation. Or kiss an effective bill, one that will make people actually want to vote for you, goodbye.