Leadership?
In case you were blissfully unaware that the House of Representatives will hold its 37th Obamacare repeal vote on Thursday, the House of Representatives will hold its
37th Obamacare repeal vote on Thursday. In case you're wondering, yes, President Obama
would veto the bill [pdf] should the unthinkable happen and the bill not only get onto the Senate floor for a vote, but be passed there. Which isn't going to happen, but here's what the White House says, anyway:
The last thing the Congress should do is refight old political battles and take a massive step backward by repealing basic protections that provide security for the middle class. Right now, the Congress needs to work together to focus on the economy and creating jobs.
If the President were presented with H.R. 45, he would veto it.
As further indication of how ridiculous this ongoing one-sided fight is, the nonpartisan CBO is
not going to waste its time scoring the bill, which would take several weeks of staff time. Instead, they point to past evaluations of Obamcare repeal (there are plenty of them) and reiterate that repeal would
cost the nation a minimum of $1.3 trillion for the 2013–2022 period. Another thing that's different this time around, is that Democrats will be
fighting fire with fire, targeting 10 Republicans who are wasting time and taxpayer money on this with robocalls to voters in their districts.
The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee is paying for the calls, which according to a script obtained by Yahoo News, will warn voters that Republicans support putting "insurance companies back in charge of your health care."
“The Republican Congress is scheduled to vote tomorrow to put insurance companies back in charge of your health care and repeal vital consumer protections and benefits that you’ve earned," the voice on the call will say. “And your Congressman might be part of the problem. Tell [your congressman] to stand up for middle class families here in California—and don't help the Republican Congress give insurance companies more control over your life." [...]
The calls will go to voters in the districts of Reps. Chris Gibson and Michael Grimm of New York, Reps. Frank LoBiondo and Jon Runyan of New Jersey, Reps. Gary Miller and David Valadao of California, Reps. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen and Bill Young of Florida, Nevada Rep. Joe Heck, and New Mexico Rep. Steve Pearce.
The argument should have some heft, particularly if Democrats start talking about the math of these votes, as the
New York Times has done. They figured out that Thursday will be "at least the 43rd day" a Republican-led House has spent on repeal. Because they've only actually held votes on 281 days in the past 29 months, that means "Republicans have spent no less than 15 percent of their time on the House floor on repeal in some way."
And there's still no jobs bill.