Anything happen Sunday? I turned on the TV and saw Karl Rove yelling at someone (turns out it was David Plouffe he was trying to shout down.) Tells
you everything you need to know.
Dana Milbank:
"Hell, no, you can't!" Boehner shouted at the Democrats.
"No, you can't! No, you can't!" echoed the protesters outside.
But they could. And at 10:45 p.m., after 14 months of trying, 219 Democrats finally did.
NY Times:
Mr. Obama’s push for the health care overhaul has been the hallmark of his presidency.
Democrats said that in taking a big step toward guaranteeing every American health insurance, they were creating a new program every bit as important as Social Security and Medicare.
Ross Douthat:
This newfound confidence has been palpable throughout the health care debate. Yes, liberals have wrung their hands over the compromises required to pass the bill. But nothing has dislodged their fundamental assumption — an assumption straight out of the golden age of ’60’s liberalism — that a bill this costly, this complicated and this risky can be made to work, so long as the right people are in charge of implementing it.
As a conservative, I suspect they’re wrong. But now that the bill has passed, as a citizen of the United States, I dearly hope they’re right.
The alternative, glossed over by Douthat, remains unacceptable.
Ezra Klein:
Health-care reform is focused on another group: the working class. People with jobs, but not jobs that are good enough to offer them health-care benefits. People with paychecks, but who aren't making quite enough money to bear the cost of insurance. People who're buying insurance on their own, which means they don't get the good deals that big employers get, and they don't get a giant tax break to help them out. But these aren't lazy people, or layabouts. These are people who've been left behind in the system. We spend a lot more money to give a lot more help to a lot of folks who need it less than this group does. ...
These are the folks health-care reform is meant to help. The fact that they can't afford insurance, though, isn't evidence of some abdication of personal responsibility. It is evidence that they're not old, or very poor, or employed by a large corporation that offers health-care insurance. It is inevitable enough that health is not fair, but it is not inevitable that the health-care system acts with similar capriciousness. And if Democrats win tonight's vote, it will no longer be the case.
John Nichols (The Capital Times, Wisconsin):
Today, Social Security is so integrated into the fabric of American life that even conservatives defend it, just as they one day will defend national health care. Notably, that health care program was first proposed not by Barack Obama or Bill Clinton but by FDR, who announced in 1939 that "a comprehensive health program (is) required as an essential link in our national defenses against individual and social insecurity."
Roosevelt was proven right with regard to Social Security in his time.
Roosevelt will be proven right with regard to national health care in our time.
Joshua A. Tucker, NYU:
And so begins the shift in the narrative of the Obama presidency: from the lost year to the man who succeeded where Democrats have failed for decades, against all odds, whose methods looked doom to fail but now look brilliant in retrospect, etc. etc. I doubt very strongly that any seats will be lost over this vote, or at the very least any more than would have been lost from "incompetent Democrats can't accomplish anything" narrative that would have dominated the campaign had the bill failed. My guess: if the economy gets worse (or even fails to get better) between now and November, Democratic seat losses will probably be exacerbated in the fall. If the economy gets unexpectedly better, Democratic seat losses will be minimized. But a legislative accomplishment of this magnitude should inspire the base, which, if anything, should help in the fall.
Greg Dworkin (answering "Pelosi's triumph on health care?"):
A Pelosi triumph? I noted last week that this strong speaker was underestimated and under-credited. I predicted that when the bill passed, that would change. By the way, you really need to compare Republican rhetoric today with that which they said after Social Security passed (anyone besides Dana Milbank remember Alf Landon?) And you need to highlight the racial epithets hurled at the Congressional Black Caucus Saturday at health bill protests (confirmed by Eric Cantor on This Week – yes, it happened, and it’s disgraceful. It doesn’t matter that George C. Wallace voters don’t like the 21st century, progress and change happen regardless.) I am looking forward to passage Sunday in a historic vote. Millions of the uninsured, under insured and poorly served need this bill. And while you watch, remember John F Kennedy’s comment: victory has a thousand fathers....
Times Leader (Wilkes Barre PA) editor and publisher:
As concerned as I am about the future economic impact of this new bill, I also know it is time to stop grousing and second-guessing. The bill appears to be reality and it’s now time we all get on with our lives and our businesses.
We’ve faced bigger challenges than how to pay for the new health care reform.
It’s best we accept it and go back to work.
And I also believe we should acknowledge the fortitude and leadership the president showed to enact historic legislation and lead reform of health care.
History will now record if his leadership was prescient or ill-conceived.
WaPo:
Congressional Republicans rallied Tea Party activists to oppose the health-care legislation on the verge of being approved by Congress even as party leaders began to look beyond Sunday's vote to campaigning against the reform in the fall elections.
That would be the tea party that hurls racist epithets and homophobic slurs at members of Congress.