Obama and Dems to go it alone on health-care reform, if GOP refuses to compromise

[Random]

Or maybe "start over" means, "You put this thing together behind closed doors, without involving us. Rather than try to edit YOUR bill, why don't we ALL put a bill together collectively -- one that has our input from the beginning rather than begrudgingly including it at the end? A genuine bipartisan effort rather than a Democrat effort with a bipartisan tweak?"

What “together collectively”? Despite numerous Democratic requests for ideas and proposals, the Republicans haven’t put forward anything coherent, much less useful, in months. I mean, they go to meetings with their base and say they will oppose any Dem plan regardless of what is in it, then go on the Sunday talk shows and complain of not being given input. How are you supposed to have a football game when all one side does is sit at the sidelines and complain that they are not being allowed to play, even when they are invited to?

The Dems need to put together the best healthcare package that can get a majority in the House and 51 votes in the Senate then put it forward. When the Republicans filibuster, Dems should make them filibuster. If the Republicans can put together a package that gets a majority in the House and 51 votes in the Senate, go with that one. Nothing gets done until this gets taken care of.

 

[thaiboxerken]

Or maybe "start over" means, "You put this thing together behind closed doors, without involving us. Rather than try to edit YOUR bill, why don't we ALL put a bill together collectively -- one that has our input from the beginning rather than begrudgingly including it at the end? A genuine bipartisan effort rather than a Democrat effort with a bipartisan tweak?"

Well, everything you said there is a lie. Democrats made every effort to get Republicans in on the deal.

 

[rwguinn]

Well, everything you said there is a lie. Democrats made every effort to get Republicans in on the deal.

Ah, yes. The old:
"We are going to do it OUR way, and you will go along" compromise.
Great Britain tried that once...

 

[thaiboxerken]

Ah, yes. The old:
"We are going to do it OUR way, and you will go along" compromise.
Great Britain tried that once...

No, that's not was the Democrats did. They invited the Republicans to give their own ideas and explain their objections to ideas that the GOP didn't like. They asked for the GOP to be a part of the process, not just to go along with it.

Try again.

 

[rwguinn]

No, that's not was the Democrats did. They invited the Republicans to give their own ideas and explain their objections to ideas that the GOP didn't like. They asked for the GOP to be a part of the process, not just to go along with it.

Try again.

Wrong answer, but thank you for playing.

 

[thaiboxerken]

Wrong answer, but thank you for playing.

I don't know where you live, but you obviously haven't been paying attention to what's happening in US Government lately.

Republican Senator Jim DeMint declared he would do everything in his power to kill health care reform. He said kill it, not actually to make it work or give good ideas towards it, just to kill it. Adding:
"If we’re able to stop Obama on this it will be his Waterloo. It will break him,"

Republican Senator InHofe: I just hope the President keeps talking about it, keeps trying to rush it through. We can stall it. And that’s going to be a huge gain for those of us who want to turn this thing over in the 2010 election.

Inhofe also revealed why the GOP strategy to “slow down” health care is really an effort to “kill it.” “If he is unsuccessful — which I anticipate and will predict he is — on getting a vote prior to the August recess, then I would say there’s no way in the world they’re going to get this done this year,” said Inhofe. “And next year would not be any easier.”

 

[AvalonXQ]

Well, everything you said there is a lie. Democrats made every effort to get Republicans in on the deal.

... everything except include them in the meetings, address any of their ideas, or -- well, anything.

 

[thaiboxerken]

... everything except include them in the meetings, address any of their ideas, or -- well, anything.

Well..no. You are wrong. They invited them to meetings. Not only did they address ideas, but they places some Republican ideas into the bill as well. You can have your own opinions, but you can't change the facts.

 

[Random]

... everything except include them in the meetings, address any of their ideas, or -- well, anything.

The Republicans were invited to all sorts of meetings, they just didn’t go.

Now I can understand believing that a policy should be opposed at all costs. If they oppose Obama’s healthcare policy that violently, that is their opinion (IMO it’s not Socialist enough). Dems used a similar oppose/resist/non-negotiating strategy to defeat Bush’s Social Security destruction plan. But the Dems didn’t whine about not being given a seat at the table after rejecting one.

 

[Thunder]

Ah, yes. The old:
"We are going to do it OUR way, and you will go along" compromise.
Great Britain tried that once...

so you believe that when Obama asks the Republicans to help make contributions to the three current plans, and help make subtractions...he is actually LYING?

 

[AvalonXQ]

The Republicans were invited to all sorts of meetings, they just didn’t go.

Can you tell me about these meetings?
Is this where the Democrats said, "You Republicans go to Meeting A, where we will pretend to listen to your ideas; in the meantime, we'll be having Meeting B by ourselves, putting together the actual bill"?

 

[AvalonXQ]

To quote America's Right:

“We’ll have that meeting,” Connecticut Democrat Sen. Christopher Dodd said yesterday of today’s health care summit at the Blair House. “But far more important, after that meeting, you can either join us or get out of the way.”
Ahh, bipartisanship.
In his opening remarks at today’s summit, President Barack Obama said that he was encouraged by what he called a “show of bipartisanship” in the U.S. Senate when four Republicans–including Massachusetts’ own wino-replacing RINO, Scott Brown–voted in favor of what the Democratic Party leadership said was a “jobs” bill. Again, it seems that the president does not seem to understand that true bipartisanship doesn’t come at the end of the legislative process when a few misguided members of the minority party joins the majority — true bipartisanship starts at the beginning of the process, starting with an exchange of ideas before anything is on paper.
And, to me, that’s the crux of the Democrats’ legislative misunderstanding when it comes to health care reform. We already know that they refuse to listen to and fail to understand the American people; by continuing to dangle the prospect of reconciliation, and by saying things like “you can either join us or get out of the way,” it’s obvious that today’s meeting–something that should have occurred at the start of the process rather than one year and nearly 3,000 pages of legislation later–is little more than political theater.

 

[Minadin]

Other interesting quotes:

"Mr. President, the right to extended debate is never more important than the one party controls Congress and the White House. In these cases the filibuster serves as a check on power and preserves our limited government."

"You've got majority rule and then you have the Senate over here where people can slow things down where they can debate, where they have something called 'the filibuster.' Eh, you know it seems like it's a little less than efficient. Well that's right. It is. And deliberately designed to be so."

"The Senate is being asked to turn itself inside out -- to ignore the precedent, to ignore the way our system has worked, the delicate balance that we have obtained that has kept this constitutional system going -- for immediate gratification of the present president."

"Why have two chambers? What were the framers thinking about 218 years ago? They understood, Mr. President, that there is a tyranny of the majority."

Of course, those are all comments made by Democrat senators in 2005, when they wanted to filibuster a judicial nominee. Back then, they were calling reconciliation 'the nuclear option'. The above quotes are from Harry Reid, Hillary Clinton, Hillary Clinton again, and Chris Dodd.

Of course, there are many, many more basically accusing the Republicans of attempting exactly what they propose to do now with regard to health care.

Here are some more of my favorites:

A change in the Senate rules that really I think would change the character of the Senate forever. And what I worry about would be that you essentially still have two chambers, the House and the Senate, but you have simply majoritarian, absolute power on either side, and that's just not what the Founders intended.

We are on the precipice of a crisis, a constitutional crisis. The checks and balances which have been at the core of this republic are about to be evaporated by the nuclear option. The checks and balances which say that if you get 51% of the vote you don't get your way 100% of the time. It is amazing. It's almost a temper tantrum.

The nuclear option, if successful, will turn the Senate into a body that could have its rules broken at any time by a majority of senators unhappy with any position taken by the minority. It begins with judicial nomination, next will be executive appointments, and then legislation.

This nuclear option is ultimately an example of the arrogance of power. It is a fundamental power grab. I say to my friends on the Republican side: You may own the field right now, but you won't own it forever, and I pray God when the Democrats take back control we don't make the kind of naked power grab you are doing.

 

[Thunder]

Rasmussen polls show a majority of Americans do not like the plan Obama released on Monday. If after Obama and the Dems release their FINAL plan, and a good 60% of the USA still hate it, I really don't know if its such a good idea to pass it anyways.

 

[Random]

Of course, those are all comments made by Democrat senators in 2005, when they wanted to filibuster a judicial nominee. Back then, they were calling reconciliation 'the nuclear option'. The above quotes are from Harry Reid, Hillary Clinton, Hillary Clinton again, and Chris Dodd.

Of course, there are many, many more basically accusing the Republicans of attempting exactly what they propose to do now with regard to health care.

No, reconcilation is a budgetary manuever. It has nothing whatsoever to do with judicial nominees.

"The Nuclear Option" of 2005 was a palimentary manuever where someone would raise a point of order with the head of the Senate, then Dick Cheney, and ask him to clarify how many votes are needed to end debate (a cloture vote). The correct answer is 60, but in the Nuclear Option, Cheney would deliberately lie and say 51 (or some other number of Senators that the Republicans had). There would be a quick majority vote on whether the ruling was correct, then it would become the new rule. The GOP would then have a cloture vote where they only needed 51 votes to stop debate, then the "up or down vote" on the nominees.

Reconciliation is a budgetary process that limits time for debate on certain budget issues. There are several limitations to its use and what it can be used for.

Here and now, the GOP has taken to renaming the reconcilation process the "Nuclear Option" then going back and finding quotes of Democrats in 2005 opposing the "Nuclear Option". Kind of like redefining child molestation as "privatizing Social Security" then looking back at Republicans talking about Bush's Social Security poilices.

 

[AlBell]

Rasmussen polls show a majority of Americans do not like the plan Obama released on Monday. If after Obama and the Dems release their FINAL plan, and a good 60% of the USA still hate it, I really don't know if its such a good idea to pass it anyways.

I can't believe I agree with you, but I do.

Our problem remains: There is no final bill, so no one knows what's in it. If it's another 2400 pager, few ever will know what's in it, until some provision effects them negatively in some unexpected way.

 

[Thunder]

I can't believe I agree with you, but I do.

Our problem remains: There is no final bill, so no one knows what's in it. If it's another 2400 pager, few ever will know what's in it, until some provision effects them negatively in some unexpected way.

well, lets see what the FINAL compromise bill will be, and what the polls say about it.

if 55% of more of America still says NO...then...it may not be wise for Obama and the Dems to go ahead with it.

 

[Skeptic]

I, for one, don't understand why the democrats don't do what both common sense, public opinion, and the good of the country tells them.

People, quite correctly I think, DO want Congress to help solving some of the problems with health care, because American health care's got serious problems. But they DO NOT want this stinker-of-a-bill, because it doesn't solve them.

Why not declare, in effect: "this bill sucks, it is dead. Let us instead work on specific problems with health care and see what we can do to improve it"?

 

[Minadin]

No, reconcilation is a budgetary manuever. It has nothing whatsoever to do with judicial nominees.

"The Nuclear Option" of 2005 was a palimentary manuever where someone would raise a point of order with the head of the Senate, then Dick Cheney, and ask him to clarify how many votes are needed to end debate (a cloture vote). The correct answer is 60, but in the Nuclear Option, Cheney would deliberately lie and say 51 (or some other number of Senators that the Republicans had). There would be a quick majority vote on whether the ruling was correct, then it would become the new rule. The GOP would then have a cloture vote where they only needed 51 votes to stop debate, then the "up or down vote" on the nominees.

Reconciliation is a budgetary process that limits time for debate on certain budget issues. There are several limitations to its use and what it can be used for.

Here and now, the GOP has taken to renaming the reconcilation process the "Nuclear Option" then going back and finding quotes of Democrats in 2005 opposing the "Nuclear Option". Kind of like redefining child molestation as "privatizing Social Security" then looking back at Republicans talking about Bush's Social Security poilices.

It's basically the same thing - they're trying to subvert the normal processes of the senate and avoid the filibuster with a questionably legal parliamentary maneuver. This isn't a budget bill. This is a normal piece of legislation. Reconciliation shouldn't be in play; it shouldn't even be an option. But they're going to change the rules and push it through in such a manner - the same sort of strong-handed tactics that they were accusing the republicans of just a few years ago.

Oh, but it was a constitutional crisis back then, it was going to ruin everything! Naked power grab!

 

[Minadin]

well, lets see what the FINAL compromise bill will be, and what the polls say about it.

if 55% of more of America still says NO...then...it may not be wise for Obama and the Dems to go ahead with it.

Parky, we should sit down as a country / forum / government and decide what the issues are - what we agree on and what we don't. Not about solutions, just about the problems.

Then, we need to carefully look at the problems and try to figure out what possible causes and remedies might be. I don't think you'll find many republicans who disagree with the idea that health care in america should be of a high quality while remaining affordable and accessible to just about everyone. Those are good goals. The main beef is in the method, and the logic of the method, which is currently proposed.

I believe that the intentions are mostly good, I just think that the one-track-mind solution of having the government run it and mandate this-and-that while imposing taxes and penalties and even potentially jailing people, just isn't the answer.

But that's all a subject for another thread. I wonder if we could even have a worthwhile brainstorming session here.