Reconciliation will finish not with a bang but a whimper. Republicans know that they already lost the fight. They just want the whole process to be over.
Like We Said
by Tim F| 39 Comments
This post is in: Republican Stupidity, Yes We Did
Like We Said
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J.W. Hamner
You gotta give Coburn credit though… the “no [v-word] for sex offenders” amendment is pretty clever.
Persia
For once, we all agree!
Corner Stone
What this all about now?
Insurers Back Effort to Make Health Care Reform Succeed
dmsilev
There will, however, be lots of whimpering. The modern GOP is very good at whimpering, whining, wailing, etc.
-dms
gwangung
@Corner Stone: It’s either
“See, we told you it was a givaway to the corporations!”
or
“They’re making lemonade out of lemons.”
Take your pick.
joes527
Nah. The strategy at this point is to get democrats on record opposing the “Stop kicking puppies” amendment. (and as many similar amendments as they can dream up)
Is is all theater, but it has quite a while to run.
some guy
@Corner Stone:
The insurance companies would rather have people sign up for coverage and pay them a premium rather than have those people pay a fine to the IRS.
And the people with pre-existing conditions who had previously been denied coverage are going to be signing up for sure, so the insurance industry needs to get the healthy folks to sign up, too, to balance them out. Hence the marketing campaign.
General Egali Tarian Stuck
I think Ezra is likely right, that senate wingers won’t go all out to introduce hundreds of amendments to appear like they are basically shutting down the senate for other business. And there is a rule where the parliamentarian can make a ruling that that is what is happening and bring the recon. package to a vote. Albeit, that call being subjective to the parliam.’s judgment.
The wingers will introduce a fair number of amendments though, and for the purpose of including things like Coburn’s no medicaid for Viagra for sex offenders, meant to create fodder for 30 second campaign ads. And other stuff like that, because there will only be one minute of debate before voting on them one after another, making it impossible to know what the content is with no time to read the amendments.
Tom65
Good, now maybe Jane will STFU about trying to attach a PO to the bill. I’d like a public option too, but for shit’s sake stop with the petulance.
ellaesther
@Persia: I was just going to write “I kinda want the whole process to be over, too.”
As usual, we’re of the same mind!
geg6
@some guy:
This.
Gregory
Yes, and one thing that separates Republicans from Democrats is that the GOP can’t stand to think of themselves as losers (whereas many Democratic politicians, and of course the so-called “liberal media,” have internalized the GOP “Dem == loser” framing).
The GOP went all in on opposition, and it’s looking more and more like it was a historically bad bet.
soonergrunt
/Kilgore
Nick
@J.W. Hamner: If I were a Senator, what I would is introduce stand-alone legislation or amendments to the law that coincide with Republican amendments and give a floor speech that said “If Republicans really want these amendments, they can join me as cosponsors of this piece of legislation, rather than waste time with amendments to the reconciliation act. That is, unless, this is all bullshit and they’re just introducing these amendments to screw up our bill”
TR
I’d tell them to “close their eyes and think of England,” but the Brits have that evil soc!alized medicine, and it would only piss them off more.
comrade scott's agenda of rage
You sure as hell wouldn’t know it from the WaPo this morning. Of course since Shallaigh Murray is doing the piece, of course you’d expect it to parrot the right wing talking points of the moment.
Xenos
@J.W. Hamner: Hmmm… is there a problem with doctors prescribing V. to sex offenders?
Is he proposing to cross reference health care databases with sex offender databases? Is there any realistic enforcement mechanism being proposed here?
OK, silly questions to be asked here.
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
@Tom65: Nope, she won’t. She thinks this bill is a major fail, and can only be righted by attaching the PO, and sending it back to a thoroughly pissed off House.
Now, the question becomes, what would happen if a Republican proposed the PO as an amendment?
stuckinred
@soonergrunt: Who’s in charge here?
The Grand Panjandrum
I just hope Al Franken (or any Democrat for that matter) offers an amendment that bars subsidizing V1agara prescriptions for Representatives and Senators who get busted frequenting hookers. Seems only fair, eh?
Brian J
@some guy:
I remember reading something about this happening in Sweden when they were required to take customers/customers were required to sign up. They found that it formed a base from which to expand their businesses.
Man, I need to save these articles. If only I could remember where I read it.
Rick Taylor
__
Will it? After posturing this was the end of western civilization, won’t their own base turn on them if they treat it as anything less now?
Uloborus
@Corner Stone:
Gwangung pretty much summed it up. The bill is passed, and this looks like absolutely standard PR. Companies make the best out of new legislation even when they didn’t want it. Always have.
David in NY
Well, uh, it would be so obviously hypocritical, and the MSM would make such a big deal about that, and … oh, well …
Nevermind.
Violet
@Rick Taylor:
No. Their base is easily distracted by shiny objects. They’re already onto the next thing. Today they’re having to fight off the “you’re all a bunch of racists” comments, so they’re busy trying to find one non-white person to put in front of the cameras.
KDP
It strikes me that the appropriate solution for the Democrats is to wait a month and then propose those amendments that seem worthwhile [edit] in standalone legislation [/edit], but would cause issues with passing the reconciliation bill. Am I missing something, or wouldn’t this defuse the whole “we’re proposing amendments in order to get campaign ads” methodology?
@Nick: Never mind, what Nick said is what I meant.
TooManyJens
I still can’t get over the fact that a process called “vote-a-rama” is a real thing in the Senate.
ajr22
Obama was like cartman in the scott tenorman ep, playing 11 dimensional chess, and enjoying the winger tears. Lets just say he made them eat their parents. Chili con carnival 2010!!!
Martian Buddy
Just the other day, someone was saying that the right would need to find a new bogeyman. Vitter disagrees:
Just because ACORN’s dead doesn’t mean they can’t still be useful.
Martin
@Corner Stone: As I said repeatedly, many insurers were never totally against this, and some weren’t against it at all. The not-for-profits do alright in this setup. They aren’t wired to maximize shareholder profits and shit like that to begin with, and always saw their existence as a service to the public through the private sector. Their biggest worries have been that as costs (that they have to pay on claims) go up, their ability to provide a product gets harder. As they lose customer base, their company gets more and more fragile.
I know it’s temping to see what Aetna does and assume that they are representative of the industry, but they really aren’t. Maybe of the for-profit industry, but they see the world very very differently than a Kaiser or most of the BC/BS.
This bill will hurt the for-profits – no question. And it’ll get worse for them as Congress patches this bill up. The not-for-profits, they can do alright here. The Nebraska insurance exchange is pretty much just going to be Blue Cross/Blue Shield of Nebraska, with some other players thrown in, at least for a while because BC/BS owns 75% of that market because who the fuck wants to go and compete in Nebraska for maybe 200,000 customers against a company that has 75% of the market agreements already in place and a whole suite of products? What I expect we’ll see are some states with common demographics banding together to create multi-state exchanges so that Kansas and Nebraska form an alliance with two big players. I can see many of the New England states doing this. I can see many of the west and midwest states doing this. It’d work in the south as well, but the elected officials all seem fucking insane down there so I won’t hold my breath.
What lost the insurers was the glide away from cost containments toward insurance regulation, the fervent push for public options (the not-for-profits see themselves as a sort of public option) and increasing demonization of insurers as the problem. No question they are part of the problem, but there’s a LOT of blame to go around here, and they were concerned that it was all going to land on them. The insurers wanted to see more cost containment for prescription drugs, they wanted to see a shift toward critical care policies vs total care, or at least incentives toward high-deductible plans for non-critical care, and things like that. They really want to see the state regulation go away, and wanted more incentives for states to open up markets.
But it doesn’t surprise me at all to see the insurers go all-in on trying to make this work. The law puts all the real cost containment burden on them. If they fail to contain costs they know that at the very least there will be public options if not a full move to single payer. From their perspective – this has to work.
Martin
@Gregory: Remember, it was just a few years ago that they had a permanent Republican majority. Daddy promised them immortality and now they find they’re dying of ass cancer.
EconWatcher
Sorry to go completely OT. But if you care about human rights and basic decency, you might want to comment to the Department of Justice and your reps about the proposed guidelines to reduce prison rape:
http://www.lawyersgunsmoneyblog.com/2010/03/doj-opens-rulemaking-on-prison-rape
The big-ticket issues are (1) how much federal funding will be withheld from jurisdictions that fail to implement and enforce the guidelines (let’s hope a lot–looking at you, Texas); and (2) whether Congress will kick in some additional funding to help assure successful implementation.
In my opinion, our tolerance of the most brutal torture and soul-shattering humiliation imaginable in American prisons is scandalous. This is the time to do something about it. By the way, even the worst wingers in Congress have been OK on this issue (the original law passed unanimously), so don’t limit your calls to Dems in Congress.
Martian Buddy
@Belafon (formerly anonevent):
Didn’t the PO pass in the House once already? If so, and if the GOP could successfully attach it in the Senate, wouldn’t it be one of those “don’t throw us in that briar patch” deals?
J.W. Hamner
@Xenos:
I think it probably just highlights the (not uncommon?) belief that sex offenders should be castrated. The idea of them being allowed to purchase some… things that will likely trip the spam filter… is anathema. I don’t ultimately think things like this matter much, but it’s still fairly clever politics.
Jamey
Heh-heh. “Ass cancer.”
Sentient Puddle
Pulling this from Twitter, but in the spirit of the New Deal, can we deem health care reform the “Big Fucking Deal”?
Violet
@Sentient Puddle:
Mean Dean called it yesterday. Pretty big support for it here. Glad to see it hit Twitter.
Simp
I don’t think they want it to be over
Little Dreamer
@General Egali Tarian Stuck:
__
I’m thinking that me being in a prolonged drug induced state right around the time that these campaign ads start coming out might be a good thing. Hmmmm, I wonder how that can be arranged.