[PAA-Discuss] FW: Reich: TIME TO ENACE HEALTHCARE WITH 51 VOTES

Fri Feb 26 12:16:20 EST 2010

GOOD INFO. Lee Loe

  _____  

From: Harrry Kiely [mailto:hckiely at comcast.net] 
Sent: Tuesday, February 23, 2010 4:17 PM
To: Undisclosed-Recipient:;
Subject: Reich: TIME TO ENACE HEALTHCARE WITH 51 VOTES

 <http://readersupportednews.org/>  
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Time to Enact Health Care With 51 Votes

<http://readersupportednews.org/component/comprofiler/userprofile/By%20Rober
t%20Reich,%20Robert%20Reich%20Blog> By Robert Reich, Robert Reich Blog    
23 February 2010 

<http://www.facebook.com/sharer.php?u=http%3A%2F%2Freadersupportednews.org%3
A80%2Fopinion%2F39-health-care%2F1076-time-to-enact-health-care-with-51-vote
s&t=Time%20to%20Enact%20Health%20Care%20With%2051%20Votes&src=sp>  Share 
 Portrait, Robert Reich, 08/16/09. (photo: Perian Flaherty)
<http://readersupportednews.org/images/stories/article_imgs/486-opinion-reic
h-081609.jpg> 

Portrait, Robert Reich, 08/16/09. (photo: Perian Flaherty)

  <http://readersupportednews.org/images/stories/alphabet/rsn-T.jpg> his
week the President is hosting a bipartisan gab-fest at the White House to
try to tease out some Republican votes for health care. It's a total waste
of time. If Obama thinks he's going to get a single Republican vote at this
stage of the game, he's fooling himself (or the American people). Many
months ago, you may recall, the White House and Dem leaders in the Senate
threatened to pass health care with 51 votes - using a process called
"reconciliation" that allows tax and spending bills to be enacted without
filibuster - unless Republicans came on board. It's time to pull the
trigger. 

Why haven't the President and Senate Dems pulled the reconciliation trigger
before now? I haven't spoken directly with the President or with Harry Reid
but I've spent the last several weeks sounding out contacts on the Hill and
in the White House to find an answer. Here are the theories. None of them
justifies waiting any longer. 

1. Reconciliation is too extreme a measure to use on a piece of legislation
so important. I hear this a lot but it's bunk. George W. Bush used
reconciliation to enact his giant tax cut bill in 2003 (he garnered only 50
votes for it in the Senate, forcing Vice President Cheney to cast the
deciding vote). Six years before that, Bill Clinton rounded up 51 votes to
enact the Children's Health Insurance Program (CHIP), the largest expansion
of taxpayer-funded health insurance coverage for children in the U.S. since
Medicaid began in the 1960s. Through reconciliation, we also got Medicare
Advantage. Also through reconciliation came the COBRA act, which gives
Americans a bit of healthcare protection after they lose a job
("reconciliaton is the "R" in the COBRA acronym.) These were all big,
important pieces of legislation, and all were enacted by 51 votes in the
Senate. 

2. Use of reconciliation would infuriate Senate Republicans. It may. So
what? They haven't given Obama a single vote on any major issue since he
first began wining and dining them at the White House. In fact, Senate
Minority Leader Mitch McConnell and company have been doing everything in
their power to undermine the President. They're using the same playbook
Republicans used in the first two years of the Clinton administration,
hoping to discredit the President and score large victories in the midterm
elections by burying his biggest legislative initiative. Indeed, Obama could
credibly argue that Senate Republicans have altered the rules of the Senate
by demanding 60 votes on almost every initiative - a far more extensive use
of the filibuster than at any time in modern history - so it's only right
that he, the President, now resort to reconciliation. 

3. Obama needs Republican votes on military policy so he doesn't dare
antagonize them on health care. I hear this from some quarters but I don't
buy it. While it's true that Dems are skeptical of Obama's escalation of the
war in Afghanistan and that Republicans are his major backers, it seems
doubtful R's would withdraw their support if the President forced their hand
on health care. Foreign policy is the one area where Republicans have
offered a halfway consistent (and always bellicose) voice, and Dick Cheney
et al would excoriate them if they failed to back a strong military presence
in the Middle East. This is truer now than ever. 

4. Reid fears he can't even get 51 votes in the Senate now, after Scott
Brown's win. Reid counts noses better than I do, but if Senate Dems can't
come up with even 51 votes for the healthcare reforms they enacted weeks ago
they give new definition to the term "spineless." Besides, if this is the
case, Obama ought to be banging Senate heads together. A president has huge
bargaining leverage because he presides over an almost infinite list of
future deals. Lyndon Johnson wasn't afraid to use his power to the fullest
to get Medicare enacted. If Obama can't get 51 Senate votes out of 58 or 59
Dems and Independents, he definitely won't be able to get 51 Senate votes
after November. Inevitably, the Senate will lose some Democrats. Now's his
last opportunity. 

5. House and Senate Dems are telling Obama they don't want to take another
vote on health care or even enact it before November's midterms because
they're afraid it will jeopardize their chances of being reelected and may
threaten their control over the House and Senate. I hear this repeatedly but
if it's true Republicans have done a far better job scaring Americans about
healthcare reform than any pollster has been able to uncover. Most polls
still show a majority of Americans still in favor of the basic tenets of
reform - expanded coverage, regulations barring insurers from refusing
coverage because of someone's preexisting conditions and preventing insurers
from kicking someone off the rolls because they get sick, requirements that
employers provide coverage or pay into a common pool, and so on. And now
that many private insurers are hiking up premiums, co-pays, and deductibles,
the public is even readier to embrace reform. 

So what's been stopping Obama from using reconciliation? Even if some of the
arguments held water before now, none does any longer.

My free advice to the President: If you want to get healthcare enacted you
must use reconciliation and quickly. Host your bipartisan gab fest at the
White House on Thursday. Tell Republicans you've been eagerly awaiting their
ideas for over a year, but the American public can't wait any longer.
Explain to them how our current economic mess is directly related to the
health care mess - we're paying 16 percent of our GDP for health care while
health insurers are hiking rates and Americans are losing their health
insurance every day. Then tell the House and Senate to get to work on
putting their bills together (or tell the House Dems to enact the Senate
bill and then save their disagreements for reconciliation), and tell Harry
Reid you want the Senate bill on a fast track of reconciliation.

Explain to the American people you understand their impatience. The
Constitution does not require 60 votes in the Senate to pass legislation. A
majority will do. That's called democracy.

<http://robertreich.org/post/402861360/its-time-to-enact-health-care-with-51
-senate-votes> Open Article On Originating Site

Robert Reich is Professor of Public Policy at the University of California
at Berkeley. He has served in three national administrations, most recently
as secretary of labor under President Bill Clinton. He has written twelve
books, including "The Work of Nations," "Locked in the Cabinet," and his
most recent book, "Supercapitalism." His "Marketplace" commentaries can be
found on
<http://marketplace.publicradio.org/collections/coll_display.php?coll_id=201
02&refid=0> publicradio.com and iTunes.

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