Liberals face obstacles in the Senate for the public option in the healthcare plan

October 28, 12:04 PMJacksonville Republican ExaminerPatrick McMahon

Previous Next

1 comment Print Email RSS Subscribe

Subscribe

Get alerts when there is a new article from the Jacksonville Republican Examiner. Read Examiner.com's terms of use.

Email Address   Include other special offers from Examiner.com Terms of Use

 Liberal members of the Democratic Party, both in and out of Congress, are facing a major obstacle towards the inclusion of a government run healthcare plan in the reform legislations being considered. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi both have expressed support for the public option and are including it, at least for now in any legislation brought for debate. While Nancy Pelosi can almost certainly force any bill through the House of Representatives, Harry Reid is facing a tougher task in the Senate. While the House is majority rules, the Senate has the filibuster in which debate can never end without 60 votes.

The Republicans have 40 senators, with Maine’s Olympia Snowe being the only member of the GOP to express interest in crafting the bill. Since Reid decided to include the public option, Snowe has taken a significant step back and will not support legislation with that in it. Along with her, several moderate Democrats are either up for grabs or opposed to the idea. Senator Joseph Lieberman of Connecticut, who is technically an Independent, but still caucuses with the Democrats, has said he will support a Republican filibuster of a public option. Many Democrats will insist that he is not one of them, but let’s remember that Al Gore chose this man as his running mate on the Democratic ticket in 2000. Other Democrats have expressed strong reservations including Blanche Lincoln and Mark Pryor of Arkansas, Ben Nelson of Nebraska, Mary Landrieu of Louisiana, and Evan Bayh of Indiana. If Republicans can hold their own and pick off one or two of these senators than Democrats will be forced to abandon their public option plan and work towards an actual bipartisan healthcare bill.

All of this is coming before the Congressional Budget Office comes out with their assessment about how much it will cost the tax payers. Let’s be real, any substantial legislation will either raise the deficit or raise our taxes. President Obama has pledged not to sign any bill that will raise the deficit, so it will be interesting to see how Democrats will manage to navigate that when the time comes. We are several weeks away, at best, before any legislation is even considered, which also does not bode well for Democrats. If the vote for healthcare reform is held in 2010, any moderate who is facing a tough reelection fight will most likely vote against it, rather than endanger their seat. The window is closing quickly for the Democrats, and let us hope that it closes rather quickly before the government decides to further expand.