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GOP senator freezes health care debate
Is this what passes for wanting to debate? Insisting on reading an amendment that has no chance of being part of the bill , aloud, by the clerks?
At least Sanders had the sense to pull his own amendment rather than let it be politicized by a group of folks with not interest in debating the actual health care bill.
http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/12/16/health.care/
WASHINGTON (CNN) -- As Democrats scrambled to meet self-imposed deadlines, Senate Republicans froze the health care debate for at least a day Wednesday by insisting that a 767-page mega-amendment be read out loud in its entirety.
The move was poised take 12 hours or more and grind Senate business to a halt for the day. It also threatened Democrats' ability to pass a health care bill before Christmas.
Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Oklahoma, set things in motion about lunchtime Wednesday. As the Senate moved to a sweeping single-payer amendment by Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vermont, Coburn objected to the common Senate procedure that waives the actual out-loud reading of the proposal.
"I would ask that the amendment be considered as read," Sanders said on the floor.
"I object," Coburn instantly responded.
Senate clerks began with the table of contents and took turns reciting the rest of the bill.
Coburn defended the tactic in a written statement, saying that Americans should hear competing proposals and that the health care debate needed to slow down.
"It's unfortunate that [Majority Leader Harry] Reid waited until the last minute to introduce his bill and now wants to rush it through the Senate," Coburn wrote.
Reid's office responded by pointing out that the move pushes back votes on other time-sensitive bills, including funding for the military.
"The only thing that Sen. Coburn's stunt achieves is to stop us from moving to the [defense] appropriations bill that funds our troops," Reid spokesman Jim Manley said in an e-mailed statement. It's "not exactly the kind of Christmas gift that our troops were expecting from Dr. No."
"Dr. No" is a common Democratic nickname for Coburn, a conservative physician adamantly opposed to most Democratic initiatives.
A Republican leadership aide said the amendment reading is an example of many tools the party has at its disposal and one they may use again.
Another opportunity is coming soon. Reid has yet to unveil the language for a compromise amendment, which is expected to be lengthy and would also take considerable time to read out loud.
Meanwhile Wednesday, several influential organizations urged passage of health care legislation in the face of growing liberal discontent with what many Democrats believe is now a watered-down Senate bill.
Representatives of the AARP, Consumers Union and the Service Employees International Union, among others, pushed for quick Senate passage of Majority Leader Harry Reid's sweeping $848 billion plan.
"Our organizations are here to say, 'Move the process forward,' " said Ron Pollack, head of the progressive group Families USA.
Reid's measure "has many important provisions that improve the availability and the quality of health care for Americans," said DeAnn Friedholm of the Consumers Union, which publishes the magazine Consumer Reports.
"We urge the Senate to move forward to keep working towards the many vital improvements not just in access, not just in cost but also in quality and safety."
The new push came one day after former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean -- a former presidential candidate and past head of the Democratic National Committee -- ripped the Senate Democratic leadership's apparent decision to eliminate both a controversial government-run public health insurance option and a provision allowing 55- to 64-year-olds to buy into Medicare.
"This is essentially the collapse of health care reform in the United States Senate, and honestly the best thing to do right now is kill the Senate bill and go back to the House," Dean said in an interview with Vermont Public Radio posted on its Web site.
Liberal Democrats are increasingly angry with compromises that have been made in an effort to get the 60 votes needed to end Senate debate on the bill and proceed to a vote on final passage.
Unanimous Republican opposition to health care legislation so far means Senate Democrats need the backing of all 60 members of their caucus. Final Senate passage would require only a simple majority of 51 votes.
Most of the liberal anger has been focused on Connecticut Sen. Joe Lieberman. An independent who caucuses with the Democrats, Lieberman has been viewed as the main obstacle to the majority party's efforts to get the health care bill passed by the Senate before Christmas.
He threatened over the weekend to join a GOP filibuster if the bill contains either the public option or the Medicare expansion.
President Obama met with Senate Democrats on Tuesday and urged them to accept a compromise and pass the bill.
"The final bill won't include everything that everybody wants. No bill can do that," he said. "But what I told my former colleagues ... is that we simply cannot allow differences over individual elements of this plan to prevent us from meeting our responsibility to solve a longstanding and urgent problem for the American people."
Obama insisted that "any fair reading" of the Senate bill showed that it meets the administration's criteria of lowering costs and expanding coverage while not adding to the federal deficit.
The Medicare buy-in was part of a package of provisions Reid announced last week as an alternative to a public option, which lacked enough support among Democrats to break a GOP filibuster.
Negotiated by a team of 10 Democratic senators -- five liberal and five moderate -- the compromise package had been hailed by Reid, Obama and others as an important step forward in the health care debate.
The package also would allow private insurers to offer nonprofit health coverage overseen by the government. But many senators have reserved judgment on the compromise proposal until the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office provides its analysis of how much it costs.
The estimate was expected to be completed as soon as Wednesday.
If the Senate eventually passes a health care bill, its version will have to be merged with the version the House of Representatives passed in November, which includes a public health insurance plan. The final bill would then need approval from both chambers before going to Obama to be signed into law.
Obama and Democratic leaders have said they want the bill completed this year. The Senate would need to finish its work this week to leave a realistic chance of meeting that schedule.
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Originally Posted by Think for myself
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