HEALTH CARE REFORM In The Budget Is BRILLIANT!!! (Can't Be Fillibustered!!!)

[Beetwasher]

Does everyone get what Obama is doing? Budgets can't be fillibustered. You only need a simple majority to pass. By putting money for health care reform in the budget, Obama takes the obstructionist Repub pigs out of the equation. They can't block it, they can't water it down, they can't make demands and there's no need to negotiate w/ them about anything.

Fuck you Repubs!! Health care reform is going to happen w/ out you!!! :rofl:

[scheming daemons]

1. Is it true that budgets can't be filibustered?

I've never heard that before.

It's great if true.

[Bill219]

3. from wikipedia....

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Filibuster

Current practice

Filibusters do not occur in legislative bodies in which time for debate is strictly limited by procedural rules. The House did not adopt rules restricting debate until 1842, and the filibuster was used in that body before that time.

Budget bills are governed under special rules called "reconciliation" which do not allow filibusters. Reconciliation once only applied to bills that would reduce the budget deficit, but since 1996 it has been used for all matters related to budget issues.

A filibuster can be defeated by the governing party if they leave the debated issue on the agenda indefinitely, without adding anything else. Strom Thurmond's attempt to filibuster the Civil Rights Act was defeated when Senate Majority Leader Mike Mansfield refused to refer any further business to the Senate, which required the filibuster to be kept up indefinitely. Instead, the opponents were all given a chance to speak and the matter eventually was forced to a vote.

[avaistheone1]

2. This sounds too good to be true.

I so hope you are right. :fistbump:

[karynnj]

4. Thank you for posting this

This is a MAJOR thing and it makes it far more likely to pass!

[Froward69]

5. YAY!!!

[flaminbats]

6. budgets can't be filibustered...

but they are not like Medicare and Social Security, budgets are only temporary. The good news being, Democrats only need a bare majority to pass it..The bad news being that if Republicans retake Congress or the White House, universal health care can be taken away just as easily.

Hopefully this budget will let everyone get the same health care members of Congress and federal employees now have, but this will only last as long as Democrats have a majority.

[Beetwasher]

7. Once In Place

It would be EXTREMELY difficult to remove. Let them try to explain taking away health insurance from tens of millions of Americans. If they ever get in the majority again, doing that would ensure they weren't in the majority after the following election.

[flaminbats]

11. I agree..which is why this first step is essential

If Republicans won Congress in 2010 and dismantled universal healthcare in 2011, they would pay a huge price in 2012! But if Republicans began to support it in 2010, and pushed for something even more progressive on healthcare reform in 2012..the Grand ole party might even earn a second chance.

[avaistheone1]

12. deleted message

[backscatter712]

19. That's the key.

Give proper, decent health care to the people for 3+, maybe 7+ years, and if the Rethugs retake the .gov, they don't dare take it away, lest they face down torches and pitchforks.

Granted, they'll pull a Norquist, cut its budget, put assclowns in charge and try to mismanage it into oblivion - the whole starve-the-beast-and-drown-it-in-the-bathtub technique. That will cause a decent amount of misery...

[JohnnyBoots]

8. And if the Right wins, healthcare reform will be taken apart faster than the

solar pannels Carter had put on the White House that Reagan had torn down, just to say fuck you the the Left. One step forward and two steps back.....usual political game.

[asphalt.jungle]

10. but that's something they would have to campaign on getting rid of

and if the people want to allow that to happen then they deserve whatever happens after that.

the reason republicans don't like these things introduced in the first place is that they know that reversing them is much harder than it seems. what they would try to do is mess with the funding, appoint idiots to oversee it and make the public angry with the program and see it as a failure.

[avaistheone1]

15. It would be difficult to take away once in place because even the republican

base supports single-payer universal health coverage. I guess the republcan little people figured out it would be better to have universal health coverage than to watch their families get sick and die without insurance. (good thinking}

Whoa! So now the repuke law-makers don't have a leg to stand on if they try to withdraw this program. Poor, poor, repukes legislators. :spank:

[damonm]

14. IF the right wins...

..which they won't, in 2010, we have this little thing called the PRESIDENTIAL VETO.
On the WAY off chance the Rethugs get Congress back after we get this health care reform passed, they'll STILL need a 2/3rds majority in BOTH houses to override an Obama veto.
And that is NOT. GONNA. HAPPEN. Not anytime in the next decade.

[flaminbats]

20. a budget needs both a majority vote and a signature..

but unlike Medicare and Social Security, temporary appropriations are not financed by a separate payroll tax or treated as untouchable trust funds for politicians to keep their hands out of!

So Congress could produce budgets without universal health care, but even countless vetoes from Obama wouldn't stop millions from losing such a benefit. I believe it would put a hypothetical Republican majority in the hot seat when 2012 rolled around.

[damonm]

24. Reread the Constitution.

For the budget to become law, it must have a signature from the President. If the president vetoes the budget bill, it must then be ovderridden by 2/3 majority in BOTH houses of Congress.

Every bill which shall have passed the House of Representatives and the Senate, shall, before it become a law, be presented to the President of the United States; if he approve he shall sign it, but if not he shall return it, with his objections to that House in which it shall have originated, who shall enter the objections at large on their journal, and proceed to reconsider it. If after such reconsideration two thirds of that House shall agree to pass the bill, it shall be sent, together with the objections, to the other House, by which it shall likewise be reconsidered, and if approved by two thirds of that House, it shall become a law.

(1) The Rethugs are NOT going to get Congress back any time soon.
(2) I don't expect the Rethugs will have a 2/3 majority in EITHER house in my lifetime.

Even IF they were to regain Congress, a Democratic president would veto that bill so fast the air would crackle, and say he's going to continue to veto the budget so long as that provision is there.

If the Rethugs want to force a government shutdown over it, LET THEM. After all, it worked SO well for them in 1996...

[flaminbats]

25. overriding a veto is harder than ending a filibuster..

61 votes in the Senate are needed to break a filibuster on universal health care, 2/3's vote in both houses would be nearly impossible with a budget that included universal health care.

I'm not arguing against universal health care, but it isn't much of a safety net if it needs to pass Congress every single year! In the short term there needs to be changes in insurance law to protect buyers with preexisting conditions, and in programs like COBRA to lower the premiums and increase benefits to a reasonable level.

Then Obama would have a fall back plan for health care reform in case plan A doesn't pass. But we must never base our reforms on the expectation that Democrats will always control Congress or that Republicans are learning about morality.

[damonm]

29. Granted.

We're not always going to be in a majority - but we will be for some time to come. What can be done now is to put healthcare through as is being done through the budget - until we have the filibuster-proof majority in the Senate, which (if current trends continue) will happen in 2 years. Kit Bond is going away in MO, and Robin Carnahan is currently the front-runner for the seat, just to name one example of a red seat likely to go blue.
At that point, more permanent steps can be taken, such as those you point out.

[quakerboy]

17. have you every given a kid a lolipop

and then taken it away. for no apparent reason?

better yet, have you ever thrown a bag of meat scraps to a pack of starving heyenas, and then taken it away for no apparent reason?

If it goes into effect, and the pubs do take a majority and end it, fuck if that won't be the end of them. T'would make the last 2 elections seem like child's play.

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

18. Which is why it is important to keep our majority in Congress

Give us, say, four to six years to implement and have everyone get used to universal health care. Then dare the GOP to take it away.

[mzmolly]

22. I think Republicans fear being placed in that position?

They don't want Americans to get used to the reality of Universal Health Care vs. the myths they perpetuate about it.

[tridim]

9. Someone pinch me

35 days in and Obama is already exceeding my expectations, expectations that were already sky high.

Take this with the 'Holder to end Federal cannabis raids' story and today is nothing short of a progressive's dream.

[ClarkUSA]

13. Amen and hallelujah. Obama is definitely "a progressive's dream"

He ain't no pandering timid DLC centrist selling us down the river.

Or as Pat Buchanan said with dismay last night on MSNBC: "Obama is a down-the-line liberal!"

That's right, Pat. Enjoy the next eight years of progressive liberalism. I know I will. :rofl:

[tritsofme]

16. Its my understanding that budgets are just a framework that must be funded by

appropriation bills.

Budgets authorize spending, the appropriations process actually release federal dollars.

Could they still attempt to filibuster appropriation bills to thwart reform?

[AlinPA]

21. That is the way I understand it. The senate appropriation bill would be subject to

a 60 vote cloture before final vote which would then require a simple majority.

[crimsonblue]

26. They usually put appropriations into Omnibus bills

The politicial price of filibustering an omnibus bill is not something the GOP wants. Hell, the senate routinely uses omnibus bills to defeat anonymous holds by senators.

[uponit7771]

27. Yeah, but the reThugs cut off thier noses to spite their faces daily. They answer to big business...

...not middle class America the most so they need to keep their constituents happy

[crimsonblue]

28. The GOP is pretty much fucked.

I think Obama learned from the Stimulus Bill and included every possible little thing he wanted or needed into his budget proposal. This will give the GOP some "yay us" moments for reducing the total budget, but the GOP simply does not have the numbers to make a substantial impact. I think and hope the Democratic leadership in Congress learned from the GOP obstructionism.

[LynneSin]

23. Obama is so damn smart

:woohoo:

[Born_A_Truman]

30. Anyone seen the plan?

I thought he put together a panel to get a health care reform package sent to him. What is in the budget?