House Liberals To Pelosi: “We Cannot Support The Senate Bill. Period.”

[tekisui]

Source: who runs gov

In a private meeting in the Capitol just now, a dozen or more House liberals bluntly told Nancy Pelosi that there was no chance that they would vote to pass the Senate bill in its current form — making it all but certain that House Dems won’t opt for this approach, a top House liberal tells me.

“We cannot support the Senate bill — period,” is the message that liberals delivered to the Speaker, Dem Rep Raul Grijalva told me in an interview just now.

Some had hoped Pelosi would push liberals to get in line behind this approach, in hopes of expediting reform, but that didn’t appear to happen in this meeting. Pelosi mostly listened, Grijalva said, adding: “We didn’t get any declarative statement from her.”

The meeting, which was polite but blunt in tone, underscores the degree to which Dems are scrambling to figure out a way forward on health care in the wake of last night’s loss. The unwillingness of liberals, and some in labor, to support passing the Senate bill means House Dem leaders need to find another way forward — fast — and leadership aides are scouring procedural rules as we speak.

Tellingly, House liberals also urged Pelosi to consider passing individual pieces of reform through the House as individual bills, and sending them to the Senate to challenge the upper chamber to reject them, Grijalva tells me. Liberals said this approach would be preferable to passing the Senate bill.

more: http://theplumline.whorunsgov.com/health-care/house-liberals-to-pelosi-we-cannot-support-the-senate-bill-period/

[xchrom]

1. Good. Nt

[county worker]

4. I'll second that "good!"

[Name removed]

2. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Edweird]

12. You have it exactly backwards. Passing this bullshit RW bill will kill the Dems.

[CreekDog]

3. If Bernie Sanders can vote for that so can you

I'm sorry the White House screwed this up for you, but there are things in the Senate Bill that need to be enacted --you know that.

The best you are going to be able to do is maybe fix them through reconciliation.

It took a year to get here, the current congress will not exist in a year.

You are going to have to swallow hard and pass what you can or it's simply not going to happen.

(i was a big fan of yours when you were on the Board of Supervisors in Pima County --but you are wrong here)

[county worker]

5. Better a turd than nothing right?

Take any good parts of this bill, tack them on to some appropriation bill and kill the damn thing!

[frazzled]

6. They've said that before

Remember the letter with all the signatories who vowed never to vote for a bill that didn't contain a public option? Um, they voted for it.

I remember calling my Congressman, Danny Davis, to ask him why he didn't sign that letter, because, even if I knew it was a longshot, we needed the leverage to get the pubic option. And they told me he was NOT going to sign it, and handed me over to one of his legislative aides. This guy told me that the Congressman was not going to put his name to a pledge he didn't know he could keep. He was not going to throw the whole health care bill out. I was mad, but walked away at least thinking, well ... he's worried about keeping his promises, and knows your word means something.

Frankly, the progressive caucus is losing it's credibility with these threats. If they kill health care reform, they are going to be in hot water, and they know it. And because it will bring every single Democrat down with them, I think they will probably decide to cross this line in the sand, too.

[BootinUp]

7. Sounds like it might be dead then

but I won't be surprised when they change their mind.

[DisgustedInMN]

8. A line in sand, maybe?

I certainly hope so. An excellent way to see how the DINOs will deal with the new reality.

[OHdem10]

9. Hang Tight, Liberals. Good for you. Someone has to be sane in

this time.

[hvn_nbr_2]

10. "Some had hoped Pelosi would push liberals to get in line"

When I see "Some had hoped Pelosi (or Obama) would push the conservadems to get in line," I'll know that it's time for ice hockey in hell.

[amborin]

11. K&R and, email Pelosi now and say no senate bill:

http://www.speaker.gov/contact/

[bvar22]

13. Stand Firm.

Kill this bill.
Pass a Stand Alone on the Pre-Existing Conditions.
Pass a Stand Alone removing the Anti-Trust exemption.

THEN, work on expanding Medicare.