Here is what the "kill the bill if it isn't everything I want" crowd looks like

[Kurt_and_Hunter]

I am a little shocked that the WH and congress didn't immediately fall behind passing the Senate bill in the House.

The establishment has been hammering us for months with the "pass anything or thousands will die," "the perfect being the enemy of the good," "nothing is perfect but this is historic legislation," etc..

And they won me over. They got me to the point where I accept that the senate bill is, despite it flaws, a great step forward.

Reality dictated that the senate bill would be 99% of the final bill and I became okay with that. Any bill is a good bill... we need a bill... there is so much good in the bill...

And now they bail on me!

Suddenly the grown-ups just "can't" pass the senate bill because it isn't pure enough? Or because passing it might hurt Republican feelings? Or because the bill isn't super popular and this is an election year?

Fuck that! You said everyone would die and we'd lose all our elections if we didn't pass an imperfect bill.

So pass the damn Senate bill.

This is posted before we have heard anything from the House Dem caucus meeting. I hope that Pelosi will march out an hour from now and announce they're going to pass the only broad HCR measure they can possibly pass at this point.

__________

Update added on edit:

Just a Chat
Josh Marshall | January 21, 2010, 11:04AM

According to Majority Leader Hoyer, at the House Dems caucus meeting this morning, the leadership presented no plan or options for moving forward to get reform passed.

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/2010/01/just_a_chat.php?ref=fpblg

[Deep13]

1. I agree. nt

[daa]

2. No way

They should do what Dr. Dean said on Bill Press this morning. Like lower Medicare to 55, expand Medicaid and some others and then have a bill that gets rid of things like pre-existing conditions and make the repugs vote no, or it passes bi-partisan.

Dean laid out the percentages of voters that voted for Obama and then Brown and they were very disaffected by health care, not strong enough, they wanted a public option. Passing crap now will only further enrage the electorate.

[butterfly77]

5. That is why we,,,

can't get anywhere too many cooks in the kitchen. We need to just pass it and add on this is why the President can't put his full effort into a jobs bill along with some of the other things he has to deal with.

A lot of our problems have been people like Bill Press and Ed not knowing when to shut up. Yes,they have had some good points at certain times in the debate but,a some point they weren't doing anything but helping the republicons..

We have too much to do.

[daa]

19. As Howard Dean has been pointing out

the poll on the MA election shows dems are not doing what the people want on health care and those that voted for Obama AND now Brown want more action and a public option, not the bill you are pushing. Look, they screwed around for a year and got it wrong big time. VA, NJ, MA, there is a message there.

[Clio the Leo]

3. Hopefully they're deciding to do that....

.... at the Caucus meeting that's going on now.

[Kurt_and_Hunter]

10. Well, onto Plan C. I can't wait.

[CTyankee]

4. But part of what the MA election has taught us is that the Dems who stayed

home and the indies who voted for Brown don't think the Senate bill is "real change" and want it killed. We need exactly these voters with us, not against us in the fall elections. And they are telling us that the Senate bill is not real reform and they want it killed.

I was exactly where you are before MA. Now I think we have a fresh opportunity to take another look at expansion of Medicare. It doesn't require setting up some clanking creaky new structure and can be gotten through more efficiently in the House.

Maybe what was deemed impossible before MA now stands before us as a golden opportunity. The public polling has shown the public behind this idea and the overall idea of a public option. Clearly, this election shows us that the public, at least in MA, don't think what was passed by the Senate is a good thing andhas too many drawbacks and compromises.

Time to reassess...

[Jennicut]

8. They don't want health care killed completely, they want it changed.

The conservadems are going to bring down the party. The filibuster rules have to be changed to get anything done because while we have a majority, it is without the conservadems.

[CTyankee]

20. I think if we stripped out the desirable parts and somehow get them passed in

whatever parliamentary move possible, that would be great. As I see it there would have to be insurance coverage for children, an immediate creation of health care for those sick, uninsured people who are at high risk and expansion of Medicare for those 55-64. These three items don't get us to universal coverage or individual mandates but they would help.

Do you think this is doable? Desirable?

[DrToast]

6. I don't remember the House agreeing to pass the Senate bill

Even before Brown won.

If there still a chance to fix it, and there is, why not do that?

[johan helge]

7. Hear, hear.

Krugman says "the Senate bill would save tens of thousands of lives, save many Americans from financial catastrophe, and partially redeem us from the shame of being the only advanced nation without some kind of universal care" (http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/01/19/plan-b/).

If this is true, and of course it is (Krugman's not an idiot), then of course the bill is better than nothing, and should be passed.

[JVS]

9. My favorite part about "pass anything or 45,000 a year will die" is their reform kicks in AFTER 2012

Should we thus conclude that they want to kill 135,000 people for the sake of winning an election?

[Inuca]

11. Enough already with this!!!

You sound like Cornyn or a whole bunch of other Rs on the Senate floor back in December. Many important provisions were supposed to kick in right away and had you bothered to get informed you would have known that.

[JVS]

12. I'm sure Cornyn was pissed as hell at the lack of the public option.

:eyes:

[Inuca]

13. No, he was not

But he WAS claiming that nothing except taxes will happen until 2012. That was my point.

[fadedrose]

14. The House doesn't trust the Senate or WH

They are being promised that the bill would be made better after it was passed, and they won't buy.

My problem is that I listened to EVERY speech that the President made and he always blamed the insurance companies for the health care problems we have in this country. Then these same insurance companies are more or less put in charge of the Health Care Reform rules - making the rules, changing them, adding them, etc., and I dread that as much as the House., Sure, they can't deny coverage or cancel coverage, but they would be able to change interpretation and cost of coverage.

[NorthCarolina]

15. I don't trust them either. eom

[treestar]

16. I thought it was the House Progressives who were preventing that?

And should they not be cheered on by the progressives here? :wtf:

[Kurt_and_Hunter]

17. You thought wrong

The death-blow was when House centrists turned on the bill after the MA result.

The idea that the progressives could or would actually block anything is hilarious. They talk tough, is all.

[treestar]

18. The Progressives are wimps too?

Who would have thought it?

I'm sure the centrists are.

[Phx_Dem]

21. That's what I've heard, "member of the progressive caucus just can't

get past some of things in the Senate bill." XM POTUS channel this morning.

[treestar]

22. I am waiting for the DU progressives to praise these Democrats for having courage

And take responsibility for the 45 million people who will do without insurance.

This after all takes "courage" and that's what they want to see. I think these congress members deserve to have their courage admitted.

[TheKentuckian]

23. Is this bargaining or denial?

This thing has been dead or should have been since the Senate passed their Profit and wealth care and protection bill while "laying down the law" on the co-equal branch that it was their way or no way.

State pools
taxing benefits
"wellness" visits to allow further extraction of resources
preserved anti-trust
same bogus excuse for cutting off paid benefits intact
forbids exclusion but at three times what the rate would be plus I would imagine anything they can squeeze out from the "wellness" visit
nothing to address afordability and in fact provides incentives for cost shifting
personal mandate without choice for most citizens

and it goes on and on

We failed to even approach quality, affordable, and accessible health care for all.