You know who else is probably happy tonight? Martha Coakley

[liberalpragmatist]

... who now is a benign footnote, instead of the woman who inadvertently killed HCR and destroyed Obama's presidency.

[Clio the Leo]

1. If ONLY she had shaken some hands..... NT

[DrToast]

2. ...and had a truck! (nt)

[Clio the Leo]

4. ... and had just the SLIGHTEST understanding of baseball. NT

[HughMoran]

3. Maaatha!

She's still busting heads as AG of Mass, believe it or not she barely missed a beat!

[liberalpragmatist]

5. Good for her

And I'm sure she's as happy as anyone to NOT have her known primarily as the woman who killed health care.

[saltpoint]

6. If she isn't on vacation...

[Hippo_Tron]

7. Actually I think it all worked out for the best

Trying to reconcile House and Senate bills in conference would've meant that we were again at the mercy of Joe Lieberman and Benator. Finally Reid did what he should've done months ago and decided to pass at least some of this through reconciliation.

[karynnj]

8. Not to mention, it did give some power to Democrats who also thought

the special deals were a problem and not only looked bad, some were indefensible. The resulting bill when the fixes are passed will be a better bill than we might have gotten otherwise.

Not to mention, after Brown's election, Nelson was on record saying that he would have insisted on the Stupack language in the conference report to assure his final vote. If they had 60 Democrats, they might not have considered the unusual route they took of two separate bills. In addition, they might have been reluctant to remove all the deals.

I'm sure they would have preferred a Democrat, but I don't think the Democrats will lose enough Senate votes to lose the majority. It will be interesting to see if the Republicans keep up their obstructionism - which has been a losing policy for them or if they opt to work with the Democrats.

In some way, the Republicans in the Senate will have time to think about it before they vote on reconciliation. Health care is passed, that bill can't change that. The fact is, if they are honest, they likely prefer the plan resulting from both bills better than just the current bill. If they acted in good faith, they would join the Democrats in passing it. It is sad, that I think the likelihood of this is near zero. I hope at least some - maybe Olymphia Snowe, who had briefly wanted to be on the right side of history - will vote yes.