Dem congressman: We may have as little as 201 votes for ObamaCare

Reconciliation – Smoke and Mirrors

If the House Democrats who originally voted “no” on Health Care Reform, are sold by the President on changing their vote to “yes,” with the understanding that the bill will be sent to the Senate to “fix” it, they are being sold a multi-trillion dolllar bill of goods!

Why would the President, whose centerpiece of his presidency is health care reform, pursue a “fix” in the Senate under Reconciliation, when all he needs to do to have government controlled health care is to simply sign the bill passed by the House, given that the bill would have already passed both houses of Congress? In fact, Senator Kent Conrad, wrote on Saturday in the Washington Post, “Reconciliation is not being considered for passing comprehensive health-care reform. Major health-care reform legislation passed the Senate without reconciliation on Christmas Eve. If the House now passes that legislation, it can go immediately to President Obama’s desk to be signed into law. The Wall Street Journal corroborates this view today, stating:

“After all, the White House would much prefer the Senate bill, because by its lights the cost-control programs are tougher than what the House prefers. And from a political perspective, a bill that can be signed immediately and that the press will portray as an historic achievement is far better than the drawn-out and gory battle that would be reconciliation. Republican Senators will have many procedural knives at their disposal, and the process will force Democrats to cast further votes and spend more months debating a deeply unpopular bill.

In other words, perhaps Mr. Obama has embraced this reconciliation two-step only to renege as soon as the House gives him what he wants. While some House Democrats would be furious, they’d soon be defending the Senate bill by necessity against the GOP. The moderates who vote for it might be collateral damage, but the White House has already concluded that this is the price of building its cradle-to-grave entitlement citadel.”

Remember the content of the Senate version of health care reform. It encompasses the following:
1. $400 billion in Medicare cuts

2. Establishes a government board to decide heath care benefits included and covered by all insurance policies

3. Creates a health care exchange controlled by the government

4. Requires the States to expand Medicaid to cover uninsured citizens at State expense, which means increased taxes.

5. Excludes Nebraska, and Louisiana from paying for Medicaid expansion in their states. Florida and Conneticutt also received favorable deals in the Senate bill.

6. Increases the deficit by $300-500 billion.

7. Raises taxes on medicine,services, and medical supplies.

8. Exempts members of Congress from having to participate in this program.

9. Will increase premium prices on existing policies, given that the individual mandate will not be enforced, which would otherwise legally compel young people to buy policies and offsett the cost of premiums overall.

10. Will allow government-subsidized abortions for the first time in 33 years.

Some may doubt, that the President would “double-cross” House Democrats about sending the bill back to the Senate to gain their support for passage of the Senate bill. However, Speaker Pelosi, of course, could simply send the Bill, passed by both the House and Senate, to the President – and the President need not sign it, as any bill sent to the President which he does not sign or veto, becomes law after 10 days.

This is ‘Chicago-style” politics! And President Obama has said repeatedly, that if he can be an effective one-term president, that is acceptable as opposed to being a two-term president. He will do this; and so will Speaker Pelosi. They will sacrifice everything, including a few of their own House members, to take control of health care in America.

NOW is the time folks. We are at the moment of truth for America’s future. Why isn’t some prominent Republican politician, or conservative media figure, calling for a march on Washington to save this country from socialized medicine, and a financial catastrophe?

SheetAnchor on March 8, 2010 at 8:02 PM