The Dems now have an opportunity to pass a sidecar of fixes to the current Senate bill using reconcilation to get the house to vote for it. And these fixes would only need 51 votes.
The senate's only viable option is to pass a sidecar of legislation fixes using reconcilation to get 51 votes to arrive at something the house will actually pass, the dems can actually use the reconcilation process to implement real changes...
Brown won because senate Dems and a decorous WH forgot who they serve. They rushed into bad deals. Refusing to negotiate for lower drug prices was a bad deal for the voters (a good deal for drug companies though). Refusing to offer a public option was a bad deal for voters (a good deal for insurance companies though). Not expanding medicare was a bad deal for voters, as was the Nebraska deal they made to give that one state an exception. Voters hate when corporate interests and special interests are put in front of the changes that are really needed.
The public wants real healthcare reform, that gives them more choices. Across the nation, expanding medicare is immensely popular, the ability to negotiate for lower drug prices is immensely popular. EVERY SINGLE POLL conducted asking about these two issues showed them to the popular among the population at large.
Hell even an opt in public option is immensely popular when people are explained what a public option actually is and that it indeed is optional. All these policies bring down costs. And they all would be the sort of real transformative sort of change that people voted for. It would be real reform.
Going through reconciliation means that what comes out of that will be a truer expression of what Democrats stand for, as they will only need 50 Senate votes instead of the 60 that constrained them before. If there is no public option, no drug negotiation, and/or no Medicare buy-in, it will be because the Democrats, as a party, oppose those measures. And, having opposed those measures, they will have failed to garner the support among the public that they will need during the next election. At the very least there's no reason not to add back in the options that were on the table in the Senate but blocked by a small handful of Senators: Medicare Buy-in and the opt-out public option. They probably could (and should) beef both of those up, but there's unquestionably an opportunity here. A medicare buy-in would be ideal. People understand it, and it could go into effect faster than a public option iirc. I'd love to see republicans campaign on repealing health care that increases medicare to a 50 or even 55 year old limit. I suspect Pelosi is leveraging the anger in the House to push the bill further than the previous negotiations (with a 60-vote threshold in the Senate) would have. She's be a fool not to, and she's no fool.
Linked from here
In short, they could get rid of the backroom deal for Nebraska, allow the govt to negotiate drug prices, implement an opt-in public option, expand medicaid, and lower medicare age limit.
All that completely helps turn around the current negative narrative on the bill (that it's fully of shady back room deals and does little to actually help people, give people more options, or control healthcare costs). Those are all the problems with the current bill that cost Democrats Mass. And it's precisely the kind of bill that Democratic Senators and House member can brand their 2010 campaigns on, and WIN. And it would also make Brown's win an afterthought.
The only question is, do the democrats have the brains and guts to actually give the public what it wants... A POPULIST HEALTHCARE BILL that actually helps them and gives them more options?
When the hell are democrats going to wake up and realize that the public wants healthcare reform, but it wants real reform, that gives them more choices, and actually tackles costs by creating a public option and letting us negotiate drug prices.
If moderates are hesistent prior to November, the senate can even pass a few things the republicans wanted later on, for example something to address medical malpractice reform.
I'm a little surprised that some people are still pushing a "reconciliation only" strategy on health care, particularly when passing the Senate bill with a "sidecar" of fixes through reconciliation would quite clearly be the dominant strategy. But just suppose that the only two options are "reconciliation only" and to pass the Senate's bill as is.
Let's take another look at that Kaiser poll I cited earlier today and look at the popular elements of the health care bill -- those which poll at a net favorability of +10 or better. Which could be implemented through a "reconciliation only" strategy? It's hard to say for sure, but here is a reasonable guess given the constraints imposed by the process:
You could probably -- not certainly -- get a public option through reconciliation, and the public option is popular, polling at a net +22. However, there are are least five provisions which are more popular than the public option that you almost certainly couldn't get through reconciliation only, including the insurance exchange, guaranteed issue, allowing children to stay on their parents' plans though age 25, guarantees on the acturial value of private insurance policies, and limitations on age rating. Nor could reconciliation ban gender rating or or eliminate lifetime coverage limits, which also poll well.
"Reconciliation only" might be better than the status quo. But it's almost certainly worse than the Senate's bill, as is. And it's categorically worse than the Senate's bill with a reconciliation sidecar. But why take half a loaf when you can get a quarter?
http://www.fivethirtyeight.com/...
DR and his party ran for reelection on populism and won, despite all the republican attacks they faced.
Yes, FDR was accused of being too liberal, and he was attacked relentlessly for it by the conservatives. Did he back off like the democrats are considering. That's the difference between Obama and him.
No, he pushed populism HARDER. And then he RAN his campaign based on his POPULIST policies, his whole party did. And the republicans watched in awe, with their mouths open and he and his whole party decimated them in the next election.
This is the path to victory especially during economically uncertain times. Don't take strategy advice from your opponents, instead, push populist legislation, campaign for reelection based on your populist achievements, and you will WIN!
Yes it would piss off fox news. GOOD. But you know what, letting the govt negotiate drug prices, expanding medicare, and creating an alternative option that the people who are sick of the stuff insurance companies pull can opt into would be precisely the kind of populist policies that Democrats can run on during a weak economy, and win with.
Now that pretty much the senate's only viable option is to pass a sidecar of legislation fixes using reconcilation to get 51 votes to arrive at something the house will actually pass, the dems can actually use the reconcilation process to implement real changes...
The public wants real healthcare reform, that gives them more choices. Across the nation, expanding medicare is immensely popular, the ability to negotiate for lower drug prices is immensely popular. EVERY SINGLE POLL conducted asking about these two issues showed them to the popular among the population at large.
Hell even an opt in public option is immensely popular when people are explained what a public option actually is and that it indeed is optional. All these policies bring down costs. And they all would be the sort of real transformative sort of change that people voted for. It would be real reform.
The public wants real healthcare reform, that gives them more choices. Across the nation, expanding medicare is immensely popular, the ability to negotiate for lower drug prices is immensely popular. EVERY SINGLE POLL conducted asking about these two issues showed them to the popular among the population at large.
Hell even an opt in public option is immensely popular when people are explained what a public option actually is and that it indeed is optional. All these policies bring down costs. And they all would be the sort of real transformative sort of change that people voted for. It would be real reform.
Even today, the public supports both the ability to negotiate lower drug prices, and the medicare expansion.
Every single poll done shows as such including the polls I cited above.
Yes, the narrative on the public option has been lost because now, people don't realize the public option is option, and think that it involves death panels.
But even today, every poll done in which people are given a description of what the public option actually entails, the public backs that too. The only polls where the public opposes it are the ones where the pollster doesn't give a definition of what they mean by the term the public option.
In short, stop taking cues from our opposition on what we should do. Every single poll shows that the public backs these things (when the term public option is defined that is).