Legal Commentary

If You Must, How To Vote BaucusCare Out Of Committee

By Big Tent Democrat

I hope the public option amendments to Senator Max Baucus' atrocious proposal succeed in the Finance Committee, but I am sanguine about that. Assuming the worst for a moment, How the bill is voted out could be important.

First, it is important that the Democrats on the Finance Committee be put on the spot on the public option amendments. Let's find out who is for it and who is against it. For example, Baucus himself, Kent Conrad, and Blanche Lincoln will be No votes and no more hiding that fact. Let them take the consequences for their opposition. Second, even if, for procedural purposes, certain Dems vote Yes, let it be a Yes/No vote. The Hill describes what I mean:

Sen. Debbie Stabenow (D-Mich.)

For months, Stabenow has said over and over that the Finance Committee is merely one step in a longer journey toward healthcare reform. That’s because she’s known for just as long that any bill produced by the panel would be too far to the center for her liking. Not that she’s planning to vote against it; she wants the political left to know that a “yes” in committee is not the same as a full-throated endorsement of Baucus’s bill. Stabenow is particularly worried about the ile they vote proposed tax on high-cost insurance pinching constituents who took early-retirement buyouts, including generous health benefits, from their union jobs.

(Emphasis supplied.) The best way for Stabenow, Schumer, Menendez, Cantwell, Kerry, Rockefeller and other Dems on the Finance Committee to make clear that their votes are FOR a public option is to say, WHEN they vote, that a Yes vote on BacusuCare in the Finance Committee is merely a procedural Yes (think of it as a cloture vote) and that they are definite Nos on BaucusCare in a floor vote and that the Senate leadership will need to adopt at least the Senate HELP bill version of the public option (and the other important changes necessary to the bill) or they will vote No on BaucusCare on the floor.

These statements MUST be made during the Finance Committee vote. There can be no ambiguity. Ambiguity from them effectively destroys the public option in the Senate. At that point, then the only hope for real health care reform comes from the brinksmanship abilities of the House Progressive Caucus. With Obama and his team likely exerting all possible pressure on them to drop the public option at that point, I do not think they can hold up.

They need some firmness from a pseudo Senate Progressive Caucus. And that starts in the Senate Finance Committee.

Speaking for me only

Full post as published by TalkLeft on September 29, 2009 (boomark / email).