February 24, 2010 – 4:58 pm
A lot of people seem to think that prospects have improved for the White House’s vision of health care reform. Those people must not be reading the same things I am reading.
For one thing, Talking Points Memo–not exactly a right-wing rag–is telling us that according to Senate Budget Committee Chairman Kent Conrad, health care reform will not happen unless the House passes the Senate’s health care bill first. That led to the following exchange between Brian Beutler, the author of the Talking Points Memo piece, and Conrad:
I pointed out that House leadership, including Speaker Nancy Pelosi, has repeatedly insisted they won’t take a flier on a reconciliation package–that they will only pass the Senate bill after the smaller side-car reconciliation bill has been all wrapped up.
“Fine, then it’s dead,” Conrad said.
Conrad added that he wouldn’t personally make any promises or symbolic gestures to House members to assure them that the Senate can or will take any action in a reconciliation bill to address House concerns.
“I don’t sign any blank check,” Conrad said.
By Pejman Yousefzadeh
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Posted in Chequer-Board
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Also tagged Barack Obama, Democrats, health care, Health Care Policy, Health Care Reform, Jay Cost, New York, Obama Administration, Politics, Reconciliation, taxes
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February 24, 2010 – 4:26 pm
Congress is now very unpopular:
Voter unhappiness with Congress has reached the highest level ever recorded by Rasmussen Reports as 71% now say the legislature is doing a poor job.
That’s up ten points from the previous high of 61% reached a month ago.
Only 10% of voters say Congress is doing a good or excellent job.
Nearly half of Democratic voters (48%) now give Congress a poor rating, up 17 points since January. The vast majority of Republicans and voters not affiliated with either party also give Congress poor ratings.
Seventy percent (70%) of voters say Congress has not passed any legislation that would significantly improve life for Americans, up 10 points over the past month and the highest level of dissatisfaction measured in regular tracking in over three years. Only 15% say Congress has passed such legislation.
Forty percent (40%) of voters nationwide now say it is at least somewhat likely Congress will seriously address the most important issues facing the nation. That’s down from 59% last March. Only 9% say it is Very Likely Congress will address these issues.
February 24, 2010 – 4:18 pm
But now, many of the Senators–and former Senators–featured in this video, think that “majoritarian absolute power” would be nothing short of wonderful:
You just have to love Joe Biden’s quote: “I pray God when the Democrats take back control we don’t make the kind of naked power grab you are doing.” Enjoy the irony.
February 24, 2010 – 8:00 am
Former Congressman Tom Campbell is running for the Republican nomination for the United States Senate seat currently held by Senator Barbara Boxer in California.
February 23, 2010 – 11:32 pm
I have made no secret in the past about my admiration for Indiana Governor Mitch Daniels. He is very smart, a sharp political fighter, an authentic small-government Republican, knows where the bodies are buried in Washington, as a former Director of the Office of Management and Budget. Governor Daniels has done a sterling job in Indiana, and has all of the qualifications that one could ask for in an excellent President.
February 22, 2010 – 8:54 am
Paul’s victory in the CPAC 2010 presidential straw poll only serves to immediately diminish the impact that CPAC could have on providing conservatives with some direction on who some of our future national leaders might be. Ron Paul certainly won’t be one of them. I’m not saying that to be critical, it’s just a fact.
February 21, 2010 – 12:36 pm
Summing up the upcoming “summit” between Republicans and the Obama Administration on health care:
. . . “There’s hope for a breakthrough here, but the odds of that are not very good,” said a top Democratic aide who has worked for years on health care. “This is a media event.”
Quelle surprise. Of course, we do happen to learn something interesting about the nascent Democratic plan to use reconciliation to pass health care reform:
Many Democrats in Congress said they doubted that it was feasible to pass a major health care bill with a parliamentary tool called reconciliation, which is used to speed adoption of budget and tax legislation. Reconciliation requires only 51 votes for passage in the Senate, but entails procedural and political risks.
“If we took a vote now, we would not have 51 votes for that approach,” said a Senate Democratic aide. “The president would have to do a major sales job. He is the only person who has the political capital to do it. But his focusing on health care means that our efforts to focus on jobs are likely to be drowned out.”
I think that it is now safe to say that…
February 19, 2010 – 4:29 pm
The use of reconciliation to pass health care reform through the Senate would be entirely contrary to the purposes of the reconciliation process. There is, of course, every reason to think that Democrats won’t have the stomach to go through with reconciliation; the process is a lot more complicated than people think it is. Reconciliation would force Democrats to pare down their health care goals. And an attempt to use reconciliation to push through health care would destroy all hopes of bipartisan cooperation on other issues in Congress. I am sure that there are Democrats for whom none of this serves as a deterrent to using reconciliation, but plenty of other Democrats will be terrified by the consequences of reconciliation. As they ought to be.
February 18, 2010 – 2:49 pm
My latest for the New Ledger has to do with Dick Cheney and his effect on the Obama Administration.
By Pejman Yousefzadeh
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Posted in Blogs, Chequer-Board
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Also tagged Barack Obama, Democrats, Dick Cheney, foreign policy, Interrogation Policy, Joe Biden, National Security, Obama Administration, Terrorism, The Unbearable Lightness Of Being Joe Biden, torture, War, War on Terror, Waterboarding
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February 18, 2010 – 2:20 pm
Many of my friends and allies think that if George Will makes a political prediction, the precise opposite of that prediction will come to pass.
