The Republican 41
Anyone think RINOs are good for nothing? This is exactly what they are good for. Every single Republican Senator (and that includes leading Maine RINOs extraordinaire—or are the RINOettes?— Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins has signed on in an attempt to stop reconciliation from applying to anything except strictly budgetary matters. This puts Democrats in the House on notice that passing the Senate bill as is just might mean that the provisions of the Senate bill become law and could be hung like an albatross around the necks of Democrat moderates (sorry for the possible oxymoron there) in the House who might vote for it.
And if any of this actually works to stop this bill from becoming law, Scott Brown’s election will have made it all possible. Without him it would be forty Republicans rather than forty-one, and they would be powerless to do anything.
Let me reiterate: without those RINOs it wouldn’t be possible either. And believe me, Maine would have had two Democratic Senators right now if not for Snowe and Collins.
[NOTE: Unless I’m misunderstanding something here, I think this article by Jay Cost misses the point. From what I’ve read about Congressional rules so far, it seems that the House must pass the Senate bill exactly as currently written and then reconciliation can kick in. Stupak and at least some of his group would only vote yea to such a bill if they knew that it could be amended re abortion funding through reconciliation. If the Republican-41 letter makes those Democrats fear this will not be possible, they might not vote for the Senate bill in the first place and it will be defeated. Jay Cost seems to see it differently.]
Excellent point.
As a Center Right Republican myself (emphasis on both Center and Right), I often shake my head at the Right-wings “purists” who fail to see the larger picture, or who fail to take into account the need for both strategy and tactics.
On a similar note, while I never put John McCain in the same category as Olympia Snowe, I know many others have. I just want to take note that we would probably already have Obamacare fully enacted had it not been for the presence of mind thet McCain had a few years ago, when it was the Republicans who wanted to remove the 60-vote requirement to break a filibuster. If they had succeeded then, they would have given today’s Dems a great gift.
As I have noted earlier :
Thus, it was the “Gang of 14” compromise, much derided by the Right purists, who saved the significance of having 41 Senators to break a fillibuster. (Everyone say: “Thank you John McCain”)
I realize I’m being repetitive, but I can’t help but feel that this is a cautionary tale for those who today lunge to the right on everything, en masse, without considering the consequences of such purism in the future.
I think Cost is correct although unnecessarily convoluted. He is arguing that once the House passes the Senate health care bill (aka, the big bill, the HRC bill, the Christmas Eve bill), it will be signed by the President and be a done deal. That is, we will have a health care reform bill with the less restrictive *Senate* abortion funding provisions. A reconciliation bill will then be offered that will amend the HRC bill (now law) in ways the House wants. Part of that will be tightening up abortion funding.
What Cost is arguing is that there is no way in the world that *Republicans* are going to object to the provision to restrict abortion funding. How can they and still argue to their voters that they were against Federal funding of abortion? So the Republican threat to leave the looser Federal funding of abortion alone is an empty threat.
What can happen – and in my estimation probably would happen – is that *Democrats* will object to any provision in the reconciliation bill that attempts to tighten abortion funding. So Stupak’s problem is not that Republicans will put the kibosh on his abortion language but that Democrats will. Stupak will need a bill passed *before* the House passes the Senate bill in order to have any hope of getting his restrictions into law. As Cost puts it:
when Stupak and his bloc cast their votes in the House, their leverage is completely gone. That’s the only power they have in the process. If they are induced to go first, they will lose to the Senate liberals.
I don’t know if such a prospective bill can be written in such a way that it is legal. I also don’t know if anyone cares whether it would be legal.
I’ve gone over this ground on my blog in what I hope is a clearer fashion that Cost and at greater length than here.
Elise: but the whole thing rests on trust of the Senate and the reconciliation process. I’m not at all sure Stupak and his group would trust the Senate. It really depends how strongly the Stupak faction opposes federal funding for abortion on principle, also; they might not want to vote for a Senate bill with that language no matter what was passed at the same time, or what promises were made to them about what the Senate will do.
That is one of the goals of this statement by the Republican 41: to sow fear in Stupak and his group. Stupak et al have to judge how serious the Republicans are. He cannot know. It’s true that he might think they will cave in the end. But it’s a game of chicken, or perhaps poker. He can’t know what they really will do, and if they do what they say, he is screwed and he has voted for federal funding for abortion.
Of course, if that happens, they (and we) are screwed, too. But he must vote before they do. He must show his cards first. (And I, like you, don’t know whether it’s possible to pass a prospective bill, as you discuss in the post at your blog to which you’ve linked.)
J.L.: I am in agreement with you. These rules are for the protection of both parties, and ultimately they protect the country.
On the other hand, back when the Gang of Fourteen intervened to stop the Republicans from changing the rules, the topic was only about judicial appointments, which previously had not ordinarily been subjected to a filibuster. But it’s a slippery slope. The 60-vote rule is basically a good thing, even if we dislike it when our side is in power.
Sober and accurate observation Neo. Taken with your post regarding Democrats and the rule of law, it is clear we are in a battle for the soul and heart of the republic.
Olympia and the Rinettes? It doesn’t have that swing, y’know?
Most of the complaints about RINO’s tend to come from outside the Northeast. Outside of NH, which is itself going blue now, what other people call “conservative” doesn’t draw much approval here – except maybe the frugality.
The rest of you can tell us to go to hell if you want, and I understand the sentiment, but these small states all have 2 Senators, and it adds up. You may not think that’s fair, but that’s how the country was designed 230 years ago.
For those of you still kicking and fussing about our style of conservatism, I will gently remind you that our conservative frugality and lack of corruption – the things most needed at present – has greatly exceeded the rest of the country for centuries, including recent years.
Way I remember it, albatross was a ship’s good luck, ’til some idiot killed it. Yes, I’ve read a poem. Try not to faint.
I’m not at all sure Stupak and his group would trust the Senate.
They shouldn’t. The Senate Dems have already screwed the House once, on the Cap & Tax legislation that was approved by the House, only to languish unloved and unworked upon by the Senate.
I R A Darth Aggie: and after he killed it, they hung it around his neck as a punishment/sign of his bad judgment and rash act. That’s the reference I was making.
See this:
I was talking to a friend who is a dem staffer and this was his reply on this:
“You could have a point with abortion language. All of the other changes are budgetary. Again, they aren’t passing a health care bill through reconciliation – they are passing fixes to a health care bill. And while it sounds like I’m parsing words – its makes a world of a difference.
Oh, and if Dems REALLY wanted to do anything, they could (and they would never actually do this) do the entire bill though reconciliation – the parliamentarian would then rule that it wasn’t allowed – THEN the issue would fall to the President of the Senate to determine whether it can, or cannot happen. As you know, the President of the Senate is currently Joe Biden. “
Basically it comes down to this: which lying thieves in the lunatic asylum can trust which other lying thieves in the lunatic asylum.?
Neo – I agree. But I think the point Cost is trying to make is that it doesn’t matter whether the Republicans make good on their promise to oppose reconciliation to tighten abortion funding. If they don’t raise the point of order, the Democrats will. The Republican threats to oppose tightening abortion funding via reconciliation are irrelevant. Stupak’s real enemies here are the Senate Democrats.
And I have no idea why I’m trying to clarify Cost when he couldn’t do so himself. 🙂
You vote for the least evil candidate. While that implies that all are evil (and in our current state this is almost true) it really doesn’t mean that. A 99% good candidate is less evil than a 98% and I would be happy with either.
As such I voted for McCain and would again – though I do think we would be in a similar boat right now. This segues into the next quote: “On a similar note, while I never put John McCain in the same category as Olympia Snowe, I know many others have”. For myself I do not either – Snowe is a true RINO, frankly I’m not sure why she is one. The she is more liberal that most of the so called “Blue Dogs”. OTOH McCain holds a special place of contempt in my heart – that is his betrayal of the ’94 Contract with America for what I can only take as a personal like of the spotlight and adulation of the press. I’ll take a RINO over a Media Whore anyday – at least the RINO may have what they feel is the best interest of the country at heart.
Many other conservatives from that time also feel it, I suspect that a great deal of people who awakened in ’01 would feel the same if they lived through that with the same immersion they have over the last decade or so. McCain has always spoken a great game, he just hasn’t followed through. Indeed, if we look at his presidential run rhetoric as what he would have done it isn’t that much different than what we see being pushed now.
In final on McCain I will say this – he will endure *any* hardship for the country. That has been proven over the years even outside of his POW time. Hardship is an easy thing for him to burden – he has seen the extremes of that and weathered it. I have never been worried over his ability to weather criticism or any of that.
OTOH he will seek approval with all his being. That is – tell him “You are wrong and that will never work, choose x” will get you no where. Indeed you can not remotely come close to legally imposing that type of idea on him. He has already faced some of the worst the world has to offer (real torture) and come out the other side – as such the chances of that negative idea being force even if illegally done is remote. OTOH you tell him how great he is for supporting X and, well X is the greatest thing on the planet. His opponents figured this out ages ago and use it against him – he has never been able to see it in himself.
Indeed – note that he wants to get the “gang of 14” back to *pass this bill* in order to avoid reconciliation. I do think he was right to do so in the previous battle – reconciliation was a bad idea. I was pretty much on the fence on the matter (I agreed with the slippery slope arguments) and it made me uncomfortable due to the list of people – but I will say I am not now.
Maybe in another 10 years I would say that the Health Care Bill is less worse than Reconciliation being used to pass it (I hope most dems thought that the appointment wasn’t worth the damage from having that option fulfilled), but I doubt it to an extent that I have no discomfort saying so. We can see how much of a media whore McCain is in that he wants to be the leader of the Republican minority side of the health care gang of 14 (and get it passed).
The ones that interest me more are the dems who refuse – interesting. They are so called “blue dogs” and they refuse to sign on given the highly partisan nature of this bill. Do they not want it passed or are they afraid of their own parties retaliation? Dunno, if the former that makes it *highly* interesting given McCain’s push for it. If the latter then it shows how much they really thought of what they said then.