Obama, Unclogged… Battle to the Death???Back to the Blog »
October 8th, 2009
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There are a number of indications that President Obama is starting to put his stake in the ground more firmly to the left on healthcare, suggesting that a more aggressive support and defense of the Public option is forthcoming. As I described in this post a week or 2 ago, if this is in fact an acurate read then we are headed for an all-out fight to the death–right vs. left, business vs. labor, fiscal conservatism vs. social liberalism…polarization of the highest degree.
We’ll have to wait until he is on the record to know for sure, but here are a couple of indications:
From last weekend, in the Chicago Tribune:
Despite months of seeming ambivalence about creating a government health insurance plan, the Obama White House has launched an intensifying behind-the-scenes campaign to get divided Senate Democrats to take up some version of the idea in the weeks just ahead.
And from today’s Nashua Telegraph:
Last week’s headlines declared the so-called public option dead on arrival after the Senate Finance Committee rejected two versions of it offered by Democratic Sens. Chuck Schumer of New York and Jay Rockefeller of West Virginia.
Dead? It is not dead, but it is dead. Let me explain.
Recently I attended a breakfast hosted by the Democratic Women’s Working Group in the House, and four female House Democrats insisted at that event that if any form of health care reform emerges from the Senate, the public option will be included in the House version.
They added that Democrats have the votes to push it through when the House-Senate conference committee meets to iron out differences between the two chambers’ bills.
And from Politico:
President Barack Obama dialed up Sen. Olympia Snowe (R-Maine) today, the senator told reporters.
What did he say?
“What do you think he wants?” Snowe joked.
They talked about the Finance Committee bill, and her proposal for a trigger to the public plan, Snowe said.
The president indicated that there would be an opportunity to discuss bringing up the trigger down the road, Snowe said, but that he also needed to consider the leanings of his party. Snowe hasn’t indicated how she will vote.
The math on the public option is very tricky in the Senate. If his pressure starts to work we’ll see a clear and unambigious statement from the President on the government plan and a hard push to the finish…and the reaction will be inevitable: the fight to the death!
Posted by Bill in Healthcare Reform
