| Al Franken was declared the winner of the 2008 Minnesota Senate race. Democrats now have 60 seats in the Senate. A "supermajority": enough votes to effectively avoid a filibuster. Right?
Not so fast:
The persistent absences of two veteran Democratic senators because of serious illness, the varied ideological makeup of the Democratic caucus and the willingness of individual senators to break with the party if they do not get their legislative way make the new mathematical might of the Democrats a bit illusory.
"We have 60 votes on paper," Senator Harry Reid, the majority leader, said Wednesday in an interview. "But we cannot bulldoze anybody; it doesn't work that way. My caucus doesn't allow it. And we have a very diverse group of senators philosophically. I am not this morning suddenly flexing my muscles."
I call bullsh*t! Kos:
But for a party and a majority leader that has been whining that it can't get anything done because it doesn't have 60 votes -- well, now it does. In other words, that excuse is now laid bare. I mean, remember how we had to be nice to Joe Lieberman because he got us closer to 60? We laughed at that logic because he didn't get us closer to shit. He would still vote with Republicans half the time, whether inside our caucus or outside it.
So yeah, I know that the "60" mark is arbitrary, and like I said in that MSNBC appearance, a new invention since it didn't exist in the Bush years. In fact, no one has promoted that notion more than Harry Reid himself, afraid to be held accountable for the actions of his caucus. Well, he's no longer got cover. Any failures from here on out will be at his feet, and his feet alone.
Right now, of course, Democrats own health-care reform. If it fails, they lose. If it passes, but it's watered down, and it doesn't fix at least some of the problems everyday Americans are experiencing with their health care insurance, they lose.
Kevin Drum:
The key to healthcare reform is that it be popular with the public. The Medicare prescription bill, for example, was generally popular because it provided a clear and concrete benefit. Broader healthcare reform, however, is going to have a harder time. If there's no public option, for example, and most people simply keep the employer-based healthcare they already have, then what's the selling point? Most people will just see higher taxes funding better coverage for the poor, and you don't have to be the world's biggest cynic to understand that this isn't going to be overwhelmingly popular. Helping the poor is all well and good, but like it or not, most of us want to know what's in it for ourselves if our taxes are going up. That's just life.
Right now, we're running the risk that the answer is "not much." Healthcare reform needs a little more obvious sizzle if it's going to survive the coming tsunami of conservative agitprop, and the bills wending their way through Congress don't have much of that left...
Just a reminder to Democrats everywhere. Yes, it's sporting to find a "bipartisan" solution - but then the Republican party's strategy to make you fail. Yes, it's quite popular with newspapers to appear as a "moderate" by working with major institutions, like the health-insurance and health-care industries. Yes, I know you're always running scared, thinking about the next election, thinking about what your Republican opponent is going to say about you. But the bottom line is, you must pass health-care reform that's effective and meaningful for everybody.
Or else you'll lose.
You've now got the means. Use it, even if you have to bloody your knuckles to do so. |
