House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer believes that the senate health care bill is better than nothing, and even if Scott Brown takes Dead Kennedy’s seat away from the democrats, the progressives will be able to pass a bill before he is certified.
What part of ‘We Do Not Want Government Healthcare’ are they not understanding? What part of “We Want Healthcare Reform; Start Over!” are they not getting? Rest assured America, they hear us and are totally ignoring our voices.
The progressives want to put America on a very tight leash by controlling every aspect of our behavior through health care, and they wonder why Scott Brown is kicking Martha Coakley’s tush? Steny Hoyer’s comments are symptomatic of the dems’ thought processes.
House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) on Tuesday said passing the Senate healthcare bill would be “clearly better than nothing.”
This statement only makes sense when one looks at the true motivations of the Progressive Socialist Democratic Party. It has never been about health care; it’s always been about telling us what is good for us because we are just open-mouthed breathing idiots. America, are you offended and insulted by what the Progressives (both dem and pub) have been doing? They are not going to stop because they, ‘as our parents’, know better than we do.
Hoyer dodged questions about how Democrats would go forward without a 60th vote in the Senate, saying he did not want to “anticipate or speculate or hypothesize” on the outcome of the Massachusetts race. But he admitted that rushing a finished product through both chambers before Brown could be sworn in was a possibility. (emphasis mine)
Asked if it was “feasible” to pass a healthcare bill in next 15 days, prior to the Massachusetts election certification, Hoyer said, “Yes.”
If Coakley pulls this out, I cannot wait to see how many dead people voted for Martha, and whether or not the Black Panthers were outside polling centers with nightsticks ‘ala Pennsylvania, November 2008.
The Dems are not going to stop to even think about what their actions are doing to the country, and I for one, am thankful that they are so rabidly turning a blind eye to the opposition. The race to flip the country to a European Socialist State is going to reverberate for decades, and the Democratic Party may not survive their assault on Americans and the Constitution.
Florida Congressman Alan Grayson telling YOU how it’s going to be:
In a bill well over 2,000 pages, some of the insanity slips through the cracks. The Senate’s version of healthcare would allow insurance companies to set lifetime limits for benefits on existing policies while prohibiting those limits on new plans. Is this another “nudge” to get the American people to give up their current healthcare plans and go with the government exchange?
A cadre of Democratic lawmakers and patient groups is urging congressional Democratic leaders to abandon plans to permit health insurance companies to set lifetime limits on their customers’ benefits.
In letters sent to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) and the other senior Democratic lawmakers authoring the final version of healthcare reform legislation, 29 House Democrats and seven Senate Democrats press the leaders to adopt the House’s take on the bill, which would prohibit insurers from establishing a dollar cap on how much they will pay out during a policyholder’s lifetime.
Under the House-passed healthcare reform bill, insurance companies would be prohibited from establishing annual or lifetime limits on benefits. Although the Senate-passed bill also forbids annual limits, it would permit lifetime limits in existing insurance plans by “grandfathering” those policies while forbidding new plans from establishing them.
Throughout the debate on healthcare reform, Democrats have routinely promised their legislation would free people from the anxiety that high medical bills would lead to financial ruin, prompting some lawmakers and patient groups to protest when the lifetime caps were introduced into the bill this autumn.
“By preserving lifetime limits, patients in grandfathered plans will be left behind as strong patient protections are extended to those who are newly insured,” the senators wrote.
Both versions of the bill are POS, and the final version being hammered out behind closed White House doors is going to be even worse.
Senate Health Care Bill H.R.3590 – Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act passes 60-39 on a party line vote as “Gaffe” Biden ‘historically’ presides in his role as Senate President and mispronounces the bill’s name.
WHAT? Like you were expecting something absolutely miraculous to happen on the anniversary Eve of Christ’s birth besides Harry Reid quoting the Founding Fathers? What? Like maybe one democrat voting in sync with the American people? What? Like maybe one democrat switching sides to republican before the vote this morning and making sure that the Progressive Socialist Caucus doesn’t turn America into the United Socialist States Of America?
Please.
We live in the late, great, United States with a guy in the White House who spent twenty years listening to Black Liberation Theology, and who is now partying like it’s 1999 along with his marxist and communist czars, a Senate full of liberal socialists lacking a moral and Constitutional compass who don’t give a sh*t about how the bill gets passed unless the payola is going a different direction, and a House run by a ball-busting, botox infused freakazoid that is pretty darn happy they changed that tax in the Senate bill.
Angst? You say you have angst? Can you tell that I have been sick to death watching the monetary mating calls of the senators these past few weeks? How is your nausea level?
The latest example of violating principles of transparency and accountability in the single-minded pursuit of legislative victory.
Look for House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid to try to circumvent the traditional conference committee process by which the different versions of health care reform passed by each house will be reconciled. If so, it will be the latest example of violating principles of transparency and accountability in the single-minded pursuit of legislative victory.
When Democrats took over Congress in 2007, they increasingly did not send bills through the regular conference process. “We have to defer to the bigger picture,” explained Rep. Henry Waxman of California. So the children’s health insurance bill passed by the House that year was largely dumped in favor of the Senate’s version. House Ways and Means Chairman Charles Rangel and other Democrats complained the House had been “cut off at the knees” but ultimately supported the bill. Legislation on lobbying reform and the 2007 energy bill were handled the same way — without appointing an actual conference.
Rather than appoint members to a public conference committee, those measures were “ping-ponged” — i.e. changes to reconcile the two versions were transmitted by messenger between the two houses as the final product was crafted behind closed doors solely by the leadership. Many Democrats grumbled at the secrecy. “We need to get back to the point where we use conference committees . . . and have serious dialogue,” said Rep. Artur Davis of Alabama at the time.
God help them if we actually make it to November, 2010, as a free nation.
After everything we have been through with Obama and his radical czars, and the Democratic Party pushing the envelope with their re-distribution of America’s wealth through legislation, I still did not think I would live to see my son’s future to self-determination signed away by a weasel from Nevada. I was wrong, and yes, George, Thomas, and John; there are fascists living and breathing in the house that you built.
Harry Reid has slid language into the ObamaDeathcare bill that would prohibit future congresses from repealing or changing a very particular section pertaining to the death panels. I am wondering why Harry did not just ‘go for the gold’ and write it for the entire bill so that we could state honestly that we are now a fascist state and not a democracy
ANY SENATOR that would now vote to pass this bill should be fired immediately (with extreme prejudice).
(Page 1020) Click to Enlarge
Section 3403 of Senator Harry Reid’s amendment requires that “it shall not be in order in the Senate or the House of Representatives to consider any bill, resolution, amendment, or conference report that would repeal or otherwise change this subsection.” The good news is that this only applies to one section of the Obamacare legislation. The bad news is that it applies to regulations imposed on doctors and patients by the Independent Medicare Advisory Boards a/k/a the Death Panels.
We Are No Longer a Nation of Laws. Senate Sets Up Requirement for Super-Majority to Ever Repeal Obamacare
The Senate Democrats declare a super-majority of senators will be needed to overrule any regulation imposed by the Death Panels
If ever the people of the United States rise up and fight over passage of Obamacare, Harry Reid must be remembered as the man who sacrificed the dignity of his office for a few pieces of silver. The rules of fair play that have kept the basic integrity of the Republic alive have died with Harry Reid. Reid has slipped in a provision into the health care legislation prohibiting future Congresses from changing any regulations imposed on Americans by the Independent Medicare [note: originally referred to as “medical”] Advisory Boards, which are commonly called the “Death Panels.”
It was Reid leading the Democrats who ignored 200 years of Senate precedents to rule that Senator Sanders could withdraw his amendment while it was being read.
It was Reid leading the Democrats who has determined again and again over the past few days that hundreds of years of accumulated Senate parliamentary rulings have no bearing on the health care vote.
On December 21, 2009, however, Harry Reid sold out the Republic in toto.
Upon examination of Senator Harry Reid’s amendment to the health care legislation, Senators discovered section 3403. That section changes the rules of the United States Senate.
To change the rules of the United States Senate, there must be sixty-seven votes.
Section 3403 of Senator Harry Reid’s amendment requires that “it shall not be in order in the Senate or the House of Representatives to consider any bill, resolution, amendment, or conference report that would repeal or otherwise change this subsection.” The good news is that this only applies to one section of the Obamacare legislation. The bad news is that it applies to regulations imposed on doctors and patients by the Independent Medicare Advisory Boards a/k/a the Death Panels.
Section 3403 of Senator Reid’s legislation also states, “Notwithstanding rule XV of the Standing Rules of the Senate, a committee amendment described in subparagraph (A) may include matter not within the jurisdiction of the Committee on Finance if that matter is relevant to a proposal contained in the bill submitted under subsection (c)(3).” In short, it sets up a rule to ignore another Senate rule.
Senator Jim DeMint confronted the Democrats over Reid’s language. In the past, the Senate Parliamentarian has repeatedly determined that any legislation that also changes the internal standing rules of the Senate must have a two-thirds vote to pass because to change Senate rules, a two-thirds vote is required. Today, the Senate President, acting on the advice of the Senate Parliamentarian, ruled that these rules changes are actually just procedural changes and, despite what the actual words of the legislation say, are not rules changes. Therefore, a two-thirds vote is not needed in contravention to longstanding Senate precedent.
How is that constitutional? It is just like the filibuster. Only 51 votes are needed to pass the amendments, but internally, the Senate is deciding that it will not consider certain business. The Supreme Court is quite clear that it won’t meddle with the internal operations of the House and Senate. To get around the prohibition on considering amendments to that particular subsection of the health care legislation, the Senate must get two-thirds of the Senate to agree to waive the rule. In other words, it will take a super-majority of the people the citizens of our Republican elected to overrule a regulation imposed by a group of faceless bureaucrats and bean counters.
RedState has the entire transcript of Senator Jim DeMint’s remarks here.
One has to wonder what is going on inside the Democratic Party when Howard Dean is allowed to spend 15 minutes on Morning Joe bashing the senate’s healthcare bill. What may be of even more interest than Howard “not vigorously” supporting Obama’s re-election is the fact that the Tea Party movement now has 41% of the support in this country vs. 35% for the dems, and 28% for the republicans. Howard seems to think that we are not being painted accurately though, because nothing was mentioned in the question about “bringing guns to the legislature”. Just goes to show that Howard appears to believe everything he is reading in the biased medias’ pages and not attending any of the rallies.
The entire 15 minute segment can be found here, and it was actually rather interesting and informative.
As for the Wall Street Journal poll, I found one paragraph to be a wake up call for the democratic leadership (which I am sure they will ignore – thank you very much!):
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said Wednesday that Democrats “fully intend to be in the majority” after November 2010, and she was now shifting to “campaign mode” to help candidates. Party officials are leaning on a number of longtime colleagues to fight for their seats rather than retire.
The Journal/NBC survey found Ms. Pelosi’s presence on the campaign trail could do more harm than good. Fifty-two percent said they would be less likely to vote for a candidate who agreed with the speaker almost all the time, compared with 42% who felt that way about candidates siding with Republican leaders.
It would appear it might be time to stuff Nancy in a closet to keep the sheeples from being reminded. Oh, Too Late! The Tea Party Patriots are going to make sure everybody who will listen will know the voting records of every single congressman and senator that is coming up for re-election!
Individuals who purchase health coverage through an “exchange” in the Senate Democrats’ health care bill would pay higher premiums than they would under current law for their plans, but new subsidies would offset the increased costs for more than half those people, according to a new analysis.
A Congressional Budget Office (CBO) reading of the Senate’s measure also indicates that part of the reason for the higher premiums is that proposed regulations in the bill would force insurance companies to offer a greater level of coverage in the plans they sold.
According to CBO, however, “the majority of nongroup enrollees (about 57 percent) would receive subsidies via the new insurance exchanges, and those subsidies . . . would cover nearly two-thirds of the total premium.”
According to the analysis, once the bill’s programs were fully implemented in 2016, people buying insurance plans individually on the exchange would pay 10 percent to 13 percent more per person than they would under current law. But some 57 percent of people on the exchange would get subsidies in the form of tax credits, and on average those individuals would actually pay 56 percent to 59 percent less for their premiums than they would otherwise.
The average premium for those buying through the exchange would be $5,800 for a single plan, or $15,200 for a family plan.
When the Tylenol kicks in, I am going to try reading it again because there is more to this report than that 10-13% increase. As far as I can assess right now, small businesses (50 employees and less), and individual policy buyers get hurt more than large corporations. Imagine that.
Nongroup Policies CBO and JCT estimate that the average premium per person covered (including dependents) for new nongroup policies would be about 10 percent to 13 percent higher in 2016 than the average premium for nongroup coverage in that same year under current law. About half of those enrollees would receive government subsidies that would reduce their costs well below the premiums that would be charged for such policies under current law.
Employment-Based Coverage
The legislation would have much smaller effects on premiums for employment-based coverage, which would account for about five-sixths of the total health insurance market. In the small group market, which is defined in this analysis as consisting of employers with 50 or fewer workers, CBO and JCT estimate that the change in the average premium per person resulting from the legislation could range from an increase of 1 percent to a reduction of 2 percent in 2016 (relative to current law). In the large group market, which is defined here as consisting of employers with more than 50 workers, the legislation would yield an average premium per person that is zero to 3 percent lower in 2016 (relative to current law). Those overall effects reflect the net impact of many relatively small changes, some of which would tend to increase premiums and some of which would tend to reduce them (as shown in Table 1).7
U.S. Senate Roll Call Votes 111th Congress – 1st Session
as compiled through Senate LIS by the Senate Bill Clerk under the direction of the Secretary of the Senate
Vote Summary
Question: On the Cloture Motion (Motion to Invoke Cloture on the Motion to Proceed to H.R. 3590 )
Vote Number:
353
Vote Date:
November 21, 2009, 07:55 PM
Required For Majority:
3/5
Vote Result:
Cloture Motion Agreed to
Measure Number:
H.R. 3590 (Service Members Home Ownership Tax Act of 2009 )
Measure Title:
A bill to amend the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 to modify the first-time homebuyers credit in the case of members of the Armed Forces and certain other Federal employees, and for other purposes.
UPDATE: 11.21.09 3:24 pm. – I’m not watching this circus until later because I KNEW that they would have enough votes to obtain cloture and shove this through to the floor. Politico is reporting that Landreiu and Lincoln are now on board (frakkin’ surprise that) and that they have 60 votes. I’m not wasting my time on this right now, but I will tell you that this morning I read on RedState that the American public has completely crashed the entire senate phone system – not just the switchboard. Good Going Guys!!!
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On Saturday, 11.21.09, the Senate will be convening one of those not so rare weekend sessions to try and shove through healthcare reform on a test vote. Please be advised that this vote is to decide whether or not to bring this bill to the floor for debate, but if the required 60 votes are obtained, this mutant will hit the floor and become even worse than it is now.
For live streaming coverage, go here for C-Span coverage starting at 9:45am Eastern, and click on Senate Debate on C-SPAN2 at 9:45am ET. When C-Span has the actual link hot, I will update this post.
Senate Health Care Debate Continues, Cloture Vote Tonight
The Senate continues debate on health care reform legislation. Tonight at 8pm a cloture vote will take place on the motion to proceed on the bill. Sixty votes are needed and if cloture passes, debate on the bill will occur after the Thanksgiving recess.
Additional Links of interest pertaining to the bill:
Have you been feeling like this while thinking about Harry Reid’s healthcare release in what is sure to be the next in a list of monstrosities coming from the Democrats and this administration?
Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK) wants the entire bill read on the floor, with estimates coming in at more than 50 hours. THAT could really screw with Nancy’s plan of ramming this through by Christmas as a “present” to the American people. With leaders like this, who needs to worry about islamic jihadist terrorists?
Senator Coburn Raising Objections:
Are y’all still sleeping poorly, or have we become desensitized to the horror of such an un-Constitutional government?
…not like it really matters. Once again, they hear us and could not be bothered with what we are saying. This would be the moment to put all emotions aside, step back, and watch closely. I personally am tired of feeling like a greyhound chasing a sock. How about you?
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) late Tuesday laid the groundwork for the Senate’s healthcare reform debate to start next Tuesday.
Reid filed a motion to introduce the bill on Monday, Nov. 16. Anticipating a Republican objection, the bill would be pushed onto the Senate calendar.
Reid’s action late Tuesday sets up a critical vote next week on a motion to proceed to the bill. Such a motion would require 60 votes to succeed — an important, early test of the Democratic caucus’s unity on procedural votes. Several senators who caucus as Democrats have expressed skepticism about the bill, while others have expressed a willingness to support procedural votes. Senate GOP Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.) and National Republican Senatorial Campaign Committee Chairman John Cornyn (Texas) have both warned Democrats that they will target any senators who support procedural votes on the bill.
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UPDATE: 11.11.09
The first thing that comes to mind is this question: Is there a real danger that if the socialists do not get this done this year it will not happen, or are they just trying to keep everybody amped up to such a level of hypervigilence that those that are fighting against total government takeover of our lives, at some point, physically, mentally, and emotionally just crash affording Obama’s crew free rein to pass whatever they want unchallenged?
The House could be in session until nearly Christmas Eve to try to win final passage on a healthcare bill.
House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) outlined the new schedule on Wednesday, saying he is prepared to keep the House working into late December in order to pass President Barack Obama’s keystone issue of his first year in office.
Hoyer’s move follows Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid’s (D-Nev.) decision late Tuesday night to file a motion that could allow the Senate to begin debate on healthcare next week.
The actions by Reid and Hoyer appear designed to meet a goal of sending a healthcare bill to Obama’s desk by the end of the year. White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel, Vice President Joe Biden and Obama himself have recently touted the year-end deadline.
Hoyer said the House would be in session for the first three weeks of December, but that could be extended to the week of Christmas.
“The House could also be in session on Monday, Dec. 21 and Tuesday, Dec. 22 if needed,” Hoyer said in a statement.
