ObamaCare: How low can they go?

CBS News, the New York Times and the Washington Post are all reporting that the Democrats are confident that they will pass health care reform sometime next week.  The problem with that assertion is that all the confidence quotes seem to come from Speaker Nancy Pelosi.  The obvious truth is they don't have the votes to pass the Reid health care bill, even using budget reconciliation.  If they did, they would have voted on it last week. (Photo Alex Wong/Getty Images)

Several schemes are being worked to assure passage of Obamacare, and all of them should concern American voters.  The first scheme is using budget reconciliation to pass it. The Senate parliamentarian last week issued an opinion that reconciliation could only be used on the Senate version of the health care bill after the House passed the Senate bill.  In other words, the Democrats would not be allowed to vote simultaneously on the Senate bill they don't really like, and the fix to make them like it.  This presents a real problem for Democratic members of the House.  Truth be told, they don't really trust their Senate counterparts to come through with passage of their fix.  Representative Anthony Weiner and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid confirm the obvious:

But one thing House Democrats are really worried about, says Reid, is that they will pass the bill, be out there with what to some is a politically unpopular vote, and then the Senate will fail to pass it.

When asked this morning on "The Saturday Early Show" if he believes the Senate is trustworthy, Rep. Anthony Wiener, D-N.Y., said that in the past the House has passed bills which the Senate has "let die" 290 times.

"There have been many cases where it's been problematic, sometimes because of their rules or they're just institutionally that way," Weiner said. "But 'fool me once, shame on me; fool me 290 times, shame on us.'"

So the Senate will have to provide real assurances - as Reid points out, "sign in blood that they are going to pass this thing."

Not to worry, House Rules chair Louise Slaughter came up with a solution that will allow the House to pass a rule by a simple majority vote that will deem the Senate bill passed. How convenient is that?  Radio host and author of Liberty and Tyranny: A Conservative Manifesto, Mark Levin has some thoughts on that:



In the event all this fails to sway enough Democrats, the leadership has decided to stuff some student loan legislation (much of which already passed in H.R. 3221 in September) into the bill.  What do student loans have to do with health care?  It's the math. The New York Times explains:

Of the 39 Democrats who opposed the health care bill, 35 voted in favor of the student loan bill. (One Democrat who voted against the health care bill, Representative Parker Griffith of Alabama, is now a Republican, and another, Representative John Tanner of Tennessee, did not vote on the education bill.)

The bottom line? Theoretically, at least, the Democrats have a chance of using the education measure to convince 35 lawmakers to switch their votes from no on health care to yes on a combined package including the financial aid changes.

Is there anything the Democrats will not do to get this monstrous government takeover health care passed?  We are about to find out.