Universal Health Care

Obama to Unveil New Health Care Bill Wednesday; “Much Smaller” Than House Bill, Says Pelosi; But Not a Retreat

UPDATE: White House and Democratic sources hasten to add late today that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi did not mean to suggest the new plan would constitute a retreat from comprehensive health care reform.

Pelosi spokesman Nadeam Elshami said the speaker was trying to say the new Obama health care proposal would take its policy cues from the Senate health bill and the ideas Obama posted online a week ago.

Elshami did not deny Pelosi’s comments about a “much smaller” bill could fairly be interpreted as suggesting a step back from the Senate bill. Instead, Pelosi has come to regard the Senate bill itself as “much smaller” than the House bill, Elshami said.

White House officials also said Obama’s not dramatically scaling back his proposal. No one was prepared to discuss a price tag, but it appears the ballpark 10-year figure of $1 trillion remains.

The revisions, it appears, will focus on adding GOP ideas on tort reform and selling insurance across state lines. White House Domestic Policy Adviser Melody Barnes spoke extensively to Fox today about White House staff dealing with these two issues over the weekend (see post below).

Democrats described inclusion of medical malpractice and selling insurance across state lines as a last-ditch effort to win Republican support. Already, White House officials and Democrats have begun to argue that bipartisanship can be defined as legislation including Republican ideas, even if Republicans unanimously vote against it.

“How Republicans vote on their ideas is up to them,” White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs said Monday. “Bipartisanship can’t simply be none of your ideas and all of our ideas. That’s not bipartisanship.”

Original post:

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said Monday President Obama will soon propose a health care bill that will be “much smaller” than the House bill but “big enough” to put the country on a “path” toward health care reform.

A senior administration official told Fox Obama’s proposal will be introduced Wednesday.

“In a matter of days, we will have a proposal,” Pelosi said, pointing to Obama’s forthcoming bill. “It will be a much smaller proposal than we had in the House bill, because that’s where we can gain consensus. But it will be big enough to put us on a path of affordable, quality health care for all Americans that holds insurance companies accountable.”

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VP Biden Could Blow Up Senate on Healthcare

Most people think all the Vice President does is break ties, but a former Senate parliamentarian has just delineated a job that could be FAR more controversial and important: the Vice President can override the Senate’s nonpartisan arbiter of the chamber’s rules, the parliamentarian.

Talk about the real nuclear, heck – kamikaze, option, the specter of Vice President Joe Biden (former long time senator) overruling the current parliamentarian, Alan Frumin, during the upcoming healthcare debate, as Democrats work to get around a GOP filibuster.

“It is the decision of the Vice President whether or not to play a role here,” former Senate parliamentarian Robert “Bob” Dove told MSNBC. Dove said the parliamentarian is merely dispensing advice, and the Vice President can overrule that advice, even though “not since Hubert Humphrey” has this happened.

But remember — Humphrey, like Biden, was a long time member of the Senate, serving 3 1/2 terms. Humphrey was the Senate’s Majority Whip. Biden served for 36 years. Dove said at the time, Humphrey “felt very comfortable playing an important role.” One can easily imagine Biden might feel comfortable, too. But it’s hard to say,. Members who serve for decades often feel a need to guard the ways and rules of the chamber.

There’s no reason to believe Dems will use this controversial power — but certainly, if they are going to go it alone and use the budgetary procedure known as “reconciliation”, which allows passage with just 50 votes (Biden breaking the tie) of certain bills that meet a strict test of relation to the budget, they really are able to go all the way and liberal groups might demand this. After all, they have had to sacrifice the so-called “public option” – or government run/monitored insurance.

Senior Senate aides appear to be unaware of this power invested in the Vice President, so no one, as yet, has been able to articulate what it means — what they’re likely to do. So – we wait.

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Obscure Senate Post Becomes Center of Attention in Health Care Debate

The Senate parliamentarian holds an obscure position in Congress: chief arbiter of the chamber’s Byzantine rules. But the man who holds the post could help make or break any health care bill enacted via a budget maneuver called reconciliation.

The legislative two-step, which both parties have used, is designed for funding matters. When it comes to its use, the parliamentarian’s job is to decide which provisions directly impact the budget, and which do not and should be stricken from usage.

How the parliamentarian — Allan Frumin — will act has become something of a parlor game in Washington, with one reporter suggesting political hacks may try to divine his potential rulings based on clues like his facial hair or his hometown.

Longtime associates say Frumin, who has been in the parliamentarian’s office since 1977 and has been chief parliamentarian since 2001, would rule conscientiously.

“He doesn’t do it from the point of view of policy. He’s made Democratic senators very angry in the past; he’s made Republican senators very angry in the past. And he is not a party hack,” said Ilona Nickels, author of “Why Congress Matters.”

Under the “Byrd rule,” named after West Virginia Democratic Sen. Robert Byrd, if the parliamentarian identifies items in a health care reconciliation bill not directly related to the budget — abortion provisions, for instance — a lawmaker can motion for those items to be removed, and the parliamentarian’s ruling will be sought.

“We know that we have some other senators, for example, from the Budget Committee, that might be very sensitive about establishing precedent that they have to live with in the future, that go against the process that they depend on as a budget tool,” Nickels said.

If Frumin’s ruling is disputed, the question may proceed to the chamber’s highest authority — the president of the Senate, who happens to be Vice President Biden.

“The vice president has the independent ability as a presiding officer to frame questions for the Senate to decide when it comes to reconciliation as he does on many other matters. He’s obviously informed by precedent and past practice but he can put a question to the Senate however he chooses to frame it,” said former GOP Senate aide Eric Ueland.

“The parliamentarian only can advise, it is the vice president who rules,” former Parliamentarian Robert Dove told MSNBC on Monday. “But I will say that not since Hubert Humphrey have I seen a vice president try to play that kind of role in the Senate.”

If Biden overrules Frumin, a senator can appeal, but a Biden supporter could move to quash or “table” the appeal, a matter that would then be decided by a simple majority vote.

“This could potentially disadvantage individuals who are attempting to use the Byrd rule to strike out or modify provisions of a reconciliation proposal when it is before the Senate,” Ueland said.

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Tea Partiers on ‘Alert’ as Democrats Lay Groundwork for Health Care Passage

Democrats appear to be gambling that a perceived lull in Tea Party activism, combined with an eight-month window to the November midterm election, is going to buy them enough time to muster the simple majorities they need in the Senate and House to give President Obama at least partial victory in his push to remake the nation’s health care system.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said Monday that Obama will have a proposal on the table “in a matter of days.”

“Time is up,” she said in an interview Sunday.

But conservative activists, particularly the Tea Party groups, are gearing up for a fight to the last vote, even if political judgment day may seem far off.

“Health care is right now our first priority because we know … it’s so close to passing, and if we look away for one second, it will,” said Shelby Blakely, a leader with Tea Party Patriots and executive director of its media arm, New Patriot Journal.

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