GOP VOTES TO PASS TAX BILL WHILE DEMS PROTECT SEXUAL HARASSERS (2018 & 2020)

GOP WORKS TO PASS TAX BILL WHILE DEMS PROTECT SEXUAL HARASSERS:

IS THIS HOW THE GOP PLANS TO WIN IN 2020?


Sources: NY Times, Bloomberg Politics, Youtube


****** Senate Weighs Changes to Tax Bill on the Same Day They Could Vote


• The Senate will convene at 10 a.m. Friday to continue the debate on taxes, ahead of a possible final vote later in the day.

• Republicans seemed to be inching toward victory on Thursday and picked up the support of Senator John McCain of Arizona.

• But they faced a setback late in the day when they were left scrambling to find hundreds of billions of dollars in extra revenue to satisfy concerns about the bill’s deficit effects.

• Lawmakers are now mulling options that would result in a tax increase down the road, including a possible increase in the corporate tax rate and the revival of the alternative minimum tax on wealthy individuals and some companies.

Republican leaders ended Thursday with the same problem they started with: They still need to secure 50 votes to be able to pass their tax bill.

Their effort appeared to be gaining momentum on Thursday, with talk of a final vote later that night or early Friday.

But by the end of the day, they were contending with twin setbacks, both involving how the bill would affect federal budget deficits.

The congressional Joint Committee on Taxation said in an analysis released on Thursday afternoon that the legislation would add $1 trillion to federal budget deficits over a decade, even after accounting for economic growth.

In addition, a provision meant to prevent ballooning deficits ran into parliamentary problems. The provision would have increased taxes if economic growth fell short of expectations, but it was deemed by the Senate parliamentarian to run afoul of budget rules that must be followed if the bill is to be shielded from a Democratic filibuster.

Without the so-called trigger, the votes of a handful of Republicans, including Senator Bob Corker of Tennessee, appeared at risk.

“Senator Corker has been pretty clear he doesn’t want any deficit spending,” Senator John Cornyn, Republican of Texas, said on Thursday, adding that he did not agree with the Joint Committee on Taxation’s assessment.

To pass the tax bill in the Senate, Republican leaders can lose only two of their members, assuming Democrats are unified against the measure.

The Senate will convene on Friday morning and the debate on taxes will continue. At some point, the Senate will undertake a marathon of amendment votes known as a vote-a-rama. Eventually, there would be a final vote on the legislation.

But in the meantime, Republicans need to decide how they want to change their bill. To satisfy Mr. Corker, for example, Republicans were discussing putting in place tax increases that would take effect some years from now, a step that would soften the deficit effects of the legislation.

Will they decide to raise taxes?

The options under discussion to satisfy the deficit hawks could essentially result in a tax increase down the road. Lawmakers have talked about raising the corporate tax rate above 20 percent after a period of years. There’s also discussion about reviving the alternative minimum tax, or A.M.T., on high-net individuals and some companies.

Both of those ideas are unlikely to sit well with some Republicans, including those in the House, who could be criticized for essentially voting to increase taxes.

Lawmakers may decide that’s a risk worth taking or they could ultimately decide to jettison the deficit hawks’ concerns and lose their votes.

Several senators are worth watching.

As Republicans mull changes to their tax plan, the spotlight will focus on several senators with varying concerns.

Republican leaders do not need to win over all of these lawmakers. In fact, they could decide that some demands are simply not worth meeting — assuming they can satisfy other Republicans and therefore get the 50 votes they need. Vice President Mike Pence can also provide a tiebreaking vote.

At least a handful of senators have expressed concerns about the deficit, including Mr. Corker and Senators Jeff Flake of Arizona and James Lankford of Oklahoma. Now that the trigger is dead, Republicans may need to come up with another idea to protect against piling up debt as a result of the tax overhaul.

Two Republicans, Ron Johnson of Wisconsin and Steve Daines of Montana, have objected to how the bill treats pass-through businesses, whose profits are distributed to owners and taxed at individual rates. In light of their concerns, Republicans plan to sweeten the tax treatment of these businesses.

Finally, there is Susan Collins of Maine, a moderate Republican who has her own concerns about the tax overhaul. She wants the bill to allow individuals to deduct up to $10,000 in property taxes, and adding that provision could help win her over.

GOP 2017 TAX BILL PROVES THEY STILL CONTROL THE MONEY IN POLITICS (BILL HIGHLIGHTS)

GOP 2017 TAX BILL PROVES REPUBLICAN PARTY STILL CONTROLS MOST OF THE MONEY IN POLITICS: (BILL HIGHLIGHTS)

WHAT CAN DEMOCRATS DO BEFORE 2020 TO PUT SOME OF THAT MONEY BACK INTO HANDS OF "AVERAGE, HARDWORKING JOE" VOTERS??

TRUMP CALLED FOR CHANGES TO THE HOUSE TAX BILL BEFORE IT PASSED.

13 HOUSE REPUBLICANS VOTED AGAINST THIS OMNIBUS "RICH GET RICHER" TAX BILL.


Sources: AP, Fox News, MSN, NY TIMES, Youtube


**** The House just passed its big tax bill. Here's what is in it.


President Trump and GOP House Speaker Paul D. Ryan (Wis.) won a major victory as the House passed the tax bill Thursday, the central piece of the Republican plan to boost the U.S. economy.

No Democrats voted for the bill. Ryan could lose 22 GOP votes, but in the end, he only lost 13.

The legislation would affect every American household and business owner.

The bill was first introduced Nov. 2 and was voted on just two weeks later, leaving little time for analysis or debate on the 440-page legislation.

The next step is for the Senate to pass its version and then for both chambers to reconcile their substantial differences.

The main goal of the House's “Tax Cut and Jobs Act” is to lower taxes on companies in an effort to make them more competitive and discourage them from moving abroad.

The bill reduces the corporate tax rate from 35 percent to 20 percent and the rate for pass-through businesses down to 25 percent (with some restrictions).

Many families would also pay less, although Ryan has admitted that won't be the case for everyone. Here's a rundown of what is actually in the final version of the bill that passed.

It keeps the Affordable Care Act's individual mandate.

The House voted on a tax bill only.

The Senate bill includes a provision to scrap the legal requirement that almost all Americans buy health insurance or pay a penalty.

The House isn't touching that, which may lead to a showdown between the two chambers if they have to resolve their very different versions of the bill

Big businesses win.

The House bill cuts the top rate that large corporations pay from 35 percent to 20 percent, the biggest one-time drop in the big-business tax rate ever. It is a permanent change that does not expire.

On top of that, companies would get some new tax breaks to help lower their bills, such as the ability to deduct all the costs of purchasing new equipment for five years, as well as a special low rate on any money they bring back to the United States from low-tax countries such as Ireland.
Many businesses have been holding cash overseas to avoid 35 percent U.S. taxes.

Now they would get to bring the money home at a tax rate of 12 percent.

The entire business tax system would also change from a worldwide system, in which money anywhere around the globe is taxed, to a territorial system in which it's mostly money made in the United States that is taxed.

Businesses have long lobbied for this change.

Small businesses get a mini-win.

The National Federation of Independent Businesses, the largest small business lobby, initially was against the House bill, but Republicans made some changes and now the NFIB is giving its blessing.

95 percent of American businesses are organized as pass through companies (LLCs, S-Corps, partnerships), and they “pass through” the business income to the owner's individual tax rate.

The House plan lowers the top rate from 39.6 percent to 25 percent for small businesses (excluding “service companies” like consultants and lawyers) and requires a complex formula where the 25 percent rate only applies to about 30 percent of the business income.

But the reality is most small businesses — 85 percent — already pay taxes at rates of 25 percent or less.

To help out the small “mom and pops,” the final bill has a 9 percent rate on the first $75,000 in income for business owners making $150,000 or less.

But that tax break phases in, meaning it isn't fully available until 2022.

<<<<< The rich do very well. The wealthy get a lot of benefits in the bill.

The estate tax, which is paid only when property and other assets worth over $5.5 million are passed on to heirs, doubles to about $11 million in 2018 (around $22 million for couples), meaning a lot fewer people have to pay it.

And the estate tax goes away entirely in 2024.

The mega-wealthy also would get to keep charitable deductions, a popular way that lowers their tax bills, and they no longer would have to pay the alternative minimum tax (AMT), a safeguard against excessive tax dodging that's been in place since 1969.

Some wealthy business owners would be able to take advantage of the lower pass-through rate as well.

Overall, the Tax Policy Center found that half the benefits of the bill go to the top 1 percent by 2027.

Donald Trump would probably benefit a lot.

As The Washington Post explains, many parts of the bill help Trump.

One of the interesting ones is that the lower 25 percent pass-through rate would apply to all income for passive real estate investors like Trump, a much better deal than most active pass-through business owners get.

Most Americans pay the same — or lower — taxes until 2023. For the next five years, the vast majority of Americans (92 percent) would either pay less or see little change, according to the official estimates from the Joint Committee on Taxation.

But that shifts sharply after five years. In 2023, only 40 percent of Americans would pay less. Twenty-two percent would pay more (the rest see little change), JCT found

Taxes will get simpler for many. The House bill collapses the seven tax brackets the country has down to just four (12 percent, 25 percent, 35 percent and 39.6 percent).

The top rate becomes a “millionaire rate” applying to income of $1 million or more a year for couples (and of $500,000 or more for individuals).

In an effort to simplify, the House bill also does away with many of the credits and deductions and replaces them with a larger standard deduction, a slightly larger child tax credit ($1,600 per kid versus $1,000 now) and a new Family Flexibility Credit worth $300 a year for individuals and $600 for couples.

The larger standard deduction means the first $12,000 for individuals and $24,000 for couples is tax-free

Say goodbye to most deductions. Almost all itemized deductions are going away, except for three.

The final House bill keeps the deductions for charitable donations, property taxes up to $10,000 a year and the mortgage interest deduction.

The mortgage interest deduction would be capped at $500,000 for mortgages (down from $1 million now).

About 30 percent of filers itemize. Most of the people who itemize claim the state and local tax deduction (SALT) where they deduct their state and local sales, income and property taxes.

Under the House bill, only the property deduction would remain. This hurts people living in high-tax (and often blue) states like New Jersey, New York and California. Several GOP representatives from these states plan to vote no on the bill in protest.

The adoption credit stays. The 401(k) exemption stays.

But . . .

Say goodbye to the tax credits for plug-in motor vehicles. It gets repealed in 2018.

Say goodbye to the deduction for medical expenses. It goes away in 2018.

Say goodbye to being able to write off the costs of your tax preparer. That goes away in 2018.

Say goodbye to the deduction for moving expenses. It goes away in 2018, except for members of the military.

Say goodbye to most tax benefits for college.

At the moment, low and middle income Americans can deduct up to $2,500 a year in student loan interest.

That benefit would go away in 2018.

In addition, grad students who get tuition waivers because they teach or do research would now have to pay income tax on the waiver, a big change.

For students currently in school, the American Opportunity Tax Credit would remain, which allows a $2,000 credit for higher education expenses.

Gabrielle Giffords Votes To Raise Debt Ceiling! Real Democracy Not Terrorism!

Giffords returns to House for debt vote

U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, grievously wounded during a January assassination attempt, returned to the floor of the House of Representatives Monday evening to vote in support of a plan to raise the U.S. debt ceiling.

Giffords was met by a wave of applause from colleagues as she walked into the chamber to support the hard-fought measure, passed a day before a deadline for the government to face possible default.

It was the Arizona Democrat's first vote since being shot through the head at a meeting with her Tucson-area constituents January 8.

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi called her "the personification of courage."

"We are privileged to call her a colleague," Pelosi said. "Some of us are very privileged to call her a friend."


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Sources: AP, CNN, Youtube, Google Maps

Debt Ceiling Bill Passes 269-161! Dems Held Noses To Save Nation's Economy!

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

House passes debt ceiling agreement

The U.S. House on Monday passed the debt-ceiling deal worked out by President Barack Obama and congressional leaders, sending it to the Senate for consideration a day before the deadline for the government to face possible default.

A Senate vote was expected Tuesday, according to multiple Senate leadership aides from each party.

The agreement reached Sunday by President Barack Obama and congressional leaders from both parties calls for up to $2.4 trillion in savings over the next decade, raises the debt ceiling through the end of 2012 and establishes a special congressional committee to recommend long-term fiscal reforms.

The legislation needs to reach Obama's desk by Tuesday at the latest. If the current $14.3 trillion debt limit is not increased by that point, Americans could face rapidly rising interest rates, a falling dollar and shakier financial markets, among other problems.

By a 269-161 vote, the House overcame opposition from liberal Democrats and tea party conservatives for ideologically different reasons.

A number of Republicans worried about cuts in defense spending and the lack of a required balanced-budget amendment to the Constitution. Progressive Democrats were livid over the extent of the deal's domestic spending cuts, as well as the absence of any immediate tax hikes on wealthier Americans.

House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, was able to round up the support of most of his GOP caucus, while the chamber's two top Democrats -- Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi of California and Minority Whip Steny Hoyer of Maryland -- voted for the plan along with more than 90 of their caucus members.

Still, emotions ran high after months of grueling negotiations that pitted the small-government, anti-tax ideology of conservative Republicans against Obama's call for balancing spending cuts and entitlement reforms with increased tax revenue to spread the pain of necessary deficit reduction steps.

This "may be the single worst piece of public policy to ever come out of this institution," declared liberal Rep. Maxine Waters, D-California, while Pelosi noted the measure "makes these big cuts and has ... not one red cent from the wealthiest people in our country -- no revenue."

At one point, more than a dozen protesters caused a disturbance in the House gallery by chanting against Speaker John Boehner until Capitol Police officers removed them.

Vice President Joe Biden spent much of Monday on Capitol Hill, trying to persuade unhappy Democrats to back the proposal.

"I am confident that this will pass," Biden asserted. "We have to get this out of the way" in order to turn Washington's focus to job growth, he said.

Boehner and other House leaders said the deal would start reshaping how Washington spends taxpayer money, which was the goal of conservatives who elected Republicans to a majority in the House last November.

"The bill is not perfect ... but changing the way that Washington spends tax payers dollars is often a lot like redirecting or turning an aircraft carrier." said House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, R-Virginia. "It's a monumental task."

Boehner acknowledged that Republicans on the Armed Services Committee were concerned about cuts to military spending in the agreement, but he told reporters he believed they would support the proposal.

"As I told them, this is the best defense number we're going to get, and frankly if we don't pass the bill, it's pretty clear to me what'll happen ... the defense number will go down," Boehner said.

The agreement revolves around a two-stage process.

The first stage includes $917 billion in savings, including a roughly $420 billion reduction in the national security budget. The cuts would be accompanied by a $900 billion increase in the debt ceiling.

Because of the pending Tuesday deadline, Obama would have immediate authority to raise the debt ceiling by $400 billion, which will last through September, according to the White House.

The other $500 billion increase in the debt limit would be subject to a congressional vote of disapproval that can be vetoed by Obama.

In the second stage, a special joint committee of Congress would recommend further deficit reduction steps totaling $1.5 trillion or more, with Congress obligated to vote on the panel's proposals by the end of the year.

The committee would comprise 12 members: Six from each chamber, equally divided between Democrats and Republicans. The panel's recommendations would be due by November 23 and guaranteed an up-or-down vote without amendments by December 23.

The committee is expected to consider politically sensitive reforms to the tax code and entitlement programs, though Democrats and Republicans disagree on the likelihood of any eventual revenue increases.

If the committee's recommendations are enacted, Obama would be authorized to increase the debt ceiling by up to $1.5 trillion. If the recommendations are not enacted, Obama can still raise the debt ceiling by $1.2 trillion. At that point, however, a budget "trigger" would kick in, imposing mandatory across-the-board spending cuts matching the size of the debt ceiling increase.

The cuts would be split between defense spending and non-defense programs, an unpopular formula intended to motivate legislators to approve the committee's recommendations.

"You want to make it hard for (lawmakers) just to walk away and wash their hands," Gene Sperling, the director of Obama's National Economic Council, said Sunday. "You want them to say, if nothing happens, there will be a very tough degree of pain that will take place."

The final debt ceiling increase in the agreement would also be subject to a congressional vote of disapproval that can be vetoed by Obama.

The agreement calls for both houses of Congress to vote on a balanced budget amendment to the Constitution, though it does not make a further increase in the debt limit subject to congressional passage of such an amendment -- something tea party conservatives were initially demanding.

In a key concession to Democrats, benefits from entitlements including Social Security, Medicaid, Medicare -- as well as veteran's benefits -- will be exempt from any immediate cuts.

Leaders on both sides of the aisle have conceded that the deal is far from perfect.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nevada, emphasized that "no one got what they want" and "everyone had to give something up."

But this "is a great stride forward" that shows "we can succeed not in spite of our divided government but because of it," he said.

A recent CNN/ORC International Poll reveals a growing public exasperation and demand for compromise. Sixty-four percent of respondents to a July 18-20 survey preferred a deal with a mix of spending cuts and tax increases. Only 34% preferred a debt reduction plan based solely on spending reductions.

According to the poll, the public is sharply divided along partisan lines; Democrats and independents are open to a number of different approaches because they think a failure to raise the debt ceiling would cause a major crisis for the country. Republicans, however, draw the line at tax increases, and a narrow majority of them oppose raising the debt ceiling under any circumstances.


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Sources: CNN, MSNBC, Google Maps

Tea Party Strips U.S. Of Its AAA Rating! Boehner Sweats! (Decision 2012)

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

So Its Come To This.

The Unthinkable Has Occurred!

In 2011 The American Economy Has Been Downgraded & Stripped Of Its Coveted, Golden AAA Credit Rating By Tea Party Politicians.

How Awful!

And Who Knew The GOP Establishment Would End This Way?

Who Knew The GOP Establishment Would Be Totally Destroyed By Its OWN Inner Party Members?

i.e., FOOLISH, RADICAL, IRRESPONSIBLE Tea Party Politicians!

But Alas Sadly Enough It Has Come To This.

By INTENTIONALLY Forcing Our Economy To Default On Its PREVIOUS DEBTS (George W. Bush's) For The FIRST Time In American History As A Means Of Bringing Down Pres. Obama, Tea Party Politicians Have Also Forced GOP Establishment Politicians To Their Knees.

i.e., Senator Mitch McConnell, House Speaker John Boehner, Majority Leader Eric Cantor & House Whip Kevin McCarthy.

Why Have I Come To This Conclusion?

Allow Me To Explain.

Last November 87+ Tea Party Candidates (GOP Ticket) Led By Michelle Bachmann & Strongly Influenced By Sarah Palin, Were Elected To Congress.

Now Those SAME 87+ Tea Party Congressional Members (Led By Michelle Bachmann & Strongly Influenced By Sarah Palin) Are In Fact Currently Holding Our Economy Hostage.

They Have REFUSED To Increase The Federal Debt Ceiling, Thus Refusing To Save Our Already Fragile, Troubled Economy From A Self-Inflicted Wound.

(FYI: Many Of The Tea Party Congressional Members Are From Southern States Where Racism Has ALWAYS Ruled!)

As I've Mentioned In Previous Posts, Neither John Boehner Nor Eric Cantor Ever Imagined Those 87+ Tea Party Fruitcakes (Led By Michelle Bachmann & Strongly Influenced By Sarah Palin) Would Do What They're Doing Now.

And What Are House Tea Party Congressional Members Doing Now?

Running Both The United States Economy & The GOP Establishment Right Off A Cliff!!

i.e., DESTROYING THE AMERICAN ECONOMY JUST TO GET RID OF A BLACK PRESIDENT!

(Reminder: Many Of The Tea Party Congressional Members Are From Southern States Where Racism Has ALWAYS Ruled!)


Is It Possible Pres. Obama Could Stop Tea Party RADICALS From Ruining Our Financial Markets Via The 14th Amendment; Section 4?

NO!

Because If He Does Use The 14th Amendment; Section 4 To Avoid Another Debt & Financial Crisis Such As The One Caused By George W. Bush In 2008, Those SAME Crazy Tea Party RADICALS (Led By Michelle Bachmann & Strongly Influenced By Sarah Palin) Would Then Begin Legal Proceedings To Impeach Pres. Barack Obama & GOP House Speaker John Boehner Would Do NOTHING To Stop Them!!

Why Wouldn't Boehner Stop Tea Party Congressional Members From Impeaching Pres. Obama Even Though He Would Have ONLY Used The 14th Amendment; Section 4 To Avert A Financial Crisis?

Because Boehner LOVES Being A Politician More Than He Loves AMERICA & The American People!!

BUT WAIT A MINUTE!!!

Are Democrats Totally Blameless In This Mess?

NO!

Here's Why.

The ONLY Reason Why Republicans Were Able To Win Back The House Was Because Democrats Including Pres. Obama, Failed To Do What They Said They Would Do If Democrats Ruled Both Chambers.

Example:

When Drafting The STIMULUS Bill, Pres. Obama Conceded To GOP Members (Olympia Snowe & Susan Collins) By Including MAJOR TAX CUTS In The Bill & By Short Changing Minority-Owned Small Businesses.

Is That What Democrats & Pres. Obama Ran On In 2008?

NO!!

When Drafting The Affordable Health Care Bill, Pres. Obama Conceded To The GOP & Health Insurance Companies On A Public Option.

Is That What Democrats & Pres. Obama Ran On In 2008?

NO!!

When Extending Unemployment Benefits Last Fall, Pres. Obama Conceded To The GOP By Extending BUSH TAX CUTS.

Is That What Democrats & Pres. Obama Ran On In 2008?

NO!!!

So You See If Pres. Obama & Fellow Congressional Democrats Had Been RADICAL Enough To Help Look Out For The American Middle Class, Ending G.W. Bush's Tax Cuts, Reforming The U.S. Tax Code, Creating Jobs, Creating An W.P.A. Infrastructure Jobs Programs, Repealing No Child Left Behind Because It Stinks, Protecting Medicare & Medicaid, Protecting Labor Unions, Collective Bargaining Rights & Workers' Rights, Stopping Employment Discrimination (Age & Race), Helping To Prevent Big Banks From Foreclosing On Millions Of Homeowners, etc.,

Then.....

There Is Absolutely NO Way Tea Party Candidates Could Have Flooded The U.S. House Of Representatives Last Fall & Knocked Nancy Pelosi From Her Throne Last November.

Instead All For The Sake Of "Bi-Partsianship" Pres. Obama Placated GOP Congressional Members & Conceded To Whatever They Asked For.

I Too Became Super Angry With Pres. Obama & Democrats Last Fall.

I Too Became Impatient.

At This Point I Have Forgiven Pres. Obama & The Democratic Party.

However After Pres. Obama Is Re-elected In 2012 & Democrats Are Back In Power, Things Must CHANGE For Real NOT Just In Words Only!!

The American People Are Tired Of Broken Promises.

We Want Real CHANGE!

NOT Politics As Usual!

In Other Words Its Time For Pres. Obama & Democrats To STOP Catering To The GOP & Become RADICAL Enough To Protect Middle Class Voters, Senior Citizen Voters, Minority Voters (Including Hispanics), College Students, Homeowners, Over-Taxed Tax Payers & Children From Low Income Homes!

Versus Just Looking Out For Wall Street & People From Higher Income Brackets.

I Repeat: The American People Are Tired Of Broken Promises.

We Want Real CHANGE!

Since We Did NOT See Any REAL Change (Only A Little), Thus Pres. Obama & Democrats Share Some Blame In Tea Party Candidates Now Holding The U.S. Economy Hostage.

So Where Does America Stand Now?

Here Are A Few Suggestions:

1) Every Citizen Of This Nation Needs To PRAY! Pray Until Something Happens! Something Constructive NOT Destructive!

PRAY For Pres. Obama, Harry Reid & John Boehner.

God's Word Tells Us To PRAY For Our Leaders NOT Bash Them!

1 Timothy 2:1-4:

1) FIRST OF all, then, I admonish and urge that petitions, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be offered on behalf of all men,

2) For kings and all who are in positions of authority or high responsibility, that outwardly we may pass a quiet and undisturbed life and inwardly a peaceable one in all godliness and reverence and seriousness in every way.

3) For such praying is good and right, and it is pleasing and acceptable to God our Savior,

4) Who wishes all men to be saved and increasingly to perceive and recognize and discern and know precisely and correctly the divine Truth.


2) Please STOP With All Of The Spending Cuts!

Pres. Obama Sir Why Aren't You Pushing For A Clean Debt Ceiling Vote?

Why Didn't You DEMAND A Debt Ceiling Vote?

In A Fragile Economy Spending Cuts Often Cause More Harm Than Good.

Where Were The Cries For "Deficit Reduction" When George W. Bush Created 3 Wars, Medicare Advantage, Established Tax Cuts For Wealthiest Citizens & When He Deregulated Wall Street?

Where Was The Tea Party, Michelle Bachmann & Sarah Palin Then????

Furthermore Those Spending Cuts Are Nothing More Than The Tea Party's Way Of Defunding Pres. Obama's Administration So He Can't Help Create Jobs & Bring Down The Unemployment Rate Before 2012.

Its A Scam & The American People Know It!

I Repeat: STOP With All The Spending Cuts!!!!

3) Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) Needs To STOP Waiting On Boehner's Bill To NEVER Reach The Senate (Because It Won't!) & Proceed With Getting Votes For HIS Bill Instead.

After All Senator Reid's Plan Is Much Less Destructive To The American Economy Than Boehner's.

4) Pres. Obama Needs To STOP Placating To GOP Congressional Who ONLY Want To See Him Destroyed & His Presidency Erased.

He Needs To Get Out & Began Spreading More HOPE To The American People.

Even Though He Wasn't RADICAL Enough To Help Protect Middle Class Voters, Senior Citizen Voters, Minority Voters (Including Hispanics), College Students, Homeowners, Over-Taxed Tax Payers & Children From Low Income Homes, During His First 2 1/2 Years In Office, Its NOT Too Late For Him To Keep Connecting With Constituents & Voters NOW.

Pres. Obama Needs To STOP Allowing The GOP To Slow Him Down!

If He Does NOT Get Back On The Trail Then How Will He Regain His Constituents' Confidence?

Do What Pres. Bill Clinton Did By Doing What Needs To Be Done For The American People Versus Sitting Around Debating & Talking!!

JUST DO IT OBAMA!

JUST DO IT!!

5) Pres. Obama Needs To Use Every Tool He Has In His Executive Order Tool Kit To Help Create Jobs, STOP Employment Discrimination (Age & Racial), Stop Voting Rights Violations, Stop Gas Speculation On Wall Street, Overhaul No Child Left Behind & Stop Or Slowdown Foreclosures.

6) Last But NOT Least, Pres. Obama Needs To Allow His 2012 Campaign Staff To Go Full Steam Ahead!

Including Allowing David Axelrod To Begin Speaking Out To Defend His Administration.

i.e, Start Another Constructive Movement (Democrats & Independents) To Outshine, Counteract & Eliminate The GOP's Destructive Tea Party Movement.

While Its True That GOP Tea Party Has Screwed Up Our Economy, I Still Believe Its NOT Too Late To Turn Things Around!

JUST DO IT PRES. OBAMA!

WITH GOD'S HELP JUST DO IT!

Vote Obama in 2012 & Rehire Pelosi!!!!






G.O.P. Fervor Cuts 2 Ways for Boehner

There is an old Texas saying often applied to politics that you need to “dance with the one that brung you.” But many of the Tea Party-infused freshmen who helped the Republican Party take control of the House last November are here to polka while their leadership is begging them to waltz.

No matter the outcome of the effort by the House speaker, John A. Boehner, to jam his debt ceiling bill through the House over the opposition of a band of freshmen and other conservatives, it is increasingly clear that the same political insurgency that put Republicans into power also has the potential to leave the party so divided that it struggles to govern.

It was a mere eight months ago that Mr. Boehner and his leadership team welcomed the new Republicans — many of whom had never held public office — into the fold of his conference, assuring them that they were the future of the party.

“I think it’s going to reinvigorate our democracy,” Mr. Boehner said then of the Tea Party, “and be a really good thing for the country.”

But the qualities that helped the majority of the 87 freshman Republicans cruise to victory in 2010 — their promises to challenge the orthodoxy of their own party and offer fealty to no one — are in this case an impediment to Mr. Boehner as he tries to negotiate a deal with Democrats to prevent a financial crisis and possible deep damage to an already weak economy. While most have come his way, many were brought kicking and screaming, and enough continue to resist to keep his victory at bay.

Of the roughly 25 Republican House members who on Thursday night refused to budge on the plan, the vast majority are freshmen, joined by some more senior members who have largely aligned themselves with the conservative deficit hawks.

In the broadest terms, the Tea Party freshmen have been victorious in changing the national conversation into an almost singular discussion of debt, and creating a consensus that America must do more to live within its means. They have changed the climate sufficiently that President Obama has moved substantially in their direction, and even stalwart liberals like Representative Nancy Pelosi, the Democratic minority leader, are talking in terms of fiscal austerity.

But it is still not clear whether they will translate their passion into accomplishment — or overreach and undercut their credibility and influence.

“Zealots are great on the campaign trail,” said Julian E. Zelizer, a professor of history and public affairs at Princeton University, “but a huge problem when it comes to governance. They often don’t believe in the art of a deal even with their allies. If they are not tamed, they can eat their own party alive.”

Mr. Boehner has been steadfast in his belief that by letting the freshmen have their say, he will earn enough good will to help him lurch forward toward ultimate legislation that would be a compromise with Senate Democrats and the White House.

In many ways, that was the rough dynamic of a fight this year over a short-term spending agreement to avert a government shutdown. But the fight over the debt ceiling — one many freshmen have been spoiling for since the day they took office —is different because the stakes are much higher, economically and politically. And while many of the freshmen have pledged to do what they believe is right no matter the consequences for their careers, their decisions are playing out against the backdrop of an incipient Republican primary in which they face the prospect of challenges from the right if they agree to a deal.

“The bitter irony of wave elections is that they can broaden your coalition and sweep you into control of the legislature, but they make your coalition more diverse and harder to control,” said Bruce Cain, a professor of political science at the University of California at Berkeley. “ What is unusual is that normally members added in this way are more centrist than the base, because they have to be in order to win in districts that were formerly held by the other party,” Mr. Cain added. “But this time, the rejection was national and based mainly on bad economic conditions and to some degree on a rejection of Obama’s policies, and the Republicans won with candidates who were from the base and beyond of the Republican party.”

For their part, freshmen are being counterwhipped, as it were, by Tea Party activists. One of their most influential groups, Freedom Works, was sending out posts on Twitter on Thursday night with the names of on-the-fence members, urging them to reject the bill.

On Thursday night, Mr. Boehner, Representative Kevin McCarthy of California, the House whip, and Representative Eric Cantor of Virginia, the majority leader, tried their best to appeal to the freshmen and other holdouts, appealing to their sense of good will, party loyalty and the bigger fights ahead.

They appeared to be refraining from the old-school tricks of promising earmarks and other goodies that are anathema to the anti-Washington new members. The vast majority of freshmen indeed got on board.

But the holdouts are enough to tank this bill, which is what forced Mr. Boehner to pull it from the floor Thursday night.

The current impasse in Congress has often been compared with 1995, when a Republican revolution in the House led by Speaker Newt Gingrich ultimately brought about a leadership coup attempt and eventually Mr. Gingrich’s resignation. In this case, at least so far, there is great sympathy for Mr. Boehner among even his most intransigent members, who say that it is the system they are fighting against far more than the leadership of the House.

“There is a desire to support him,” said Representative Trey Gowdy of South Carolina, whose entire delegation — four of the five of them freshmen — were, as of late Thursday night, standing in opposition to the bill.

“There is a desire to act before Aug. 2, and a desire to move on to other legislative priorities,” Mr. Gowdy said. But, he added, echoing many of his classmates, without higher cuts up front and perhaps a balanced budget act as part of the legislation, the bill would look like too many compromises of the past.

“There has been a sense that the 75th raising of the debt ceiling would provide a metaphor for the larger conversation about the size and scope of government,” he said.


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Sources: AP, CNN, MSNBC, NY Times, Politico, Think Progress, Wall Street Journal, Youtube, Google Maps

Senate Health Care Bill DOA! House Listening To Voters

Dems Health Care Talks Collapsing



Health care reform teetered on the brink of collapse Thursday as House and Senate leaders struggled to coalesce around a strategy to rescue the plan, in the face of growing pessimism among lawmakers that the president’s top priority can survive.

The legislative landscape was filled with obstacles: House Democrats won’t pass the Senate bill. Senate Democrats don’t want to start from scratch just to appease the House. And the White House still isn’t telling Congress how to fix the problem.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) both tried to put a good face on the obvious chaos on Thursday, promising to press on.

“We have to get a bill passed,” Pelosi told reporters. “We know that.”

Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus (D-Mont.) said, “No way is it dead, because it’s so important for the country. And we will find a way to pass [it].”

But for the first time in the yearlong push, Democratic aides — and even some members — finally acknowledged privately that the fear of failure was real. And Congress recessed for the weekend without an obvious path forward as rank-and-file Democrats started splintering in different directions.

Democrats struggled all year to maintain a coalition in support of health care reform without any GOP votes. Republican Scott Brown’s improbable win in Massachusetts on Tuesday now looks like it has the potential to end that almost-impossible balancing act.

This post-Massachusetts confusion raises the stakes for President Barack Obama’s first official State of the Union address next week, which some now believe must be a last-ditch effort to get health care finished.

On Thursday, Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), a fierce proponent of health reform, said it wasn’t clear how the Senate should press ahead.

“Obviously, you cannot just proceed as if nothing happened, because something very significant happened,” Schumer said, referring to Brown’s victory. “There is a strong view in both caucuses that we want to do some good things in health care, and the question is how? How much and how quickly?”

Pelosi took one option off the table Thursday when she told reporters that she doesn’t have the votes to pass the Senate bill unless it undergoes major changes. The White House had hoped to avoid a protracted health care fight by getting the House to adopt the Senate bill, despite deep misgivings among House Democrats.

That leaves two main options for moving forward:

The first would be to pass a scaled-back health care bill, but it remains to be seen what that would look like. Liberal groups have already assailed the idea for falling short of the president’s initial goal of near-universal coverage. And the second idea is for the House to pass a so-called corrections bill that would make changes to the Senate legislation but would require the Senate to pass the second bill as well.

Schumer would not say which option he preferred.

“There are obviously different options, and you have to look at each,” Schumer said. “How long will each one take? I don’t think we want to do health care the next three months. So there are tradeoffs here, and that’s what everybody is exploring.”

And other options seem to keep popping up all the time. During a closed-door session at the Capitol Visitor Center, a number of House Democrats told their leaders to pursue a third path that would involve breaking the bills into separate parts and moving them one at a time — a tactic that presents obvious practical and political concerns.

In the absence of clear directives from congressional leaders or the White House, Democrats started pointing fingers and freelancing their own ideas.

An undercurrent to the unresolved negotiations is the mounting friction between the House and the Senate. The two chambers don’t see eye to eye on most days, but since the stunning Democratic loss in Massachusetts, the tensions have been exacerbated at a time when their trust and cooperation is essential to finishing health care.

Part of the negotiations center on whether Reid can provide an ironclad guarantee that the Senate will not leave the House in the lurch, aides said. If the House agrees to pass the Senate bill with a companion measure — or a “cleanup” bill — to make fixes, they want to know that the Senate will indeed pass it, too.

There was some talk among Senate leadership on Thursday of putting together a letter signed by 51 Democratic senators pledging to pass a cleanup bill if the House would pass the Senate bill. But that effort fizzled when support for it didn’t materialize, insiders said.

“The Senate moderates’ viewpoint is, ‘We passed our bill. We’re not going to spend three weeks on some other bill,’” said a Democratic lobbyist who represents clients pushing for reform.

“There’s a real possibility it doesn’t get through,” said another Democratic lobbyist.

Sen. Robert Menendez (D-N.J.) said one possibility involved having the Senate pass the cleanup bill first. But there’s a question as to whether the Senate can amend a bill that is not yet law, officials said. Reid would also want some assurances ahead of time from the parliamentarian that key elements of the cleanup bill would not be struck from the bill, officials said.

House Democrats are angry with the Senate for passing a bill that divided their base, angering labor unions with a tax on expensive health plans and progressives by abandoning the public option. House members are frustrated that the Senate assumes they will roll over whenever the upper chamber demands it and that they took until late December to pass a bill.

Rank-and-file Democrats would like more guidance from the White House, but some complained when rumors broke that chief of staff Rahm Emanuel was prodding lawmakers to move quickly to repackage a scaled-back bill. A White House source said Emanuel was just surveying members to see what they could accept.

Some Democrats also worried that voters would judge them out-of-touch for devoting so much energy to health care now.

“People think we’re not doing enough on the economy, we’re not doing enough on jobs, we’re not doing enough on employment, and perhaps we’re doing too much on healthcare,” said New York Rep. Eliot Engel, an outspoken backer of reform.

“Right now, their priority is jobs and the economy,” he continued. “Health care is not the priority. If we look like…we’re hell-bent on making health care the no. 1 priority regardless of how much pain is out there, then I think we do it at our own peril.”

Frustration among House Democrats was clear in a Thursday morning caucus meeting, members present said afterward.

Massachusetts Rep. Mike Capuano kicked things off by telling colleagues that health care reform wasn’t the only reason Democrat Martha Coakley, who beat him in the primary, lost the general election. Capuano said his party failed to explain to voters what the legislation means for average Americans, saying they should never have passed a 2,000-page bill.

“The health care bill is too complicated, and it looks like too many backroom deals,” Capuano said in an interview with POLITICO. “We need to do a much better job explaining what we are trying to do.”

Mississippi Rep. Gene Taylor got up after Capuano and said Congress should do a bill a week and have a pep rally, according to people present at the meeting.

Pennsylvania Rep. Mike Doyle told fellow Democrats that people in his district support insurance reform but hate the gamesmanship in this debate, citing Nebraska Sen. Ben Nelson’s deal to shield his state from future changes to Medicaid and taxing benefits.

“They hate the devious stuff,” Doyle said. “They hate when we do something slick.”

The Senate, meanwhile, can’t understand why the House doesn’t acknowledge that the bill it passed is the best it can do.

“I have to respectfully say to the House, they’ve done some good work, but I just think that the bill that we end up with is going have to be more along the lines of what the Senate did,” said Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-La.).

Democrats also were also critical of an idea to scale down the bill to include popular provisions saying that all reform’s parts are interdependent. For instance, banning insurance companies from denying people coverage because of pre-existing conditions requires that all people be required to carry insurance, which necessitates subsidies to help people afford insurance. And subsidies require tax increases or other revenue raisers to pay for them. Doing any of those things in isolation will drive up health care costs, they argue.

“Health care isn’t an incremental problem and there is no incremental solution that will work,” said Jacki Schechner, a spokeswoman for the progressive coalition Health Care for America Now.

She said there’s “a frustration with the lack of appreciation for just how much we’ve got. We’ve got the majority. We’ve got the bill. We’ve got the urgent need. We need to keep moving forward.”

To make matters worse, Maine Sen. Olympia Snowe, once a possible Republican vote, signaled Thursday that she was unlikely to rejoin negotiations with the White House and Democratic leaders unless they scaled back their ambitions.

Despite the dimming prospects, Senate Democrats on both ends of the political spectrum said they wanted to see the bill passed.

“We have to have it. We have to get the bill,” said Sen. John Rockefeller (D-W.Va.). Not doing it “would be a disaster. It would be a disaster for my state. It would be an economic disaster. Talk about jobs; that’s the only growing sector in the economy. It just would be awful.”


Sources: Politico, MSNBC, TPMTV, Youtube, Vodpod

Health Care Lobbyists Now Wooing House Dems...Public Option Is Dead!

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Health Lobby Takes Fight To The States


Like about a dozen other states, Florida is debating a proposed amendment to its state constitution that would try to block, at least symbolically, much of the proposed federal health care overhaul on the grounds that it tramples individual liberty.

But what unites the proposal’s legislative backers is more than ideology. Its 42 co-sponsors, all Republicans, were almost all recipients of outsized campaign contributions from major health care interests, a total of about $765,000 in 2008, according to a new study by the National Institute on Money in State Politics, a nonpartisan group based in Helena, Mont.

It is just one example of how insurance companies, hospitals and other health care interests have been positioning themselves in statehouses around the country to influence the outcome of the proposed health care overhaul. Around the 2008 election, the groups that provide health care contributed about $102 million to state political campaigns across the country, surpassing the $89 million the same donors spent at the federal level, according to the institute.

Any federal legislation is likely to supersede state constitutional amendments. But backers of the state measures say they want to send a message to Congress and also lay groundwork for fights about elements of the health care package that are expected to be left up to the states.

Some proposals floated around Capitol Hill, for example, would allow individual states to “opt in” or “opt out” of regional health insurance markets or government-sponsored insurers.

“We would be essentially telegraphing our intentions,” said State Senator Carey Baker, a Florida Republican and lead sponsor of the state’s proposal. “If there was an opt-in, we are essentially stating now that we are not going to opt in.”

Advocates of a sweeping overhaul by the federal government, on the other hand, say the magnitude of the health care industry’s contributions shows the dangers of leaving such a question up to individual states, where campaign finance and ethics rules vary from strict to negligible.

“The states are the next battle,” said Richard Kirsch, national campaign manager for the liberal advocacy group Health Care for America Now, “and the insurers and health care industry are primed up and ready to go. The industry has enormous power at the state level, and very few states have state-level consumer groups that are able to lobby effectively against them.”

Last year, for example, the drug industry poured more than $20 million into political contributions in states around the country. In California alone, the industry spent an additional $80 million on advertising to beat back a California ballot measure intended to push down drug prices.

Now, speaking on condition of anonymity because the pharmaceutical trade group is officially backing the federal overhaul, industry lobbyists say they are eyeing Congressional proposals that would expand a state’s Medicaid obligations, and are preparing to fight efforts to make some of it up by paying less for drugs. (A spokeswoman for the National Conference of State Legislatures said many states were contemplating just that.)

The idea of amending state constitutions to block the core of the federal health care legislation, including the requirement that individuals and businesses buy insurance, began at the conservative Goldwater Institute in Arizona, the state where the first such measure will appear on the ballot next year.

“The measures are an opportunity for people to make their views known in a tangible way, to generate some rumble at the grass roots,” said Clint Bolick, a lawyer at the Goldwater Institute who helped devise the idea.

From there, though, the concept was picked up by the American Legislative Exchange Council, a business-friendly conservative group that coordinates activity among statehouses. Five of the 24 members of its “free enterprise board” are executives of drug companies and its health care “task force” is overseen in part by a four-member panel composed of government-relations officials for the Blue Cross and Blue Shield Association of insurers, the medical company Johnson & Johnson and the drug makers Bayer and Hoffmann-La Roche.

The group adopted Arizona’s proposed amendment as a model, and it was introduced in 14 state legislatures around the country. Lawmakers in several others are reportedly considering it as well.

“We are trying to prepare, and trying to send a message that there is no reason for those decisions to get made at the federal level,” said Representative Linda L. Upmeyer, a Republican who is leading the council’s efforts in Iowa.

The states where the amendment has been introduced are also places where the health care industry has spent heavily on political contributions in recent years, according to figures from the National Institute on Money in State Politics. Over the last six years, health care interests have spent $394 million on contributions in states around the country; about $73 million of that went to those 14 states. Of that, health insurance companies spent $18.2 million, according to the institute.

In Florida, where health interests have given a total of about $32 million over the last six years, the state medical association has become an especially important backer of the proposed amendment. In contrast to the national American Medical Association, the state chapter has come out firmly against the current Congressional proposals, and a spokeswoman said the Florida group had embraced the proposed state amendment “to protect Florida from being forced into a federal government mandate that would hurt patients.”

Dr. Madelyn E. Butler, president elect of the Florida Medical Association, said, “We are trying to ameliorate the effects of national health care reform on the State of Florida.”

James Greer, chairman of the Florida Republican Party, said he too supported the proposal, which could be on the ballot in 2010 or more likely in 2012. Whatever its legal weight, Mr. Greer said, its mere presence on the ballot would give it political force.

“It will energize Republicans and independents who want to vote against Democrats and the policies of the Democratic Congress,” Mr. Greer said.


Sources: NY Times, CBS News, Face The Nation

House Dems "Dithering" On Public Option...Pssst! Its Dead!

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Public Option May Be Dropped From Final Health Care Bill



House Democrats are signaling that a final health care bill will drop the government-run public health insurance option favored by liberals but rejected by conservatives from both parties.

A House-Senate conference committee will begin negotiations next month on merging health care bills passed by the Democratic majorities in each chamber.

However, voting in both chambers was extremely close, raising concerns that a compromise might fail to win the necessary final approval.

One of the main differences between the two measures is the public option. The House bill contains the public option as a competitor to private insurers in a national heath insurance exchange open to people now unable to get coverage, but the Senate version lacks a public option.

President Obama, who has made health care reform his top domestic priority this year, has expressed general support for a public option but stops short of insisting on the provision.

Liberal Democrats in the House have said they want to keep the public option, but one of their leaders -- Rep. James Clyburn of South Carolina, the chamber's third-ranking Democrat -- said Sunday that he could vote for a bill without the government insurance plan.

"We want a public option to do basically three things: create more choice for insurers, create more competition for insurance companies and to contain costs," Clyburn said on the CBS program "Face the Nation." "So if we can come up with a process by which these three things can be done, then I'm all for it. Whether or not we label it a public option or not is of no consequence."

The Senate health care bill required the support of all 60 members of the Democratic caucus to overcome a Republican filibuster. Such precarious support allowed individual moderates in the Democratic caucus to wield major influence on the bill, with at least two -- Sens. Joe Lieberman of Connecticut and Ben Nelson of Nebraska -- saying they would oppose the measure if it contained the public option.

On Sunday, Rep. Chris Van Hollen of Maryland, chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, acknowledged the reality of the Senate politics. Asked on "Fox News Sunday" about the public option, Van Hollen said, "It's not dead, but we also recognize that the Senate was able to just muster the 60 votes."

The House could drop the public option if "there are other mechanisms in whatever bill comes out that will keep down premiums," Van Hollen said.

Supporters of a public option say it would provide nonprofit competition to private insurers that would bring down costs, but opponents contend that it is the first step toward a government takeover of the health care system.

In place of a public option, the Senate bill includes a provision allowing private insurers to offer nonprofit coverage overseen by a government agency.

Both the House and Senate bills would permit the creation of nonprofit private insurance cooperatives to increase competition.



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Senate Dems Consider Revisiting Public Option...2010 Elections

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Public Option Tensions Linger


Just hours after a critical Monday morning vote in the Senate, Democrats were already talking about future changes to the health reform effort in hopes of calming a revolt among liberal activists.

Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa), chairman of the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, predicted the government health insurance option long favored by liberals would be part of that second look.

“It will be revisited,” Harkin said. “This is just the beginning. … What we’re building is a starter home, not a mansion. And guess what? We have room for expansions and additions later on.”

But if progressives were relying on President Barack Obama to make a hard push for the public option during the House-Senate negotiations on a final bill — a hope that liberals held out for months — the president downplayed the importance of it Monday in some of his toughest language yet about why he didn’t consider the idea critical to reform.

“As a practical matter, this is not the most important aspect of this bill — the House bill or the Senate bill,” Obama said of the public option, adding that it “is an area that has just become symbolic of a lot of ideological fights.”

Only “a few million people” would have benefited from the public option, he said, in an interview with American Urban Radio, acknowledging the idea’s limited reach in a way Democrats had declined to do throughout the year.

Even in the afterglow of Monday’s successful test vote, which moved health care reform closer to enactment than at any point in the past two decades, Democrats are unlikely to paper over the divisions caused by the public option anytime soon.

Within minutes of the 60-40 vote, two of the final holdouts, Sens. Ben Nelson of Nebraska and Joe Lieberman, the Connecticut independent, were threatening to withhold their support if the bill drifts closer to the House bill, which includes a public option and different ways to pay for reform.

“Conferences with the House often split the difference. This is a very fragile balance that brought 60 together,” Lieberman said. “So I think it’s critically important, if we’re going to adopt health care reform legislation, that the bill that comes back from conference is essentially what passed the Senate. I know that’s asking a lot of our colleagues in the House, but that’s the practicality of where we are.”

The Senate voted Monday at 1 a.m. to begin moving the health care bill to final passage, effectively assuring its approval later this week. But Republicans yesterday signaled that they are planning to stick with their plan to force Democrats to take the final health reform vote on Christmas Eve at 7 p.m.

Republicans on Monday also continued their attacks on the reform bill, criticizing the last-minute deals cut by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid to secure 60 votes and saying that Democrats are trying to force a bad idea on the country with a series of rushed votes and a lack of debate.

"It was quite arrogant: "We know best. You all sit down and shut up’ — meaning the American people. ‘And Republicans, we don’t need to deal with you. You just sit down and shut up, and we’ll take care of this for you.’ Very arrogant".

The President and the Leadership said, "Make history".

Well, that’s what you talk about when you don’t have the Polls on your side. And of course, a lot of things that have happened in history have not been good,” Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky said on Sean Hannity’s radio show Monday.

Next up would be a House-Senate conference to work on a final compromise. House members traditionally resent being dictated to by the upper chamber, but some House Democrats have acknowledged they may have little choice but to stick with the bulk of the Senate bill, if they hope to preserve health reform.

Reid (D-Nev.) said he has not yet focused on the compromises or concessions that could come in the conference committee.

“We have to pass this bill in the Senate first, and that is our direction, that is our guiding light,” Reid said. “And we’ll worry about next steps at a later time. We are going to finish this bill before Christmas.”

House leadership aides say they aren’t getting much sense from their bosses of what their priorities will be heading into negotiations with the Senate, but most suggest Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Majority Leader Steny Hoyer will hold out for some changes, however slight, to make sure their rank and file are comfortable.

And no one wants to hear Lieberman dictate policy to the House — even if he’s correct about the effect of changes on the delicate balance of votes in the Senate.

“I don’t think the House members care what Joe Lieberman has to say,” said one House Democratic leadership aide. “Joe Lieberman has absolutely no say in the Democratic Caucus. I don’t think anything he said makes a bit of difference. ... It shouldn’t be for the Senate to come in and say, ‘Take it or leave it.’”

Most Democrats in the House acknowledge that they don’t have much room to work with the Senate, so changes will most likely nibble around the edges of a final compromise. This might mean pushing the Senate to move up its implementation date for programs that it voted to go into effect later than their counterparts in the House bill. The Senate bill, for example, starts the insurance exchanges a year later than the House. And the House bill would close a gap in prescription-drug coverage next year, while Senate negotiators, who agreed just last week to close the gap, still haven’t settled on a start date for expanded drug coverage.

Aides in the House are split over whether abortion opponents in their caucus will accept softened restrictions along the lines of those in the Senate bill. A number of first- and second-term Democrats are listening closely to the Roman Catholic Church, which has already come out against the Senate bill. So anti-abortion Democrats in the House might have more leverage than their colleagues in the Senate to force tougher restrictions.

House leaders also might make another push to insert the public option — even though few expect it to succeed, given Reid’s inability to add it to the Senate bill.

“It makes sense for us to go one more round,” the same aide said. “It’s worth it to our base.”

But no one expects a single issue to scuttle the entire package once leaders have enough of their members on the record voting for this bill. Democrats have begun to see the finish line, aides said, which gives them an added incentive to keep from going off course.

Whatever negotiations the two chambers hold, most House aides don’t expect the talks to stretch on because the White House and the party’s congressional leaders want to wrap up work as quickly as possible so that they can pivot next year to the economy and job creation.

Senate Democrats sought to maintain the momentum from the early-morning test vote, announcing later Monday an endorsement from the American Medical Association. But at the same time, Reid was forced to defend a series of narrowly crafted provisions in the Senate reform bill that benefit individual states, saying “it doesn’t speak well” of senators who didn’t secure such deals.

“There are 100 senators here, and I don’t know that there’s a senator that doesn’t have something in this bill that isn’t important to them,” Reid said. “If they don’t have something in it important to them then it doesn’t speak well of them.”

He likened the legislation to the Defense Department appropriations bill, which passed Saturday and is thick with earmarks and other provisions benefitting individual members and even private corporations.

“That’s what legislation’s all about,” Reid said of the compromises. “It’s the art of compromise. In this great country of ours, Nevada has many different problems than does New Hampshire. Michigan has many different problems than does Georgia.”

Reid made the remarks as he accepted the AMA endorsement. The legislation lacks the group’s No. 1 priority — a permanent fix to doctors’ Medicare reimbursement rates, which perennially threaten doctors with deep cuts. But the endorsement could help the group get action on a fix after reform is finished, which is what it is pushing for now.

The so-called doc fix is one of the first elements of health care reform that Democrats would address if they pass the comprehensive bill early next year.

Asked whether Democrats would reopen the public option debate next year, Harkin said: “You never know. I believe it is so vital and so important, it will be revisited.”



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