Thursday, December 24, 2009

Sen. Jim DeMint's Christmas Gift To America


The procedural rules of Congress are nothing if not byzantine - and thus are the they a double edged sword to be exploited by both sides. And it may just be that Sen. Jim "Santa" DeMint, exploiting the rules, has put a present under the tree of every American. He has put a huge monkey wrench into Harry Reid's bum's rush of our country towards national suicide health care. This from Red State:

When Senator DeMint engineered, and Republican Leader McConnell actually objected to the appointment of the conferees, he was really handing the ball off to the left wingers — progressives if you will — and now they have their shot to either hold their own clan members who are against the Senate compromises and force them to vote No, or have their policy demands be ignored and take the crumbs from Senator Nelson’s and Senator Lieberman’s table.

Now, because of the Senator DeMint’s objection, unless the House votes for the Senate bill unchanged — which is highly unlikely (see below) — then the Senate ObamaCare bill must be amended on the House floor to gain the votes they need to pass it on the House floor. And because of Senator DeMint’s objection to the appointment of the conferees, there will be no conference, or conference report.

If the House amends the Senate bill, they then have to send the amended bill back to the Senate — where all the 60 vote margin cloture votes still apply — cloture on the motion to proceed, and cloture to end the filibuster and cloture on any amendment.

Do I believe that this objection to the appointment of the conferees will kill ObamaCare? Yes, if the progressives or those 64 House Democrats who voted for the Stupak amendment do not roll over and play dead.

This monkey wrench may explain why the White House is putting out the word that it wants the health care bill to pass the House after the State of the Union, in February.

You all can decide whether the DeMint objection could be the kiss of death to ObamaCare, but I offer the following to convince you that it is . . .

Do read the rest of the post. This ought to make for a brighter Christmas Day.

2 comments:

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cdor said...

I have often wondered when polls show about 60% of Americans against this bill just how many of those are actually wanting free market reforms and how many think the bill is not socialist enough because it doesn't immediately burn all private health insurance companies, shackle their employees, and send them all to SuperMax in Colorado. I have never seen a poll that attempts to determine that rather significant distinction. Perhaps you could enlighten me GW, or someone else reading these posts.

If the far left manages to help the Repubs kill this bill, even Rick Moran might begin to think, maybe there is a God, afterall.