TPM: Schumer Working w/Landrieu,Lincoln on Trigger over Opt Out (art3)
TPM says Reid has the votes to open debate but Sen Schumer is owrking on a trigger with Linolcn and Landrieu as both say they oppose public option. Progressives have a huge fight ahead on this. Yuck.
http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo…
Frankly…
I’m pleasantly surprised it’s gotten even this far. I thought the playbook was going to be, Reid: “I’m including an opt-out public option in the bill”, after which the conservative Senators start freaking out, and so a few days later Reid goes: “Sorry guys, no can do, I tried, really!”. But anyways, I would give at least 50% odds to the public option being stripped, triggerized, or at least weakened in some way via amendment. The conservative Senators are simply holding all of the cards here. Killing the bill is an acceptable outcome to them, and not for basically anyone else, so all anyone else can do is try to appease them. If merely getting to cloture on the motion to proceed was this slow and difficult, I can’t imagine what it’ll take to get them to vote for the two cloture votes on final passage.

And I don’t see even a Progressive Block strategy being very helpful here — the White House and leadership really want a bill, so presumably they’d be willing to pressure conservative Senators; I just don’t see what, in a practical sense, they could actually do to pressure, say, Blanche Lincoln. She’s up for reelection next year in a very red state, one of the only states in the country where Obama actually did much worse than Kerry, and it looks very much like she’s going to lose. What could they possibly have on her?

Not to mention someone like Joe Lieberman, whose behaviour bears no relation to any sort of rational electoral concerns whatsoever.

 
Lincoln's going to lose no matter what

  So it costs her NOTHING to do the right thing and actually SERVE her constituents. It’s the freedom of impending death.

  Why this option never occurred to Blanche Lincoln says more about her character and integrity than I ever wanted to know.  

“We judge ourselves by our ideals; others by their actions. It is a great convenience.” — Howard Zinn

[ Parent ]  
The fact that they're not willing to do anything positive
just out of the goodness of their hearts is the entire reason we have to go through this whole ordeal in the first place. It’s sort of like a starting assumption.
[ Parent ]  
Actually
I’m wrong. For some reason I totally forgot that reconciliation exists. So, that’s how they could can pressure them — just threaten to circumvent them. So, that’s what they should do.
[ Parent ]  
Just because Blanche Lincoln is running in a very red state
doesn’t mean that

1) Most of that states residents don’t want a public option

2) That the party doesn’t have a number of financial and political things that it could do to help her, or withhold and redistribute to other candidates

3) That seeing the Democrats lose on their major policy initiative would do anything other than tank her candidacy.

It really wouldn’t be hard for the DNC to say ‘we have this money that was supposed to go to you, but instead, we’re going to run issue ads behind Russ Feingold, who is also running in a tight race, unless you help us on the #1 thing that we need.’

[ Parent ]  
How do you say? ..
Arkansas is a very red state? .. as Booman said .. Arkansas loves them some white Democrats .. pretty much all state wide office holders in Arkansas are Dems .. just because Obama lost there doesn’t mean squat … all polls I ever saw(even late in the campaign) said Hillary would have smoked McCain there .. yeah I know what that says about Arkansas
[ Parent ]  
I wasn't even really debating that point
just saying that, presupposing that point, it still doesn’t justify Lincoln filibustering the HC bill.
[ Parent ]  
The Douchebag Caucus

 Instead of caving to them, Schumer might want to make them state, publicly, exactly WHY the opt-out isn’t good enough for them.

 Lincoln and Landrieu and the rest of the Douchebag Caucus are getting away with too much here — because the rest of the Dems are letting them. There is no RATIONAL argument against the opt-out, at least from the standpoint of a conservative who’s worried about his teabagger constituents being exposed to that horrible, horrible public option.

 Make them say WHY the opt-out doesn’t meet their needs.

 If the Democrats had actual leadership…  

“We judge ourselves by our ideals; others by their actions. It is a great convenience.” — Howard Zinn

 
If you read Jane ..
over at FDL .. she speculates that Schumer is angling to force Reid out and claim the Majority Leader seat
[ Parent ]  
Who will stand up and filibuster triggers?
Someone(s) from the pro public option side of the Senate needs to make clear that triggers or some other sellout of the public option will not get 60 votes either. The Conservadems and leadership need to be disabused of the idea that every last cave will be supported by every last member of the majority.

Filibuster any weakening of the public option and either the Conservadems cave or we get gridlock and reconciliation.  

Health care reform = Employer payroll savings = More hiring and more jobs!

 
The only senators from the very beginning
who have been willing to draw lines in the sand have been the conservadems, its been sad really. a conservadem routinely claims they can’t vote for a PO, but whenever even the strongest PO supporter is asked if they will vote for a non-PO bill, they pass up on the chance. The only reason why its in the senate bill is because of the threats coming form house progressives and outside pressure groups, which, with Reid facing reelection, were enough to spook him into including some version of the PO in the bill. Senate dems would’ve caved ages ago if they were forced to take a true stand on the PO. Schumer, in particular, is like Obama, he’s for the PO, but will pretty much sell it down the river if it gets the 60 votes.  
[ Parent ]  
I hope Bernie ..
or Feingold would do it
[ Parent ]  
The man, the myth…
Roland Burris!
[ Parent ]  
Getting the cloture vote to end debate
will be real tough. Leiberman, Lincoln, and Landrieu have all publicly said they will filibuster the bill if it includes the opt-out, and Ben Nelson has basically said as much. It’s time to put up or shutup, Obama is going to have to meet with these senators and push them a little bit, albeit delicately since their egos can’t be bruised. Obama has always been saying that when the time is right they’ll draw lines on where they stand. The time is now…there is no time to “let the senate do their work” as they;ve been saying all year.  
 
sick
reid weakened the po with an opt out thinking he placated these people. now they want more. it falls again to hosue progressives to hol dfirm for a natl po or we are screwed.
[ Parent ]  
These people hold no values
and that’s always been the problem with trying to negotiate with them. This bill meets everything they claim to want in a billd, deficit neutral, saves billions in the out years, significantly weakens the PO, maintains the private sector, but it still isn’t enough because they will only accept a COMPLETE surrender to their demands, seriously.

They talk of compromise but that’s not what they want, they want everyone to come to them and bow. And what’s worse is if their needs aren’t met, not only will they vote against the bill, they will filibuster the damm thing. They will filibuster the ENTIRE bill because of something that will cover 3 million americans and have their states opt-out of. They simply don’t care fellas, they have no values, they will kill this thing and sleep like a baby.

[ Parent ]  
Fuck delicately
Obama needs to give them the Johnson treatment.  LBJ passed far more contraversial bills through Congress with a strong er filibuster.  And he didn’t do it by coddling up to the waverers.  

The party has plenty of carrots and sticks to use if they were willing to.  

[ Parent ]  
Additionally,
Joe Lieberman needs to be reminded that his membership in the caucus is quite contraversial, and he stands to lose his chair.  
[ Parent ]  
an amendment right
ok if say schumer crafts this crap trigger must it be an amendment on the floor to pass?
[ Parent ]  
Maybe that's the strategy
whip count the trigger.  If there are fewer than nine democrats in favor of it, trade a promise of cloture for an up or down vote on the trigger.  Then the trigger gets defeated, Reid gets the cloture votes, and we move on with life.  

Of course, who knows if this is acceptable to our holdouts.  

[ Parent ]  
LBJ passed those bills
by watering them down to get Republican votes.

[ Parent ]  
hence
we should’ve started from single payer!!!!!111omgone
[ Parent ]  
good luck convince them of that one
they tend to go for the circular argument: we got this. therefore, that’s all we could have gotten. You are not suppose to question whether the strategy produced the results or not.  it happened because it happened. That’s all you are suppose to think.
[ Parent ]  
How would that have helped?
We would’ve ended up going from single payer to public option to opt out to where we are now. It just would’ve taken longer.  
[ Parent ]  
If the many exclamation marks didn't give it away…
I was being facetious.
[ Parent ]  
He did both
We’ve completely abandoned the sticks and carrots approach to things, it seems, and have now opted entirely for watering bills down.
[ Parent ]  
The problem with the trigger
is that it’s written so as to guarantee that it will never be pulled.

But hypothetically, would it be possible to draft a different version of “trigger” in such a way that it would almost certainly be pulled within, say, a year?  By defining targets that ALREADY aren’t being met?  Isn’t that just a matter of numbers?

Of course, it might be that the other side would see through that.  

I don’t know the answer to this.  Just thinking out loud.

sTiVo’s rule: Just because YOU “wouldn’t put it past ’em” doesn’t prove that THEY did it.

 
I believe this has been tried
and was rejected by Olympia Snowe.  Whether or not Lincoln or Landrieu might go for this, who knows?
[ Parent ]  
Exactly
A trigger that is likely to be pulled in 80% of the states would be better than an opt-out that likely to lead to 70% of the states with a public option. The final “trigger” that would be included in the event of a “compromise” has yet to be written. Yes, the Senate finance committee version wasn’t likely to be pulled in most states, but that doesn’t guarantee another version would have the same specs. Likely, perhaps, but not guaranteed. This may be the end game. Both sides can claim they won. Not saying this is the ideal situation, but without reconciliation, this may be the only feasible option left.  

Demockracy.com

[ Parent ]  
The reality is these
senators would never agree to a trigger that would actually, you know, work. Their whole reasoning behind supporting a trigger is because its the only “compromise” being discussed that doesn’t involve having a PO as part of the bill, and holding their support of the trigger would probably require it to ensure no PO in the bill today or in the future. The idea that they want to give the private sector a chance first, as Snowe says, is absurd and a lie. They’re well aware the private insurance companies have been given many chances and aren’t going to offer lower premiums.  
[ Parent ]  
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