Last week, just prior to the Health Care Summit, the president posted his “final” word on the proposed legislation. It was basically the Senate bill with a few of the House versions more egregious programs tacked on. This was the party line until this afternoon. Now we hear that he will instead offer a stripped down version this week. The polling numbers really sucked over the weekend and now it’s a free for all.
The Summit failed to sway anyone, and the president’s poll numbers dropped. Over the weekend, Nancy Pelosi stated that “The health care bill can be bipartisan even though the vote may not be bipartisan.” She said this on CNN and the peanut gallery is still howling with laughter.
A number of leading Democratic senators have come out against using the reconciliation process to pass the health care bill, and with the opposition of various factions in the House to each others nonnegotiable demands, the whole thing is turning into a Marx Brothers movie with guns. Meanwhile, Charlie Rangel is hiding in the closet hoping no one knocks on the door.
The Republicans, who actually made a little sense at the summit, are on the sidelines almost as confused as everyone else except they’re avoided stepping in the dog poop. They have been very clearly told they are irrelevant, so now the Democrats have no one to blame but themselves.
On the funny pages also known as Op/Ed, Paul Krugman has taken leave of his senses and is now drooling in the corner after a nervous breakdown while E.J. Dionne is restating the party line faster than Pravda during Glasnost. His latest on the subject is that the reconciliation mess staring Congress in the eye is actually a great big fuzzy bunny because the Senate already passed a bill and all the House has to do is agree. Al Hunt is urging the president to go gangster on Congress and strong arm them the Chicago way into doing his bidding.
Pretzel logic is the order of the day. It would actually be funny if we didn’t have so many other pressing matters.
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