ObamaCare - update

Obamacare Marches On [Yuval Levin]

The story of the day is certainly Senator Ben Nelson’s shameless perfidy—giving up his pro-life principles in return for swindling taxpayers in the other 49 states into paying all of Nebraska’s future new Medicaid costs. The deal he struck would undermine both the logic underlying the Hyde Amendment and the logic underlying the Medicaid system. There is no conceivable policy argument for the way the new bill treats Nebraska, it’s simply a case of a senator’s vote being purchased with taxpayer dollars.

But the bigger and more significant story is what Nelson’s decision now enables—that is, the larger Reid health care bill, which now looks far more likely to pass the Senate (though it still faces a tough road after that). It’s easy to get caught up in the daily tactics and forget what we’re getting ourselves into here. The Reid bill is the embodiment of the Democrats’ attitude that they just have to pass something, whatever it is. About the only thing that can be said in favor of this bill is that it is something. Otherwise, everything that can be said about it redounds in its disfavor.

The CBO assessment of the bill tells the appalling story. We are going to raise taxes by half a trillion dollars over the next ten years, increase spending by more than a trillion dollars, cut Medicare by $470 billion but use that money to fund a new entitlement rather than to fix Medicare itself, bend the health care cost curve up rather than down, insert layers of bureaucracy between doctors and patients, and compel and subsidize universal participation in a failed system of health insurance rather than reform or improve it. Indeed, this bill will make it exceedingly difficult to fix our health insurance financing system in the future, since it sucks dry the potential means of such reform but leaves the fundamental cost problem essentially untouched (and in some respects worsened.) After all the back and forth, pulling and tugging, it is hard to see what is left in this bill that any member of Congress, liberal or conservative, would want to support.

The public seems to see that, and is increasingly opposed to the bill, but for now Democrats in congress still persist. It’s no wonder Obama, Reid, and Pelosi want to rush this process through before their rank and file members can grasp what they’re doing. But it’s a bit of a wonder that those rank and file members so far seem to be playing along. Ben Nelson, Mary Landrieu, and a few others have been bought with taxpayer-funded favors for their states. What’s everyone else’s excuse?


Cantor: A Look Ahead [Robert Costa]

If the Senate passes its health-care bill this week, it’ll head to the House of Representatives. Once there, will Republicans have any chance of stopping it? NRO asked Rep. Eric Cantor (R., Va.), the House minority whip, for answers.

“Once in the House, it will be about what Nancy Pelosi wants to see happen,” says Cantor. “If it goes to conference, the public will have a better chance to understand what this bill means and to open up some discussion. We need to do that on a wide variety of issues, from life to the real costs inside this bill. The conference process would allow for a lot more deliberation. If not — if Speaker Pelosi tries to ram this though — that would be a real game-changer. That would be an extraordinary letdown for the American people.”

Cantor predicts that abortion would be the key issue in the House’s debate of the Senate’s bill. Pro-life Rep. Bart Stupak (D., Mich.) “has outlined very clear language” on abortion and “has made it clear that if it’s not included then he will vote against the bill,” he says. “There is a lot of reticence among many moderate Democrats. It’s unfathomable to think that pro-life Democrats would go for the Senate version. They know that the Senate’s bill is a 30-year record-breaking move to allow taxpayer dollars to fund abortion. I can’t imagine any of them supporting it.”
Cantor also notes that he’s kept a close eye on the Senate during its health-care debate. “What disappoints me is all of their deal cutting and horse trading,” he says. “They’re allocating taxpayer dollars as if those dollars belonged to the senators. It borders on immoral. Just look at the way Senator Landrieu put her vote up for sale. Senator Nelson did the same.”

Public opinion from both sides of the aisle, he adds, will be crucial going forward. “The Left knows that this bill does nothing but expand the existing system for insurance companies. The Right knows that it has nothing in terms of liability reform. In terms of a consumer health-care model, it’s an anathema to free-market conservatives. And, because it keeps insurance companies in the game, it’s also an anathema to progressives.”

For now, Cantor says he’ll be watching the 1 a.m. cloture vote at home in Richmond and rooting for his Republican colleagues in the Senate. “Mitch McConnell, Jon Kyl, and the rest of their team have put up deliberative, constant efforts to thwart this bill. They’re still at it.”

For more on the health-care battle, visit NRO’s “Doctor! Doctor!” blog.