The Road To 100

Forgetting our Vice-President’s counting ability, he made it clear during the final push of the presidential campaign that jobs was at the top of the agenda should Barrack Obama be elected president.  He was elected president and instead of jobs being the top priority, President Obama has spent the first 25% of presidency focused on health care reform.  That focus on health care instead of jobs played a large role in the election of Scott Brown, a Republican put in place by the voters of one of the most liberal states in the Country to replace an icon in the Democratic Party.

It appeared that the message was received by the White House, for during the State of the Union address delivered on January 27 President Obama announced, “Jobs must be our number-one focus in 2010.”

Both parties of Congress gave the President a standing ovation at this point in the speech.  Congress, as well as the President, seemed to understand that putting people back to work should be the focus of their efforts going forward.

So what has the White House been focused since the State of the Union address?  Health Care Reform, of course.  Go to the White House web site and you’re bombarded with health care rhetoric.  And now it looks as if the White House has finally figured out a way to pass this unpopular piece of legislation, through reconciliation, and force it upon a population who don’t want it.

How will the Democrats bypass the will of the people? 

Before I get into that, how does a bill usually make it through Congress?  First, a bill will pass through the House of Representatives.  Often changes are made to appease enough members of the House to get the bill to pass.  The bill then moves on to the Senate.  Again, changes are made to garner enough votes for it to pass.  In the Senate, however, a senator (or group of senators) may filibuster against a bill, not allowing the bill to come to a vote.  A filibuster can be broken by a vote of 3/5 majority (60 out of 100).  Once a bill gets through the Senate, the bill then goes to a committee of senators and representatives.  The committee’s responsibility is to come to a compromise on the different versions of the bill that came out of the House and the Senate.  Once the compromise bill is reached, it goes back to the House for a second vote and then to the Senate for a second vote.  Once passed by both chambers, the single bill goes to the president for his signature.  That is what is supposed to happen.

In the case of President Obama’s Health Care Bill, the House of Representatives and the Senate each passed very different versions of the bill.  The two bills were then to go to committee to be rewritten as one bill.  While in committee, however, the Commonwealth of Massachusetts elected Scott Brown who had campaigned that he would be the 41st senator against the health care bill, therefore allowing a filibuster to keep the bill from ever being voted on by the Senate.  The people of Massachusetts, and according to every published poll I could find the citizens of the country, made it clear they did not want this health care bill to pass.  The election of Senator Brown seemed to kill the health care bill in its present state.

Not so fast.  Congressional Democrats and the White House have found a way to get this bill passed without having to worry about a senate filibuster.  Nancy Pelosi has pressured enough representatives to pass the senate version of the bill as it is presently written, without committee work to compromise between the two chambers.  The House will then pass a second bill to “fix” the first bill.  Both bills then move on out of the House.  The senate does not have to vote on a bill that it has already passed, so the health care bill will move on to the president.  The senate will vote on the “fix” bill the House passed in a process called reconciliation.  A reconciliation bill, by rule, is limited to 20 hours of debate, meaning it cannot be filibustered.  The Democratic leaders in the Senate have “promised to fix” the senate bill, but in fact may choose to fix some or none of the bill.  Either way, the Health Care Reform Bill makes it to the president for his signature.

It gets even better.  Democrats have had difficulty getting a bill that would allow a government takeover of the student loan program any where near the sixty votes required to push it through the Senate.  Nancy Pelosi has announced that she will attach the Student Loan Reform Bill to the “fixes” that get sent to the senate, which means Democrats can get this bill through without fear of filibuster as well.  What does student loans have to do with “fixes” to a health care bill.  Nothing really, but that isn’t the point.  Since Democrats have decided to take on health care on their own, they figure why not attach another piece of legislation they know will get filibustered if presented as a seperate bill.  It is very sneaky, but a brilliant way to get what you want when a large portion of the population doesn’t agree with you.

The government will takeover health care and student loans all at the same time.

Will it stop there?  Good question.  Many believe this is the first step to a single payer system such as Canada’s.

Canada’s single payer system seems to work fine except when you need actual serious care.  Take for example the case of Newfoundland and Labrador’s Premier Danny Williams (a premier is similar to a governor).  When he required a serious heart operation, he decided to take on the expense himself and travel to the United States for the operation. 

An unapologetic Danny Williams says he was aware his trip to the United States for heart surgery earlier this month would spark outcry, but he concluded his personal health trumped any public fallout over the controversial decision.

In an interview with The Canadian Press, Williams said he went to Miami to have a “minimally invasive” surgery for an ailment first detected nearly a year ago, based on the advice of his doctors.

“This was my heart, my choice and my health,” Williams said late Monday from his condominium in Sarasota, Fla.

“I did not sign away my right to get the best possible health care for myself when I entered politics.”

The 60-year-old Williams said doctors detected a heart murmur last spring and told him that one of his heart valves wasn’t closing properly, creating a leakage.

He said he was told at the time that the problem was “moderate” and that he should come back for a checkup in six months.

Eight months later, in December, his doctors told him the problem had become severe and urged him to get his valve repaired immediately or risk heart failure, he said.

His doctors in Canada presented him with two options – a full or partial sternotomy, both of which would’ve required breaking bones, he said.

He said he spoke with and provided his medical information to a leading cardiac surgeon in New Jersey who is also from Newfoundland and Labrador. He advised him to seek treatment at the Mount Sinai Medical Center in Miami.

That’s where he was treated by Dr. Joseph Lamelas, a cardiac surgeon who has performed more than 8,000 open-heart surgeries.

Williams said Lamelas made an incision under his arm that didn’t require any bone breakage.

A Canadian government official decides to come to the United States to have treatment he couldn’t get in Canada, and this is the direction the president and Mrs. Pelosi are trying to take us?   No wonder they need to bend the rules to get health care reform passed.

Of course, the bill isn’t actually complete yet.  And if you are thinking you would like to read it before it gets passed, well listen to what Speaker Pelosi said at the 2010 Legislative Conference for National Association of Counties on March 9th.

Now that’s transparency!