Sen. Lieberman Tries to Kill Meaningful Reform
Sen. Joe Lieberman, (I-CT) is adamant on wanting to water down the health care reform bill, to the point that the overall effect of it will represent nothing more than a cosmetic change over the status quo.
As the senator from Connecticut, a state with some of the largest insurance companies headquartered within its borders (and consequently within its tax and voter base), Lieberman is playing fast and loose with the health of all Americans for the benefit of a small number of citizens of its state (and for the benefit of his own reelection efforts, to be sure).
To summarize, Sen. Lieberman is "dead set" against the idea of the public option (in essence, government run and funded health care), as well as the Medicare buy-in provisions of the bill, which would have allowed Americans as young as 55 to buy into the Medicare program, already the largest medical plan in the country.
Obviously, both of these provisions of the overall bill would go a long way towards covering the nearly 50 million Americans who are currently uninsured. Make no mistake: conservatives in Congress have been against any such provisions in the bill from the get-go, and they will fight tooth-and-nail to keep them out of the final framework.
Now, the leadership in the Congress will need to find a Republican vote to bring the total of "YES" votes to 60, the filibuster-proof majority that will be needed to pass the HCR bill with any meanigful reform included.
Odds are that Harry Reid will try to lean on Sen. Olympia Snowe of Maine, a moderate Republican, to help pass the bill.
And the dirty business of democracy goes on.
posted by KJ Wojciechowski at 11:19 AM
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