Pelosi Concedes: House Lacks Votes for Health Care Bill - Congrats America, Thanks Mass

Thursday, 21 Jan 2010 12:22 PM

Queen Pelosi cannot admit that she was wrong and that the people do not want what she and her Progressive cohorts have been selling.

WASHINGTON – Speaker Nancy Pelosi said Thursday that she lacks the votes to quickly move the Senate's sweeping health overhaul bill through the House, a potentially devastating blow to President Barack Obama's signature issue.

Pelosi, D-Calif., made the comment to reporters after House Democrats held a closed-door meeting at which participants vented frustration with the Senate's massive version of the legislation.

Her concession meant there was little hope for a White House-backed plan to quickly push the Senate-approved health bill through the House, followed by a separate measure making changes sought by House members, such as easing the Senate's tax on higher-cost health plans. Such an approach would be "problematic," she said.

"In its present form without any changes I don't think it's possible to pass the Senate bill in the House," Pelosi said, adding, "I don't see the votes for it at this time."

Pelosi's remarks signaled that advancing health legislation through Congress will likely be a lengthy process — despite Democrats' desire for a quick election-year pivot to address jobs and the economy, which polls show are the public's top concern.

"We're not in a big rush," Pelosi said. "Pause, reflect."

Source: The Associated Press/Posted NewsMax

Pelosi Rejects Senate Version of Health Care Bill

"We're not in a big rush," Pelosi said. (Time to) "Pause, reflect."… Translation: I have polled and cajoled everyone and after trying all the tricks in my bag… I mean all, I finally have to admit that only 38% of America wants ObamaCare and their reps are finally listening… so I don’t have enough votes to cram this through against the will of the people.

It is a time to celebrate!! But with the Nancy and crew it is never time to stop being vigilant!! THITW

The Health Care Bill Is Dead

And other repercussions of Scott Brown's victory in Massachusetts.

BY FRED BARNES

The impact of Republican Scott Brown’s capture of the Massachusetts Senate seat held for decades by Teddy Kennedy will be both immediate and powerful. It’s safe to say no single Senate election in recent memory is as important as this one.

Here are a few of the repercussions:

1) President Obama is weakened. For the third time in three months, he couldn’t deliver for a Democratic candidate. Last November, he abetted the defeat of Democrat Creigh Deeds in the Virginia governor’s race and failed to prevent Democrat Jon Corzine’s ouster as New Jersey governor. Now in Massachusetts, his appearance for Martha Coakley was a bust. A president who can’t aid his party’s candidates loses influence with Congress and inside his party.

That’s not all. Obama’s agenda, chiefly health care, took a beating in Massachusetts. In fact, it was the chief cause of Coakley’s defeat. Without the intrusion of national politics, she would have defeated Brown. But Obama and Democrats in Washington have created a hostile environment for Democratic candidates even in liberal and Democrat-dominated Massachusetts. So there’s a double whammy for Obama: he can’t help if he personally shows up to campaign on behalf of Democrats and his policies are ruining their chances of being elected.

2) Independents are lost to Democrats, at least for the time being. In 2006 and 2008, they fled Republicans in large numbers and facilitated Democratic triumphs for the House, Senate, and White House. Now they’ve staged a mass migration to the Republican camp. In Massachusetts, where they make up half the electorate, they overwhelmingly voted for Brown. This followed the 2-to-1 advantage they gave to Republicans in Virginia and New Jersey last year.

Democrats may win them back, but not if they stick with the liberal policies--especially the unbridled spending and $1 trillion deficits--of Obama and congressional Democrats. These are killer issues among independents. Perhaps it will take another unpopular Republican administration in Washington to push them toward Democrats again. And that is years away.

3) In the midterm election in November, Republicans are poised to win 25 or so House seats. But it will take a net of 40 to take control the House. For this, they need more open Democratic seats, which are easier to win than incumbent-held seats. Brown’s victory in Massachusetts is a good bet to scare many more Democrats into retirement.

If a Republican can win in Massachusetts, why not in Missouri or Pennsylvania or a solidly Democratic state like New York? Last week, Democrat Vic Snyder of Arkansas announced his retirement, citing the political climate as the reason. It’s an anti-Democratic climate.

4) Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell is the new king of Capitol Hill. His skill in keeping 40 Republicans united against Democratic health care reform was masterful, and it wasn’t easy. A number of Republican senators are drawn to co-sponsoring or at least voting for Democratic bills. Not this time.

By keeping his minority together, McConnell put enormous pressure on Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, who had to keep every Democrat in line to gain the 60 votes need to halt a Republican filibuster. On health care, it meant he had to make unseemly deals with a host of senators, most egregiously in the Medicaid payoff to Nebraska to appease Senator Ben Nelson. Reid got the votes, but the deals were political poison.

5) Oh, yes. The health care bill, ObamaCare, is dead with not the slightest prospect of resurrection. Brown ran to be the 41st vote for filibuster and now he is just that. Democrats have talked up clever strategies to pass the bill in the Senate despite Brown, but they won’t fly. It’s one thing for ObamaCare to be rejected by the American public in poll after poll. But it becomes a matter of considerably greater political magnitude when ObamaCare causes the loss of a Senate race in the blue state of Massachusetts.

Then there’s the House, where Speaker Nancy Pelosi insists some version of ObamaCare will be approved and soon. She’s not kidding. She’s simply wrong. At best, she has the minimum 218 votes for passage. After the Massachusetts fiasco, however, there’s sure to be erosion. How many Democrats in Republican-leaning districts want to vote for ObamaCare, post-Massachusetts? Not many.

Pelosi met with House Democrats yesterday to tell them how the negotiations on a compromise health care bill between the House and Senate were going. As she spoke, one Democratic member whispered to another, “It’s like talking about your date on Friday, but the date’s in the emergency room.” ObamaCare went into the emergency room in Massachusetts and didn’t make it out alive.

Pelosi 'Spooked' After Meeting with Blue Dogs

House Liberals to Pelosi: 'We Cannot Support the Senate Bill. Period.'

Union Big: Labor Won’t Support House Passing Senate Bill

Obama Tells Congress Not to Ram Through HealthCare

Obama Says: We Lost Touch With American People Last Year

Seeing red: Graphic of the night — Cautionary Tale for GOP

By Michelle Malkin • January 20, 2010 01:11 AM

How ya like these red apples?

(h/t Mary Katharine Ham)

January 19 was an amazing day for grass-roots conservatism. But the Beltway GOP should be warned against unjustified triumphalism. They were late to the game. Activists still haven’t, and won’t, forget the massive amounts of money Washington, D.C. Republicans wasted on Dede Scozzafava. And Scott Brown quite noticeably didn’t mention the word “Republican” once during his prepared remarks.

The GOP brand is still damaged. And instant exploitation of the Brown win — see the NRSC website here — isn’t going to help matters. As I’ve said for many years, the Republican Party needs to clean its own house before it demands that the Democrats clean theirs.

The Brown victory was very clearly a strike against machine politics of all kinds and business as usual in Washington. That includes top-down meddling by tired old GOP operatives. The party bosses have tried to install their preferred Senate candidates in Florida, Colorado, and California. They will use Brown’s win to argue for more “mooooooderation.” As I wrote yesterday in my analysis of how Brown unified a center-right-indie coalition, that is not the lesson of the Massachusetts miracle.

Wake up and smell the Tea Party leaves.

***

Heh. – Riehl World View

***

One more cautionary note: Tonight is unquestionably a night to celebrate. But remember to manage your expectations, as always, of all politicians. You’ll be less disappointed when they inevitably let you down.

Help Get Scott Brown Seated Right Away!!

Let us all call William Gavin and insist Brown be seated immediately!!!! Secretary of State Mass contact info: Secretary William Galvin 1-800-392-6090 email is cis@secstate.ma.us View this site to get an idea on what they do with the law in Mass?!?

BOSTON (AP) - Massachusetts's top election official says it could take weeks to certify the results of the upcoming U.S. Senate special election. That delay could let President Barack Obama preserve a key 60th vote for his health care overhaul even if the Republican who has vowed to kill it wins Democrat Edward M. Kennedy's former seat.

Secretary of State William F. Galvin, citing state law, says city and town clerks must wait at least 10 days for absentee ballots to arrive before they certify the results of the Jan. 19 election. They then have five more days to file the returns with his office.

Galvin bypassed the provision in 2007 so his fellow Democrats could gain a House vote they needed to override a veto of then-Republican President George W. Bush, but the secretary says U.S. Senate rules would preclude a similar rush today.

The potential delay has become a rallying point for the GOP, which argues Democrats have been twisting the rules to pass the health care bill despite public opposition. It's also prompted criticism from government watchdogs.

"We believe that elections should be by the people and for the people, and when the people have spoken, the system ought not be politicized," said Common Cause President Bob Edgar, a former member of Congress. "If the Republican wins, the person should be seated immediately. If the Democrat wins, the person should be seated immediately."

Massachusetts Democrats already changed state law last fall so the governor could appoint a fellow Democrat to fill the seat after Kennedy died in August.

Now that interim replacement, Sen. Paul G. Kirk Jr., says he will vote for the bill if given the chance, even if Republican Scott Brown beatsDemocrat Martha Coakley in Tuesday's special election to fill the seat permanently. Brown, a state senator, has pledged to vote against the bill; Coakley, the state attorney general, supports it.

Businessman Joseph L. Kennedy, no relation to the late senator, is also mounting an independent campaign, but he has trailed badly in publicopinion polls. He, too, opposes the bill.

Kirk and Coakley represent the crucial 60th Democratic vote to prevent a filibuster of the legislation. A Brown victory would shift the chamber's balance to 59-41—just enough for Republicans to block the legislation.

Yet passing or stopping the bill could depend on when the new senator is seated. Obama is angling to get the bill passed before he delivers his State of the Union speech, most likely in early to mid-February.

"Until a new senator is sworn in, Sen. Kirk is the senator," Coakley said.

While Galvin wrote a letter in 2007 so Democrat Niki Tsongas could assume a U.S. House seat immediately after a special election, an aide said he would not do so in the case of the upcoming Senate election.

"The Senate requires the certificate of election, which can only be issued after this period takes place," spokesman Brian McNiff said.

Democrats control the Senate, and they argue there is recent precedent for withholding a seat until local officials certify an election. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and his colleagues waited 238 days before seating fellow Democrat Al Franken last year after Republicans challenged his 2008 election all the way to the Minnesota Supreme Court.

"When there is a certified winner in Massachusetts, the Senate has received appropriate papers and the vice president is available, the successor to Kennedy/Kirk will be sworn in," said Reid spokeswomanRegan Lachapelle.

She said that could take "a week or more."

By GLEN JOHNSON - AP Political Writer

Let us all call William Gavin and insist Brown be seated immediately!!!! Secretary of State Mass contact info: Secretary William Galvin 1-800-392-6090 email is cis@secstate.ma.us View this site to get an idea on what they do with the law in Mass?!? No more two party games or standards!

Even Barney Frank Concedes Healthcare Approach ‘No Longer Appropriate After Brown Beats Coakley

Bayh Warns “Catastrophe” If Dems Ignore Massachusetts Senate Race Lessons

Scott Brown’s Shot Heard Around the World: What If?