Still?

Mon, Feb 22, 2010

Obama isn’t giving up on cramming a health care revamp through Congress. Latest reports indicate that Obama is prepared to offer a reconciliation package to the House and Senate and instruct the Senate to use reconciliation (not to be confused with a reconciliation package) to force a federally controlled health care system through Congress. Choosing this path of pseudo dictatorship would be the biggest political mistake of the President’s career yet.

President Obama is blurring the lines between Congress and the Executive branch. The House and Senate have been unable to reconcile their packages and make another run at passing bi-partisan reform. The President, in all of his confident gusto, believes he can wave his magical hope and change wand, put on a health care summit charade and force through a big government plan without the help of the Congress. To this President, Congress is a hindrance and bi-partisan means circumventing the rules so that no opposing party has a say. The American people are noticing.

Wise moderate Democratic Senators will stay away from the Albatross of the reconciliation plan, or nuclear option. Participating in these political shenanigans in today’s highly charged Washington atmosphere is too risky. Those Democrats would be politically wiser to go back to their constituents and tell them they believe in finding an amicable solution that all Americans can agree on, not a package that requires playing games. A no vote, under the umbrella of the nuclear option, offers those Senators far more credibility than getting a bill passed because Obama says so.

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