The current push for health care reform in the United States is one of the most important legislative initiatives of the past 50 years.  By now most of us know how the stage is set.  The Democrats, lead by President Obama, are attempting to ram through a comprehensive reform package that will insure all Americans for the fist time in the nation’s history.  Single-payer health care - or essentially full on nationalization of the current system - was never even discussed by the Democrats, who hold control of the White House and have majorities in both the House and Senate. Instead the “public option” was floated, which would give the government the mandate to set up a coverage system for all those lacking insurance in our current system.  The Democratic plan taking shape would also require all Americans to have some form of health coverage.

On the other side, the usual foes of progress, the Republican party, are doing whatever they can to stop health care reform from happening.  They have presented some lame measures which offer the uninsured incentives to buy coverage from private carriers, but nobody thinks it would actually do much to change anything  - which is probably the point.  The GOP does have one weapon at its disposal to derail the Dems plan though, and one it has no qualms using as it has shown again and again and again: the filibuster. 

As you probably know by now, the filibuster is the ridiculous parliamentary procedure in the Senate which allows a minority to block a vote on a bill by mustering a mere 41 votes, out of 100.  Given that this is the only move the GOP has left to block the Democratic agenda, it has used it indiscriminately to stop whatever legislation it can.  The filibuster has hung like a spectre over bill after bill since Obama has taken office.  Legislation passes through the House - which has no ridiculous filibuster rule - without a hitch, only to be held up in the Senate, by the minority party Republicans, despite the fact that the bills can get an outright majority of Senate votes.

But it turns out there is a way around the fiibuster, even in the United States Senate; the place where good policy ideas go to die.  It’s called reconciliation, and it’s yet another bit of Senate parliamentary nonsense, but this time one that might help us get everybody insured.  Reconcilation attaches Senate measures into a budget bill, which then cannot be filibustered.  It has been used to get some of the more controversial bills to reach the Senate passed, including the Bush tax cuts, avoiding the dreaded filibuster.

The good news is, health care and education reform language for reconciliation has already been written into the budget bill for this year.  So if a compromise is not reached in the Senate, it will take effect in the fall, giving the White House a filibuster proof, up or down vote, which it will almost certainly win.

So my question is; what are we messing around for?  My hope is that the strategy is simply to appear bipartisan and reasonable, while the bottom line is that the “public option” version of the health care bill is going through no matter what. All this talk of trying to find a compromise is nice and all, but let’s face it, this bill will never be bipartisan.  Not given the attitudes in the GOP right now.  Health care needs to be rammed through via the reconciliation process, and be enacted by a simple majority - which is frankly how all bills in the Senate should be passed.

LINKS:

NY Times: Obama Steers Health Debate Out of Capital

ABC News: Fact Check: The Truth Behind Obama’s Health Care Plan

CNN: Senate panel cuts cost of health care reform to less than $1 trillion