When President Obama assumed office, he did so with the promise of reforming America’s healthcare system by implementing a public option. The president argued that a public option would not raise taxes for the middle class, but would “be self-sufficient and rely on the premiums it collects.”
His critics said that not only was this goal too ambitious, but that it could not, and even should not be done. His backers lauded the plan, saying the country needed change and the status quo was no longer enough. Since then, the road to healthcare reform has been a long and bumpy one, and for liberal Democrats on the Hill, things have taken a turn for the worse. And most recently, it’s all because of one Senator from Connecticut.
When it comes to passing the healthcare bill in the senate, Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nevada)-the most powerful person in the chamber- has had to take a back seat to Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-Conn). In the last week, Lieberman almost single-handedly shut down the Democrat’s plan to include an option that would allow seniors ages 55-64 to buy into Medicare. Now the measure, which was originally the compromise to Reid’s public option, is no longer a part of the bill.
So how could one senator so drastically alter a provision in the healthcare bill that a majority of Senate Democrats and the Obama administration supported? Welcome to the game of Capitol Hill politics.
Though an independent, Sen. Lieberman caucuses with the Democrats, giving them their super-majority of 60. But unfortunately for Reid, Lieberman didn’t approve of the Medicare plan, telling Bob Schieffer on Face the Nation, “…I certainly would have a hard time voting for it because it has some of the same infirmities that the public option did. It– it will add taxpayer cost. It will add to the deficit. It’s unnecessary. …”
And so in order to appease Lieberman and retain the 60 votes, the Medicare option was dropped. But this of course, didn’t happen without stirring up frustration and fury with liberals in the media and on the Hill. Washington Post blogger Ezra Klein unleashed his anger by writing, “At this point, Lieberman is just torturing liberals. That is to say, he’s willing to directly cause the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people in order to settle an old electoral score,” (he later took out the word “directly” to tone down the accusation that Lieberman’s disapproval of the option was simply murderous).
One senior Democratic aide told Politico, “The anger toward him right now is white hot.” And spokesman for the Progressive Change Campaign Committee, Adam Green, proposed taking disciplinary action against the senator, saying, and “…Taking away Lieberman’s chairmanship is the way to teach a lesson to others.”
Despite this, the White House is still pushing for the Senate to pass healthcare reform by Christmas. At this point, anything would be acceptable, just as long as something gets passed. If that sounds desperate, it’s because well, that’s exactly what President Obama is. In a meeting with Senate Democrats on Tuesday, the president pushed the bill’s passage saying this would be the last chance for reform.
White House Communications Director Dan Pfeiffer told Politico, “If President Obama doesn’t pass health reform, it’s hard to imagine another president ever taking on this Herculean task. For those whose life’s work is reforming health care, this may be the last train leaving the station.” Vice President Joe Biden seconded that sentiment, saying on MSNBC that if reform isn’t passed now, it will be pushed aside for another generation. The message to the Senate is, essentially, it’s now or never.
But trite hyperbole and the apocalyptic plea of “something is better than nothing!” are not likely to have any effect on moderate and Republican senators who are dead-set against a drastic overhaul of the healthcare system. Nor is the president’s desperation helping his approval rating, which recently hit an all-time low of 41 percent, according to Rasmussen.
Although in the end, the Senate may heed Obama’s call for action in the face of perceived crisis, it won’t be the action President Obama promised with gusto when he assumed office. But just getting something to pass in the Senate will take a lot more wooing of moderate Democrats and Republicans, while risking losing the support of staunch liberals. At this point, only time will tell if a reform bill will pass by Christmas, not to mention what effect doing something as opposed to nothing will have on the 2010 elections. And who knows how many more Joe Liebermans there are.
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Amanda Carey is the Editor of The Tiger Town Observer at Clemson University. She has previously worked for Robert Novak and has been published in Reason Magazine and The American Spectator.
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