President Obama is ready to do whatever it takes to ignore the will of 73 percent of Americans who do not support passage of Obamacare.
He has announced plans to ram the bill through via reconciliation by violating the traditions of the Senate and causing what Democrats have previously described as a constitutional crisis.
He reverses his own previously stated position that you should only pass sweeping legislation by bipartisan large majorities and demonstrates again that he is not “hopenchange”, but just another political hack.
He is actively working on buying votes. The Weekly Standard reports that Obama has nominated the the brother of a Democrat Congressman who initially opposed Obamacare a lifetime appointment to a federal appeals court:
Tonight, Barack Obama will host ten House Democrats who voted against the health care bill in November at the White House; he’s obviously trying to persuade them to switch their votes to yes. One of the ten is Jim Matheson of Utah. The White House just sent out a press release announcing that today President Obama nominated Matheson’s brother Scott M. Matheson, Jr. to the United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit.
Obama is aware that the longer this drags on, the lower his changes for passing Obamacare even with unprecedented political maneuvers, bribes and intimidation. He has set March 18, two weeks from today, as the deadline for getting the final bill and the reconciliation bill passed.
Republicans should use every opportunity to slow down the process and to amend the bill.
Obama also faces huge hurdles from his own party. The Congressional Democrats would have to pass the Senate bill before a reconciliation bill could be voted on. There aren’t enough votes to support the Senate bill in the House. After two resignations, a death and a switch by the lone Republican that supported Obamacare in the House, there aren’t even enough votes to pass the bill the House passed in November,
There are even less votes for the Senate bill which does not have the prohibitions against federal funds being used for abortions that the House bill has. Bart Stupak, who put the restrictions on funding of abortion into the House bill, confirms that there are twelve representatives who voted for the House bill that will vote against the Senate bill:
Pro-Life Democrats in the House would have to trust their left-wing colleagues that they would still be willing to pass stricter controls on abortion funding after they have won passage of the main bill. Pro-life Democrats know that they cannot trust the left-wing of their party.
It is still infinitely preferable to stop the bill than to ride the outrage over the passage of Obamacare to overwhelming victory in November. Even if Obamacare is stopped, voters will be outraged about the close call and send Democrats packing in November.
Here is Scott Brown reacting to Obama’s attempt to ram Obamacare through despite popular opposition:
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