Lynch Stands Firm
Stephen Lynch sounds like a firm No:
Rep. Stephen Lynch (D-Mass.) is a firm “no” on health care reform — in large measure because he opposes the idea of any kind of excise tax on Cadillac plans, even one that’s delayed for years and years.
That’s put Lynch a former ironworkers union official in Boston at odds with many union biggies, who are swallowing hard and accepting a proposed House-Senate compromise.
Lynch — who voted for the tax-less House bill last year — has become a serious target of his union buddies, enduring pickets at his district office, an AFL-CIO robocall blitz and at least one recent drop-in visit from a very influential old friend — Joseph J. Hunt, president of the International Association of Bridge, Structural, Ornamental and Reinforcing Iron Workers.
“I walk into my office and I’m like, wow, it’s Joe Hunt,” said Lynch, who served as president of Ironworkers Local 7 before he was elected. “He accepts the [Cadillac Tax] deal, I don’t. her couldn’t understand why I didn’t agree.”
The Vote Before The Vote
The GOP will force a vote today on the Slaughter Solution itself.
Wow
When a Massachusetts Democrat starts to sound like a no:
Rep. Stephen Lynch, says a proposed parliamentary move to pass health-care reform would be “disingenuous” and harm the credibility of Congress.
In a sign of how tough it’s been for Pelosi to round up votes for the massive bill, Lynch – a South Boston Democrat who supported a House reform package last year – said he’ll probably vote against a key Senate version of the legislation, unless unexpected major changes are made soon.
Kucinich a Yes
As I predicted yesterday, Rep. Dennis Kucinich will change his vote to a Yes. Not to worry, though. Still plenty of room to defeat the bill.
Natives getting restless now
Our friend Leslie Eastman reports from the San Diego Code Red ObamaCare protest.
Diary of a Girl Student
Something reminded me of Korea today, which of course brought to mind … “Diary of a Girl Student”.
Procedural Problems
More procedural tangles:
“The most important is that, based on reconciliation instructions, the “fix” bill must be shown to reduce the deficit by at least $1 billion. The challenge is, that’s after assuming that the Senate bill is law. In other words, the reconciliation bill can’t claim any of the deficit reduction from the Senate bill, but rather it must reduce the deficit relative to the Senate bill. Yet the changes that are being talked about will cost a lot of money. This includes eliminating the “Cornhusker kickback” and offering enhanced Medicaid subsidies to all states, increasing subsidies for the purchase of insurance, eliminating the so-called “donut hole” on Medicare prescription drug benefits, and whatever else they put in the bill. At the same time, delaying until 2018 the enactment of the “Cadillac tax” would be scored as a reduction in revenue, and thus add further to the deficit.”
(via The Corner)
Is Our School Board Presidents Reading?
News from Detroit:
“The president of the Detroit school board, Otis Mathis, is waging a legal battle to steer the academic future of 90,000 children, in the nation’s lowest-achieving big city district.
He also acknowledges he has difficulty composing a coherent English sentence. Here’s a sample from an e-mail he sent to friends and supporters on Sunday night, uncorrected for errors of spelling, grammar, punctuation and usage. It begins:
If you saw Sunday’s Free Press that shown Robert Bobb the emergency financial manager for Detroit Public Schools, move Mark Twain to Boynton which have three times the number seats then students and was one of the reason’s he gave for closing school to many empty seats.
…
Here’s another mass e-mail from Mathis, from Aug. 11, 2009:
Do DPS control the Foundation or outside group? If an outside group control the foundation, then what is DPS Board row with selection of is director? Our we mixing DPS and None DPS row’s, and who is the watch dog?
He graduated from Southwestern High School in 1973 with what he says was a 1.8 grade-point average but was previously reported as a .98 average. After serving in the Navy, Wayne State placed him in a special program to help academically unqualified students move forward, on the G.I. Bill.
He stayed at Wayne for 15 years, as a student and a counselor, becoming a virtual “prisoner of Wayne,” as he jokes, unable to graduate.
Mathis and another student unsuccessfully challenged the use of an English proficiency test as a requirement for graduation. In 1992, when the case went to trial, the lawsuit gained national attention. Mathis said then his failure to pass the test “made me feel stupid.” The requirement was eventually dropped in 2007, and Mathis applied to get his degree the next year, after his election.”
Unhappy Liberals
Ultra-liberal blogger Jane Hamsher is feeling ripped-off:
“After avoiding direct questions for months, [Congresswoman] Donna Edwards signed the July 31 letter saying she would vote against any health care bill that didn’t have a public option. I caught up with her at Netroots Nation and she asked me to have a fundraiser for all the members of Congress who signed the letter.
“Carrots, not sticks,” she said.
Blogs across the country came together and did just that — raising $430,000 to thank 65 members of Congress for promising to hold the line at something 80% of the public wanted.
Donna Edwards said the same thing to Cenk Uygur on the Young Turks: “at the very minimum, a strong, robust public option has to be part of an ultimate, ultimate plan.”
Paul Jay of The Real News reported “Rep. Edwards to insist on public option.”
And as she told the Washington Post:
I’ve joined with 60-some of my colleagues who signed a letter to the president and to our leadership saying very clearly that if there’s not a public option in the final bill then I won’t support that bill.
They concluded, “In short, the public option remains a line in the sand for Edwards.”
Then she suddenly caught the #Rahmflu. Less than two weeks after the fundraiser she was equivocating: she “declined to speculate on whether she would vote against a conference bill without a strong public option….’That’s a long way down the line,’ Edwards said. ‘I am talking about the House vote.’”
Rep. Edwards should not have asked people to lead fundraisers of support for members of Congress who pledge their word if she’s not prepared to lead those members to honor it.”
Those 65 members of Congress should be ashamed of themselves. They made a pledge, raised money based on that pledge, and then went back on the pledge.