Odds on Reconciliation
“This is so unfair!” you think as the BR bill. “Why should I, the brainchild of the smartest people in the country right now have to subject myself to these demeaning rules?”
Because Mr. Jefferson and Madison and the other geniuses back then wanted you to be subject to those rules today and forever here in the United States of America. That is why they made it so difficult to pass legislation in the Senate in the first place…it is supposed to be the place where the hot cup of soup of legislation passed by the House is ‘cooled off’ in the saucer beneath it when it spills.
So here is what you are up against in the gauntlet:
– Any knife that will cut out a thick piece of your skin if you dare exceed the budget rules and parameters.
– A hatchet that will cut off any finger that seeks to bring in any extraneous legislation that is not ‘germane’ to the issue at hand, namely budget and tax issues relating solely to health care, nothing else.
– A tomahawk to your scalp if you even dare violate any of the so-called ‘Byrd Rule’, named after the senior Senator from West Virginia, Senator Robert Byrd himself who is still serving (Something to watch for: if he votes for any waivers from his own Byrd Rules, then you will know that the goose is cooked, the cards are stacked and someone from Chicago has gotten to him and made him an ‘offer he can’t refuse!”)
– Hot coals under your bare feet as you run down the Senate hallway to the Senate chamber to vote.
– Various other atrocities committed to your physical person as you try to skirt the reconciliation rules and procedures and increase the deficit, all intended to keep the debate focused on tax and budget issues in the health care debate, not on broader issues of policy.
‘War is hell!”, said William Tecumseh Sherman and ‘budget reconciliation’ is just ‘war by other means’ (Baron von Clauswitz)
Take some time to read this fantastic, easy-to-read summary of the entire budget reconciliation process by a Senate expert, Keith Hennessey. All of it, both sections (it was written last August but is still germane)…don’t skip a word cause there will be a test on it later.
Let it all sink in and then you will know just how difficult it really and truly is to get everything the Democrats want in the gold-plated platinum health care bill through the budget reconciliation ‘nuclear option’. (President Truman used the real ‘nuclear option’ and to equate this debate with that ominous decision is ludicrous)
We remain persuaded that win-or-lose, we are going to have to start over again next year and keep pushing this rock up the health care reform hill time and time again like Sisyphus…another great story for which we have great affinity.
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published courtesy Frank Hill
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