THE BILL PRESS SHOW

Again On Health Reform, The Party of No

After weeks of wheeling and dealing, Senate Democrats have finally lined up the 60 votes necessary to pass health care reform legislation.

It’s been an ugly process, proving that old saw about how nobody wants to watch sausage being made.

In order to win their votes, Joe Lieberman demanded no expansion of Medicare; Ben Nelson extracted major concessions on abortion; and Mary Landrieu walked away with $300 billion for Louisiana.

No, this was not the finest hour for Democrats. But still, compared to Republicans, Democrats still looked like heros. And Republicans look like losers.

No doubt about it: As disappointed as I am in Senate Democrats for not coming up with a stronger bill, I’d still much rather belong to a party where 60 Senators all support universal health care, but differ on how to achieve it – than belong to a party where all 40 Senators offer no legislation of their own, but decide to vote en masse against health care reform – simply because Barack Obama is for it.

On the economy, on jobs, on Afghanistan, on health care, these are tough times and tough issues.

The American people deserve something more from elected officials – than voting no on everything.

Democrats may be fighting among themselves. But, even in disunity, they offer a hell of lot more leadership on every issue – than the party of NO.

That’s my parting shot for today.

This entry was posted on Monday, December 21st, 2009 at 11:23 am and is filed under BILL BLOG. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.