Predictable As The Sun Coming Up
by digby
All 41 Republican Senators vowed in a letter today to do everything in their power to kill Democrats’ health care legislation and vote en bloc against procedural motions Democrats want to use to fix the health reform bill passed Christmas Eve by the Senate.
This would include a scenario where the Republican Senators oppose language championed by anti-abortion rights Democrats in the House and side instead with abortion rights defenders.
The House moderates want to ban any federal money from going to insurance companies that offer elective abortions. The Senate-passed health reform bill would create pools of segregated funds with only private money going to cover abortions.
“So you’d be voting with Barbara Boxer on an abortion measure?” a reporter asked Sen. Tom Coburn, the OB-GYN and Oklahoma Republican who vehemently opposes abortion rights, at a press conference this afternoon. Boxer, a California Democrat, is a vehement supporter of abortion rights.
“Yes I would. I certainly would,” Coburn said, clarifying that he would oppose a procedural motion in the Senate to allow the stricter ban on federal funding for abortion from being added to the Senate health reform bill.
So what happens now? I’m assuming that they will use the “point of order” option that the Catholic Bishops are pushing and then the entire Democratic establishment will expend a great deal of pressure on pro-choice Democrats to vote for Stupak. If they can get the women to slit their own throats it would be especially delicious.
I keep hearing that the Republicans will pay a price for not voting for the amendment (or allowing it to proceed.) But that totally misapprehends how the right wing thinks. They don’t care if their representatives vote hypocritically, especially the social conservatives who care far more about defeating the godless liberals on health care than they do about the Stupak amendment. There will be no price. They will be cheered.
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