The Senate Finance Committee just killed an amendment proposed by
Sen. Chuck Schumer to create a new government-run health
insurance plan by a vote of 13 to 10. Coupled with the failure of
another version of the so-called "public option" introduced by
Sen. Jay Rockefeller
earlier in the day, this officially means that the Finance
Committee's health care bill will not include a government-run
plan favored by liberals.
The defeat of the government plan in the Finance Committee sets
the stage for a brawl among Democrats that will help determine
whether or not they're able to pass health care legislation.
Other Democratic health care bills, including the ones from three
House committees as well as the Senate Health, Education, Labor
and Pensions Committee all include a government plan. Eventually,
Democrats will have to find a way to merge all the bills
together, which won't be an easy task.
On the House side, liberal members have insisted that they would
not support a bill that did not include what they consider to be
a "strong" government plan, meaning tying reimbursement rates to
Medicare.
The problem is that when Rockefeller proposed something similar
today in committee, five Democratic Senators voted against it.
Even when Schumer removed the tie to Medicare rates, three
Democrats voted against it: Sens. Max Baucus, Kent Conrad, and
Blanche Lincoln. And that's just the Finance Committee. Other
Senate Democrats including Ben Nelson, Mary Landrieu, and Joe
Lieberman have publicly opposed a government plan. Taken
together, that means at least 8 Democratic Senators oppose what
liberals would consider a "strong" government plan, and at least
6 would oppose even a milder version. Schumer himself admitted
today that they did not currently have 60 votes to pass the
government plan in the Senate.
Thus, the whole health care fight may hinge on whether the White
House will be able to get liberal lawmakers to drop their demands
for a government plan. This is problematic. The reason is that
one of the most obvious ways to win over liberals would be to
increase the level of subsidies to individuals seeking to
purchase health insurance, yet doing so would substantially drive
up the cost of legislation. President Obama has boxed himself
into a corner on that front by
declaring that his plan would cost $900 billion, and by
vowing to veto any bill that adds to the deficit.
