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The Spectacle Blog
The House Republican whip team just held a conference call in which they said that the Democrats have 206 yes votes for the health care bill. They need 216 to pass it. There are currently 51 Democrats who are said to be undecided and the leadership can afford to lose 37 Democrats in all, which sounds like a pretty tough road for opponents of the bill (without the Stupak language on abortion, all Republicans are expected to vote no).
Chief Deputy Republican Whip Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) nevertheless said he felt this week had hurt Democratic vote-getting efforts somewhat. He argued that the Slaughter rule did not sit well with some wobbling Democrats and "will make the American people very angry" if the leadership actually tries to go through with it (McCarthy seemed to suggest they won't). McCarthy said that usually when you talk about process, you lose but "this year, I think process does matter." He said that the Scott Brown victory suggested that voters wanted the Democratic leadership to be more responsive than they have been during the health care debate.
Rep. Parker Griffith (R-Ala.), a recent party-switcher from the Democratic Party, talked about some of the things the Democrats will do to whip their members. Griffith said they will "know your demographics," "know how much cash you have on hand," "know how popular Obama is and Pelosi is in your district," and know if you want a "road project," "medical school," or "have a severe Medicaid shortage that needs to be shored up." Griffith said that as a physician and former Democrat, "I saw firsthand that the Republicans had many good ideas that were ignored."
UPDATE: Congressman McCarthy's communications director emailed to clarify that the Republicans based this number on a count by the liberal blog Firedoglake, which is likely to have better contact with the Democrats' whip team than they do. Firedoglake currently counts 191 confirmed yes votes, 206 confirmed no votes, and a 205-209 tally with leaners included.
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More Blog Posts by W. James Antle, III
http://spectator.org/blog/2010/03/17/republican-whip-team-says-dems
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Seneca| 3.17.10 @ 5:24PM
The math in the first paragraph may seem daunting until one realizes that many of the 51 alleged "undecideds" must be included in the 206 votes that are being counted here as "for" the bill. I believe that if there are 206 "yes" votes, the real number of the undecideds is only about 20.
This means that Obama must drop the whole thing, if he is to live true to his campaign promise to govern by consensus and not to ram through major legislation like the nationalization of health care on a "one vote margin" or a similar narrow base. But since few if any of his other campaign promises were made with sincerity, perhaps one should not expect this one to be any different.
Pingback| 3.17.10 @ 5:36PM
Let Freedom Ring » Blog Archive » Blogger Conference Call Notes links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
Pingback| 3.17.10 @ 5:38PM
California Conservative » Blog Archive » Blogger Conference Call Notes links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
Finrod| 3.17.10 @ 6:56PM
The math looks to be completely wrong; there are 253 Democrats in the House (according to Wikipedia) and 206 + 51 is more than 253, and that's assuming no Democrats are a solid no (which we know is wrong).
office 2007| 3.26.10 @ 9:38PM
office pro 2007 VS office ultimate 2007 !