Friday, March 12, 2010

The Democrats' Tangled Web   [James C. Capretta]

In 2009, Democrats chose to proceed with a health-care bill under the regular order — that is, they sought to pass the legislation under normal House and Senate rules. They did not put together a budget reconciliation bill with health care in it, something that could have passed the Senate with a simple majority vote. They conceded that such an approach would likely produce a flawed product, as many non-budgetary provisions in a health-care plan would not survive the reconciliation process. And so they decided to try and pass a bill without resorting to reconciliation, even though they knew they would need 60 votes in the...