Dan,

It took months after HillaryCare was dead and rotting until the Dem leadership finally admitted that it had no pulse. And even then the bill was just “shelved” until the next legislative session. There’s no conceivable way that Pelosi, Red, Obama or even lesser leaders like Hoyer can come out and say “health care reform is dead” or even “we’ve moved on for now.” They just can’t.

And honestly, I don’t blame them. When our side gunned for Social Security reform and came up short, we conceded that we failed and that is a massive political error even if it’s honest. The deathmarch of trying to actually pass this thing could only be supplanted by coming out and saying, “Hey, so remember that health care legislation we spent a whole year on, said was absolutely essential to economic recovery and argued was our number one priority that couldn’t fail? Yeah, it’s over.” That wouldn’t be a death march, that would be an instant and summary execution for their side. The liberal base would start up the circular firing squad once again and would be totally depressed in terms of GOTV. Independents would see that Democrats are completely incapable of governance and flee into our arms even more than they are right now.

No, the only smart course is to say nothing about health care and when prodded say “we’re looking for a way forward and discussing some ideas.” That’s what they’ve been doing since Brown’s election and I think they’ll continue to do that. Yes, Pelosi is making some racket about getting rid of the antitrust exemption, but it’s little more than just noise. I think there is a bit of somewhat serious discussion about the two track plan with reconciliation, but the real calculus is how long it would take. Since reconciliation would have to start in committee again, it could take until past Easter to get close to a final vote once again. With primary season already in full swing by then, I don’t know how many House Dems would want to risk that.

Of course, the biggest problem is the more they try to think this thing through, the more time ticks away and the longer that timetable becomes. So the only rational solution for the Dem side is to hope health care fades away and that they can score some “victories” on legislation like financial regulatory reform and job creation. They’ll probably re-assess their standing in the spring and see if their prospects have improved. If they have, then maybe Obamacare gets new life in late spring and early summer. If not, which I can almost guarantee is the case, then it will just have faded into dust.

I used all the obama voodoo on that ROADKILL dead skunk and the skunk refused to move. I left a note on on it obamascare.

do you think Sen. Jim DeMint might have a good shot at becoming majority leader in the Senate if the Repubs take it back? He’s been awesome on fighting ObamaCare and has shown some really good leadership IMO.

do you think Sen. Jim DeMint might have a good shot at becoming majority leader in the Senate if the Repubs take it back? He’s been awesome on fighting ObamaCare and has shown some really good leadership IMO.

This is better even than I originally thought.

I remember back in July-August, when I was certain, somewhat impractically, that it would not pass because a nascent (at the time) popular uprising would make it fail.

I hit on some things, missed on others, but overall I get a win for this (yes, this comment is about me, thank you):

Incorrectly, I thought it would pass the Senate (bunch of thieving high-binders with no accountability) but not pass in the House (where they would feel the very real pressure of the popular uprising.

As it turns out, it passed both. I was rescued because the arrogance of the Senate was such that they passed a different bill, while the clock ran out on reconciliation (thank you MA voters!). So in the rerack, the House Dems have lost the stomach to even pass the Senate-passed bill. And no possible bill exists that would pass the House and Senate both.

And meanwhile, 6 months have gone by, and the die is set on their political doom. And STILL, they forge onward! Right over the cliff.

Socialist countries in Europe – Spain, Portugal, and Greece – are near bankruptcy after trying to “tax and borrow and spend their way” out of the recession.

This made Wall Street very nervous today:

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/Stocks-tumble-on-worries-apf-838755238.html?x=0

More empirical evidence that such a technique will not work!

So will Hell-th Care die away now? No, but we can always hope that things will change!

Socialist countries in Europe – Spain, Portugal, and Greece – are near bankruptcy after trying to “tax and borrow and spend their way” out of the recession.

This made Wall Street very nervous today:

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/Stocks-tumble-on-worries-apf-838755238.html?x=0

More empirical evidence that such a technique will not work!

So will Hell-th Care die away now? No, but we can always hope that things will change!

The Republicans must now loudly and insistently propose two or three small but important health care insurance reforms such as:

- opening up competition across state lines,
- allowing more “cafeteria style” selection of needed coverages rather than being forced to take everything a state legislature dreamed up as being necessary, and
- tort reform

Virtually every voter would get behind these proposals. Remind everyone daily they were part and parcel of the step-by-step approach suggested by the Republicans throughout 2009 but were shut out of all the negotiations to draft the bill.