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Senate Democrats
Close to Dropping Medicare Expansion |
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In what the AP
(12/15, Espo) calls an attempt to assure "Christmas-week passage
of the bill to extend coverage to tens of millions," Senate
Democrats are reportedly close to abandoning a plan to expand
Medicare, which had been added last week to their healthcare
reform bill. The AP adds that "liberals sought the Medicare
expansion as a last-minute substitute for a full-blown,
government-run insurance program that moderates earlier insisted
be jettisoned. But it drew strong opposition from Sen. Joe
Lieberman (I-CT) and quieter concerns from a dozen Democrats."
McClatchy (12/15, Lightman) reports, "Democrats emerged
from a one-hour, 45-minute private meeting Monday night and
indicated that the Medicare proposal, which party leaders first
floated last week as part of a tentative deal between moderates
and liberals, could be gone." The
Los Angeles Times (12/15, Levey, Hook) notes that "even
several leading liberal lawmakers appeared resigned to the
collapse of their dream of including either a new 'public
option' or an expansion of the existing Medicare program." The
Times adds that "the death knell of the Medicare buy-in proposal
came Sunday, when" Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV)
called Sen. Lieberman "to his office after his appearance on
'Face the Nation.'" Lieberman "met with Reid as well as White
House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel, deputy chief of staff Jim
Messina and Nancy Ann DeParle, the head of the White House
Office of Health Reform." In fact,
Politico (12/15, Brown, Raju) reports, the move to drop
the Medicare plan came after Emanuel urged "Reid to cut a deal
with Lieberman on reform, according to a source close to the
negotiations."
In a front-page story, the
Wall Street Journal (12/15,
A1, Hitt, subscription required) quotes Reid as saying after the
meeting, "Democrats aren't going to let the American people
down. ... We all stand shoulder to shoulder." ABC World Newss (12/14, story 2, 2:10, Karl) reported that "Reid
railed against Republicans" on Monday "for stalling the
healthcare bill, but Reid's real problem is in his own party.
... The challenge for...Reid: with no Republican support, every
Democrat can be a king. He needs every single one of them to
defeat a Republican filibuster. That means Lieberman can kill it
and so can Ben Nelson, who also doesn't like expanding Medicare
and says he can't vote for the bill unless it includes tighter
restrictions on abortion funding."
New
York Times (12/15, Hulse, Pear) reports, "Senator Tom
Harkin, Democrat of Iowa and chairman of the health committee,
appeared to be laying the groundwork for a decision to abandon
the Medicare buy-in." Sen. Harkin said, "There is enough good in
this bill that we ought to move it" even without the Medicare
provision. Sen. Arlen Specter (D-PA), "who switched parties
earlier this year to become a Democrat, urged his colleagues not
to let obstructionists stand in the way. 'I came to this caucus
to be your 60th vote,' he said to a round of applause."
The
Hill (12/15, Rushing, Bolton, subscription required)
notes, "Sen. Evan Bayh (D-IN) said the general consensus at the
meeting Monday was that dropping the Medicare buy-in provision
was 'necessary' to salvage the rest of the legislation." Harkin
and Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D-WV), The Hill adds, "also confirmed
the Medicare buy-in would be dropped."
The
Washington Post (12/15, Murray, Montgomery), meanwhile,
reports that "the full contents of the legislation probably will
not be known until Tuesday, at the earliest, when the
Congressional Budget Office is expected to provide an official
cost analysis." USA Today
(12/15, Fritze), CongressDaily
(12/15, Edney, Friedman, subscription required), the
Washington Times (12/15,
Haberkorn), Roll Call (12/15,
Pierce, Drucker, subscription required), and
FOX News (12/15) also cover
the story.
Sen.
Lieberman's opposition to Medicare buy-in sparks outrage among
liberals.
Sen. Joe Lieberman's (D-CT) announcement on Sunday that he would
filibuster any Senate healthcare reform bill that includes a
Medicare buy-in has sparked a wave of notably harsh criticism
from liberal supporters of the Democrats' reform plan. In a
front-page story, the New York Times
(12/15, A1, Herszenhorn, Kirkpatrick) reports that Sen.
Lieberman "threatened on national television to join the
Republicans in blocking the healthcare bill, President Obama's
chief domestic initiative," but "within hours, he was in a
meeting at the Capitol with top White House officials."
According to the Times, Democratic senators "suggested that they
were on the verge of bowing to Mr. Lieberman's key demands,"
although "many Democrats" have "suggested he is catering to
insurance industry interests back home." The Times adds that
"campaign finance advocates" claim Lieberman is "an insurance
industry puppet," who "wants to protect private health insurers
from competition because he has received more than $1 million
insurance company campaign contributions since 1998."
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