Wiseacre
Retired USAF Chief
You're a fool, a liar and a punk, as well as wrong. The bill was changed under threat of a filibuster, Republicans spent the summer of 2009 doing everything possible to prevent health care reform both procedurally and by lies, misrepresenations and using emotion charged pejoratives. Money flowed from special interests to defeat or make the bill less noxious to those who benefit from the current system.
I just don't believe what I'm reading here, revisionist history at it's finest. In fact the bill was NOT changed under threat of a filibuster, the dems passed it while they had the chance even though most Americans told them specifically they didn't want it. Let's review: the dems have a filibuster proof senate for all of 2009, Scott Brown is not sworn in as a senator from Mass until what, Jan 2010. So for the whole freakin' year the Dems had total control to do whatever they wanted, and the repubs could do absolutely nothing to stop them. That is the plain unvarnished truth.
So the dems go home for the August break and get a real earful from the public. Despite the fact that Obama, Pelosi, Reid, and every other lib/dem including the MSM tried to convince people how great it was, nobody bought it. Did the GOP fight it? Of course, from their perspective it was a piece of shit, and most Americans thought so too then and still think so now. Last I heard more people want it repealed now than then, it was never popular.
So Pelosi passes the ACA in the House, and the Senate passes their version in the Senate. But holy shit, Scott Brown is electd to become the 41st repub in the Senate and the dems realize they can't change the senate bill because it'll fail the vote. So they pass the senate version in the House and Obama signs it into the law. That about the way you remember it? So what YOU said was WRONG, they in fact did not change the law but passed it without any confernece action to reconcile the two bills.
At no time could the repubs have done anything but bitch about it. As far as special interest money, you got any links to prove more of it flowed to the GOP to kill it than went to the dems to pass it? I recall big pharma wanted it cuz they thought they'd get big bucks out of it from taxpayer dollars.
The dems own ACA, lock, stock, and barrel. It is beyond lame AND hypocritical to claim otherwise. The sad truth is, your guys had total control and fucked it up. And now you want to put blame on the repubs for not supporting a shitty piece of legislation that was against their principles.
I thought that it was changed to prevent a filibuster, but not as Wry Catcher is indicating. If I remember correctly, Speaker Pelosi was having trouble getting the moderate Democrats to bow down to her and it was they who threatened to break ranks and join the Republicans if she didn't water the damned thing down.
The Republicans could not have done anything had the Democrats been of one mind. Thank goodness there are actually some reasonable Democrats in Congress or who knows what kind of shit they would have given us?
Immie
I assume you're talking about the House bill, no filibusters happen in the House. Pelosi may have watered down the bill to get her wayward democrats on board with it, but at no time did the repubs have any influence at all.
Once the dems passed it in the House, the Senate passed their version. But then Scott Brown gets elected as the 41st repub, horrors! Normally these things go into a committee and they have to pass the revised final version in both chambers of Congress. BUT - with Scott Brown on board, the dems know they won't get an amended version through the senate cuz he promised to vote against the ACA. So, the House passes the senate version and that became law.
So - by the time Scott Brown arrives on the scene the bill was in it's final form, no changes were made to it to avoid a filibuster. Whatever is in that legislation is entirely owned by the Dems, and it is dishonest as well as hypocritical for them to suggest otherwise.
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