Time to Clean House?

What is remarkable about the House passage of the Senate healthcare bill is that it was done in the face of strong public opposition. What is even more remarkable is that House Democrats seem to have learned nothing from a similarly unpopular vote last summer.

The House Democratic leadership pushed the Waxman-Markey cap-and-tax bill through on June 26th by the same margin of 219 to 212. Members then went home for the Fourth of July recess. Many who voted for it found out that their constituents were strongly against energy rationing. Several have since decided not to run for re-election. A number of others could be defeated in November.

The popular blowback against the House vote on Waxman-Markey is what stalled cap-and-tax in the Senate. Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) had planned to bring it up as soon as Senators returned from the Fourth of July and pass it before the August recess. But when Senators saw the public reaction, they decided to drop cap-and-tax and take up health care reform, which at the time enjoyed more support.

But people have been turning strongly against the House and Senate healthcare bills ever since some of the details started to become clear. Unlike Waxman-Markey, however, the healthcare bill has already passed the Senate, so will now be signed into law by President Obama.

The fate of the accompanying reconciliation bill that the House also passed last night does not depend on public opinion. Senate Democrats have more than the 51 votes necessary to pass it. Instead, it's up to the Senate's parliamentarian to rule whether key parts of the reconciliation bill are in order. How he interprets some of the Senate's most arcane parliamentary procedures will determine whether the House Democratic leadership's gamble has paid off.

It's still over seven months to the congressional elections on November 2nd, but you may want to check now on how your Representative voted on the healthcare and the cap-and-tax bills. Freedom Action has the votes listed here. Just type in your zip code.