This is what passes at TNR for analysis of the controversies involved in the HCR cramdown
Ah, the subtle nuanced thought processes of the liberal intelligentsia, as exemplified by Jonathan Cohn, senior editor at The New Republic and its resident social welfare policy and health care expert.
Cohn sees discussion of the legal issues raised by the Slaughter amendment and other arcane and possibly (probably?) unconstitutional maneuverings by House leader Pelosi as not worthy of serious consideration. Nope, it’s all just politics, and who cares anyway, as long as the Democrats win?
Or, as Cohn—Harvard alum and former President of its newspaper the Crimson, as well one of the best health care writers around, according to the Times and WaPo—would say: “whatever.”
Here’s the excerpt from his trenchant analysis [emphasis mine]:
There’s still talk of a procedure under which the House would pass the reconciliation package and, in the process, “deem” the Senate bill passed without a direct vote on it. Apparently the Senate bill could then go to the president for signature, even as the reconciliation bill went to the Senate for action there. I say “apparently” because I’ve heard enough conflicting explanations of how this might work that I’m reluctant to state this as fact.
This idea, by the way, continues to baffle me. The technicality of having deemed the Senate bill into law rather than voting on it seems unlikely to spare Democrats the attack ads they want to avoid. At the same time, it seems likely to muddle the message of demanding an “up-or-down vote,” which has helped clarified the issue for voters and help put enactment within reach.
Whatever. The important thing is that the bill passes.
“All laws repugnant to the Constitution are null and void.”
-Chief Justice John Marshall, SCOTUS, 1803, Marbury vs Madison
“Courts/Governments repugnant to the Constitution are null and void.”
-sofa, 2010
“Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, –That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government…
…
And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.”
– T. Jefferson, et al, 1776, Declaration of Independence
It would be nice if the Republicans would demand that all members of congress would have to use the same health care that the rest of us will have to use. They should insist on it and make the hold out dems insist on it as well, and they should publicize this. How curious that the patriarchal congress has really great private insurance and the rest of us will have this crappy health care. If it’s such great health care why doesn’t congress also have to use it? Where is the press on this? The press used to LOVE this kind of class war thing. What happened? Don’t they know a pulitzer level story when they see one? We live in such bizarre times. I feel like it’s because my dopey generation finally seems to be in charge. Where are the grown ups?
Thank God for your posts on this, Liberal Fascism, and Dr. Sanity’s posts because otherwise I would really feel like Alice. This is truly down the rabbit hole. It is really hard to think about something when you can see no reason for anybody’s doing anything they do.
Or it could be just another argument for having Harvard stars run everything and the rest of us just tug our forelocks and resume clinging.
“Whatever.”
I can foresee using this line of argumentation often in the near future.