Health Care: Speed Bump In The Senate?

“Reconciliation limits debate to 20 hours, and amendments have to be germane.” Senate Parliamentarian Robert Dove

What is this – we can make up rules as we go??

Good God! Are the Democrats complete morons? Just put the House Bill up for a floor vote. Up or down. No amendments. Let each GOP Senator and Liberman and Nelson blather for as long as they feel like, twice. Then vote. Pass the the bill with 51+ votes and go home.

FYI, I hate the House bill too and wouldn’t vote for it (especially with the poison-pill Stupak language), but if the Dems want to snatch victory back from the jaws of defeat, that is how you do it.

KT, thanks for this update. Short of a real filibuster or the nuclear option, what’s the best defense against this? (I still think if Frist had won his nuclear option we’d already have HCR by now.) Maybe if the R’s do it here they’ll try this against finance reform and other issues. I’m also guessing (strictly imho) they would’ve done this long ago if it didn’t already have an effective counterstrategy. thanks for your thoughts
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(…and sorry for nearly missing the weekend “1000 words”; I was on a road trip but slipped in some comments at the end.)

President Obama should therefore publicly recommit himself to working with the Republicans, and repeatedly rededicate himself to the principle of bipartisanship. He should get up in front of a crowd of Republicans and reassure them that he’s more than willing to cobble their specific ideas onto Democratic proposals –ideas like not enacting Democratic proposals, for example.
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If the GOP minority obstructs legislation as a bloc in this fashion, it will once again prove that Obama has failed –as he failed overwhelmingly last year, month after painful month– to reach out sufficiently to Republicans. The President’s primary responsibility is to be seen as the close-working partner of the party whose policies were uniformly rejected by the American people after having seen them in action –that’s what it means to be a strong leader entrusted by voters with the power to get their most important problems solved.
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The American people don’t care about legislative results that enhance their lives in an economic crisis, or cure decades-long ills experience by the country, they’re much more concerned with the appropriate process gestures having been made. If, at the end of the day, nothing happens to improve their lives, voters will look to see that Republicans haven’t been shut out of the process, and judge Democrats’ efforts on that key basis. If unemployment stays where it is, but President Obama can say with integrity “I tried to include Republican ideas in every measure I took to reduce the effects of the crisis,” the Democratic majority will be overwhelmingly re-elected to power to try again.

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Nope. But that’s actually in the rules. See the links.

The worst news for health care reform is that is has suddenly dropped from Obama’s radar entirely.

http://www.political-buzz.com/

Don’t the amendments have to pass muster with the reconciliation rules?
And Republicans have like 3 ideas total. To act like they could just generate an endless stream of Amendments based on torture, cutting tax rates to zero, and cheating on their wives and running around in diapers, is just bluster.

Key paragraph. (Don’t shoot the messenger.):
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In the Senate, total debate on a reconciliation bill is limited to 20 hours, although the actual time for consideration of the omnibus package often exceeds this time limit set in the Budget Act. Motions and amendments may be offered and considered without debate at the end of this time period. There are also restrictions on the content of a reconciliation package and on the amendments which may be offered to it. For example, any amendment to the bill that is not germane, would add extraneous material, would cause deficit levels to increase, or that contains recommendations with respect to the Social Security program, is not in order. The Budget Act also maintains that reconciliation provisions must be related to reconciling the budget. For example, section 313 of the Budget Act, more commonly known as the “Byrd Rule”, provides a point of order in the Senate against extraneous matter in reconciliation bills. Determining what is extraneous is often a procedural and political quagmire navigated in part by the Senate Parliamentarian. The Byrd Rule and other points of order in the Budget Act may only be waived in the Senate by a three-fifths vote. Furthermore, the Budget Act prevents reconciliation legislation from being filibustered on the Senate floor.

That is some beautiful, raw, undistilled sarcasm.

I think you just made David Broder cry.

Frivolous Amendments R Us. That’s the way gov’ment works.

Yes, actually calling out the enemy of the American people, the party primarily responsible for the cratered economy and a HC system that sees 10s of 1000s die each year for lack of treatment, this would be uncivil. See Grayson, Alan. Far better to reach out to mofos in acts of delusional harmony, thus eliding any possible difference between you and them in the voters’ minds.
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Here’s the rub, the GOP only has to be against Obama. In American culture this is sufficient to regain power in harsh econ. times. The question over a year in is what exactly does the President stand for? What does he want out of HCR? His own COS suggests it’s no longer even a priority. Kevin’s insertion of Broder is spot-on: as long as dems govern with his toxic image in mind, reaching out to a party that will never meet them 1/2 way, in lieu of fighting rabidly for their constituents’ interests, they will only fleetingly gain power.

Dropped and kicked out of the playing field. Obama is now concerned with the Economy. He is for “jobs, jobs, and more jobs”.
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It is clear from the past 3 major elections held in Virginia, New Jersey and Massachusetts that he has no other choice than to create jobs.
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Of course this will not happen either before it is too late for him and the rest of the goons on the left, but hey, give it your best shot Mr Obama!!

Obama must work closely with the minority to insure that legislation satisfies the republican agenda. After all, true bipartisanship means providing change republicans can believe in.
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The republicans are ready to lead. They made that clear last Friday, when they presented Obama with an impressively bound pamphlet.

Karen I had some hope that health care might survive when I read this this morning

http://wonkroom.thinkprogress.org/2010/01/26/reconciliation-derail/

Do you think the Vice President might take on the role of the “ultimate decider” of what can stay in under the rules?

Torture to keep us safe. Cut taxes to create jobs thus creating revenue. Who cares if they cheat on their wives. I don’t. So really, 2 ideas will do it. Well maybe we could cut spending too. Sounds like a plan.

He blew his best wad during his campaign. Since then, nothing.

How solid is Kent Conrad? I ask, ’cause, if I’m reading this right:

In general, a point of order authorized under the Byrd rule may be raised in order to strike extraneous matter already in the bill as reported or discharged (or in the conference report), or to prevent the incorporation of extraneous matter through the adoption of amendments or motions. A point of order may be raised against a single provision or two or more provisions in the bill (usually as designated by title or section number, or by page and line number), in amendments offered thereto, or in motions made thereon, or against an entire amendment or amendments. The chair may sustain a point of order as to all of the provisions (or amendments) or only some of them. The maker of the point of order defines the scope of the provision or provisions being challenged.

(italics mine)

Conrad would be the one that would sustain a point of order against amendments considered ‘extraneous’:

As the Senate Budget Committee noted in its report on the budget resolution for fiscal year 1994, “‘Extraneous’ is a term of art.” In the most general terms, the rule bars the inclusion of matter that is not related to the purposes of the reconciliation process.

There’s some vague criteria as to what constitutes extraneous legislation, with exceptions having to be certified by the chairman and others.

I figure that there’s going to be ample opportunity to negate a ‘flood’ of amendments that aren’t related to the bill (and a number that are).

(pp. 81-87)

you just made David Broder cry
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The priests of High Broderism don’t think that this is sarcasm.

Karen,
Remember, the amdendments have to be germane, under all reconciliation rules. But even if they somehow did turn out to be germane, and each one took as long as possible, say 30 minutes for introduction, reading, and vote, then we’d get through 48 in 24 hours. And that’s 24 hours straight–like a filibuster, there will be no recess. Two-and-a-half days of that would be a small price to pay for health care reform, and to make the Party of No prove on CSPAN how bats**t insane they really are.

In any case, this has been discussed in the past week at Think Progress and the O’Neill Institute Blog, but David Waldman has what I think is the definitive take. He discusses Greg Sargent’s recent posts and the posts at the other two blogs, and analyzes what could happen. Pay particular attention to the precedent for the Majority Leader to call for a very important point of order (further to grape_crush’s comment at 11):

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2010/1/26/830678/-Can-Senate-GOP-still-derail-reconciliation

But what if they could do it? How would it work? Well, Republicans would basically have to stay on the Senate floor, coming up with amendment after amendment, and trying not to look too silly doing it. There would be no debate allowed on the amendments, since time would have expired (though they can sometimes grant themselves unanimous consent for a few minutes of debate if it’s thought to be a worthy amendment), so it’d just be them and us, standing there on the floor, with them on C-SPAN2 trying desperately to come up with something new to say to keep the debate going.

Does this sound familiar? Like maybe similar to something everybody has been saying they wanted to force Republicans to do, anyway? Hmm. Interesting. And what better way to have it, than under circumstances where Republicans weren’t really allowed to say all that much?

Anyway, there’s also another point this situation reminds me of.

There’s an October 3, 1977 precedent from when Sen. Robert Byrd (D-WV) was Majority Leader, wherein faced with an exploitation of an old cloture rule loophole that allowed Senators to file the same sort of endless stream of amendments, even after cloture had already been invoked, he addressed the chair with this point of order, which was sustained by the chair:

I make the point that when the Senate is operating under cloture the Chair is required to take the initiative under rule XXII to rule out of order all amendments which are dilatory or which on their face are out of order.

The point having been sustained (and an appeal of the ruling tabled, which requires a simple majority vote), Byrd used his right of preferential recognition as Majority Leader to call up all the rest of the amendments one at a time, whereupon the chair ruled each of them out of order on its own motion. (Source – warning, PDF)

I would argue that if that point of order can be sustained for the post-cloture environment, when debate is limited to 30 hours, surely it should be sustained for the reconciliation environment, when debate is limited to just 20.

I believe the same point of order can and should be made and sustained — if we even get that far, given what former parliamentarian Bob Dove had to say — and that Harry Reid might then use his right to preferential recognition to call up all pending amendments, and have them ruled on immediately by the chair.

Would they do such a thing? I don’t know. But could they? I believe they could. And quite frankly, it’s a good exercise for thinking about more Senate rules reform (cough — filibuster! — cough) in the future. We already know that’s on everyone’s lips.

This is fantastic information. Dave Waldman is definitely king.

Another thought: Majority Leader Reid is good at knowing his constraints, how he must prepare to run the floor effectively. He’s likely strategizing for the worst conditions, i.e.: no unanimous consent given at all, endless points of order, and endless amendments. So he’ll be doing what Jeff Davis says, looking to get to the floor “right before the Senate is supposed to take a long vacation”. Given the current uncertainty on even the content of the “sidecar”, and the likelihood that it will have to go through at least a pro-forma committee vote, Reid has undoubtedly ruled out passing a fix by Feb. 12. (I mean, please, President Brown only gets sworn in on Feb. 11.)

So if he’s going to do it, he has two workable windows: all of March, leading up to the Passover/Easter recess starting March 27; or all of May, leading into the Memorial Day recess, starting May 29.

Perhaps this explains Rahm’s perplexing, depressing timetable?
http://www.tnr.com/blog/the-treatment/rahm-thinks-reform-can-wait-while

Maybe you could ask Jim Manley about the amendment vote-a-rama and the timetable logic?

[...] Health Care: Speed Bump In The Senate? – Swampland – TIME.com [...]

Wow. And they have the balls to claim that they’re not obstructionists…

[...] Health Care: Speed Bump In The Senate? – Swampland – TIME.com [...]

[...] Health Care: Speed Bump In The Senate? – Swampland – TIME.com [...]

“He should get up in front of a crowd of Republicans and reassure them that he’s more than willing to cobble their specific ideas onto Democratic proposals –ideas like not enacting Democratic proposals, for example.”

That’s not just an example, that’s the exactly what the Republicans mean when they say “bipartisan”: our ideas, not yours. If they’re calling for bipartisanship in good faith then the word doesn’t mean what they think it does.

FYI, Obama has been reaching out to Republicans on this since the beginning and he literally did reach out to them again last Friday on national television to boot. This whole reform plan has moved as slowly as it has specifically because they’ve been trying to get Republican input and changing specifics of various forms of various bills to please Republicans and win their votes.

Republicans haven’t been negotiating in good faith and they haven’t been honest partners in driving reform. They’ve been using every trick they can think of to slow this process to a halt not because they want input but because they simply don’t want it to happen. Pulling these kinds of stunts to slow the reconciliation process is just another facet of that campaign.

Obama should recommit to bipartisanship? Republicans should publicly own up to the their true goals: stopping the reform the public badly needs and very much wants.

[...] health care reform Obama's Waterloo? Is reconciliation a real possibility or can the Republicans block it? Will Democrats pretend health care reform is still a priority – to placate the left – even as [...]

[...] The CMS report couldn't have come at a better time for Democrats. Their health care reform legislation is on the ropes, with newly elected Republican Sen. Scott Brown due to be sworn in today, reducing the Democratic Senate majority to 59, one short of the number required to break a filibuster. Dramatic figures in the CMS report show that health care accounted for 17.3% of the U.S. economy in 2009. The increase in health spending, from $2.34 trillion in 2008 to $2.47 trillion in 2009, was the largest one-year jump since 1960. CMS predicts total U.S. health spending in 2019 will be $4.5 trillion. This will bolster the Democratic argument that dramatic health reform is an urgent need that must happen quickly. President Obama continued this week to push Congressional Democrats to get health reform legislation to his desk, both at a town hall in New Hampshire and speaking directly to a meeting of the Senate Democratic caucus yesterday. Of course, getting a bill out of Congress is no small task. [...]

[...] taking up the underlying bill. But the Senate Democrats and the White House believe that is simply impossible to pull off, because even under reconciliation rules, Senate Republicans could bog down the measure with [...]