Ezra opines about what might happen to the conference report, if the House and Senate versions don’t line up, and they most certainly will not:
The Senate is trickier. But the conference report can’t be amended. It can’t be changed, or held up in committee. It can be filibustered, and it can be voted against. Those are the options. If three Democrats opposed the legislation and wanted to kill it, they would literally have to filibuster it (this is assuming that Democrats have 60 votes, which is not certain given Kennedy’s health). That would be a very hard thing to do at that stage in the game. It would isolate the obstructionists, ensuring funded primary challenges and the enduring enmity of the Senate leadership and the White House. Kent Conrad can say that there aren’t enough votes for a public option and imply that he’s just protecting the final bill from defeat. But is he willing to be one of those “no” votes? Is he willing to filibuster? That’s a different game indeed.
The White House has worked hard to imply to its liberal supporters that they need to be patient with the disappointments of the Senate process but confident in the outcome of conference committee. On July 20, Obama spoke to a group of liberal bloggers on a conference call and articulated the strategy quite explicitly:
“Conference is where these differences will get ironed out. And that’s where my bottom lines will remain: Does this bill cover all Americans? Does it drive down costs both in the public sector and the private sector over the long term? Does it improve quality? Does it emphasize prevention and wellness? Does it have a serious package of insurance reforms so people aren’t losing health care over a preexisting condition? Does it have a serious public option in place? Those are the kind of benchmarks I’ll be using. But I’m not assuming either the House and Senate bills will match up perfectly with where I want to end up.”
This strategy, of course, relies on a lot of trust, and that’s not something the White House has these days. But that’s the administration’s argument: Phase one is not a negotiation, and you can’t demand a perfect product out of both chambers. In this period, the White House will do whatever is necessary to clear a bill out of the Senate, and if that means bargaining away the public option, so be it. Phase two is a negotiation, and you should trust the White House to produce a good piece of legislation. And phase three, well, that’s the easy part. That’s passage. Hopefully.
via Ezra Klein – When Health Care Does Become a Negotiation.
So the President to hold the course and wait for things to progress to the conference committee and trust that Sen. Reid will stack the Conference committee with liberal leaning Senators, plus the required committee chairs, to iron out the final version. Then we’ll see if the Blue Dog Democrat types in the Senate have the stones to vote against cloture on a certain Republican filibuster.
If all this parliamentary maneuvering seem unfamiliar to you, perhaps you should review some old School House Rock:
