On Morning Joe this morning the talk is about the Baucus bill and how it manages to thread the needle on costs and how opposing this is going to hurt the GOP.
On Hotair Captain Ed Allahpundit says it will give the president cover:
but this does give The One political cover on his heretofore Big Lie about ObamaCare being “deficit-neutral.” Especially since CBO is the agency that’s been tormenting him for months with projections that the program will cost vastly more than the White House claims. Now, finally, they’ve handed him a politically salable option.
Red State sees the GOP folding:
I am told quite reliably that in a meeting today on Capitol Hill, Republican Senators began to rapidly move toward concessions on health care because they are afraid they cannot hold their members.
Robert Stacy is not surprised:
Aw, c’mon, Erick — “starting to waver”? As if, until today, Republican Senators were a formidable phalanx of conservative stalwarts standing on guard to defend our liberties against the unconstitutional schemes of the Left?
Are we talking about the same Republican wussies who endorsed Charlie Crist in Florida? The effeminate weaklings who supported John McCain for the 2008 GOP presidential nomination? So far as anyone can tell, there is not a single Republican in the Senate who possesses a sound brain, a straight spine and a functioning set of testicles.
Michelle has numbers to call with basic instructions:
Tell them to man up.
Anyway I imagine it will create some buzz on the bill, and when I say imagine it is significant, because as William Jacobson tell us THERE IS NO BILL
The Baucus Concepts are disasterous, but that’s for another post. For this post, let me get across a simple concept: THERE IS NO BAUCUS BILL.
Your esteemed Senators on the Senate Finance Committee will not be voting on legislation because THERE IS NO BAUCUS BILL.
Your esteemed Senators have so little respect for you that some of them are willing to vote in favor of legislation which does not exist because THERE IS NO BAUCUS BILL.
The actual legislation will be drafted in secret by Harry Reid and a few other people, including staffers whose names and political connections you never will know, and the resulting legislation will be rammed through the Senate and House before anyone gets to read and analyze it.
You would think that this little fact that the bill doesn’t exist would have been mentioned on Morning Joe today, you’d think wrong.
Fausta gets it:
So, we’re being told that the bill on the Emperor’s New Clothes is going to reduce the deficit, only that the Emperor will still be naked.
And we’ll be the ones paying for it.
The CBO covered itself in shame this time.
Senator Alexander gets it:
“This is an estimate of a concept, not a formal cost analysis of an actual bill.
Sister Toldja gets it:
What a bunch of malarkey. How stupid do they think we are? Waiting
Remember this also, this bill hasn’t been written yet. This is a preliminary analysis that’s waiting for the final legislative language. And that’s just the Senate version. The House has its own bill and, assuming they insist on passing it, the two measures will have to be reconciled in a conference committee and voted on again. These so-called savings, pathetic as they are, could vanish as quickly as a snowflake in the Sahara. The “Baucus Bill” is a bad joke.
I think that pols are going to rush to embrace this summery and use it as an excuse to not read the actual language that we will have to live by and it will cost us dearly. I think the media is going to go on a full court press with this.
I predict that either Rush this afternoon or Sarah Palin in Facebook or both will actually point this bombshell out and won’t people look like fools when they do.
Remember elections have consequences and we always get the government we deserve. If this passes and becomes enshrined into law it will be our own doing and our own fault.
Update: Third sentence out of Rush’ mouth. Great minds and all that.
