Hotline has a helpful whip count on House members’ position on health care reform. The math sure looks complicated. We have a lot of scaredy-cat Democrats and not a few who take their marching orders from the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops. Let me tell you something. If you are to the right of Ben Nelson on abortion rights, you really ought to reconsider your party affiliation. In my opinion, a small coterie of anti-choice House Democrats is holding the president’s number one priority item hostage to make access to abortion even more restrictive than it is currently. At least Ben Nelson recognized that the reforms need to pass and struck a deal that would probably sabotage the effort to have abortion services available in exchange plans while not explicitly doing so. [Side note: to demonstrate how radical this is, RomneyCare has abortion coverage even for subsidized plans].
Bart Stupak says he is more optimistic about reaching a deal than he was a week ago.
“I’m more optimistic than I was a week ago,” Stupak told The Associated Press between meetings with constituents in his northern Michigan district, including a crowded town hall gathering where opinions on health care and the abortion issue were plentiful and varied.
“The president says he doesn’t want to expand or restrict current law (on abortion). Neither do I,” Stupak said. “That’s never been our position. So is there some language that we can agree on that hits both points — we don’t restrict, we don’t expand abortion rights? I think we can get there.”
But where would that language be incorporated? It almost definitely cannot be part of the the sidebar reconciliation bill since it wouldn’t have a significant impact of the budget. Because the Senate bill must be passed in the House as is, that means any changes in the abortion language cannot be incorporated in either of the two bills that will be voted on.
At this point, I am putting the primary blame on the Bishops. They may want something a bit stronger than what Ben Nelson was able to get them, but the difference between Nelson’s language and Stupak’s language is so small that many people cannot even see any practical difference. Weighing that against health care access for 30 million Americans, it shouldn’t be a hard choice. We’ve all made compromises in this process, some of which involve serious moral concerns. Secondly, I blame the Catholic Democrats in Stupak’s camp who seem to have abdicated their autonomy to a body of Bishops who are unaccountable to the American people. If the Bishops make unreasonable demands that harm your constituents, you first responsibility is to exercise your own judgment and do what’s right.
If Pelosi solves this, she’ll deserve a medal, a statue, and that a congressional office building be named after her.