From Bloomberg, The GOP has the votes for Skinny Repeal. The bill will go to conference – but it is very possible out of that conference that skinny repeal will simply to to the house.
Graham and McCain made clear they did not want Skinny Repeal to pass, and were holdouts. Ryan has to this point REFUSED to promise the House will not simply pass the Senate version.
It is unclear if there will be changes to the Senate Bill in conference. It may be that in the end Graham and McCain have simply caved.
If true the GOP will end the mandate to buy healthcare. Obamacare does not work without it – and premiums will explode as a result.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-07-27/gop-promise-to-torch-obamacare-veers-toward-bare-
bones-repeal?utm_content=politics&utm_campaign=socialflow-organic&utm_source=twitter&utm
_medium=social&cmpid%3D=socialflow-twitter-politics
Update at 1:33: McCain, Murkowski and Collins vote no!!! The Bill has failed.
I have no doubt they will be back.
Some thoughs and links this morning:
1. Maggie Hassan beat Kelly Ayotte by 1,017 votes, or .2%. EVERY SEAT MATTERS.
2. We still struggle, I think, with focusing on the things that matter. Trump does so much crazy stuff, that it can be hard to see through all of it and find the battle at hand.
3. We don’t know. We really don’t. Confident predictions are lies. The Senate got close here, and using a process that no one could have foreseen ahead of time. We have consistently under estimated the danger the Republicans present.
4. The two most interesting votes last night were Flake and Heller’s. Clinton won Nevada, and lost AZ narrowly. Both Flake and Heller voted for this anyway, which suggests to them the danger of pissing off the GOP right, and the donor money they will get for voting the way they did outweighed the danger from losing in 2018.
The Times account is here. Pence went to the floor because he thought they had the votes and he was needed to break a tie. Hard to believe they didn’t know they didn’t have the votes.
The Post account is here. I am sorry if people can’t get behind the paywall.
Five true heroes:
Five Democratic heroes from last night: each risked more than the 3 GOP nays. Each will have a tough fight in 2018. pic.twitter.com/0uW5ibXcGy
— dcg1114 (@dcg1114) July 28, 2017
Pence was in until moments ago, presumably to break a tie vote. Perhaps still waiting in the wings. But at the moment it looks like there is some real difficulty for Yertle to the Turtle to produce the minimum 50 GOP votes. Don’t get too hopeful yet. Best to err on the side of caution.
Been following Steven Dennis’ twitter account since I got back home this evening. Things may temporarily be looking up.
McCain may well be a no vote. Pence is back in the chamber trying to work him over.
Murkowski, McCain and Collins appear to be voting no.
Holy crap on a cracker! Am I reading this all correctly? Not ready to spike any footballs just yet, but man I might just breathe a bit more easily.
Don’t. 49 of those mother fuckers voted for the skinny repeal. The line is very thin. With republicans, NEVER spike the football. To paraphrase the Rude Pundit: “republicans are mother fuckers. Don’t be surprised when they fuck mothers. It’s right there in the name.”
Wise words. For now, I think a deep sigh of relief for the time being is acceptable. Will see what daylight brings.
For the moment, Yertle is saying that it is “time to move on.” We’ll see. tRump hasn’t started barking his orders through twitter just yet.
Speaking of the terror of twitter: tRump tweeted shortly afterward with his standard passive-aggressive comment about letting ACA implode.
Video coverage of Elizabeth Warren after the vote. She’s on fire. Hopefully I can figure out how to get to sleep now.
McCain gets even. Trump can now suck on that.
Trump’s WH is failing OJT at a faster rate: The New Yorker – Anthony Scaramucci Called Me to Unload About White House Leakers, Reince Priebus, and Steve Bannon – He started by threatening to fire the entire White House communications staff. It escalated from there.
No hyperbole in the above. Trump fans will love it:
I have to give you credit, Marie3. All along you described Trump as a bumbler while I and many others called him a grave threat to the republic. I haven’t changed my mind about that, but his bumbling has so far largely neutralized his threat.
Don’t recall that I used the word bumbler. My preferred word was nincompoop. Bumblers tend to be rather nice, but don’t accomplish much and therefore, are irritating because they don’t earn their keep.
Nincompoops (my definition) think they’re smart when they’re mostly of average intelligence, are very poorly informed on almost everything, and relish pushing their weight around, even when they have little formal weight. They’re also devious, occasionally clever, arrogant, and a pain-in-ass to deal with. They also have an innate ability to turn on a form of charm that makes them attractive to a significant percentage of people.
A mistake others (those immune to their charms from the get-go) make, and it’s a natural impulse for most, is not to limit their interactions to the most minimal level possible given the situation. Another mistake is not being consistently polite and courteous in those interactions; again normal because nincompoops are irritating and enjoy challenging others for sport. Mistakes because the shelf-life for nincompoops in any arena isn’t that long and during the interim, they’re too incompetent to do lasting major damage. They shoot themselves in the foot over and over again for all of the above personality characteristics, but that’s easier for the charmed to see when others have refrained actively trying to get them to see.
An example, Gaineville PD tweet
Other PDs are weighing in saying the same thing. And it’s best for the left to nod in silent agreement to maximize the potential for professional law enforcement to be heard. Particularly by the vast majority of LEOs that don’t support police brutality, many of whom were ‘charmed’ or seduced by Trump.
Words of caution from The Guardian:
So as noted before, let’s not spike any footballs nor assume the zombie is dead. I am more hopeful that the proverbial zombie has been shot in the head, but I want a bit more than hope to go by.
Did Addison just throw up the ball and hope for the best here? Did McCain affirmatively screw him and Pence by giving them the impression he was on board?
The TPM account is interesting.
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/dc/inside-the-chamber-obamacare-senate-vote
Looks like they organized it to protect Flake from T, from R pressure. probably same with Heller if he isn’t planning to go over to dem. goes to my theory that McCain came back to DC for this reason and voted yes on motion to proceed to give time to organize, also, protect the R sens from WH pressure.
It is interesting.
Voting for something that never becomes law is never as bad as voting for something that does.
So Flake votes for to keep the Arizona donors happy, and McCain knifes the bill. In the end Flake and Heller are protected in two ways.
There is a great CNN video on the vote.
Lastest approval ratings for US Senators
Flake: net -8 (approval 37%; don’t know 18%)
Heller: net +8 (approval 41%; D/K 26%)
But are vulnerable, if the opposition can come up with good and solid candidates.
The five you listed may not be as vulnerable as your chart suggests.
Donnelly: +28 (approval at 53%; D/K 23%)
McCaskill: +12 (approval at 48%; D/K 15%)
Tester: +11 (approval at 50%; D/K 11%)
Heitcamp: +32 (approval at 60%; D/K 12%)
Manchin: +26 (approval at 57% and D/K 12%)
My general theory is good approval ratings in deep rate states don’t protect dems in the end.
Heitcamp is probably in the toughest race.
In general the Dem Senate approval ratings for the group in ’18 are good.
Heller was always in doubt – but I was waiting for Flake to jump shit and he never really did.
Would like to see some data supporting that conclusion.
An example off the top of my head is Louisiana — +20.3% for Trump. Yet, Vitter (R), a sitting Senator, lost in the 2015 gubernatorial run-off election by twelve points. My guess is that Vitter’s approval rating before that election was at or near negative territory.
My theory applies to Senators with good approval ratings in states where the opposite party dominates.
I ran some numbers in 2014 – have to find them.
It does not apply to bad candidates. See 2012 Indiana and Missouri.
Diaper Boy? Too sick even for bayou country.
That’s my point. Bad approval ratings can take out a Republican in a very red state. Of course, something has to run against them.