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Ping Pong And The Health Insurance Premium Assistance Bill

You've probably read about the idea of bypassing a House-Senate conference on the Health Insurance Premium Assistance Bill so that President Obama can tout it in his State of the Union address. apparently, House liberals are not pleased with the notion:

Two well respected House liberals — Jan Schakowsky and Jerrold Nadler — expressed skepticism about the current public option compromises emerging from the Senate, and vowed that House Dems would not be railroaded into swallowing the Senate bill. “It would be a mistake to think that the House leadership will go into any kind of conference committee with the expectation that we’re just gonna sign on to the Senate bill,” Schakowsky told me. “The House intends to negotiate with the Senate. We expect those deliberations to be vigorous. The House is not simply going to sign on the dotted line.” [. . .] “The House is not going to be dictated to,” Nadler told me.

We'll see. Giving Obama the chance to include "health care reform" as an "accomplishment" in his speech is one of the lousiest reasons I have ever heard for such a thing.

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    Passing the same bill (none / 0) (#1)
    by christinep on Tue Dec 08, 2009 at 04:07:17 PM EST
    It sure would save a lot of maneuvering as well as dispense with further opportunity for Repubs to stall is the "ping pong" (passing the same bill)approach could occur. Obviously, the House needs to maintain its prerogatives of not being rushed, etc. So, the comments you cited make sense. But, assuming (and, it is a big assumption) that the Senate can work out a Medicare buy-in, extension of Medicaid, and the FEHB type with OPM lead, there may well be satisfaction of the big issues related to increasing coverage/universality, lowering costs (subsidies + OPM bargained & monitored exchange,)and a strong public component (the first stage of Medicare expansion.) The abortion $ component from the Senate could overtake the older Stupak version in the House on return if Speaker Pelosi can get the majority of the caucus now on the whole "ping-ponged" bill. I guess thats my question: What does the Speaker do upon the Senate bill's arrival? Does it move to the floor of the House for an ordered vote without amendment? (And--before that--where is the preconference negotiation? Is it the Speaker and the Senate Leader? Do they bring their Leadership teams? ???)