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Media Coverage of Republican Health Care Fail

Most mistakes in one article I've seen yet on the health care vote: NBC News. I suspect it will be gone by morning, so I printed and uploaded it. How did they even release it? It seems like it was written before the vote by someone who was convinced the Republicans would succeed:

Senate Republicans narrowly passed their pared-down amendment of an Obamacare repeal bill at 1:00 a.m. Friday morning, less than three hours after the text of the legislation was released.

Update: I was right. NBC has already replaced the article with this version by the same reporter.

Some better coverage with interesting details:

Reuters on McCain's apparently last minute decision to vote against the bill: [More...]

McCain was approached minutes before the vote by Pence and Republican Senator Lindsey Graham. ....After speaking to Pence and Graham for some time, McCain walked across the floor to tell Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and Senators Dick Durbin, Elizabeth Warren, Amy Klobuchar and Dianne Feinstein that they had his vote. Feinstein embraced him as voting began.

The New York Times on Trump's attempt to strong-arm Lisa Murkowski:

On the other side, the Trump administration twisted arms. Mr. Trump directed Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke to call Senator Lisa Murkowski of Alaska to remind her of issues affecting her state that are controlled by the Interior Department, according to people familiar with the call, who requested anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the press.

Ms. Murkowski, one of two Republicans to vote against starting the health care debate, confirmed to reporters that she had received a call from Mr. Zinke, but declined to describe the details. However, people familiar with the call described her reaction to it as “furious.”

Isn't that called extortion?

The Atlantic:

Late Thursday afternoon, McCain and Senators Lindsey Graham of South Carolina and Ron Johnson of Wisconsin held a surreal press conference to denounce a policy that, just hours later, two of them would vote to advance. They said they would only vote for the skinny repeal as a means to an end—a vehicle to set up a House-Senate conference committee that would allow Republicans another chance to work out a broader replacement bill. “The skinny bill as policy is a disaster. The skinny bill as a replacement for Obamacare is a fraud,” Graham declared.

“I need assurances from the speaker of the House, and his team, that if I vote for the skinny bill, it will not become the final product,” he continued. “If I don’t get those assurances, I am a no, because I am not going to vote for a pig in a poke, and I’m not going to tell people back in South Carolina that this product actually replaces Obamacare, because it does not. It is a fraud.”

....Ryan’s assurance was enough to win over Graham and Johnson. Days removed from a speech decrying his own party’s handling of health care,

More from the Atlantic article on Paul Ryan's "wink wink":

Democrats pleaded with their Republican colleagues to reject Ryan’s offer. “Don’t delude yourself that this bill won’t become law. There is a very good chance that it will,” Senator Chris Murphy of Connecticut warned on the Senate floor. He excoriated Republicans for unveiling their bill just hours before the vote, and he likened the underlying policy to “arson.” “This process is an embarrassment,” Murphy said. “This is nuclear-grade bonkers what is happening here tonight.”

The Atlantic also reports that the hour delay in voting was due to Pence and McConnell trying to convince McCain:

A vote planned for shortly after midnight on Friday was delayed by more than an hour after top Republicans—first McConnell and Vice President Mike Pence—huddled with the Arizonan in an effort to change his mind. But McCain, trying to live up to his maverick image one more time, would not budge.

Roll Call doesn't mention cheers, only gasps, when McCain voted:

Updated 3:10 a.m. | In a dramatic early Friday morning vote, the Senate voted down the Republican effort to overhaul the U.S. health insurance system, 49-51, with GOP Sen. John McCain of Arizona’s dramatic “no” — to gasps in the chamber — providing the key vote to send the bill to defeat.

(I actually didn't hear either, but maybe C-Span was muting the sound from the Gallery to make the roll caller's voice more prominent -- or maybe I missed it while updating my live post.)

Roll Call also reports Pence tried to convince McCain for "more than" 20 minutes, not an hour.

Pence himself spent more than 20 minutes trying to get McCain to change his mind.

I'm not sure why Republicans were surprised:

Republicans were confident shortly before the vote they could get to a 50-50 tie, and bring in Pence to break it. Before he cast his “no” vote, McCain had gathered with a sizable group of jovial Democrats on the other side of the Senate chamber. He returned to the Republican side, walking right past Majority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky.

Roll Call also says "He defied prudent medical guidance" in returning to Washington to vote. It then recounts all the positives in his career, but misses it's most glaring failure: His hail-Mary pass of choosing Sarah Palin as his running mate. Before we canonize him, lets not forget that -- or that McCain's vote would have made no difference had Sens. Lisa Murkowski and Susan Collins not voted the same way.

< Senate's Midnight Vote on Health Care: Another Republican Fail | Reince Priebus Out as Chief of Staff >
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  • Display: Sort:
    HA (5.00 / 2) (#1)
    by CaptHowdy on Fri Jul 28, 2017 at 06:14:39 AM EST
    DEWEY DEFEATS TRUMAN!!

    the media (5.00 / 1) (#2)
    by CaptHowdy on Fri Jul 28, 2017 at 06:19:08 AM EST
    even FOX is making this a failure of Trump as much as the republicans.

    even the deplorables will now begin to ubderstand this is not a governing party.

    i checked in with some trumper relatives FB page this morning.

    they are pi$$ed.  they get this.  this was their primary job 1 for Trump and the republicans.

    a helluva lot of them will not even vote in 18.

    thats a common theme.  

    im done.  why vote?  

    Yep, (none / 0) (#4)
    by Ga6thDem on Fri Jul 28, 2017 at 08:03:00 AM EST
    disappointment and/or start weaving more conspiracy theories about Hillary.

    Parent
    Thanks for staying up and watching (5.00 / 3) (#3)
    by ruffian on Fri Jul 28, 2017 at 06:43:09 AM EST
    I couldn't do it.

    I'm glad McCain found his conscience in the end, or maybe it was a big FU to Trump. Either way, I'm good with it. Maybe this was a bad week to dis military people, Trump, you idiot.

    Murkowski is the real here, IMO. She withstood the most pressure, especially the last bit of Christie-style extortion. I'm glad she told people it made her furious instead of being persuasive. Learn something, Heller and Capito. If you even have jobs after this term.

    Double bonus - killed bad policy AND showed the GOP for the clown car it is.   Hope they can wise up and do the needed fixes to Obamacare now.

    If CNN is correct (5.00 / 2) (#5)
    by Militarytracy on Fri Jul 28, 2017 at 08:58:51 AM EST
    And Obamacare is why the Republicans have the White House, the Senate, and the House, who are the insane voters who thought Republicans would give them anything better and less expensive?

    You know what (5.00 / 1) (#6)
    by Ga6thDem on Fri Jul 28, 2017 at 09:05:06 AM EST
    I have observed? Since we have taken personalities out of and stuck to issues people seem to be warming to Obamacare. Those people who thought the GOP would give them something better are completely ignorant of insurance and the current way medicine is practiced in this country. Of course, again, the media and their games of who you "like" is partially to blame for this. Trump never had a plan. It was obvious he had no idea about healthcare. So people took the word "better" and made it be whatever they wanted it to be.

    Parent
    The poor schmucks never thought (none / 0) (#7)
    by jondee on Fri Jul 28, 2017 at 01:43:27 PM EST
    that far ahead. All they wanted to do was save America from Obama's socialist agenda and get back at their foreign-born bogeyman.

    Parent
    There's shame in this, too... (5.00 / 1) (#8)
    by desertswine on Fri Jul 28, 2017 at 09:40:20 PM EST
    The shame is that 49 wealthy, privileged, elitist, representatives of the people voted to deprive millions of the right to health care; the poorest, most needful, and most desperate of their countrymen.  What kind of people are these?  Thank god they were defeated, but god damn them too.  

    shows you (5.00 / 1) (#9)
    by leap on Sat Jul 29, 2017 at 12:24:59 AM EST
    what kind of god that is, eh? When you both thank it and damn it in the same sentence!

    Parent
    That's what Sen. Mazie Hirono said ... (5.00 / 3) (#10)
    by Donald from Hawaii on Sat Jul 29, 2017 at 03:27:58 PM EST
    "I know what it's like to run out of money at the end of the month. That was my life as an immigrant here. And now here I am, a United States senator. I am fighting kidney cancer, and I'm just so grateful that I had health insurance, so that I can concentrate on the care that I needed, rather than how the heck I was going to afford the care that was going to probably save my life. And guess what? When I was diagnosed with kidney cancer and facing my first surgery, I heard from so many of my colleagues, including so many of my colleagues on the other side of the aisle, who wrote me wonderful notes, sharing with me their own experience with major illness in their families and their loved ones. You showed me your care. You showed me your compassion. Where is that tonight?"

    ... on the floor of the Senate Thursday night, in a moving personal speech that's belatedly getting the recognition it deserves.

    It proved surprising to a lot of us out here who've long known Mazie personally, if only because this is the first time we've seen her have to stop mid-sentence to compose herself. Because while she can be very warm and expressive with us in private, she's otherwise had a public reputation as a very reserved woman who rarely if ever talks about herself in such personal terms.

    In that respect she's very much her mother's daughter, in the sense that she is not at all prone to public displays of emotion. Quite the opposite, actually. As an elected official, Mazie's always gotten very high marks for her diligent work ethic and her wide base of knowledge on any number of subjects. But her political style has often been criticized locally as something akin to a distant and aloof bureaucratic functionary.

    Anyway, she clearly threw her caution aside on Thursday night to speak from the heart, and it's certainly worth a watch.

    Aloha.

    Parent

    Do you recognize (5.00 / 3) (#11)
    by Ga6thDem on Sat Jul 29, 2017 at 06:35:56 PM EST
    the criticism she is getting? It's the same criticism Hillary got and I guess all women who run for office. If we show emotion we're weak. If we're stoic we're cold and unfeeling. We have a real problem in this country when it comes to women.

    Parent
    we have real *problems* (5.00 / 1) (#12)
    by leap on Sat Jul 29, 2017 at 10:51:42 PM EST
    in this country. Misogyny. Sexism. Racism. Violence. Ignorance. Lack of empathy. Poor-ism.... It's a long list of odium.

    Parent
    ... last Thursday night. I've known her for nearly 30 years, having first met her in 1988 when she was the state representative representing the Mo'ili'ili / Makiki area of central Honolulu. This was the first time I've ever seen her speak so personally like that. She's otherwise a very private and reserved woman who doesn't wear her emotions on her sleeve.

    The criticism Mazie's received out here over these many years actually has nothing to do with her gender but with the fact that more often than not, she tends to drone on monotonously in "Bureaucratese" when talking with constituents about an issue. (Think Charlie Brown's schoolteacher in a Peanuts TV special.) It hurt her considerably in the 2002 gubernatorial debates with then-Maui Mayor Linda Lingle, who's a lot more warm and personable.

    It's the same complaint that's often dogged German Chancellor Angela Merkel over the years, as well as former British Prime Ministers David Cameron and John Major. It doesn't necessarily reflect who they actually are in person, and the complaint is more about the elected official's style than it is substantive. But in this era of mass media with its often inordinate emphasis on the superficial, it is what it is.

    Aloha.

    Parent

    White House Budget Chief Mick Mulvaney ... (5.00 / 1) (#14)
    by Donald from Hawaii on Sun Jul 30, 2017 at 05:39:37 PM EST
    ... is now insisting that another vote on healthcare must take place in the Senate, before the administration will agree to move on anything else.

    Sorry to burst your balloons, Mick, but the bill died the very moment the Senate's presiding officer formally announced that it had been rejected on a 51-49 vote by that body in those wee hours of early Friday morning.

    If Majority Leader Mitch McConnell wanted to maintain a sliver of hope that they could somehow finagle something through, then he should never have brought the bill to the Senate floor without concrete assurances -- not vague promises -- that he had the requisite number of votes for passage on Third / Final Reading.

    There are no mulligans to be had in due legislative process. The measure cannot be resurrected from the dead. If congressional Republicans want to continue pursuing an Obamacare repeal, they will have to start all over again from scratch. And right now, I don't believe that they have the stomach to do so.

    The Trump administration could really benefit from the hiring of someone who actually knows how the legislative process works, and can further explain it to everyone else in the West Wing. It was pretty clear this morning that Mulvaney didn't even have a clue in that regard.

    Aloha.

    Terrorizing fragile Americans! (5.00 / 1) (#15)
    by Militarytracy on Mon Jul 31, 2017 at 03:38:35 PM EST
    They are openly terrorizing US citizens while all pissed off about Venezuelan citizens being terrorized. Complete effing hypocrites!

    Parent
    The next thing you know, (5.00 / 2) (#16)
    by Jack E Lope on Tue Aug 01, 2017 at 11:27:31 AM EST
    ...they'll be criticizing Cuba for holding prisoners without trial.

    Parent
    haha, that's funny! (none / 0) (#17)
    by linea on Tue Aug 01, 2017 at 10:53:05 PM EST
    i agree. either prosecute them for terrorism in a u.s. court or hand them over to the hague i.c.j.

    Parent