"New plan might allow Dems to slip public option through Senate"

[Clio the Leo]

I dont believe this has been posted before, forgive me if it has...

New plan might allow Dems to slip public option through Senate
By: Susan Ferrechio
Chief Congressional Correspondent
October 7, 2009 Senate Democrats desperate to find a way to pass a health care bill that includes a federal insurance plan may have come up with a way to do it without putting moderate members who oppose it in political jeopardy.

Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., is weighing a plan to bring the final health care bill to the floor without a public option -- making it much easier to get the 60 votes needed to prevent a Republican filibuster -- and then adding the provision later as an amendment.

The public option amendment would be there waiting, but the 60-vote test would technically be on a bill without the government plan. Then moderate Democrats could drop out for the vote on the public option, which requires just 51 votes for passage.

"It's brilliant," said a top Senate Republican aide. "It gets you your votes on cloture for a package that does not include a public option."

<snip>

Senate aides suggest that after passage in the upper chamber, the Senate bill -- public option included -- could then be sent to the House, allowing the lower chamber to simply pass Reid's legislation instead of taking up its own bill. That route would avoid a protracted and contentious battle to meld two different bills and might allow President Obama and Democrats to achieve their goal of passing health care reform by year's end.

http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/politics/New-plan-might-allow-Dems-to-slip-public-option-through-Senate-8351547-63634887.html

The general thought among those in the Senate in favor of the PO is that moderate Dems will ultimately choose loyalty to the party over opposition to the PO. ..... or rather, not so much party loyalty but NOT being seen as siding with the GOP.

Also, here is a VERY VERY VERY important article that explains how the whole thing gets done ..... it's a MUST read but it's so long and involved that I'm having a hard time making it into an OP. JUST READ IT!!!!! ........ NOW!!! It answers EVERY frustrated complaint we see posted here at DU on a daily basis re: this whole process.
http://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/55081