I know this sounds terrible, but I can't help but wish Holy Joe a slow, painful death without health insurance. I don't know which drives me crazier -- his dishonesty, or his hypocrisy.

Now it falls on United States senators like Even Bayh(D[?]-Wellpoint) to take the already-inadequate health care reform bill and extract enough concessions to make it completely worthless.

Well, it's march forward or die, now.

To get the necessary votes for cloture -- Enhanced Persuasive Techniques -- I suggest setting up a waterboarding facility there in the WH basement. First one up? Lieberman. (And he won't be able to call it torture, either!)

The House has betrayed a majority of the american people thru the Stupak amendment, so one can only imagine where the Senate Clown Car will land on 'health care reform' -- be that as it may...

we have learned thru this spectacle many things about the limitations, failures, and indecency, of even our closest allies in government in washington.

it is very difficult to imagine how likely a real health care reform bill will be produced -- more so, now that we say the level of contempt the huge Dim majority in the House has -- willing to deny women their reproductive rights in a matter of hours, through a regulatory amendment on a "healthcare" bill.

That's the type of paradoxical horror the Bush administration was doing week in and week out. Now we know the Obama administration goes for that shit, too, and i sure do trust hopey-changey candyland a whole god damn lot less after last night.

if we get any 'health care reform' with a public option that is a working and sustainable program, we will begin there to put into effect as soon as possible, a single payer universe health care program in this country.

that is still the goal in health care, as far as i can see. i just think we are gonna be startin' a whole hell of a lot further away form it than i had imagined 6 mos ago...

Maybe our presidnet is on Acai berry treatment.. I hope he's right but I think Joe Douchebag is going to trump his enthusiasm.

neill with all due respect, the issue of abortion is not forefront in the minds of the majority of Americans (women or men) regarding their concerns about our healthcare system. Insured people are going bankrupt everyday because of illness that they assumed would be coverd, millions don't have access to even basic medical care, people are seeing their insurance companies deny their children coverage for ridiculous reasons. I don't like the the Stupak amendment, but there are much larger and more visceral issues in our disaster of a healthcare system that need to be addressed. IF this passes we'll see that amendment overturned at some point. But to frame healthcare reform as a reproductive freedom issue is wrong and frankly unfair.

This bill is far from perfect, but it is a sledgehammer blow to the system we now have, and it can be improved on as time goes on. It's a start and a good one. I think it puts us on the road we need to be going down, and in this country, that's a big accomplishment. IF it passes we;ll go foreward, not backward, and that is a very positive outcome.

saint zak, since you are a saint, i guess i caint suggest that you dont know shit with regard to how the forefronts of the minds of the majority of the women of this country think about their reproductive rights -- and the connection of such rights to heathcare -- i'll just assume you got a tad of that omniscience from yer bossman.

so i give up... women dont mind their uteruses belonging to old white guys in washington so long as there is an on-paper public option. st zak (and st stupak) and the lord know best...

i'll also only suggest that the divine pony-discovery you announce that the US House of Reps has delivered all sprinkled up and down with fairy dust and having that magical new car smell -- aint.

Saint Zak and neill just above, I am a pro-choice woman and while I wish the Stupak portion hadn't been put in, I think it was necessary to pass this bill. I would be all for the government paying for abortions, but it ain't gonna happen.

This bill isn't perfect - by a long-shot - but it's a good starting point.

Joe, the irrelevant archangel

Great news. The public option has passed the People's House.
That is huge.

Now just get any old bill through the Senate. Even one with the Snowe Trigger. In fact: It is now perfectly okay to bring Snowe along. She can and should replace the Archangel Joe once again on the national stage. In my cynical left eye she is both prettier and more progessive. Let her have all the Media's glory.

All is fair in love and politics. It is getting good bills passed that matters.
And the People's House has delivered.
So now we use Olympia to get to the next step.
And Joe? Snowe's trigger makes his vote irrelevant...

Next: When the two bills are reconciled, that is when Joe becomes permanently irrelevant. The leader of the Senate, the President, and the House all want a public option. Case closed: Reconcile it into being. It is a done deal. All that is left is the up-or-down vote, the signature, and the celebrating.

Eyes on the prize please!

Lastly: Strip Joe of all committee chairs. The time has come for that. And similarly, the time has come to start immediately pumping DNC money into finding and building a strong candidate to replace him.
Find a carpetbagger if you must...
But find and develop someone strong.

In 2012, quite likely, both Barack and Joe will stand for reelection. Joe must lose and Barack must win. By my reckoning, that night is 725 days away...

Eyes on that prize too please...
It will be one glorious night.
Count the days...

Neil - if abortion is all about choice, and a woman chooses to have an abortion, then she should pay for it. It's her choice, not mine and not any other taxpayers. She should pay for it.

We, The People, should demand that senators and congressmen who vote against health care reform give up their own, government-paid health care. Give it up for themselves, and for their families. Let them vie for coverage in the private system that they so love.

FMD: A lot of women who request abortions cannot afford them. It's a medical procedure that is legal and should fall into other categories..some women are actually at risk of losing their life if they don't have the abortion. And some don't choose to get pregnant..many are raped or used precautions that didn't work..this is just more misogynistic legislation.

But the larger point is if the House had to go there, and the bill still narrowly passed..

What chance in HELL does the bill have passing in the Senate before it looks like nothing other than a big wet kiss to the insurance companies? Who said that recently? It's so true..

So in the end Obama got most of the House Democrats to vote yes, along with socialist Reps. Bernie Sanders and Republican Anh Cao.

Does that mean Obama's health care reform is tri-partisan?

Make that will be tri-partisan -- after Senator Bernie Sanders casts his vote.

The more I see my nation praising the passing of this bill the less I like my nation. America screwed all the women in America with this bill. We were suppose to be a freaking part of this, not the goddamn price for it.

Glad my uterus was good for something. Forgive me if I don't allow America to watch my back.

I saw somewhere today a figure about what percentage of women currently pay for abortion services with their own money (rather than submitting an insurance claim), and IIRC it was something like 70-75%. That suggests that Stupak, odious though it may be in principle, doesn't change the status quo all that much. We live in a country that's pretty strangely fucked up on the subject of abortion--I'm of the "Don't like abortion, don't have one" persuasion--and it may well be that this is the best that can be hoped in USA 2009.

Declaring it's a horrible bill feminists cannot support... that strikes me as preferring to have no Social Security than one that doesn't protect agricultural or domestic workers (a provision that was all about blatant sexism and racism). And the fact of the matter is, any Social Security is far better than none at all, even if to get it progressives had to cave to a bunch of sexists and racists.