The bipartisan suggestion of today"s healthcare summit. Photograph: C-Span
Summary: Well appreciate God that"s over - 7 hours of liveblogging. If anything the limit finished in what the British call a "score draw", or what the French call the initial universe war: extreme ditch warfare, with no entertain since and in the finish usually integrate of inches of domain becoming different hands.
The select thing to contend was that the healthcare limit was made at home theatre, put on for the media. That"s nonsense, of course. This was the genuine thing but shown live on television, and crackling with tragedy at times. Anyway, from the beginning....
9am Eastern Time (2pm GMT): What US healthcare remodel needs is a shot in the arm. What it competence get instead is a knee in the groin today, as Republican and Democratic politicians are brought together in a day-long assembly to try and find a small usual ground.
The record are being televised live, from 10am ET (3pm GMT), and we"ll be covering the key events right here, in a 7 hour marathon of live-blogging.What to see out for? Any signs that the Republican celebration in Congress can contend the steely finalise to conflict reform, even if the Obama administration department takes up the own policies and uses them. For the Democrats the issue is how far they are rebuilt to go to eventually pass the bill, and what methods they use.
Already, Senate infancy personality Harry Reid has indicted Republicans of "crying" about the bill"s passage. And he competence have a point: the GOP was even indignant about the figure of the list to be used today. That doesn"t bode well. And conjunction does this Associated Press item:
President Barack Obama and congressional Democrats, holding out small goal for Thursday"s televised bipartisan limit on health care, are rebuilt to try for a inclusive check in the entrance weeks but a singular Republican vote.
Anyone anticipating for a new thing of bipartisan goodwill: don"t hold your breath. Unless you"ve got unequivocally great health insurance.
9.45am: The players are creation their approach in to Blair House, usually opposite the travel from the White House. How low are expectations that any swell will be made? Let this front page title from USA Today discuss it the story: "Outlook low for health summit" – with a check display that fundamentally nobody thinks there will be any agreement. So, the usually approach is up, right?
CNN have roused Wolf Blitzer to front a special show on the HCR summit, that is the US homogeneous of the Queen going to a funeral.
9.55am: Nancy Pelosi chatting to Kathleen Sibelius on teevee. That"s all that"s happening.
10.03am: You could cut the tragedy with a tissue. So far: lots of generally old white men sitting around a list celebration of the mass pieces of paper. In alternative words: what majority of Washington DC looks similar to majority of the time.
10.04am: OMG! Obama"s entered the room! Everyone stands up. There"s John McCain, seeking weird. Some Republican tries to have a fun as Obama squeezes past and Obama"s similar to "Yeah, whatever" as he goes past. Cold.
10.08am: OK, back-slapping over, here we go. Obama"s opening remarks lays out the box for remodel of a small sort.
Details for the idealisation Democratic proposals are entrance out. One big benefaction finished to the Republicans is this: permitting people to buy health word opposite state lines, definition that, say, someone in New York State can buy from a health insurer formed in California. Why is this important? Because that equates to that the insurer can be regulated by an additional set of manners in one state. But the idealisation offer from the White House talks about "inter-state compacts", suggesting an additional harvesting machine of slip to be added.
10.15am: President Obama is utilizing by assorted Republican statements on the need for healthcare remodel and suggestions. "This became a unequivocally ideological battle," says Obama. "Politics finished up trumping usual sense." But what he"s anticipating to get forward – surprise! – is on "where we agree". There"s a small overlie – and Obama refers to "what we think is the majority appropriate mix of the House and Senate legislation that"s already passed" as the basement for discussion. (You can review that here.)
10.19am: Now it competence not be as sparkling as curling, but if you wish to watch this live you can find it on C-Span here and additionally live streaming on the White House website.
10.21am: Now it"s the Republicans" spin – around Senator Lamar Alexander of Tennessee. He"s not the majority sparkling chairman in the world, but compared with the Republican Senate minority personality Mitch McConnell he"s dynamite. But afterwards so is mold.
"I"d similar to to proceed with a story. When I was inaugurated governor..." great, interjection Lamar. (Is narcolepsy a pre-existing condition on my health insurance?) Alexander tells a small lengthened embellishment about Detroit cars. Which doesn"t have sense, the gist of that is if a new car doesn"t sell afterwards don"t repeat the same indication successive year. New metaphor! "It"s similar to giving someone a square to a train line where the buses usually run half the time." Is it? And an additional one: "This is a car that we can"t stop and repair and begin over. But we have to begin over."
This is made at home Republican knowledge from Senator Alexander, and is I think usually a approach of receiving up time and spinning out their lines until TV viewers get wearied and switch over to The Young and the Restless, that will be about ... now.
10.25am: "Some contend we need to rein in the word companies, and competence be we do," says Alexander, who is still banging on. Basically, it costs as well majority and ah, something something, the majority appropriate approach to dilate entrance is to reduce the cost.
Here we go: Alexander fires the initial shot of anger: the Republicans don"t wish the Democrats to have have make have use of of of of the settlement parliamentary procession to pull by the stream bills. We will listen to this over and over again. Alexander right away quotes Alexis de Tocqueville – yep, an 19th century French man is so definitely relevent here.
But that"s usually the begin of a prolonged story doctrine from Alexander, the upshot of that is: utilizing settlement to pass HCR will fall short American democracy.
10.42am: Nancy Pelosi is right away on, and you do a great pursuit of creation the case, focusing on people"s worries about HCR. She"s you do a improved pursuit than Obama, who tends to wind and recycle remarks from his prior statements.
Oh lord, right away it"s Harry Reid: "I wish to outlay a integrate of mins articulate about Nevada." I gamble you do, Harry, we"ve all seen your check ratings. In actuality Reid would be improved off essentially being in Nevada jolt hands right now.
Actually, Reid tells a terrifying story of a Nevada integrate with health word who had a baby with a split taste – that the word association wouldn"t compensate to repair since it was a pre-existing condition. How can a baby baby have a pre-existing condition? Another delight for the US healthcare industry.
Now Harry Reid is repelled – shocked! – to listen to all this verbalise about utilizing settlement by the Republicans. "Reconciliation isn"t a small thing that"s never been finished before."
(If you had the word "reconciliation" in your HCR celebration games, afterwards hope for to splash up and presumably a liver transplant.)
10.50am: I"ve pronounced it before, but Senator Max Baucus does see utterly similar to Dick outpost Dyke.
10.57am: Healthcare remodel limit seating chart! It"s similar to you"re there, in the room.
10.58am: Now things are removing interesting: Obama usually smacked down Lamar Alexander over the projected costs of HCR, utilizing congressional check bureau stats. Exciting. "This is an critical issue, Lamar," says Obama - who shouldn"t do that close initial name thing that he likes so much, in this context. Senator Alexander, surely.
The boss has a built-in value in these meetings, as was seen when Obama went to the Republican member assembly in Baltimore last month. When the boss speaks, everybody else has to close up. Or the tip have make use of of will kill you*.
(*Not essentially true. But they could.)
11.02am: At the begin of the limit all 3 US headlines channels were covering this live. And who was the initial to leave it and go behind to the studio? You competence think it would be Fox News – but no, it was CNN. So right away it"s MSNBC v Fox News to see who can last longer.
11.09am: It"s Republican Senator Tom Coburn. Who is an tangible live doctor. So he should know what he"s articulate about ... solely that he has usually claimed that food stamps and free propagandize lunches are the greatest equates to of diabetes. Which has got to be bullshit. But I"m not a doctor, so who knows?
Coburn goes on so prolonged that Harry Reid cuts him off with a abrupt joke: "I competence not know majority about disinfectant but I know something about filibusters." We move along.
11.14am: Woo! Fox News wins! MSNBC usually blinked and left the HCR limit to lapse to the studio. So Fox News was the headlines channel that stranded with it longest. Take that, haterz.
11.22am: A reader down next in the comments, goto100, suggests that the share cost movements of health word companies is an indicator of how the limit is going. That"s a fun thought - well, this HCR limit creates researching batch prices appear similar to fun.
So, I theory we can predicate that if health insurers see their share prices rise, on top of the index as a whole, afterwards the prospects for HCR aren"t you do so well. Let"s see... well, the SP 500 is down overall, slightly. Let"s see at Aetna, a big insurer: it"s up scarcely 1% today. Wellpoint – that had such a great day prior to association yesterday (and they are propitious that Toyota was removing knocked about up down the hall) – is up 0.7% in choppy early trading, as we used to write on the FT when zero majority was happening.
11.30am: Dick outpost Baucus is on, articulate about the have have make have use of of of of of healthcare "exchanges", that he explains thus: "What I similar to about exchanges, it"s similar to Orbitz, it"s similar to Expedia," says Max outpost Dyke. "You go to an sell and you see around and get the majority appropriate price."
11.33am: If you had "bending the cost curve" on your HCR celebration game, afterwards splash now!
11.35am: Some Republican congressman declared Dave Camp (really) of Michigan, who is a wonk-manqu̩. He usually quoted something from page 1959 of the Senate HCR bill. Now he"s onto page 992 Рand indignant about the new Medicare board, that is one of the singular majority appropriate cost-cutting measures in the total shebang. What. Is. Your. Problem.
Obama cuts him off, observant "I don"t wish to try and cut you off." "I"m roughly done," says Dave. Yet successive events – Dave keeps articulate – indicate otherwise.
11.40am: Woo, Mitch McConnell is the bomb. He pipes up and says that Democrats have had 52 mins vocalization time whilst Republicans have had usually twenty-four minutes. Nice. Mitch McConnell: time watcher.
"You"re right, there was an imbalance on the opening statements, since I"m the president," replies Obama. Which is true.
11.45am: Someone keeps creation shrill sighs in to their mic. My money"s on McConnell.
Noon ET (5pm GMT): What"s this? Senator Jon Kyl (R-AZ) usually pronounced it"s OK that health word covers usually 40% of healing costs. Hmm, that"s engaging ... yep, here"s the quote: "Plans right away cover around 40% of the costs of care." Isn"t that the gist of the problem? That"s the disproportion in in between Dems and GOP – do the Republicans think that 40% is adequate? It"s not.
12.23pm: Tom Coburn"s weird remarks progressing (11.09am, see below) that food stamps and free propagandize lunches equates to diabetes (the greatest cause, maybe) have been removing trashed online, nonetheless a small Republicans are perplexing to pull back, such as that line on propagandize lunches. Now, there"s positively an justification for spending some-more on healthier propagandize lunches, but the Republican celebration hasn"t usually been at the forefront of that fight.
To be precise, here"s Coburn"s allude to today:
"We probably emanate some-more diabetes by the propagandize lunch programme and the food stamp programme than any alternative thing..."
Any justification for that? Anyone? And if that"s loyal afterwards what"s McDonalds been you do for the last twenty-five years to assistance compromise the diabetes issue – offered tofu smoothies?
12.34pm: John McCain speaks, to no great effect, and Kevin Drum tweets: "Is McCain auditioning for the lead in a movie about a cranky, sour old man? He"s got the purpose down pat."
12.38pm: The glorious Dan Kennedy responds on Coburn"s dumb food stamps/school lunches diabetes epidemic, around Twitter: "We"ve combined copiousness of diabetes by impolite farming subsidies. Don"t think that"s what Coburn means."
Ah yes, the heavily subsidised high fructose corn syrup, not to discuss the outrageous plantation subsidies paid to great old sugar. Why, that all comes from the US taxpayer. Fancy that. Although it has to be pronounced that the distance of food stamps and propagandize lunch programmes is approach some-more than farming subsidies, hold it or not.
12.51pm: Joe Biden speaks, for the initial time, and utterly realistically and to the point: observant if you hold that the assorted evils of the stream HCR should be fixed, such as pre-existing conditions, afterwards all we are arguing about is how to do it.
12.55pm: Louise Slaughter (D-NY) speaks, usually the third lady to verbalise alternative than Nancy Pelosi and Kathleen Sibelius. "We need to get absolved of pre-existing conditions. It is cruel, it is capricious, and it is usually finished to assistance the bottom line." She mentions that in multiform states, made at home assault opposite women is treated with colour as a pre-existing condition, that is indeed bizarre.
12.57pm: Slaughter relates a story of a lady incompetent to means dentures – and so wore her upheld sister"s dentures. "Did you ever hold that in America, that"s where we would be?" asks Slaughter.
My co-worker Ewen MacAskill mentions that this used to be utterly usual in Scotland, twenty or thirty years ago. So, ah, an additional delight for the US healthcare system.
12.58pm: So there"s a opinion in the House of Representatives, definition that everybody has to go off and vote. Obama gets out of the room quickly, probably snapping out for a discerning smoke.
Presidental Cigarette Break / House Vote / Lunch: What improved time to total up where we are, after scarcely 3 hours. Um.
1.55pm: The participants are filing behind in to Blair House. In the meantime I"ve been Googling food stamps – and did you know in farming Alaska you can buy bows and arrows on food stamps? Fact.
1.58pm: Obama"s on foot opposite Pennsylvania Avenue from the White House to Blair House, so we should be restarting.
Where are we: there are dual summits going on here. The Democratic one has people articulate about the problems of the stream US healthcare complement (insofar as it"s a system). The other, the Republican summit, is indignant about total of the legislation being proposed. So they aren"t usually at cross-purposes, and both these discussions are engaging and even utilitarian and illuminating. But they aren"t articulate to each alternative so much.
2.10pm: Senator Mike Enzi (R-WY) right away relating erotically appealing tales about his years in the shoe business, and concludes: "these exchanges can be good." And has a semi-sensible idea, of permitting all insurers to go on the sell lists, but note that ones encounter smallest supervision standards. That"s a unequivocally Nudge sort of idea. Even some-more surprising, he talks for similar to 3 minutes. So hats off to you Mike Enzi.
Now Tom Harkin, senator from Iowa, who has a notation from a rancher in Iowa, detailing how his family of 4 is right away profitable $18,000 a year for health insurance. He"s stranded with his insurer since of pre-existing conditions, so can"t shift insurers.
2.17pm: Oh hey it"s Dave Camp again, articulate about page 625, subsection 98, divide B! We need to clarity some-more about this complicated day Cicero. Let"s see ... he has perceived $120,000 from healthcare companies in debate contributions. Small change, right?
Here"s his bio:
Congressman Dave Camp represents the people of the 4th Congressional District of Michigan, that spans from Owosso to Greenville and northward to Traverse City and the Leelanau peninsula.
But what of Dave Camp, the man? Hey, he went to Sussex University, in 1973-74. (Wasn"t Sussex a hotbed of Marxism of the History Man sort during the 1970s?) Anyway, he"s a counsel by the looks of things. Which he doesn"t discuss on his central website bio.
2.31pm: Now it"s Marsha Blackburn, a bit of a flamethrower for the Republicans. She wants to verbalise about offered health word opposite state lines – that the insurers are all in foster of since it could meant they all move to South Carolina or Wyoming where state regulators and state regulations are weak. Now, it could work fine, if there was a small form of inhabitant regulation. But Republicans don"t foster that, even though it would patently equivocate the misfortune problems.
In response, Professor Obama gives a short harangue on the story of health word in California, but afterwards winds up by saying: since not have a inhabitant marketplace? "I essentially think that could be applicable if the sell could be stood up. So there is a approach of bridging that difference," says Obama.
2.40pm: Obama takes on the thought that everybody can get diagnosis by puncture bedrooms even but insurance. Who pays for that treatment, he asks? Everyone else with health word ends up profitable additional as a a result. "We"re already putting the income in, it"s usually in a unequivocally emasculate approach … We"re not saving money, we usually don"t see it. It"s called uncompensated care."
2.45pm: It"s Joe Biden articulate about HCR and the outcome on the deficit. Time for Joe to silver a pleasant Bidenism, on the theme of politicians supposed to know what the American people think: "I know what I think. I think I know what they think but I don"t know what they think."
Anyway, it all costs a lot of income presumably way.
2.48pm: Biden"s still going ... tortuous the bend ... and so on. I"ve got the receptive to advice down. Shot of John Boehner, who appears to be nipping a thistle. He unequivocally does see similar to a impression out of Mad Men. Meanwhile, Mike Enzi hunches brazen and thinks about offered boots in the great old days whilst solemnly scratching the side of his face. John McCain looks vaguely angry.
2.53pm: Now it"s large Paul Ryan (R-WS). In the credentials there"s a marching rope playing. People see around in alarm.
Paul Ryan: "The check is full of gimmicks and smoking mirrors." Smoking mirrors? Is that similar to a smoking jacket? Or some-more similar to a smoking gun? Let"s pretence he meant to contend "smoke and mirrors".
Ryan says: "I"ll finish with the cost curve. Are we tortuous it down or are we tortuous up?" (Drink!) Up, it seems. Which is bad.
The standing quo needs to be fixed, says Ryan. "What we simply wish to do is begin over and begin off with a purify square of paper." Oh yeah, that"ll do it.
3.17pm: Ah, the pretentious steer and receptive to advice of Chuck Grassley expelled in to the wild with the English language.
For those of you who haven"t had the happiness of conference the senator from Iowa, live and uncut, afterwards it"s formidable to communicate usually the genuine Grassley experience. Basically, suppose dual speeches, cut up, and incidentally pasted behind together, afterwards translated in to Mandarin and afterwards Xhosa and behind in to English again. Then review aloud by your somewhat insane uncle.
3.20pm: I"d similar to to point out that Wonkette proposed liveblogging these talks at 2pm and lasted until 2.42pm.
3.27pm: Republican House personality John Boehner speaks: "This check is a dangerous examination with the majority appropriate healthcare complement in the world." What, this check additionally affects Japan?
3.31pm: Oh great, John Boehner brings up abortion: "This check that we have prior to us ... starts for the initial time in thirty years allows for the taxpayer appropriation of abortion." Oh that"s going to assistance matters. What"s the answer afterwards John? "Let"s begin with a purify square of paper." Oh, articulate points. "Why can"t we agree?" wonders Boehner.
On abortion, Shelby Knox tweets: "Boehner is lying so casually. This check does NOT concede taxation payer appropriation of termination – in fact, it still rolls behind repro rights."
3.40pm: Oh God it"s McCain again. Why does he get to verbalise so much? "We Arizonians hatred California since they"ve stolen the water," says McCain, for a small reason. OK. Anyway, healing malpractice remodel right away since it functions in Texas.
Now McCain"s behind banging the settlement drum – a parliamentary tactic that avoids the obstructing legislation and the 60 opinion super-majority. Anyway, McCain and the rest of the Republican celebration are opposite utilizing reconciliation. "I think it could mistreat the destiny of the country," says McCain. Yes, by God, flitting legislation by a majority! The repairs that would do.
Both sides are jockeying for on all sides on reconciliation, that"s what this is about. The Democrats aren"t receiving the bait, but the Republicans keep goading them.
3.44pm: Senator Dick Durban: "For majority years I worked in a courtroom." Dick, that"s called being a lawyer. It"s OK, you can contend the word.
Durbin becomes the 100,000th chairman to namecheck Atul Gawande"s New Yorker essay on healthcare costs. It"s brilliant, if you haven"t review it already, it"s here.
Durbin does a unequivocally great pursuit of skewering a small Republican articulate points about the stream proposals: "If you think it"s a revolutionary tract and it"s wrong, afterwards for integrity consequence dump out of the sovereign employees" health plan."
3.51pm: Obama accuses Paul Ryan of utilizing "some great poll-tested language" on Ryan"s "government-run healthcare" line.
Obama is right away in push-back mode, as seen in the Baltimore bloodbath.
3.55pm: And the Republican big finish comes from ... John Barrasso! What do you mean, who? John Barrasso – the former arch senior manager of the largest sanatorium in Casper, Wyoming. And right away senator.
4.00pm: Oh, wow, John Barrasso thinks all members of Congress should usually have "catastrophic" health word – so, usually cancer and big stuff. Why? asks Obama. "Because afterwards we"d have some-more skin in the game," says Barrasso. And so people would save more. "But what if you were on $40,000, John?" says Obama. That floors Barrasso, who struggles to come behind with a fish fabrication ("glub glub glub") about fool around ground rangers.
Fantastic – this was by far the majority appropriate sell of the day so far. It obviously shows the disproportion in in between the dual sides.
Henry Waxman follows up: "I consternation if Republicans think seniors on Medicare should be on inauspicious caring only." Bingo. Waxman afterwards smacks McCain"s advocacy of a California law that dates behind to the 1960s and isn"t keeping healthcare costs down, and so majority for that idea, hey?
Waxman knows his things and is alighting a small good punches: "I listen to people contend all day, "Mr President the people don"t wish your plan". Well if I listened to their tongue all day, I wouldn"t wish your plan either."
4.07pm: Henry Waxman competence see similar to a Bond villan (strokes white cat) but he can sell formidable healthcare reforms.
4.15pm: Paul Roskam, a Republican from the land of Lincoln, has a novel take on the "clean square of paper" articulate point: HCR is similar to an Etch A Sketch, and it"s time to shake up it and begin with ... a transparent screen.
4.20pm: Chris Dodd. Who cares what he thinks.
4.38pm: So we"re in to the last stages here. Obama says there"s 3 people who haven"t spoken, and an additional Republican, and afterwards Pelosi and afterwards Obama to finish up.
4.42pm: Tom Coburn: "We ought to have an additional verbalise similar to this." Must we?
4.55pm: John Dingell says the stream check isn"t perfect, but the last square of undiluted legislation was delivered at Mt Sinai. Most people think that"s a fun but Dingell"s so old he was probably there.
4.58pm: Nancy Pelosi is job out Dave Camp for observant that the bills cut Medicare payments to seniors. "They do not," she says sternly. "That"s the facts."
4.59pm: Woo hoo, it"s nearby the end! "The actuality that we"re usually an hour late beats my prediction," says Obama.
Obama says he"ll total up areas of agreement and disagreement. He says: "We determine that we need a small word marketplace reforms. We don"t determine on all of them, but we determine on a small of them." He wants Republicans to see at the word industry reforms.
The second thing he thinks there"s agreement on is permitting small businesses to stick on exchanges, permitting for larger purchasing power. He compares this to Walmart utilizing the distance to expostulate down prices. (Not certain that a lot of small businesses will similar to that analogy, generally the ones competing opposite Walmart.)
Buying health word opposite state lines? This thought is in the stream bills, but Obama"s regard is the "race to the bottom" effect, and mentions the e.g. of credit cards and issuers relocating to the states with weakest regulation. He wants a small elementary protections. "This is not a big supervision takeover, it"s something we do in roughly each aspect of life."
Medical malpractice: Obama admits that Democrats lend towards to conflict malpractice law reform, but he wants to work on it.
5.08pm: Obama"s performance, possibly you similar to him or not, has been substantial here. For 7 hours, with usually 45 mins off in the middle, he"s kept this up, and is still articulate and creation clarity underneath the spotlight. It"s tough to suppose a small former presidents handling something similar to this. I meditative there of .. let"s see ... Calvin Coolidge. Coolidge"s father was once asked to report his son. He paused for a substantial duration prior to replying: "He ain"t sassy."
5.22pm: Obama: "I"d similar to the Republicans to do a small soul-searching" but fears that the opening can"t be bridged, and that it"s going to be quarrel in Congress. But if we can"t agree, "that"s what elections are for," he says. A turn of applause, in service if zero else. Obama gives John Boehner a virile semi-hug and a slap on the back. Then he gets in to a short ear-bending from Mike Enzi, presumably about shoes.
Free at last. It"s eventually over, and you"ll be repelled to listen to that the complete room didn"t couple arms in a organisation welcome prior to rushing to the Hill to pass a small headlines bipartisan laws. But afterwards that was never going to happen. Of march this was partly theatre. Was it a rubbish of time? Well, that depends, probably not, even if it wasn"t history"s majority fit have have make have use of of of of of time.
More outline after to hang up, after the "smoking mirrors" that Paul Ryan referred to have cleared.
6.10pm: So what did we clarity from the healthcare summit? Who won? The bizarre answer is that both sides won.
We schooled that the Republicans once again exhibited substantial discipline. The togetherness of the Republican congress is far-reaching and low - and that explains to a small grade their new made at home success. Of march that will be ignored by the media in the commentary, but the Republicans came in to this limit with a elementary set of singular goals and a finely-honed message. They delivered their summary and we"ll see shortly sufficient if they met their goals - nonetheless their idealisation goal, of murdering the HCR legislation, is still in play. That was their target right away and they completed it. Will any Republicans opinion for the last legislation on the building of Congress? No.
The Democrats had the majority appropriate tunes, and they played them. Where the Republicans were forbidding but trained the Dems were all over the place but they had a small stand-out performances, from Tom Harkin and Henry Waxman, as well as Obama. The Republicans don"t have people with their range and learn of policy. Waxman, in particular, was stellar. The Democrats have a improved story to tell, the perceptible failings of the stream system, that even the Republicans don"t worry to urge any more.
Obama himself, by utilizing the list for 7 hours, with usually a 45 notation mangle in the middle, gave an unusual performance. You felt, even at the end, that he could have left an additional 7 hours with usually a discerning mangle for a Marlboro Light and a Diet Coke.
Personally I found it fascinating, to see so majority politicians so sincerely deliberating America"s healthcare problems for so long. There"s no love lost on presumably side, but it was all business. The volume of grandstanding was in few instances low - usually John Boehner and John McCain indulged, nonetheless Boehner"s was a tranquil explosion, whilst Charlie Rangel was a lowlight.
In end ... if the Democrats had the Republicans" discipline, they would have upheld the damn check by now. If the Republicans had the Democrats" learn and dignified force, they would have killed it by now.
Now, it"s full steam forward for reconciliation. It"s going to be brutal. This will have or mangle the Obama presidency, utterly simply. Good night, interjection for reading.
