Jeff Merkley is going to get Republicans on record as opposing Medicaid for Vietnam vets. And various other awful sounding amendments whose actual purpose is to send the repeal bill back to committee.
I don’t want to single out Merkley here so much as the practice. Harry Reid dealt with this practice by simply not allowing amendments he didn’t approve. He’d fill up the “amendment tree” with BS Reid amendments and any legit amendments fellow Democrats proposed, while Republicans were mostly shut out from offering amendments. Mostly, this was to prevent Republicans from proposing amendments to do things like get Democrats to vote against Viagra for sexual predators(an amendment they actually did get through).
It’s time to start punishing Congresscritters who use these tactics, rather than the Congressmen who have to vote on these poison pill amendments. Jeff Merkley is normally a good Senator and I understand why he’s doing what he’s doing. The GOP effort to repeal and replace is utter crap and is only going to make things worse. But this tactic is distasteful and unacceptable and really should be ended. Merkley deseves bad publicity for this, rather than applause from Vox.