If you’re for the bill, you want the motion to recommit to fail. Passing it would send it back to committee and would require either a conference with the Senate or another vote in the Senate on the changed House language. Basically, as long as this vote fails, the health care bill will go to the President. He can then sign it any time and we’ve at least got something. There would then be a third vote, the reconciliation bill, that would pass the fixes for the more odious parts of the Senate bill. That will then go to the Senate and hopefully those also get through.
Congratulations, America, on joining the civilised world. Highlights for me, from this article anyway:
I’m so pleased! Hopefully now Obama and the Dems can concentrate on getting the US out of recession, Iraq, Guantanamo and Afghanistan.
Single payer would have been far better but this will do in the meantime.
The Republicans should be ashamed of themselves for the lies they told and the obfuscations they made on this one. They’ve repeatedly made it clear they don’t give a damn if people drop dead because they can’t afford health insurance just as long as some greedy private insurance health care executive can continue to legally suck up funds for his third house.
:rolleyes:
Yes, my explanation was exactly backwards. Good thing I’m not voting in the House, eh?
Is the Senate going to vote on this tonight too?
That’s the plan. The motion to recommit just failed (199-232), so now it’s on to the reconciliation bill. Then a motion to recommit on that, I believe.
ETA: Bah, you said Senate, not House. The Senate isn’t voting tonight. Plus, their votes are going to take days of waiting for cloture to be voted on and broken, as well.
If you mean the initial bill, no. They’ve already passed it and Obama can sign it. As for the sidecar, I don’t know what the schedule on that is. I’d expect it by the end of the week, but I haven’t seen any real info.
Huh? The numbers were different than on the initial bill? How does that make sense? Are some of the Democratic nays just going with what they see as inevitable now for future political positioning?
And does this mean that there are two more votes to go until this is done, failure of either meaning there was a lot of celebration for nothing? I wonder if it could still happen or if, as I suggested earlier, some ambivalent Democrats now see this as done and want to salvage some political capital from it.
No, the main bill the House voted on was exactly the one that the Senate passed by a 60-40 margin on Christmas Eve. So it goes straight to Obama’s desk.
The House, as I type this, is voting on the second bill, the much smaller package of fixes to the main bill that the Senate will take up under reconciliation rules. [The Senate vote on that part] won’t be tonight; I presume it’ll be in the next day or two.
No, if the House passes the current vote, we’ve got a health care bill. The rest is fine tuning. And single-payer. And facism. And communism. And the Spanish Inquisition.
Then I’m again misunderstanding, and perhaps I should type no more tonight. Except for perhaps an occassional “Yay!”
Communism, sure. But I wasn’t expecting the Spanish Inquisition!
Well!
I never expected that!
I mean single payer, I have seen all of the other items though. 
Communism was a red herring!
Wow, I didn’t expect that!
Guess quickreply isn’t quick enough if you are watching CSPAN at the same time. 
QFT. It’s not quite what I wanted (watered-down) but after a few years of the law being enacted hopefully most of the WHARRRRRGARBL will have faded and most Americans will realize that this is, in fact, a good thing. At that point Congress can start to make US Health Care what it should be.
Nobody expected the Spanish Inquisition… or this bill to pass!
Seriously, I’m very pleased. It’s not a perfect bill by any means, and I’m reminded of what Bismarck allegedly said: “Anyone who loves the law or sausage should not see either made.” But it’s much better than the status quo, and a significant accomplishment for the President. I think we’ll look back on this vote in decades to come and see this as a major step forward for making the U.S. a more humane society. The CBO projection of a net savings with this bill is also welcome news.
I’m especially proud to be a Democrat today. Amazing, and kind of sad, that not a single Republican in the House voted for it.
No, I think you’ve got it. As of the passage of the main bill in the House, we’re one Presidential signature away from the Senate bill’s becoming law, which is what you said.
The rest, as you said, is fine tuning. The House just passed the much smaller package of fixes that the Senate will consider this week (but not tonight) under budget reconciliation rules.
And it’s before midnight! Whew! Pumpkin avoided.
Nobody expects the Spanish inquisition.
Sorry. Couldn’t resist.