Obamacare Update And A Commentary On Canadian Health Care...

...by the former President of the Canadian Medical Association:

But hey, what would he know, right? Let's go ahead and copy their system here.

On a related note, Matthew Continetti blows away the straw man argument that Obama and the Democrats just loooove to repeat ad nauseum:

I don't know whether Joe Klein believes Rep. Paul Ryan of Wisconsin is a "nihilist" and a "hypocrite" engaged in a "disinformation jihad" aimed at persuading the "tight, white, extremist bubble" that is the GOP to defeat ObamaCare. Still, it might have been a good idea for Klein to have read Ryan's health care reform plan, or the Republican Study Committee proposal, or Michele Bachmann's Health Care Freedom of Choice Act, or the many ideas included in Yuval Levin's latest editorial in THE WEEKLY STANDARD, before he wrote in his new column that "There is no Republican health-care alternative in 2009."

Anyone who seriously believes that the Right wants to do nothing, nor has put forward any alternative plans is either a total hack or completely ignorant.

In other Obamacare news:

• Obama's biggest union friends say Obamacare must pass
  
• Whoa: even the limpest RINOs are backing away from Obamacare
  
• How the lack of consumer choice drives up costs
  
• Coincidence alert: AARP sheds 60,000 members, 'conservative' competitor sees spike in new members
  
• Firms with Obama ties see $$$ from Obamacare push
• More Obamacare-ish nightmares in Britain
  
• You know what works? Tort reform. Just ask Texas - they've already done it.
  
• If America's health care system is so bad, then why did Americans' life expectancy just go up (again)?
  

In reconciliation news, it sounds like Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid is attempting some legislative sleight-of-hand:

According to the Wall Street Journal, Reid will split the bill to break out the most contentious budgetary portions of ObamaCare for the reconciliation process, while keeping the portions that garner the most support in a separate bill that has to pass a cloture vote. While that may solve the issue of parliamentary procedure, it won’t solve the issue of Republican reaction to getting steamrolled on ObamaCare:

The White House and Senate Democratic leaders, seeing little chance of bipartisan support for their health-care overhaul, are considering a strategy shift that would break the legislation into two parts and pass the most expensive provisions solely with Democratic votes. …

Most legislation in the Senate requires 60 votes to overcome a filibuster, but certain budget-related measures can pass with 51 votes through a parliamentary maneuver called reconciliation.

In recent days, Democratic leaders have concluded they can pack more of their health overhaul plans under this procedure, congressional aides said. They might even be able to include a public insurance plan to compete with private insurers, a key demand of the party’s liberal wing, but that remains uncertain.

Even the Democrats are unsure what they can and cannot squeeze into reconciliation. The taxes and subsidies look like they could qualify. The WSJ lists an expansion of Medicaid as a legitimate reconciliation item, but that’s stretching it, although perhaps not to the breaking point. Individual mandates, a ban on insurers using pre-existing conditions as a disqualifier, and a cap on out-of-pocket expenses for the insured won’t go through reconciliation. They’re unsure on a public plan, co-ops, and exchanges, but those are not budgetary items; they’re new programs.

This still won’t work, however. First, the individual mandates are likely to get filibustered, which makes the non-reconciliation package a dead letter. If the public option gets into the reconciliation package, the Republicans will still erupt in outrage, and will grind the Senate to a halt through the use of objections to unanimous consent. It matters not whether a bill gets offered in either track — it still needs unanimous consent to dispense with bill reading and other procedures which would take weeks or months to complete, with no other business allowed onto the floor.

Plus, how will the Senate and the House reconcile these bills in committee? If the final version of the bill comes out of conference as one piece, Republicans can still filibuster it — and they will have company if it includes a public option. Reconciliation doesn’t solve that problem at all.

Hot Air rightly points out that if even the most moderate RINOs are backing away from using reconciliation -- which they are -- then the reaction from the much more conservative members of the Senate is likely to be...strenuous. It only takes one very determined Senator to cause mass chaos in the Senate, and using reconciliation will almost certainly anger much more than one.

The August recess will be up in a week or two, and then the rubber will meet the road. Keep up the pressure on your representatives, and keep spreading the word. This is a battle that we can win, and one that we must win if we are to preserve freedom and prosperity in America for our children and grandchildren.

There's my two cents.