Jamie Dupree

Health Care Work

By
Jamie Dupree
@ June 22, 2009 12:00 AM
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Democrats this week will try to jam a health care reform bill through a key Senate Committee in hopes of regaining some lost momentum on the issue.

But even if a bill is approved on a party line vote by the Senate Health Committee, it won't have any details on how to pay for health reform, which must be acted on by another panel.

In other words, at most, Democrats will only be able to claim a partial victory this week.

And it won't be easy to get that.

First off, Democrats haven't even laid out a full bill before the Health Committee. Last week, they started public drafting work on a 615 page plan that has several big holes in it.

What kind of holes? How about no details on a government health insurance option, which might be the most controversial thing that Democrats are proposing.

Two other sections were left blank as well - "intentionally," admitted Democrats - so we'll see if we finally get those details today.

If Democrats really want to ram this bill through the Health panel by Friday, they probably can, simply because they have the votes.

But that doesn't mean such a move will get backers of reform any closer to final approval of a health reform package in the Congress.

In fact, it could well galvanize Republicans against the idea of doing anything this year, a sentiment that was heard on the Sunday talk shows.

Meanwhile, if you want to see the latest bill from the House, you can see that at http://bit.ly/yxwgL

But don't expect to find any details in that bill about how reform will be paid for. Democrats aren't going to be releasing those plans until July at the earliest.

And once they do that, then they'll really start feeling the heat, just like 15 years ago, when health reform went down to defeat.

You can also follow Jamie Dupree on both Twitter and on Facebook.



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