Washington Hijinks

A few pundits gave been saying that the Senate health care bill isn't the final bill, just a negotiating tool.  Right - a negotiating tool to determine just how large the tax cuts for the rich will be.  But the disagreements over what to leave in and what to leave out - or who to leave out - will make it very tricky to get it through.  Meanwhile, the Democrats are fervently defending the existing Affordable Care Act tooth and nail . . . without much power to stop or retard the progress of the GOP's health bill.  It figures that they would suddenly defend and "own" the Affordable Care Act after it's too late.  They have to rely on Republican ineptitude.   Fortunately, that actually looks like a possibility.  And it may even be a reality; Mitch McConnell has just delayed a vote on the Senate bill, which likely won't come up until after Congress's Independence Day recess.

At the same time, lot of people are blaming Nancy Pelosi for the party's last special-election losses in Georgia and South Carolina.  Well, she's not going to be deposed - the old guard in the Democratic Party isn't going to let go of power so easily - but she's not to blame for these losses either.  Except for maybe her appointment of Representative Ben Ray Luján of New Mexico as the chairman of the committee that runs Democratic House campaigns, as he dropped the ball on these two races plus the the two in Kansas and Montana.  Geez, the Democrats could have won the South Carolina race if they gave more money to candidate Archie Parnell, but Luján concentrated on the the impossible dream of winning Georgia's Sixth House district seat.

It must have amused observers to see that the Democrats, having failed to make Hillary Clinton the first female President, spent so much money on this one district and saw Karen Handel and Handel's supporters use Nancy Pelosi, the first female House Speaker, in ads for Handel's candidacy in this district in order to win and become the first female U.S. Representative elected to the House from Georgia . . . and Handel, of course, was the Republican candidate.