By Jason Tolbert
Lawmakers in Washington have focused their attention for months on the top priority of President Obama’s domestic agenda — overhauling the country’s health insurance system. Now, he’s leaving it up to Congress to hammer out the details.
Meanwhile, as Arkansans have become educated on phrases like public option, health exchange, and triggers, our own Sen. Blanche Lincoln has been at the center of the debate, offering us a Hamlet-like performance as she weighs each decision.
One consistent talking point Lincoln has maintained is that she will not agree to anything that does not put Arkansans first. However, it’s difficult not to notice the political gamesmanship that is being played out on the news.
Several weekends ago, everyone anxiously awaited Lincoln’s vote on the first major health care hurdle for the Senate — the procedural motion to move Majority Leader Harry Reid’s health-care bill to the Senate floor. With 59 votes securely lined up and 60 votes needed, all eyes were on Lincoln as she took to the Senate floor.
“I will vote for cloture on the motion to proceed on this bill,” declared Lincoln, who added, “I will not vote in favor of the proposal that has been introduced by Leader Reid.”
Later, it came out that the drama was all for show. Lincoln intended to vote for the bill all along. Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., almost let the cat out of the bag to reporters the day before the vote. News came later that Lincoln confided to fellow holdout Sen. Mary Landrieu, D-La., on Friday evening that she would vote for the motion but that she wanted to the be the 60th vote.
Why would Lincoln want to be the last holdout before finally giving in? Was this all a carefully timed chess move meant to keep Lt. Gov. Bill Halter from jumping in the Democratic primary race for her Senate seat? As Lincoln weighed her decision in Washington, Halter was greeting needy Arkansans in Little Rock at a free health clinic while rumors of his Senate candidacy swirled. By making a deliberate point of being the deciding vote, she took away Halter’s excuse to jump in … at least for now.
The next phase of this chess match has now evolved, which seems about as genuine as professional wrestling. Just hours after voting to move the debate to the floor, I asked Lincoln if she could vote for cloture on a bill that contains a public option. She assured me that she would not.
By the end of last week, she had joined other moderate Senate Democrats to hammer out compromise legislation.
With details trickling out as deadline approached, it appeared the compromise will have some sort of so-called “non-profit option” rather than a public option. The basic difference is that this plan is designed to be supported by the premium of participants and not subsidized by tax dollars.
It seems the script that will now play out will include Lincoln bringing Reid, D-Nev., to his knees, forcing him to give in and make her changes before she finally agrees to sign on, perhaps becoming the 60th vote one more time.
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Jason Tolbert is an accountant and conservative politial blogger. His blog — The Tolbert Report — is linked at ArkansasNews.com. His e-mail is jason@TolbertReport.com
