Earlier I directed a post to the attention of the two Republican Senators from Maine, Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe, listing seven reasons why having a "trigger" for a public option was a bad idea. It looks as though at least one of them was listening.
WASHINGTON (CNN) – A moderate Republican who has previously broken with her party to support President Obama’s $787 billion stimulus bill said Sunday that she does not support the idea of using a so called “trigger” on the public health insurance option as part of health care reform legislation.
Asked on CNN’s State of the Union if the use of the trigger would make inclusion of the public option more acceptable, Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, unequivocally replied “no.”
“The problem with trigger is it just delays the public option,” Collins told CNN Chief National Correspondent John King, “because the people who are going to be making the determination about whether the market is competitive enough, want the public option.”
Well, there are certainly other reasons, but the one she highlights is a prime one, as I wrote.
Gamesmanship: Do you think, for one moment, that the President, who was all about the 'public option' in his health care town halls and speeches, Speaker Pelosi, who has repeatedly affirmed that she has no intention of allowing a bill to pass without a 'public option,' and the Democratic Senate caucus, who would like to dedicate this bill to the recently deceased Senator from Massachusetts, will allow a bill to pass with a trigger if they aren't 100% certain that the trigger will be pulled? The government is notoriously bad at forecasting positive results, and these benchmarks will clearly be set so that the private market has no chance to reach them. A 'public option' with a trigger is the functional equivalent of voting for it outright. If you feel uncomfortable with the latter, why would you vote for the former?
Good show, Sen. Collins. Good show. On the other hand, the Democratic senator from my state seems lost.
New Hampshire Democrat Sen. Jeanne Shaheen refused to answer directly when asked whether Collins’ position indicated that President Obama should either not fight for inclusion of the public option in the final bill or, alternatively, pursue a legislative strategy that relied solely on Democratic votes for health care reform.
“I think we’re going to have a bill that has significant bipartisan input regardless of how the votes come out,” Shaheen told King.
Huh?
9/14/09 0745: It looks like Senator Snowe has also been paying attention.
(CBS) Moderate Republican Senator Olympia Snowe (R-Maine) said a public option in the health care bill is "universally opposed by all Republicans in the Senate" and called it "a roadblock to building the kind of consensus that we need to move forward," on "Face the Nation" Sunday.
"[T]herefore, there's no way to pass a plan that includes the public option," she told host Bob Schieffer.
She said that the president "should be more specific" on where he stands on the public option, and called David Axelrod's assertion earlier on the program that he would "not be willing" to accept a proposal without it "unfortunate."
