Photo of the Day – 1000 Words: Home Alone Edition: House Republican Conference Chairman Mike Pence and Congresswoman Cathy McMorris Rodgers hold a news conference yesterday on health care legislation.
Karen Tumulty at Swampland has the picture showing the black hole on the other side of the universe from yesterday’s jubilant, ecstatic, joyful photos as Obama signed health reform into law.
Congratulations to the President, the Speaker of the House, the Majority Leader of the Senate, the Committee Chairs, the Democrats who voted for health reform, and all the people everywhere who worked to make this moment happen – especially the late Ted Kennedy. In the months between now and November 3, people everywhere will come to see that this is a seismic shift in American politics and that this bill represents genuine positive change. And with this achievement, we now have the opportunity to build on a new foundation and improve the structure of health care each year. All in all a remarkable piece of history tonight.
Update: TPM has the list of who got the 20 presidential pens at today’s signing ceremony. My favorite is #19.
Three pieces set the stage nicely for today’s House vote:
Both articles cite the depth of the opposition and the polling numbers in ways that seem to buy into the Republican narrative that the country will punish the Democrats in November if health care reform happens.
I don’t buy it. If the House passes the health insurance reform bill today, the narrative shifts. The media is forced to cover the bill accurately and focus on what it does, rather than covering the opposition to it as if it had an intellectual leg to stand on. Obama and Pelosi, and even Harry Reid will be recognized for having fought and won the fight to recognize health care as a right, a battle that has been waged since FDR’s early days. And the American people will begin to recognize that all the dire predictions of the right have been lies. They made the same arguments against Social Security in the ‘30s and Medicare in the ’60s; they were wrong then and they’re wrong now.
And finally, Maureen Dowd is at her best today as she takes Bart Stupak to task and celebrates the leadership of America’s Catholic nuns on this issue as they took on the bishops and stood up for the best traditions of Christian social justice.
If we win today, Nancy Pelosi and the nuns are the heroes of the end game.
Matthew Yglesias, writing in The American Prospect, looks at the “election eve” polling and finds that “once Democrats stopped arguing about health and started getting real on passing reform, voters got behind them.”
Talking Points Memo counts the votes and links to the news. The administration sure sounds confident they’re going to win passage of the Senate bill in the House. But it’s going to be close and I wish it were clearer where the votes are actually going to come from.
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