Harry Reid sent a letter to Mitch McConnell today announcing what we’ve all known – that the Senate will move forward with a reconciliation sidecar bill to fix elements of the health care package already passed. The key quote:

Many Republicans now are demanding that we simply ignore the progress we’ve made, the extensive debate and negotiations we’ve held, the amendments we’ve added (including more than 100 from Republicans) and the votes of a supermajority in favor of a bill whose contents the American people unambiguously support. We will not. We will finish the job. We will do so by revising individual elements of the bills both Houses of Congress passed last year, and we plan to use the regular budget reconciliation process that the Republican caucus has used many times.

Judd Gregg, the obstructionist-in-chief, has outlined the Republican game plan: to try to throw out every single piece of the sidecar as a violation of the Byrd rule, offer up dilatory amendments on hot-button issues, and basically use multiple parliamentary tactics to stop the bill. Nobody should assume any of that will work.

Meanwhile, liberals are being urged not to make any changes to the deal on the sidecar rolled out by the leadership, presumably so the process wouldn’t have to go back to the House one more time for concurrence. That does mean that they are whipping against an up-or-down vote for the public option, among other things that won’t appear in the sidecar bill.

Whether or not this sidecar will include student loan reform, eligible for the reconciliation process, remains a matter of debate. The leaders in the relevant committees pushed strongly for its inclusion today.

After a bicameral Democratic leadership meeting Wednesday night, it seemed that that merging the two bills and proceeding to votes under the same budgetary order had hit serious roadblocks But Senate health Committee Chairman Tom Harkin (D-Iowa) and his House counterpart George Miller (D-Calif.), said Thursday that “it’s critical we do both” and that Democrats could score “twin victories.”

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) left the door open to moving two packages together, but said he first wanted to hear from his caucus at an afternoon meeting.

“We’re going to talk about whether education will be part of reconciliation. Under the instructions that came out of the Budget Committee, we’re entitled to do both health care and education by reconciliation—that’s part of the instructions,” Reid said. “But the caucus, I want them to make the decision.”

Miller says that including the student loan bill would “help” whip count efforts in the House. If that’s the case, there should be no reason not to use it if it can still snag 50 votes in the Senate, which seems somewhat likely. Harkin stressed the urgency of ending the big bank subsidy now, saying that “we may never get around to it” again.

Presumably we’ll know more later.