Keeping with her vow to pass popular individual elements to improve health care while the process for the comprehensive bill works itself out, Nancy Pelosi will bring to the floor today a bill to end the health insurance industry’s anti-trust exemption, part of the McCarran-Ferguson Act of 1945. A similar version of this legislation, which [...]

In stark contrast to recent reports of a deal that would pass comprehensive health care reform, Rep. Eric Massa (D-NY) told supporters this week that a comprehensive bill would not pass, and the best alternative option would be to get Republicans on the record with a series of smaller bills, building incrementally to a full [...]

The President is clearly taking control of health care reform. We know about the pep talk Obama gave publicly in his meeting with House Democrats, but it was the private session that revealed much more. Clearly, Obama was leaning on the House caucus to pass through health care. But there were a couple specifics that [...]

Earlier I noted rumblings of a potential deal on one element of health care, though it was knocked down. That’s because there’s a marathon meeting going on right now in the White House, which has lasted over five hours. Harry Reid, Nancy Pelosi and leadership from both chambers are in session. One reporter tweeted that [...]

Hemmed in by the House Democratic caucus, which simply will not pass a bill with the Senate’s excise tax as part of the financing, Barack Obama is making some nods in the House’s direction, in the interest of finding a bill that can get majority support in the lower chamber. President Barack Obama has indicated [...]

The Hill reports on last night’s meeting between House and Senate leaders and the White House, where the decision has been formally made to not formally hold a conference committee, potentially speeding passage of a health care bill. I say “potentially” because passage is going to hinge on a bicameral agreement, and that’s not going [...]

(Programming note: The Roundup will be delayed until later tonight) The Senate just passed a third and final cloture vote, by a count of 60-39, on the health care bill. In prior votes today, Jim Bunning did not vote, so I would assume in advance of a roll call, that he was the missing vote. [...]

The Senate is in the middle of the second of seven procedural votes on health care reform. In the first, lawmakers voted down a point of order on the Constitutionality of the individual mandate proposed by John Ensign and Orrin Hatch. The party-line vote failed, 39-60. Other votes include a series of additional points of [...]

Within the hour, the Senate will pass the third and final cloture vote on their health care bill, almost certainly with 60 Democratic votes and no Republican ones, clearing the way for final passage on the bill tomorrow morning. At that point, the House and the Senate will have to reconcile their bills in a [...]

The fallout over President Obama’s comment that he did not campaign on the public option continued today. FDL’s slinkerwink found video evidence of the President discussing a “public plan” in 2007, ironically as part of a presentation to Planned Parenthood about reproductive care. In it, he claimed that reproductive care was basic care and that [...]

With the votes to pass health care in the Senate a fait accompli, everyone has turned their attention to the conference committee, and the numerous knotty issues involved in reconciling the House and Senate bills and arriving at something that can pass both chambers. Democratic Senators spent the weekend vowing that whatever comes out in [...]