Sunday, November 08, 2009

220 – 215

The House voted to pass the Affordable Healthcare for America Act, HR 3269 sponsored by Congressman John Dingell by two votes last night.

Surprisingly one of those two votes was from a first term Republican congressman, Congressman Anh “Joseph” Cao (LA - 2).

Of his bipartisan vote, Cao said this in his news release:

“I have always said that I would put aside partisan wrangling to do the business of the people. My vote tonight was based on my priority of doing what is best for my constituents.”
Geez. In Louisiana they have a Republican congressman that votes on the issues that benefit his constituents. Go figure.

And while 39 Democrats voted against the bill, this wasn’t the voting bloc of fiscally conservative Democrats that we have in congress called Blue Dog Democrats, although a little over half of the Nay voters were from that caucus.

But of the 39 who voted “No” only 23 of their number were Blue Dogs, leaving 16 non-Blue Dogs who voted with the Republicans (well all but one of them anyway). This means that 30 Blue Dog Democrats voted with the majority.

But I wondered about those 16. If fiscal policy wasn’t the reason they voted against the bill, what was? So I checked. As it turns out there were as many reasons that they voted against the bill as there were congressmen who did so. Some said the bill didn’t go far enough, some were concerned that it wasn’t known for sure whether people would get a savings on their healthcare policies, one guy thought it would drive some of the not-for-profit hospitals in his district out of business. Dennis Kucinich wondered why we have infinite funds to fight wars and give to Wall Street, but not enough money or resolve to pass a Single Payer healthcare system. He finds the whole idea of for profit healthcare insurance as antithetical to the way to legislate true reform.

Dennis Kucinich is the only reason I would consider moving to Cleveland, Ohio. So I could have a congressman that I agree with and who stands on his principles.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

“I have always said that I would put aside partisan wrangling to do the business of the people. My vote tonight was based on my priority of doing what is best for my constituents.”

Sounds like more democrats and repugs could take a lesson from this guy. I still don't think it is a good idea though to require the working poor to purchase insurance if they can't afford it.