After several firm pronouncements that a vote on the 2,000 page $1.8 trillion PelosiCare bill will be put to a vote in the House of Representatives on Saturday, Democrat leaders are backpedaling and saying that a vote may be pushed back to Sunday or even later next week.
In other words, they don’t have the votes. Hot Air’s Ed Morrissey calls the demand for a Saturday vote her “Hail Nancy pass.“ It’s apparently ready to drop incomplete, but we can still intercept it.
(202) 224-3121
(202) 224-3121
(202) 224-3121
Majority Leader Steny Hoyer of Maryland says the vote that House Democrats had scheduled for Saturday could slip to Sunday or early next week.
Hoyer acknowledged to reporters Friday that Democratic leaders don’t yet have the 218 votes needed to pass President Barack Obama’s historic health overhaul initiative.
Byron York notes that Nancy Pelosi’s greatest fear lies in Democrat House members going home and being influenced by the voters they’re supposed to be representing rather than her and Hoyer.
“You meet constituents and get an earful from them — that’s the last thing she wants,” says a key House Republican aide. “If you were a Democrat, and you went home last weekend and were asked about the health care bill, you could say, ‘I’m still looking at it.’ Well, now you’ve had it for a week, the vote is any day now. What are you going to say?” Better just to stay in Washington and avoid potentially uncomfortable scenes.
[...]
“The thing that Pelosi has going for her right now is that a lot of her members are more afraid of her than they are of their constituents,” says the GOP insider. He notes that Pelosi has plenty of weapons to make life miserable for members who cross her — “any benefits the member can have for the remainder of this Congress, the kind of support they’ll have going into next year’s election, and if they lose, what kind of post-Congress opportunities they will have.” All could be endangered by a vote against the health care bill.
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