Barack Obama unveils his healthcare reform plan

  I honestly can no longer figure out what Barack Obama is trying to accomplish in regards to healthcare reform. Yesterday he released HIS healthcare plan and it seems to have the best worst of the Senate and House versions of the bill in it. There is both enough  in this bill and left out of this bill to make people on both sides of the aisle wonder what is going on.

  Included in the bill is federal funding for abortion and healthcare mandates while excluded from the bill is a public option. Barack Obama has introduced a bill that has guaranteed no Republican support in the Senate by including the healthcare mandates and federal funding for abortion, but the exclusion of the public option could cost the president the more liberal votes that he needs to gain passage of this bill. And on top of that, the abortion issue could drive away Bart Stupak and his band of 40 pro-life Blue Dog Democrats in the House.

  Perhaps the commission that he is supporting that would limit the amount insurance companies can raise their rates is a backdoor opening for the eventual single payer system that the far left so desperately wants. Theoretically, the government could choke the earnings of the insurance companies down to the point where they could no longer stay in business, opening the door for a public option down the road.

  The American people rejected the previous healthcare reform bill because of these issues and the sheer size of the bill, so the president’s response was to create an even bigger, bloated bill than the one that 58% of Americans already oppose. He has done this ahead of the big bipartisan healthcare summit and I honestly can’t figure out what he is trying to prove with this proposal or what he thinks it will accomplish.

  Has he released this proposal as a starting point that he is willing to negotiate into a final slimmed down version of the bill? Or has he done this to ensure the Republicans oppose it in order to paint them into a corner as the party of no? It seems to me that he is not listening to the will of the majority of the people.

 There seems to be no way that this bill can be pushed through congress as it is presently constituted, even using reconciliation. While he may be able to hold onto the 51 votes he needs in the Senate, I am not sure he can hold onto the needed votes in the House.

  There still appears to be differences that could could prohibit this bill from becoming law and I am not sure that they will be ironed out in this bipartisan summit. This appears to be a “show trial” for lack of a better term.

  I realize that this post is rambling, and I apologize, but I am trying to talk my way through this and I am not having much luck. If there is anybody out there who can lend a hand and enlighten me, please do.