After seeing the reaction to my thoughts on the passage of the health care bill, I have decided to dedicate another posting to this topic. Many Americans did not want the reconciliation bill to pass, as was evident by the protests at hundreds (if not thousands) of town hall meetings during the summer congressional recess. Several who did favor the bill disagreed loudly with much of what I said in my last post. I felt some of the comments were lacking in specifics and were driven purely by emotion. While I welcome criticism on my posts, I believe a productive exchange of ideas must be based on specifics.

I welcome people to challenge me with regard to bipartisan support for this bill; however, the record shows bipartisan support was not present for this reconciliation bill. Democrats did not have support within their own party. Back room deals were needed to get support from within the Democrats' own ranks - not the conservatives. If there had been any measure of support from Republicans, there would have been no need to eschew transparency in favor of vote buying. One of these sweet deals went to Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-La.) for the new Louisiana Purchase. This deal initially allocated $100 million in exchange for her wavering vote. Unfortunately for taxpayers, Landrieu's "yes" vote did not become solid until an additional $200 million was promised.

Mathematically, the Democrats could have easily pushed this through the Senate with the Democratic supermajority. If you want to talk about transparency and truth, let's talk about the education reform that was included in the health care bill. What do private tuition loan companies have to do with health care? Let's also talk about Nancy Pelosi telling the American people congress needs to pass the bill in order for the people to see what is in it. I'm still scratching my head wondering if she actually said that.