Shocking News: Americans Care About Results, Not Process Or Senate Rules

While to most people in greater America this would seem like common sense, it is amazing how many people inside the Beltway will find this news mind-boggling. A new poll shows that the majority of Americans in many states don't object to Democrats using reconciliation to pass health care reform if they think the bill will benefit their families. When asked:

If the Senate passes a health care reform bill that you consider to be beneficial to your family, would you object to the Senate's use of "reconciliation" rules to pass that bill with a majority vote, or not?

Fifty-five percent of people in Nevada would not object. The numbers were 67% in Illinois, 65% in Washington, 58% in Missouri, 60% in Virginia, 66% in Iowa, and 53% in North Dakota.

The important part of the question is clearly whether people think the health care reform bill will result in a benefit to their families. If people think a bill is a bad bill that will hurt them, then they don't want it passed using reconciliation, regular order, or with massive bipartisan support, for that matter. They simply don't want it passed. If people think it is a good bill, however, one which would personally make their lives better, they simply want it passed into law, and don't care about the process.

The problem for Democrats is that the current Senate bill is very unpopular. If Democrats plan to use reconciliation they should only use it to make the bill more popular. This can be done by stripping out unpopular ideas (e.g. the excise tax and individual mandate), and by adding very popular provisions that really take on the insurance and drug industries (public option, Medicare buy-in, and drug re-importation, for example).