Tuesday Morning Open Thread

Good morning.

The Senate continues its trek towards passage of the health insurance bill. Check out the Senate's "Orders" for today. Incomprehensible. This morning, Senators will vote on the the "manager's amendment," which is the fix-it part of the bill containing all the latest compromises. They had to wait 30 hours following the cloture vote which took place early, early yesterday morning. (UPDATE @ 7:57 a.m.: The "manager's amendment just passed: 60 - 39.) There will be another cloture vote this morning, too, on what's called the "substitute" amendment. (UPDATE @ 8:13 a.m.: Cloture was invoked on the substitute amendment: 60 - 39.) Then, they'll wait 30 hours to take the final vote on that. Then, there will be one more cloture vote on the final bill itself, sometime early tomorrow afternoon. So, after another 30 hour wait, it looks like they're still on schedule to pass the bill on Christmas eve. Complicated, I know. And, who knows what tricks Tom Coburn may still have up his sleeve.

I'm sure a lot of Senators and Senate staffers are upset about delaying their holiday plans. Such hard lives. But, having Christmas in D.C. isn't as rough as having it in Kandahar or Fallujah.

The looming question is: can or will the Senate bill be fixed? Will the conference with the House, which has a far better bill, even matter? Nothing about this process has given me any confidence that will happen.

I think Christmas is this week.

Let's thread...