I have not seen anybody discuss the issue so far, so maybe the answer is so obvious that it is not worth the brief time to address this question: Is it really necessary for a healthcare reform bill to get the support of 60 senators? I understand the business about filibusters and cloture votes, but the press has implicitly assumed that, without exception, every senator who does not support the Senate legislation will automatically support a filibuster against the bill. Maybe this is true, but have our Senate leaders (along with former Senators Obama and Biden) even considered the possibility that one or a few senators might behave differently from what is assumed?
One famous TV newsman, who should know better, brought up the issue again yesterday about Barack Obama's "present" votes while in the Illinois State Senate. The implication was that Obama was too much of a weasel to vote for or against a proposed bill, so he voted "present" in a cynical attempt to avoid committing himself. The context of yesterday's reference was in relation to Obama's taking some time to consider his alternative courses of action if Afghanistan. In the Illinois state legislature, "present" has a specific meaning, of which most of Obama's critics are either ignorant or else willfully distorting the picture. In effect, "present" means the same thing as "nay" (or "no"), but is basically a signal that the legislator supports the intentions of the bill, but that the bill as written is too flawed to support. I bring this up now, only to illustrate that what may seem obvious is not necessarily so.
Back to the subject of getting healthcare reform through Congress, it appears that the House will pass some kind of a bill, the Senate will pass a very different kind of a bill, and hopefully a conference committee will work out some unified bill that the president can sign. This process is clearly difficult, and it is not yet certain that anything will eventually pass both houses of Congress. It would be a difficult task in any circumstances, but it is made much more difficult by the fact that a determined group of 41 senators can block any legislation. Even getting unity among the Democrats in the Senate seems impossible. Some of the progressives have indicated that they will absolutely refuse to support a bill that does not contain certain provisions, while some moderates in the same party apparently will refuse to support a bill that does contain those same provisions.
Is it at least possible that a small number of senators could be persuaded, even if the bill that emerges is personally disappointing to them, to invoke cloture? In other words, they might not vote in favor of the legislation itself, but they would agree to kill a filibuster that would prevent the Senate from voting the bill up or down. President Obama's popularity may not be as high as it was when he first took office (those poll ratings were never going to be sustainable), but he is still by far the most popular and admired politician in the country. There have got to be some senators who owe him, at minimum, the opportunity for a Senate bill to come to a floor vote. In addition, some "blue state" Republicans, most notably Olympia Snowe, might find it to their own political advantage to kill a filibuster, even if they do not support the bill. The Senate bill may not really need 60 votes.
I have previously written about my own preferences about what healthcare reform bill I would like to see enacted into law, but I will not rehash the arguments here, because that would confuse the more basic issue. Politically, Obama needs some kind of healthcare reform bill to pass, and I would rather see a disappointing healthcare reform bill pass than to have no healthcare reform pass. While the task is difficult, I believe it is at least possible that support by a slightly under 60 senators could be enough.
