A Republican insider has more information for Beltway Buzz readers on how fellow conservatives stand on the Social Security debate:

“Harry Reid is speaking very confidently about how he won’t allow any Democrats to support a cloture vote on Social Security. We need five votes and right now we don’t have any, other than maybe Ben Nelson.”

“Some Republicans are looking at this fight and thinking that even if we can’t get a bill passed this year, we could nationalize this debate and take it to the voters in 2006. But the only way that’s going to happen is if five Democrats vote to end the filibuster and then vote against the bill. That’s not going to happen.”

“In theory it could work like the tax increase vote in ’93. But the House is being more skittish on this than the Senate, which is very unusual. They are letting the Senate go first.”

“The talk is that we should now be focusing on passing smaller issues instead of this. And with the way this debate has gone, tax reform is dead too.”