If it is all-or-nothing for the Democrats on the health-care bill, at this point I’d wager — at even money — on “nothing.”
They need 217 votes, a majority of the 432 members currently in Congress. They don’t have them right now.
If the House doesn’t have the votes, senior White House officials say they would like Congress to pursue a more modest health care reform bill.
But there seems little desire for that among House Democrats, who would like to focus on jobs.
“We are NOT doing scaled back bill,” a senior House leadership source emails ABC News.
Full story here. Tapper also notes that Rep. Marion “The Difference Is Me” Berry (D., Ark.) has not decided how he is going to vote this time around.
UPDATE: Sen. Ben Nelson (D., Neb.) says (for whatever it is worth) that he doesn’t know if Democrats have the votes to do a comprehensive bill:
“We may be forced to doing healthcare — to use my analogy — by making a pie a piece at a time, which is typically not the preferred way to handle legislation,” the senator added. “But this is so big, and has so many moving parts and has so many supporters and detractors, that maybe that’s the only thing you can do. Grab a piece of it here, grab a piece of it there and try to put together as much of it as you can.”






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