Senate passes $1.1 trillion spending bill while still discussing the chaotic healthcare bill

Last week, Democratic negotiators agreed to drop a controversial plan for a government-run public health insurance option to boost the bill’s chances of approval.

The tentative deal would allow people aged between 55 and 64 to join Medicare– the government health insurance program for people 65 or older.

After its announcement, several analysts have shown that the new proposal continues to be another type of government-run public health system.

Government accountants are pouring over the latest compromise proposals to see how much they would cost, and some lawmakers are reserving judgment until that plays out this week.

Only a few senators have really seen the entire bill. In a very close legislative struggle, Democrats need all 60 votes in their caucus, but do not yet have them.

The Senate Republican leader, Mitch McConnell said on Sunday that Democrats were too divided to muster the votes to pass an overhaul of the U.S. healthcare system.

“There are more Democratic positions than you’d find in a stack of newspapers,” Republican Senator Mitch McConnell said on the CBS’s program “Face the Nation.”

On the other side, a senior Democratic senator said he was optimistic although the task is “very, very hard.”
Party leaders, to resume the debate Sunday, are pushing hard to finish the Senate overhaul legislation before Christmas and to begin negotiations with the House, which has passed its plan.

While saying “I want to be a friend of the process,” Sen. Ben Nelson, D-Nebraska, sounded distinctly down on the Medicare proposal.

“I’m concerned that it’s the forerunner of single-payer –the ultimate single-payer plan, maybe even more directly than the public option,” he said. By single-payer, he meant national health insurance run by Washington.

Nelson already says he won’t support the bill unless fellow Democrats establish a firewall to ensure no public money goes toward abortion coverage.

Independent Senator Joe Lieberman was a firm opponent of the bill’s original plan for a public insurance option. Even with it out, he said he would find it hard to vote for the bill if it contains the Medicare buy-in as written.

The debate comes after the same Senate passed a $1.1 trillion spending bill with increased budgets for vast areas of the federal government, including health, education, law enforcement and other programs.

The more-than-one thousand-page package passed 57-35 and now goes to President Barack Obama for his signature. Senator John McCain, R-Arizona, criticized the large amount of spending in this bill.

All but three Democrats voted for the bill, while all but three Republicans opposed it. Democrats said the spending was critical to meet the needs of a recession-battered economy.

Republicans decried what they called out-of control spending and pointed to an estimated $3.9 billion in the bill for more than 5,000 local projects sought by individual lawmakers from both parties.

Congress must soon raise the debt ceiling, now at $12.1 trillion, so the Treasury can continue to borrow, and Democratic leaders are eying a new figure close to $14 trillion, pushing the issue, for political reasons, past next November’s election.

The Americano / Agencies

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