H.R. 3962 Health Care Bill Passes from Firedoglake

 by Rayne http://firedoglake.com/2009/11/07/h-r-3962-health-care-bill-passes/

As of 11:07 p.m. ET, we have a health care reform bill. Although five minutes remained on the clock, the votes were all in with 220 Yeas, 215 Nays.

Of the Nay votes, 39 were Democrats.

There was a lone Republican Yea from Rep. Joseph Cao of Louisiana. Good for him.

There has been clapping and cheering on the floor of the House, as if they did something really great today. I wish I could feel the same way, really.

But for me, the Stupak Amendment was like the vote for cloture on Alito's nomination to the Supreme Court and the vote for cloture on the Military Commissions Act. The failure to vote in line with Democratic values for cloture told us all we needed to know.

We can't trust the right thing will be done in conference committee, based on what we've seen in the past.

Anybody else feeling as used and discarded right now as I do?

UPDATE: There's a few folks who don't understand why some of us are upset about the way things went down today. Our Scarecrow explains it well, in comments:

It's like winning a huge battle, but half of your friends were killed or wounded.

36 million more people will be insured or become eligible for Medicaid
There will be a trillion dollars raised to help subsidize this.
There will be multiple measures to help control the costs of Medicare
We will stop subsidizing private insurers in Medicare Advantage
Closes the donut hole
Allows Medicare negotiation for drugs
Includes the seeds of a public option
Prohibits denials based on prior conditions; ends rescissions except for fraud
funds more education for doctors/nurses
Begins dozens of health prevention programs, pilots, surveys
Creates entities to evaluate and recommend better treatment, cost saving
And on and on.

It's a massive achievement, but women, mostly poor, paid a price.

Yeah. What Scarecrow said.