Thread: Sen. Cruz continues night-long attack on Obamacare

By Ed O’Keefe and Paul Kane, Updated: Wednesday, September 25, 4:00 AM E-mail the writers

Several like-minded Senate conservatives briefly joined Cruz for a time on the Senate floor Tuesday evening, including Sens. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) and Rand Paul (R-Ky.), two 2016 presidential aspirants. Cruz could yield to colleagues for long-form questions but could not leave the floor or sit.

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Tex.) continued his attacks on President Obama’s health-care law early Wednesday morning by continuing a marathon speech modeled on old-fashion filibusters that likely will complicate House GOP efforts to pass a funding bill that would avert a government shutdown next week.

Speaking with little assistance from his Republican colleagues, Cruz assured that debate on the spending measure will stretch well into the weekend. With Senate passage all but certain on a bill that will include funding for the health-care law, Cruz’s strategy will give House Speaker John A. Boehner (R-Ohio) and his colleagues only a few hours to respond with a different version of the legislation.

The freshman senator took the floor Tuesday afternoon promising to speak “until I am no longer able to stand” and his effort continued overnight, usually with just two other senators with him in the Senate chamber.
By 5 a.m. Wednesday, the length of Cruz’s marathon discourse had surpassed more traditional talking filibusters delivered by Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) in March and a roughly 14-hour filibuster delivered by the late Sen. Robert C. Byrd (D-W. Va.) in 1964.

As he outlined his opposition to the health-care law, Cruz’s hours of oratory touched a broad mix of subjects and sources, ranging from lyrics from a song by country music star Toby Keith; excerpts from the book, “Atlas Shrugged,” a favorite of libertarians; quotations from the popular reality television show, “Duck Dynasty;” the unemployment rate among African American teenagers; how his father, Rafael Cruz, used to make green eggs and ham for breakfast; a recent acceptance speech by actor Ashton Kutcher at an awards show; and the restaurants Denny’s, Benihana and White Castle.

At one point Tuesday night, Cruz opted to read bedtime stories to his two young daughters, who he said were home in Texas watching television with his wife. Cruz first read “King Solomon’s Wise Words,” from the Book of Proverbs and then the Dr. Seuss classic, “Green Eggs and Ham,” saying that it was one of his favorite children’s books.

Several times Cruz read supportive messages sent to his office via Twitter. He frequently noted that James P. Hoffa, president of the Teamsters Union, has warned that the new health-care law may create “nightmare scenarios” for employers.

If Hoffa is correct, then Cruz said that “senators shouldn’t be asleep when the nation is undergoing a nightmare.”

Several like-minded Senate conservatives briefly joined Cruz for a time on the Senate floor Tuesday evening, including Sens. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) and Rand Paul (R-Ky.), two 2016 presidential aspirants. Cruz could yield to colleagues for long-form questions but could not leave the floor or sit.

His most frequent partner was Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah), who would offer the Texas senator a respite by speaking at times for almost an hour.

Lee gave detailed critiques of Supreme Court decisions and employed a series of recollections from his younger years to draw attention to his concerns with the health-care law, commonly known as Obamacare. He recounted working as a young Supreme Court clerk in an office with an unruly thermostat. A maintenance worker finally discovered that the thermostat had been installed upside down.

“I looked out the window across the street at the Capitol and I thought, I wonder if there’s something that Congress can learn from this,” Lee said.

One night as a young child, Lee said his father accidentally ran over the future senator’s foot with the family Oldsmobile. Suffering from incredible pain, Lee said the only word he could blurt out was “Reverse!”

“Sometimes when you’re doing something that hurts someone, you just have to reverse,” Lee said, drawing his memories back to the debate at hand.

Several junior Democratic senators presided over the chamber through the night. Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) passed the time scanning her iPad. Reporters spotted Sen. Christopher Murphy (D-Conn.) returning to the U.S. Capitol shortly before 11 p.m. with a Red Bull in hand.

“There’s no point to this other than advancing the career of one or two senators,” Murphy said as he wrapped up his two-hour shift around 1 a.m.

As the hours dragged on, Cruz began leaning more on the podium at his desk, which was surrounded by binders and stacks of paper. In case he ever lost his sense of place, a large yellow post-it note reminded him in blue ink: “Yield only for the purpose of a question. Be careful!”

The Cruz talkathon was the latest example of the increasingly stark division among Republicans, both on Capitol Hill and nationally. The Texas newcomer, just 42 and nine months into office, is carrying the banner for conservatives urging a take-no-prisoners approach in confronting the president, even if it means shuttering the government.

But the move angered senior Republicans, who complained that Cruz and other junior senators pushing this strategy did not understand the wounds the GOP suffered during the mid-1990s shutdown battles with President Bill Clinton. Back then, the party controlled both the House and Senate, a luxury when compared to its tenuous majority in the House today.

“I just don’t believe anybody benefits from shutting the government down, and certainly Republicans don’t. We learned that in 1995,” said Sen. Orrin Hatch (Utah), the dean of the GOP caucus. “We’re in the minority. We have to find a way of standing up for our principles without immolating ourselves in front of everybody, in a way when we don’t have the votes to do it.”

Some suggested that this was the latest example of a party adrift, both on policy and strategic thinking. “We haven’t had much of a strategy on anything to this point. Everybody’s shooting from the hip,” said Sen. Saxby Chambliss (R-Ga.).

Boehner and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) originally preferred a different approach that would have required Democrats to vote for the health-care funds, while GOP senators could have symbolically opposed.

Cruz played a leading role, along with outside conservative groups, in pushing House Republicans to take a harder line. House Republicans relented and on Friday passed a bill exactly as Cruz wanted.

“We don’t need fake fights. We don’t need fake votes. We need real change. We need a better economy. We need more jobs,” Cruz said early Tuesday afternoon, rejecting the original Boehner-McConnell plan.

By holding the floor, Cruz and his allies launched what looked to most Americans like a traditional filibuster, fixed in the popular imagination by Jimmy Stewart’s performance in “Mr. Smith Goes to Washington.” But parliamentary procedures already in place dictated that Cruz will have to yield the floor by Wednesday afternoon at the latest.

At that point, the Senate is scheduled to hold a key procedural test vote that is near certain to pass with bipartisan support. McConnell had hoped that he could get Cruz and his band of allies to relent so that the Senate could pass something by Friday. He even convened an extra meeting, in addition to the weekly Tuesday policy luncheon, at which several senators said Cruz was encouraged to drop some of his delaying tactics or Boehner would not get the legislation until late Sunday or early Monday.

The extended discourse by Cruz and Lee was the culmination of a strategy they began developing in the summer when Lee, first elected in 2010, started looking for allies to defund the law by using annual spending bills for federal agencies as potential leverage.

Lee and Cruz launched a commercial campaign that targeted fellow Republicans with ads designed to pressure GOP senators to support the pair’s shutdown strategy. Senior colleagues have rejected the approach, and instead have grown more angry.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/politi...y.html?hpid=z2

ObamaCare for Obama Petition




If Obama loves ObamaCare so much, then he and his family should be forced to accept the same insurance coverage middle class Americans will receive! The bureaucrats too many times set up a system for US but not for THEM. Let’s FORCE these elitists to submit to the same laws they want for us!
Sign the Petition: (You will begin receiving complementary emails from Patriot Update and The Black Sphere)

Sign the petition by including your email address below.

The ObamaCare Health Insurance Exchanges are set to open on October 1, 2013, to begin offering health plan benefits, as mandated by the Patient Privacy and Affordable Care Act (PPACA).
Against all reports to the contrary, Barack Obama continues to state that health care costs and insurance rates will decrease in the new, “competitive” market; and that benefits will be better, i.e. – “better benefits, stronger protections, more bang for your buck.”
We provide the following, as evidence that Mr. Obama’s claims are false, and demand that he and his family be required to accept the same, basic-level health insurance coverage that the majority of Americans will, undoubtedly, have no choice but to accept; because their existing plans will be unaffordable.
Bottom Line: If ObamaCare is so great, then Mr. Obama and his family should happily accept the same level coverage that middle class America will inevitably receive.
Whereas: According to a report by the Society of Actuaries, Health insurance costs are expected to increase; because ObamaCare regulations are causing medical claims costs to become more expensive to process;
Whereas: A report released by the House Energy and Commerce Committee, chronicles the massive premium increases awaiting Americans when full implementation of ObamaCare occurs. It is expected to increase individual health insurance premiums by an average of nearly 100 percent. In some cases, premiums could rise by 400 percent;
Whereas: ObamacareFacts.com, reports that a basic “bronze” level health care plan will cover only 60% of out of pocket health care costs and offers basic coverage. Plans range from the basic “Bronze” (60%) to “Silver” (70%) more expensive “Gold” (80%) and “Platinum” (90%) level plans. High-end plans carry a 40% excise tax which helps pay for the program;
Whereas: Because of sky-rocketing premiums and health care costs, many Americans will not be able to maintain their existing “silver,” “gold,” or “platinum” level health care coverage; or they may be penalized for doing so through an excise tax. Some customers are already receiving letters from their health insurance providers notifying them of increased, unaffordable premiums. At best, Americans may be able to afford “bronze” level coverage, or be forced to hold out for Medicaid expansion; despite the fact that Barack Obama has touted that ObamaCare will “deliver the security of quality, affordable health care”;
Whereas: Many details about premiums, out-of-pocket costs, benefits; and which doctors, hospitals and drugs the plans will cover remain up in the air, less than two months before enrollment is scheduled to begin Oct. 1;
Therefore: We demand and expect that if Barack Obama insists on moving forward with his indefensible “Affordable Health Care Act,” that when the health insurance exchanges open on October 1, 2013, Barack Obama be required to take advantage of the basic, bronze level health insurance coverage that the majority of Americans will most likely be financially forced to accept. If the Patient Privacy and Affordable Care Act includes all of the wonderful benefits that Barack Obama has claimed, then this bronze level coverage should be quite sufficient to provide his family with quality, affordable health care that delivers “more bang for his buck.”



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