Excellent! Finance committee has no contribution to make, so it's time to vote on the HELP bill, which the Senate should have done a month ago.

Why Senator Grassley, between your comments over the last month, and Senator Enzi's admission that he is only trying to neuter a bill he won't vote for, of course there won't be compromise. The only question is whether Baucus and Conrad are willing the tell you to eff off or if they believe the same malarkey that you do

I can't believe the Dems are allowing themselves to be rolled by this clown. I'm beginning to think choosing Obama over HRC was a mistake. Republicans throw his bipartisan desires against him at every turn and still don't vote for the measure anyways. So they strip the better bill and then vote against the compromise - and it's going to happen again and again.

The longer Grassley and Co. can delay this bill the less time there will be to focus on other Obama campaign promises. Dem are going to lose Senate and House seats in 2010 and then the GOP will claim Obama lost his mandate and will further step up their obstruction. It's so damn obvious and Obama and Reid are playing along. Obama has been pretty much an epic disappointment.

As far as I can tell, choosing Obama (over HRC) was still the right move. However, we have to move this health care bill.

The FC should vote on the HELP bill. Grassley and the GOP do not want to negotiate in good faith. Vote on the HELP bill. Please. Get it out of committee -- get it to the floor and then do the amendment process. This is the only way to ensure health care gets done.

Golly, who could have predicted that, after successfully delaying progress for a month, Grassley would advocate for more delays?????????

They got nothing left. The economy is going to rebound, and Republicans aren't going to be able to take credit for it, given those awesome vote totals earlier this year. If healthcare gets passed, they won't be able to take credit for that, either.

Crazy-as-a-bedbug Jim Demint was right about Waterloo. Only it ain't Obama's Waterloo.

Can they just ignore the finance committee?

I don't think the majority of Democratic senators--and even Rahm Emmanuel and possibly Obama himself--really *want* a public option if this means (as it certainly does) that the monies of health insurance and pharma will now go exclusively to Republicans. I am becoming more and more persuaded that with the exception of certain very progressive legislators in the house and senate, the Democratic party is as scared of upsetting the corporate oligarchs as the Republican party is eager to bow down before them.

F*ck Grassley. Let's get this job done for the American people!

I love how everybody is angry at Grassley instead of being angry at Emmanuel or Obama. Don't you think that if they *really* wanted action on a *specific* plan including a public option they would have directed Baucus to ignore the Republicans? Remember the pressure they put on the Progressives to support the War Funding bill? Where is that pressure now?

Don't blame Grassley. He's only as important as Obama and Reid allow him to be.

This is Obama and Reid's failure of political will, skill and courage.

I'm still inclined to believe that Obama and crew are giving these guys enough rope to hang themselves with....believing Americans will sour on their obsturctionism. Although I must say, some of the comments about Rahm and Obama getting had and not standing up to fight are starting to resonate a bit more. The problem here is that as Obama loses leftie's approval, his political capital decreases.

Morning you'all: I don't have much to say, as I believe all you liberals have said it all already, but I need to repeat my advice of yesterday: forget the republicans, and pass the bill with or without their support. Let the chips fall where they may. Have a great w/e everyone.

That's it, kick it down the road. The longer this can be stretched out without a decision, the better chances are to defeat it. Yay status quo. Grassley is trying to create the impression of an impossibility voting out a bill in the hopes that it will move public opinion. The real truth is that he's a status quo guy, and wants no change.