Is Joe Lieberman Bluffing, or Would He Really Torpedo Health-Care Reform?

Posted by Joshua Holland, AlterNet at 10:19 AM on October 28, 2009.

OK, the Dems had a choice of strategies to get around an inevitable GOP-led filibuster of any health-care bill with a public option.

The bill they have in the House has a public option. They could have gotten a really watered-down bill without the measure through the Senate, used the popular momentum for a public choice to add it during the the reconciliation process (in which the House and Senate bills are combined) and then done a full-court press to pass the final product. 

Most Congressional observers doubt that the handful of cantankerous Democrats in the Senate who might join a filibuster of the Senate bill the first time around would have the nerve to block the legislation if it came back from the reconciliation process with some compromise public plan. Which would have left the insurance caucus Dems -- Joe Lieberman, Ben Nelson, Evan Bayh, Blanche Lincoln and other sell-outs -- out of the limelight.

But Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid promised to deliver a bill with some form of public insurance option. That moves the process along significantly and, as The Hill reports, may help progressives in the House get a "robust" version of the scheme through the lower chamber, as the details of their bill get ironed out. (See Booman for more on the process stuff.)

But because Reid doesn't have the votes so far to bring his bill to a vote -- and may not even have enough to begin debate on its provisions -- it's a high-risk move, in large part because it empowers so-called "moderate" Senate show-boats like Joe Lieberman, who promptly announced that he would likely join a Republican filibuster of the reform package. Whatever else he believes, Lieberman's all about the attention and he's got an abundance of it right now.

At this time, I'd like to just remind readers that when progressives backed Ned Lamont in the primary against Lieberman in 2006, Harry Reid came to his defense by swearing that Old Joe was "with us on everything but the war" in Iraq.

Anyway, sour grapes aside, the buzz today is about whether Lieberman can be moved. Is he being cantankerous now to puff up his own chest and make the liberals who had the chutzpah to beat him in a Democratic primary chafe but will eventually come around? Or is he really prepared to almost single-handedly blow up the whole year-long legislative process during its final act if he doesn't get his way?

A sampling of what some smart observers are saying about that question after the jump ...

Ezra Klein writes that he doesn't "take Joe Lieberman's threat to filibuster health-care reform more seriously" in part because the Senator left himself some room to maneuver by saying he'd block the bill "in it's current form."  

Additionally, Lieberman's argument against the public option is simply false. "I think a lot of people may think that the public option is free," he says. "It's not. It's going to cost the taxpayers and people who have health insurance now, and if it doesn't it's going to add terribly to the national debt." Soon enough, he'll be looking at Congressional Budget Office numbers saying the exact opposite...

Ezra Klein's a smart guy, but his rationalism is often inexplicable.

Plus, Lieberman has not, traditionally, been conservative on health-care issues. He's a moralist and a hawk, but not a particular critic of the safety net.

Mark Ambinder agrees with Klein:

Now -- the final bill, post-conference, is going to look a bit different from the reconciled Senate bill. Lieberman is giving himself the power to influence the final bill. I doubt that the Senate leadership is going to press him too hard right now, preferring to see if he can be accommodated in the final debate.

While Steve Benen appreciates the argument, he writes: "I wouldn't count on it."

I understand the argument... Lieberman gets to feel very important for the next several weeks by making this threat less than 24 hours after Harry Reid stated his intentions, but that doesn't necessarily mean he wants to be known forever as The Senator Who Killed Health Care Reform.

I find it very easy to believe, however, that Lieberman is capable of doing just that. He left himself some wiggle room, but not when it comes to the public option -- he's against it, no matter what, even with all of the compromises thrown in.

What's more, Lieberman didn't have to make the explicit threat to get the attention he craves -- he could have just as easily said he's keeping his options open, forcing Dems to cater to his demands. Instead, he went further, explicitly vowing to stop the Senate from even voting on the bill if some consumers in some states have a choice between public and private insurance plans.

What does Lieberman have to gain by following through on this threat? Well, if he plans to seek re-election in 2012, he'll need a lot of Republican support to have a chance. Running as the independent who single handedly prevented public-private competition would probably be a big selling point.

But numbers-cruncher extraordinaire Nate Silver is having a hard time figuring out what's in it for Lieberman in political terms:

 Would voting to filibuster the Democrats' health care bill (if it contains a decent public option) endear Lieberman to his constituents? No; Connecticutians favor the public option 64-31.

Would it make his path to re-election easier? No, because it would virtually assure that Lieberman faces a vigorous and well-funded challenge from a credible, capital-D Democrat, and polls show him losing such a match-up badly.

Would it buy him more power in the Senate? No, because Democrats would have every reason to strip him of his chairmanship of the Homeland Security Committee.

Is Lieberman's stance intended to placate the special interests in his state? Perhaps this is part of it -- there are a lot of insurance companies in Connecticut -- but Lieberman is generally not one of the more sold-out Senators, ranking 75th out of the 100-member chamber in the percentage of his fundraising that comes from corporate PACs.

Are there any particular compromises or concessions he wants in the bill? He hasn't stipulated any, at least not publicly.

Silver concludes that he's probably in it for the attention, but notes: "the reason this is a little scary for Democrats is because the usual things that serve to motivate a Congressman don't seem to motivate Joe Lieberman."

Which brings us to Steve M.'s analysis:

I think he might actually relish political martyrdom. He might crave it.

The conventional wisdom is that he was stung by the primary challenge in '06 and is still bitter about being rejected by voters and many big-name Democrats, but it's clear that he kinda dug it, too, right? And if he now loses his chairmanship? Or loses reelection in 2012? Well, he'll be politically dead -- but he'll be in paradise, the object of the attention of 72 virgins, with names like Coulter, Cheney, Hannity, O'Reilly....

A mediocrity like Lieberman? Getting that kind of adulation? Paradise indeed.

Seriously, what happens if this really is a death blow to his Senate career? He'll be an acclaimed "martyr" on the wingnut right, a man lauded over and over again for his "courage." He'll get a big book deal, probably from Rupert Murdoch's HarperCollins or Mary Matalin's Threshold imprint at Simon & Schuster -- and this time he'll have endless opportunities to flog the book in the right-wing media, and it'll do a hell of a lot better than his previous books. He'll be a regular commentator on Fox and for The Wall Street Journal -- maybe he'll even get his own show. A little bit of this, some corporate-board activity here, maybe some lobbying (his or his wife's) over there ... he'll be set for life. His ego will be set for life. So where's the harm in committing political suicide, if he draws blood on our side?

Tagged as: lieberman, health-care reform