Obama May Use Legislative Ploy to Jam Through Health, Tax Bills

Jam through...but Obama said he was going to work across the aisle...be a new kind of President...end partisanship. Here's how he's ending partisanship: He's neutralizing the other party with a "parliamentary procedure."

By Brian Faler

March 18 (Bloomberg) -- President Barack Obama may try to push through Congress a health-care overhaul, energy proposals and tax increases by using a partisan tactic that would thwart Republican efforts to block the measures.

The administration and congressional Democrats are debating whether to use a parliamentary procedure called reconciliation to advance some of the biggest items on the president’s agenda. The move would allow Democrats to approve plans to raise taxes by $1 trillion, create a cap-and-trade system to rein in greenhouse-gas emissions, and overhaul health care without a single Republican vote.

“You’re talking about running over the minority, putting them in cement and throwing them into the Chicago River,” said Senator Judd Gregg, a New Hampshire Republican who stepped down last month as Obama’s pick for Commerce secretary. “It takes the minority completely out of the process.”

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