Two pieces of positive news for the prospects of a healthcare bill passing (or at least getting to a floor vote).
First, the Congressional Budget Office has released it’s report on the predicted cost of Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus’ healthcare bill and the numbers look good for Democrats. Ezra Klein has a few summaries of the report. Matt Yglesias stays up late in Europe to read the report. National Review Online has some initial thoughts on how the GOP will respond. Allahpundit at Hot Air as well. Megan McCardle has faith it will pass. Will this report get the Olympia Snowe vote?
The second bit of news is the fact that moderate Republicans are endorsing the Democratic plan for reform. This shouldn’t actually be news because Gov. Schwarzenegger and Mayor Bloomberg have no vote in congress. However, it is more indicative of the politicking that the Obama administration has been doing across the aisle. While Republicans have moved farther to the right, some have become increasingly disenfranchised. The Obama administration reached out and encouraged these moderates to come forward and make the leadership look even more extreme.
[...] mentioned this before in the context of healthcare, but the Obama administration’s apparent tactic of making people [...]