GOP Still Filibustering Sebelius Despite Flu Outbreak

The Plum Line:

So Kathleen Sebelius will get her confirmation vote as Health and Human Services secretary tomorrow in the Senate -- but even with the flu outbreak, her confirmation will still have to clear a big hurdle, requiring 60 votes.

Read the whole story: The Plum Line

Comments

[Lemmy]

Great headline - like she's going to swoop in and save the day!

[Pilate]

More like, between her confirmation and the money for pandemic preparedness stripped from the stimulus bill, we could already be ahead of the curve on this. Now, thanks to the Party of NO, we have to play catch up.

[Lemmy]

“All those little porky things that the House put in, the money for the [National] Mall or the sexually transmitted diseases or the flu pandemic, they’re all out,”
Chuck Schumer

Great article in the WSJ regarding the PREP Act of 2006 passed by . . . gulp . . . Bush. The Feds have worked with manufacturers and have developed and stockpiled crucial anti-virals which are bearing fruit today.

[Lemmy]

“President Barack Obama has not yet chosen a surgeon general or the head of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. His choice to run the Food and Drug Administration awaits confirmation,” Politico reported.

[Pilate]

So, the Senate Minority Leader, Mitch McConnell, wants to filibuster this lady's confirmation. Refresh my memory. Isn't this the same Mitch McConnell that just last week was whining to high heaven that he didn't want Obama to invoke Reconciliation later this year in order to make sure the new Health Care bill gets passed, that he wants a "bipartisan bill?" And if memory serves, this is also the same GOP that screamed "obstruction" when Bush was nominating all these nuts to judgeships of different kinds, and the Dems were balking on their confirmations? "This guy deserves and up or down vote," was their mantra, as I recall. So which is it, Mitch? Up, down, or hypocrisy and political posturing?

[samilli3]

I don't think the G.O.P is in tune with reality....

[Jamie Kowalski]

"Choice" is the law, by the way. To be "pro-choice," is therefore to agree to the law. To object to her confirmation based on her being pro-choice is to declare yourself to be against the law. An untenable position for a law-maker, don't you think?

[antmousie]

Perfect.

[tiotom77]

$7000 in unpaid taxes, her excuse was ignorance...$40,000 in un-reported campaign funds from "Tiller the Killer" an abortion doctor...she should fit right in with the rest of the tax cheats and liars

[watchful123]

Yep...including all of the Republican Congressional members who should be vetted.

[kapalabhati]

Oh, yeah, that's what their concern is unpaid taxes. Please; if she were a right wing, anti-choice republican, they would be throwing her a tea party. It is the blind adherence to a fringe religious agenda that has no place whatsoever in the public discourse.

[Pilate]

Yep, next to the Senate Page chasing, prostitute familiar, wide-stance-in-the-men's-room, warmongering, torturing, xenophobic Republicans, she should look squeaky clean. Thanks for pointing it out.

[watchful123]

This whole swine flue outbreak has pushed Obama's healthcare agenda even more to the forefront. And the Republicans know that with Sebelius' confirmation the Obama Administration is that much closer to Healthcare Reform.

Another poster mentioned this...and i too believe that many circumstances are conspiring against the Republicans...in favor of Obama and his agenda. If this is God's favor (i believe it is)....the Republicans can forget it.

[hollybork]

Circumstances are conspiring against Republicans who have acted without good faith, seeking to frustrate Obama Administration actions or policies. The Sibelius filibuster is one example, and the stripping of funding for pandemics and for volcano monitoring are two others. It is good to see each one of these bone headed moves get its moment of infamy. Restores my confidence in the justice of the universe.....

[professoramy]

Agreed. A - greed. The key word here, of course, is 'greed.' It is entirely possible that people could die just because the jealous and without-a-sane-idea repubs can only be obstructionists and not leaders. Heaven forbid any of them should seek to be humanitarian and representative! People who lose loved ones to a pandemic or other disaster that the repubs blocked leadership for should sue individual repubs in civil suits claiming wrongful death. Similar to comprehensive sex ed in schools, when we adults know how to literally save lives [from HIV and other diseases and unplanned pregnancies] and yet withhold life-saving information and preach only abstinence, then those responsible should also be held accountable for signing the death warrants of countless thousands of teens who will become infected or pregnant because the ideologues were answering to rush and glenn.

[Cosmic-Zantor]

Conservatives really need to accept that the abortion issue is over. They lost. Reagan couldn't get rid of abortion. The first Bush couldn't get rid of abortion. George W Bush, the most heinously conservative President in modern history, couldn't get rid of abortion.

It's not going away. It will never, ever, ever be illegal in America. There is absolutely no chance whatsoever that Roe v Wade will ever be overturned.

Deal with this. You want to lower abortions? Stop this ludicrous "abstinence only" sex education. Get out of this fantasy world and step into reality.

[justoverit333]

I just cannot figure out why republicans hate America.
It's really sad though.

[kappa08]

WHY DO REPUBLICANS HATE AMERICA?

[justoverit333]

They're afraid to back down now. They will appear weak,
which we all know they are anyway.

[ebanks84]

I truly believe they think their ideology is based on American values and they are terrible mistaken about that. True Americans do NOT have their basic belief system and they don't understand why we don't.

[David Planchet]

Call your Republican senators today and ask them what they hope to accomplish by holding up the nomination of Kathleen Sebelius for Secretary of HHS. Remind them that there is a potential pandemic looming and having HHS and the CDC fully staffed would be in our nations best interests. The Congressional switchboard number is 202-225-3121. Ask for your states senators.

[Wiseup2Day]

Did you not read that only 50 people in the U.S have this, there's 300 Million people in the U.S...36,000 die every year of the regular flu..why are you so panicked? It's ridiculous fear mongering..and that's all..why?

[ebanks84]

I don't think they will listen. Most of them are stuck on stupid here lately.

[care4mypeeps]

Mitch Mc Connell and the GOP has just declaired war on the American people by holding up the nomination of Kathleen Sebelius purely for political reason in the midst of a pandemic.

There is No stronger hate that you can show for your Country and your people when Hateful Polotics is put befor the Lives of its Citizens.

We don't need any more examples of the Republicans Hatred for anyone Not Republican Loyalist.
Since they have declaired War On Us, It is On.

Lets see who is Left Standing after 2010 and 2012. We already know the end results it is just sad seeing the Republicans destroy themselves in such an embarrasing way.

[ebanks84]

I wonder if we can accuse them of treason at this point? Does anybody have a clue?

[antmousie]

Remember,"If your not with us, your with the terrorists". I think it went something like that.

[Wiseup2Day]

They used fear to get the stimulous bill, now this. 50 people in the U.S, out of 300 Million have this flu, no one is even near death..36,000 die every year of the regular flu...this is a WAG the Dog false crisis...

[NC4Obama]

Yea its the Obama admin that is hyping up all the media outlets in order to get their pick into the WH, even though it was already a given that she was going to get in, the republicans can only stall her getting in but she was going to get in either way. It's also the media that is talking up the fact that they are missing a lot of spots atm at HHS.

But hey.... iam sure you heard that it is all a big wag the dog thing from some guy on talk radio, cause they are always correct.

[Republicrats]

1) Susan Collins is not against the idea of pandemic prevention funding
(2) George W Bush actually pushed for this pandemic prevention money in the first place
(3) Chuck Schumer called pandemic prevention funding a "little porky thing"
(4) The money was allocated a month after the stimulus in March's omnibus bill.

[Republicrats]

Schumer] said the compromise hammered out between Senate Democrats and moderate Republicans - which has enough support to get it past any threat of a filibuster - was far better than that passed by the House on Jan. 29.

"All those little porky things that the House put in, the money for the [National] Mall or the sexually transmitted diseases or the flu pandemic, they're all out," Schumer said.