New senator halts health care reform

Last Tuesday marked the end of an era with the election of Scott Brown to the U.S. Senate seat, which was once held by the late Edward M. Kennedy.

Brown, a Republican, is the first to be elected to the Senate from the state of Massachusetts since 1972, when Edward Brooke defeated John Droney. Brooke was defeated by Paul Tsongas in 1976, and the state has only elected Democratic senators since then, until last week.

While it is certainly a big story that Brown will be the state’s first Republican senator in 34 years, the bigger story is what his election means for the rest of the country and why.

Implications of his election will be more far-reaching for the rest of the country than for the state of Massachusetts, which essentially already has universal health coverage. Any health care reform on a federal level will have little or no impact on most residents in the state.

While it’s true that Brown is the 41st Republican vote against health care, 41 votes are required to block the passage of a bill in the Senate. The Democrats’ lack of tenacity on the issue is the sole reason nothing has been accomplished as of yet, regardless of a 41st vote.

In a democratic sense, there is absolutely no excuse why the election of Brown should be seen as anything other than an anomaly and completely inconsequential.

Unfortunately, votes count for more than debate and his election will, of course, make a big difference in what happens with health care reform in this country. The only reason for this is because the Democrats do not have the nerve to do what is necessary to provide the American people with a not-for-profit, universal health care model like the rest of the Western world.

In order to provide all Americans with health care, it will take a far more progressive bill, one even more progressive than H.R. 3200 in the U.S. House of Representatives, and it will take a reconciliation vote in the Senate, which disallows the potential for a filibuster and only requires 51 votes for passage. Only certain parts of the bill are eligible for a reconciliation vote.

Brown is not the man who should be carrying the torch for health care reform, because he is a man who does not believe in it and will not vote for it. Instead of rallying together and figuring out a way to carry on the Kennedy legacy, Democrats in the Senate will more than likely make even more concessions in order to get vote No. 60 from Sen. Olympia Snow (R-Maine) or Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine).

Sadly, Kennedy’s death not only marked the death of a political legend, but the death of any meaningful change to the current system of health care in this country.

To put the problem in the simplest terms possible, the Democrats don’t have the gumption to get anything done, and the Republicans do not care to make any changes to the current for-profit system.

Because of this, the entire country will continue to suffer the consequences of the pathetic excuse for a health care system that we currently live with in this country.

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