|
 |
 |
|
Huckabee: Throw proponents of health bill out of office
Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee (R) on Sunday urged Nebraskans to remember how politicians voted on healthcare reform during the 2010 midterm election season.
Huckabee appeared at an Omaha, Nebraska rally against the healthcare reform legislation just hours before the Senate held its cloture vote on the bill. The 2008 GOP presidential candidate spoke in the backyard of centrist Sen. Ben Nelson (D-Neb.), a last-minute holdout vote on the bill.
Huckabee is also considered a potential GOP presidential candidate in 2012.
Nelson, who is up for reelection in 2012, said on Saturday that he was prepared to vote for cloture on he bill after he struck an agreement with Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) on the bill's abortion provisions.
The 60 members of the Democratic caucus united to pass the cloture motion, a key step before the final vote, early Monday morning.
Much of the crowd at the rally focused its angst at Nelson, who was the final member of the Democratic caucus to lend his support for the bill. Here is more from the World-Herald:
Ben Nelson must have felt like a punching bag.
The Democrat was the center of attention at a rally in downtown Omaha on Sunday — and much of the attention was unfavorable, as opponents of the health care legislation in Congress expressed outrage with his decision to cast the crucial 60th vote in favor of the Senate bill.
About 1,800 people attended the rally...The crowd at the Civic Auditorium was revved up, calling Nelson a “traitor” and a “sellout” and booing whenever his named was mentioned.
But Nelson's predecessor, former Sen. Bob Kerrey (D-Neb.) told the paper that the popular Nelson would likely be reelected despite the anger directed toward him about his vote on healthcare reform:
Former Sen. Bob Kerrey drew considerable heat in 1993 when he voted for then-President Bill Clinton's budget-cutting package, which included an array of tax increases.
Kerrey, too, was the swing vote. And, like Nelson, Kerrey drew national attention as he publicly anguished over whether to vote for the bill.
A month after the vote, Kerrey returned to the state and was confronted by angry Nebraskans. But a year later, in his re-election bid, he defeated Republican Jan Stoney by 10 percentage points.
[...]
“I do not think this will damage Sen. Nelson's political career or haunt him if he runs in 2012,” Kerrey said. “Faced with the multiple challenges health care presents to states and the nation, I'd rather defend an ‘aye' vote than a ‘nay.'”
Most Viewed RSS Feed »
