GOP Senator McConnell Finally Reveals His Tax Cut “Health Care” Bill, Intends to Force a Vote Before It Can Be Scrutinized

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell after a Republican meeting about the Senate Healthcare Bill, on Thursday. Credit Doug Mills/The New York Times

Having hidden the details as long as he could, Mitch McConnell has finally revealed his tax cut health care bill.  Contrary to the expectations originally set, the bill turns out to be the House’s brutal bill with a few of the edges sanded down (for example, it stretches the phase-out of Medicaid out a few extra years, the better to evade immediate electoral repercussions) and not a complete re-write.  Needless to say, it retains all of the tax cuts for America’s most comfortable.

Senator McConnell intends to force a vote on the bill next week.  Right.  Before senators have had any time to study the bill, before the CBO has had time to score it (or will the CBO grind out a quick analysis over the weekend?), before senators have been home to hear from their constituents, etc.  And of course, without a single committee hearing or any public comment.  The faster they vote on it the less time there is for consideration or feedback.

Remember 2009?  Contrary to the spin we are hearing from the GOP, passage of Obamacare featured months of congressional debate and hearings, multiple CBO evaluations, voluminous public comment and entreaties to bipartisan participation.  No, this cynical secret process is unprecedented in modern times.

The question now is, will there turn out to be at least three GOP senators possessing the moral sense to say “No” to throwing 20-plus million Americans out from under the health care umbrella?  I keep (naively?) thinking that surely there are people of conscience somewhere in the GOP.  Surely when it comes to this level of cruelty some of them will step back from the brink.

Right?