Health care bill in Senate

Democrats may be breathing a sigh of relief with Senator Ben Nelson's comments after the defeat of his abortion amendment. Previously, Senator Nelson seemed unmovable: “I don’t ordinarily draw a line in the sand, but I have drawn a line in the sand." Now he just says that it will make "it harder" for him.

The amendment’s sponsor, Democratic Sen. Ben Nelson, threatened to filibuster the legislation if his amendment failed. The question now is whether Nelson continues working with Democratic leadership both on his abortion concerns and as a member of a coalition of liberal and moderate senators trying to bridge their differences on the public option.

"What happened tonight makes it harder to be supportive. We'll see what happens," Nelson said after the vote.

Nelson said he isn't going to work with Reid on a compromise, "I had no Plan B. I'm not looking for a Plan B, but others may be," he said, adding, "I always listen to the leader if the leader had something to say." . . .

On the other side, Senator Snow appears less interested in the proposals regarding the public option. Senator Rockefeller seems pretty confident: “All in all, I have to say we are in a pretty good place right now. You can see a kind of overarching sense of ‘Well, yes, let’s do this,’ but we have to see what the (Congressional Budget Office cost estimate) is.” The amazing thing is the huge unfunded obligations that already exist for Medicare and Medicaid and these proposed changes would just make that worse.