Nancy Pelosi is a coward, a bully and a hypocrite — and Barack Obama is hiding behind her skirts.
So what does that make him?
Pelosi obviously can’t find enough votes in her own party for ObamaCare, so the House speaker is preparing to approve the president’s health-care bill by legislative legerdemain — that is, by not voting on it.
And to hell with the Constitution.
Not to mention President Obama’s long-abandoned vow that the health-care-reform process would be “completely open and transparent.”
Indeed, Pelosi has just the opposite in mind: She intends to employ an arcane bit of backroom alchemy known as “deem and pass,” in which the House would vote on a few less-controversial fixes to the Senate’s health-care bill.
Then, under terms of a special rule, such passage would automatically mean that the House “deems” that the entire bill has been approved.
Say what?
Well, Pelosi says, “no one wants to vote for the Senate bill.”
No kidding.
If they did, it would have become law long ago — and now midterm congressional elections are rapidly approaching.
This would seem to be a pretty good argument for scrapping the bill and starting all over again.
Au contraire.
Instead, Pelosi plans to stand the Constitution on its head and ram through legislation that the American people overwhelmingly oppose — and that even members of the president’s own party in Congress don’t want.
But what makes this even more outrageous is that Pelosi and New York Rep. Louise Slaughter, who proposed the idea, know full well just how wrong it is.
Because five years ago, they and a number of Democratic colleagues joined in a lawsuit charging that the use of “deem and pass” by the Republicans was unconstitutional.
True, they lost that case, but on procedural grounds — the courts never ruled on the constitutionality of “deem and pass.” And the Supreme Court ruled in 1998 that each house must pass the exact same text of a bill before it becomes law.
Anyway, “deem and pass” has been used in the past only for routine, non-controversial issues.
Using it to radically overhaul the nation’s entire health-care system — one-sixth of the economy — would be a thumb in the eye to the fundamental principles governing the United States of America.
In practical terms, it most certainly would lead directly to years of litigation over its legality. How that would reduce health-care costs and help the uninsured is a mystery.
Moreover, if the ploy is successful, it won’t be the last time it’s employed. Not by a long shot.
Stumping for ObamaCare in Ohio on Monday, the president declared: “I don’t know about the politics, but I know what’s the right thing to do.”
Tearing a hole in the Constitution is the “right thing to do”?
No, it’s not.