Health Care

Uh… Ben Nelson Knows We Can See Him, Right?

by Tim Foley

category: Obama And Congress

Published May 29, 2009 @ 03:26PM PT

We live in the Internet Age.  FCC reports can be examined.  Votes can be tracked.  Position statements can be analyzed and reanalyzed, and the intersection of all of the above creates a pattern that can be inferred if not outright documented.  Activists and interest groups know this.  Many elected officials know this.  When is Sen. Ben Nelson (D-NE) going to learn?  Because there’s no way he’d be doing zigzags on health care like this if he was paying attention to the trail he’s leaving.

Nelson prides himself on being one of those “fiscal conservative” Democrats.  He’s in the sliver of the Senate known as the moderates and, as such, wields disproportionate power on the closest of votes.  The most common reaction of moderates when we’re attempting big, transformative change is to find a way to water it down, regardless of need.  Hence the spectacle of the Stimulus bill, when Sens. Nelson, Conrad, Snowe, Collins and others found a way to trim items out of the bill – acting not out of particular economic concerns, but out of a mix of ideology and because, well, they could.  They were the indispensible votes on a close but important piece of legislation.    That made Nelson the center of attention, as he often is.

Well, these days, if you’re the center of attention, you’ve got to watch your caboose.

Nelson made waves by being the first Democrat to come out against the public health insurance option that would compete with private insurance – a central feature of the plans put forward by Barack Obama, Max Baucus, Ted Kennedy and the House of Freakin’ Representatives.  Earlier this month, Ryan Grim reported that Nelson declared he would “be gathering together a coalition of like-minded senators to oppose the plan, the conservative Democrat from Nebraska promised.  [Almost a month] later, it's still a coalition of one.”  He even told Congressional Quarterly the public plan would “be a deal-breaker.”  Seems a little strange, right, especially since many other moderates have been forthcoming with their support.  Enter the folks at Change Congress, the group spearheaded by Lawrence Lessig, who this week launched an ad campaign to demonstrate that Nelson has accepted over $2 million in campaign contributions from the insurance industry since the 1990s.  For the last election cycle alone, that number was $608,709.  Between that and the large number of private insurance companies who make their home in Nebraska – well, things are getting interesting.

Now correlation doesn’t imply causality.  But it does provide color.  You know what else provides color?  The fact that Nelson now says he’s open to the public plan!  Says a Democratic powerbroker emerging from a closed door meeting two days ago, “"He made it clear that he is open to the public option. That's not a line in the sand where he says it must be off the table for him to move forward on health care reform.”  That’s a heck of a reversal, and such timing – immediately after he’s dinged by a very public ad campaign.

Note to Congress:  keep in mind this is the most public and important push to reform our health care system in a generation.  Given the pressures on our families, on our businesses, on our economy and on our state and federal budgets, we cannot afford to fail.  All eyes are on you.  If you’re going to deny the American people our chance to finally get it right, you better watch your caboose.