Single Payer Health Care Related Links


The Hill

July 31, 2009

Liberals will get single-payer vote on House floor

By Mike Soraghan

 

Seeking to dampen liberal anger about deals cut with centrists, Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) said House leaders have agreed to allow a floor vote on a government-run, single-payer system.

 

"A lot of members on our committee want a vote on that," said Waxman said in an interview. "I believe their wishes will be accommodated."

 

Rep. Anthony Weiner (D-N.Y.) offered a single-payer amendment in the Energy and Commerce Committee on Friday, but withdrew it after Waxman said House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) had promised a floor vote. 

 

http://thehill.com/leading-the-news/liberals-will-get-single-payer-vote-on-house-floor-2009-07-31.html

 

The Weiner single payer amendment:

http://energycommerce.house.gov/Press_111/20090731/hr3200_weiner_1.pdf

 

 

Comment:  Call out the troops. We have work to do!   Dr. Don McCanne


How single payer came back on the table

by Michael Munk
Sat, Aug 1, 2009

http://www.michaelmunk.com/Archive_national.htm

As it looks to me, here's a brief summary of the politics that led to the promised House vote on 676 next month. Waxman's Energy & Commerce committee was the scene of the showdown.

The seven Blue Dog Democrats on the committee had held up reform for the past several weeks. With a push from Obama whip Emanuel (enabler of many of the Dogs in the last congressional campaign) Waxman struck a deal with four of them --their leader Mike Ross (ARK), Bart Gordon (TN), Baron Hill (IN) and Zack Space (OH). In return for their votes, the deal would (1) delay the full House vote past August, (2) weaken the bill's public health care option and (3) cut $100 billion from health care spending over 10 years, much of it from insurance premium subsidies to uninsured middle income families.

Those outrageous concessions finally produced some outrage from House progressives, 57 of whom signed a letter to House leadership threatening to vote against a weak bill. In response, Waxman renegotiated his deal on behalf of Obama with his committee's Blue Dogs and progressives that would (1) delink the public option from Medicare and force it to negotiate its own reimbursement rates, (2) restore the middle-income subsidies by shifting funds from existing federal health care programs and (3) reduce the limit of premiums for the uninsured from 12% to 11% of a household's annual income.

But now Waxman faced another challenge from the Left. Rep. Anthony Weiner (D-N.Y.) proposed a single payer amendment that would have forced every member of the committee to vote it up or down--a possible embarrassment to progressive members (including Waxman who was a co-signer of 676 last year but took his name off this year). With the support of Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.), Mike Doyle (D-Penn.), Bobby Rush (D-Ill.), Jan Schakowsky (D-Ill.) and Peter Welch (D-Vt.), Weiner offered to withdraw his amendment IF Pelosi promised to bring 676 to a floor debate and vote. She agreed and Waxman and Weiner sealed the committee vote at 31-28.

In that vote, only three of the original Blue Dogs (Jim Matheson of Utah, Charlie Melancon of Louisiana and Bart Stupak of Michigan) and two other Democrats (John Barrow of Georgia and Rick Boucher of Virginia) held out and joined every Republican to vote no. The four other Blue Dogs honored their deal with Waxman and voted with their party.

No one expects 676 to win in September, but it will be a significant test of strength between the progressives and their opponents in the Democratic party. No Democrat will have anything to lose by supporting it--they can tell their constituents they supported single payer in a losing effort and went on to pass whatever the Rules Committee will decide will be the final version of the Obama bill in the House (which evidently will be heavily influenced by the Senate's version.

I confess I am not completely clear on how "robust" the public option is in Waxman's bill is, but the opportunity to watch House Democrats stand up and be counted on single payer 676 is a worthwhile achievement.


House panel OKs healthcare bill, setting stage for fall vote   Thanks to Toni Rizzo

No Republicans on the committee vote for the plan. Democrats will pitch the plan nationally over the August recess.

By Janet Hook   August 1 2009

Reporting from Washington -- President Obama's ambitious plan to overhaul the nation's healthcare system got a major boost when a pivotal House committee passed a compromise bill Friday night, clearing the way for a floor vote this fall.

The complete article can be viewed at:
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/la-na-healthcare-house1-2009aug01,0,2500915.story

Visit chicagotribune.com at http://www.chicagotribune.com


Three blue Dogs (Barrow, Matheson and Melancon) and Rick Boucher from swVirginia coalman and Bart Stupak of MI, a C street renter, Law Enforcement Caucus, prolife Democrat went over to the GOPers in a committee with 36 Dems and 23 Repubs

Dems win approval of health bill in committee

By DAVID ESPO and ERICA WERNER, Associated Press Writers David Espo And Erica Werner, Associated Press Writers – 13 mins ago

WASHINGTON – In a triumph for President Barack Obama, Democrats narrowly pushed sweeping health care legislation through a key congressional committee Friday night and cleared the way for a September showdown in the House.
The 31-28 vote in the House Energy and Commerce Committee, along party lines, was weeks later than either the White House or Democratic leaders had hoped.
As part of a last-minute series of changes, the committee agreed to cap increases in the cost of insurance sold under the bill, and also to give the federal government authority to negotiate directly with drug companies for lower prices under Medicare.
The new provisions were part of an intensive effort Democrats made in recent days to satisfy the conflicting demands of liberals and conservatives on the panel, unity necessary to overcome a solid wall of Republican opposition.
"We have agreed we need to pull together," said Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., the committee chairman who presided over hours of private negotiations and public committee meetings. Five Democrats opposed the bill.
The measure is designed to extend health insurance to millions who now lack it, at the same time it strives to slow the growth in medical costs nationwide — Obama's twin goals.
While the pace of action was slower than party leaders had hoped, it was speedier by far than the timetable in the Senate.
There, Democrats said a deadline of Sept. 15 had been imposed on marathon talks aimed at producing a bipartisan compromise. Several officials said Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., had informed fellow senators he intends to convene his Finance Committee to begin voting by then.
Without a bipartisan bill, Baucus would presumably have to produce a measure tailored to Democratic specifications, a step he has said repeatedly he would rather avoid. It wasn't clear how much the deadline was Baucus' idea, and how much it reflected growing impatience at the White House and on the part of Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada.
The Energy and Commerce Committee was the third of three House panels to act on the legislation, a measure that numerous lawmakers note would rearrange one-sixth of the nation's economy. A vote in the full House is expected in September, after lawmakers return from a monthlong vacation.
In the run-up to final approval, the panel handed the drug industry a victory, voting 47-11 to grant 12 years of market protection to high-tech drugs used to combat cancer, Parkinson's and other deadly diseases. The decision was a setback for the White House, which had hoped to give patients faster access to generic versions of costly biotech medicines like the blockbuster cancer drug Avastin.
Democrats also turned back a Republican bid to strip out a provision allowing the government to sell insurance in competition with private industry. The vote was 31-28, reflecting the shaky majority Democrats had on a 59 committee they nominally controlled with 36 members.
The Democrats who opposed the final bill were Reps. John Barrow of
Georgia; Rick Boucher of Virginia; Jim Matheson of Utah; Charlie Melancon of Louisiana and Bart Stupak of Michigan.
Under the bill, insurance companies would be required to sell coverage to all seeking it, without exclusions for pre-existing medical conditions. The federal government would provide subsidies for lower-income families to help them afford policies that would otherwise be out of their reach.
The bills would set up so-called exchanges, in effect national marketplaces where consumers both with and without subsidies could evaluate different policies and choose the one they wanted.
The main expansion of coverage would not come until 2013 — after the next presidential election.
Even so, the political stakes are enormous for Obama and the Democrats as they strive to pass legislation that has proven elusive for years. Republicans are overwhelmingly opposed to the approach they chose, and outside groups on both sides of the issue arranged a heavy dose of television advertising over August.
"Let me assure you: There will be a health care reform bill passed and it will make a big difference in the lives of the American people," Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., said in an interview.
But the House Republican Leader, John Boehner of
Ohio, countered that "Democrats are in for a long, hot summer once they return to their congressional districts, where Americans are lining up in opposition to a government takeover of health care. "
On a vote that crossed party lines, abortion opponents failed in an attempt to bar insurance plans that offer abortion services from accepting customers with government subsidies. The vote was 31-27.
On Thursday night, the panel agreed on a provision saying the government could neither require nor prohibit abortion services in insurance plans sold in the exchange.
Waxman's announcement of a series of last-minute changes capped a tumultuous period that began more than two weeks ago when conservative and moderate Democrats on the panel sought changes.
Needing their votes, Waxman began negotiations that grew to include Pelosi and White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel. An agreement at midweek excluded more businesses from a requirement to offer insurance to their workers and reduced subsidies for lower-income uninsured.
It also swiftly triggered a counter-revolt among liberals, who demanded the subsidies be restored in full.
The final deal accommodated them without sacrificing the concessions made earlier to the conservatives, and included numerous other provisions.
Insurance plans sold in the exchange would need government approval before increasing premiums by more than one and half times medical inflation. The Bureau of Labor Statistics calculated that medical prices rose at an annual rate of 3.6 percent annually for the three months ending in June.
The provision giving the federal government the right to negotiate for better drug prices under Medicare has long been a goal of Democrats who say it could lower costs for seniors. Critics argue that is unlikely unless Congress also limits the drugs than can be sold, thereby giving the government the ability to play one company off against another.
That has long been viewed as politically unfeasible under Medicare, because it would limit the choice that seniors now enjoy.
But including restrictions in the government health insurance option would place it in line with Medicaid, the government program for the poor, as well as the Department of Veterans Affairs and many private plans that limit drug choice.


Read Krugman, Conyers responses - Single payer or nothing!  Nothing is what we will get if we don't get single payer, is their basic conclusion. Meanwhile, if you look at what the Blue Dogs forced, it is just percentages of already unacceptab le approaches (low and moderate income people will have to pay 12, instead of 11 percent.  What if we made the public option a check off that put you upon request on medicar,cal and took a standardized health tax out of your payroll?  I'm trying to think inside thi9s thing!!!

House Democrats End Impasse on Health Bill

By ROBERT PEAR and DAVID M. HERSZENHORN

Published: July 29, 2009

WASHINGTON — Efforts to pass sweeping health care legislation took a big step forward on Wednesday as House Democratic leaders reached an agreement with fiscally conservative party members that would cut the bill’s cost and exempt many small businesses from having to provide health benefits to workers.

Representative Henry A. Waxman of California, second from right, chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, reached agreement on Wednesday with four of seven conservative Democrats on how to lower costs of the health care bill.

The agreement, brokered by aides to President Obama, overcame a 10-day impasse and would allow a pivotal House committee to resume work on the bill, with an expectation that the panel could approve it later this week.
Under the deal, the Democratic leaders promised to defer a vote by the full House until September, so lawmakers could test public sentiment on the measure, which could fundamentally restructure one-sixth of the nation’s economy.
Elements of the agreement reflect priorities shared by centrist members of both parties who have been trying for months to forge a compromise in the Senate Finance Committee.
Under the House agreement, the federal government would still establish a public insurance plan to compete with private insurers, but the public plan would not use Medicare fee schedules to pay doctors and hospitals, as envisioned in the original House bill. Instead, the public plan would negotiate rates with health care providers, as private insurers often do.
Representative Mike Ross of
Arkansas, the chief negotiator for the fiscally conservative Democrats known as Blue Dogs, said the changes were “a huge win for us.”
Blue Dogs said the change reduced the likelihood that the government plan would compete unfairly with private insurers by forcing doctors and hospitals to accept below-market rates. As part of the deal, states could, in addition, set up nonprofit cooperatives to offer coverage to individuals, families and small businesses. The Senate Finance Committee is coalescing around a similar idea, as an alternative to a government-run insurance plan, but it was not in the original House bill.
“We have cut the cost of the bill substantially,” Mr. Ross said. “We have delayed a floor vote until September. We have protected small business.”
But some of the concessions to Blue Dogs set off a revolt among members of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, who said they feared that the public insurance plan was being weakened.
“We do not support this,” said Representative Lynn Woolsey, Democrat of California, co-chairwoman of the progressive caucus. “It’s a nonstarter.”
In the Senate, negotiations in the Finance Committee were also moving forward — to such a degree that Senate Republican leaders became worried that a deal might be near. One Republican negotiator, Senator Michael B. Enzi of
Wyoming, tried to quash that idea, saying the group was “nowhere near a deal.”
“I don’t see a way that we can finish before the recess,” Mr. Enzi said — just 24 hours after the Senate Democratic leader, Harry Reid of
Nevada, had said he expected the committee to approve a bill next week.
The Energy and Commerce Committee, the third of three House panels to take up the legislation, was to resume work on Thursday.
As he traveled to
Raleigh, N.C., and Bristol, Va., Mr. Obama welcomed the agreement. “I’m especially grateful that so many members, including some Blue Dogs on the Energy and Commerce Committee, are working so hard to find common ground,” he said. “Those efforts are extraordinarily constructive in strengthening this legislation and bringing down its cost.”
The president’s travels on Wednesday were part of a White House sales pitch, as officials have been fretting that the script has been hijacked by critics who say that some of his proposals could hurt Americans who already have health insurance.
“These folks need to stop scaring everybody,” Mr. Obama said.
After marathon negotiations, four of seven Blue Dog holdouts on the Energy and Commerce Committee reached the agreement with the chairman of the panel, Representative Henry A. Waxman, Democrat of California.
The Congressional Budget Office said the bill would ultimately provide coverage to most people who are uninsured. Mr. Ross said the Blue Dogs had won concessions that should bring the 10-year cost below $1 trillion, a goal shared by the Senate Finance Committee.
Senator Max Baucus, the Montana Democrat who is chairman of the committee, said the latest estimates from the budget office indicated that his bill would cost “under $900 billion.”
The House negotiators, including Mr. Ross and aides to Mr. Waxman, said they had agreed to make these changes in the bill:
Most employers would still be required to provide health insurance to workers or pay a new federal tax, but more small businesses could qualify for the exemption, which would be available to businesses with annual payrolls of $500,000 or less, compared with a threshold of $250,000 in the original House bill. The maximum tax rate, 8 percent of wages, would apply to employers with payrolls exceeding $750,000, rather than the original threshold of $400,000.
Medicaid would be expanded, as under the original bill, but states would pay a small share of the additional costs, perhaps 7 percent. The federal government would have paid all the additional cost under the original bill.
People with low or moderate incomes could still get federal subsidies to help them buy insurance, but they might have to spend slightly more of their own income — a maximum of 12 percent, rather than 11 percent.
Representative Earl Pomeroy, a Blue Dog from
North Dakota, voted against the bill in the Ways and Means Committee on July 17 but said Wednesday that he could support the revised bill.
He said he was pleased that the bill would exempt more of the smallest employers, and that the public plan would not use Medicare payment rates, which are low in
North Dakota.
Mr. Ross gave few details about the new provisions to control costs, other than to say that the government would spend less on subsidies and Medicare would save money by linking hospital payments to the quality of care provided, under a new system of “value-based purchasing.”


Vulnerable Pups  by digby

I just watched yet another one of those stories about the poor Blue Dogs who simply have to vote against health care because the upstanding Real Americans in their district just won't stand for all these liberal elites socializin' our excellent health care system. This CNN piece with John King was filmed in bucolic
Idaho where the surrounding countryside is breathtakingly gorgeous and the food looks amazing. It is the perfect picture of Real Murika. As required by law, much of it was filmed in a breakfast diner and featured tables full of salt 'o the earth middle aged white people saying adorable things like, "I voted for Reagan even though he was too liberal." The rare Democrat defending the congressman takes a position of quiet subservience, agreeing that those liberals in San Francisco and New York don't know diddly about diddly.

Certainly, these places really are incredibly beautiful and the people who live there are as American as apple pie. But so is
San Francisco and the residents who live there are as American as Cioppinno. The idea that these folks in the diner are some sort of perfect representation of the average American is a fantasy cooked up about 80 years ago by the immigrants who created the movie myth of middle America. Whether of not John King meant it that way or not, by framing his story the way he did, he perpetuated this narrow view of the average All American small town man and woman.

Even worse, the idea that the Blue Dogs are in particular danger of losing their seats is not necessarily correct. Michael Tomasky looked into it recently:

So what I'm trying to get at here is: how vulnerable, really, are some of these Blue Dogs? To hear them talk sometimes, you'd think if they depart one iota from a basically conservative agenda, the voters will toss them out. I'm not insensitive to that prospect. As we will see, some Blue Dogs have very legitimate concerns. And obviously, one who represents a mostly rural district can't establish a pattern of voting like Maxine Waters. Everybody gets this.

But a lot of them play that violin way too often, confident that big-city reporters in
Washington and New York will just accept that their district is full of reactionaries and that they have to pander to that reaction constantly to stay in office. So I went to the numbers to try to gauge how vulnerable they really are.


As you may have guessed he determined that, for the most part, they aren't very vulnerable at all:

You'll notice, if you're familiar with the current debates and with some of these people, the interesting fact that some of the more vocal Blue Dogs are among those with the most comfortable margins. As I noted in a post the other day, Mike Ross of Arkansas is a leading healthcare Blue Dog. His MVM is a gaudy +67. Collin Peterson of Minnesota, who helped weaken the cap and trade bill, has an MVM of +41.

You will also notice if you really study this list that McCain won many of these districts rather narrowly. In fact, he won 24 of them by 10 points or fewer. This hardly makes these districts scarlet red.

You can see also how many of these members either run unopposed or face only token opposition in these red districts. Many of them are long-time incumbents and fixtures. Even some with only modestly positive MVM figures are solid incumbents, as you can tell by looking at their margins: Gene Taylor (number 24 on the list, +50), Ike Skelton (number 31, +32), Dan Boren (number 32, +40).

My conclusion? Yes, some Democrats have to be very careful and not be seen as casting a liberal vote. But they're a comparatively small number. A very clear majority of these people have won by large enough margins that it sure seems to me they could survive one controversial vote if they some backbone into it.

But many of these folks manage to sell this story line to
Washington reporters who've never been to these exurban and rural districts and can be made to believe the worst caricatures. I say many of these Democrats are safer than they contend. People need to start challenging them on this.


I agree. But it probably wouldn't change anything because these people actually are conservatives who believe in the things they are doing. Their "vulnerability" is simply the excuse they use to collect money and power within the Democratic Party. In fact, they are Trojan horses, operating inside the Big Tent to carry out conservative goals no matter which party is in charge. And the party leadership surely knows this and allows it to continue for reasons of their own.

The media, on the other hand, keeps up the mythmaking because it's a fun story that allows them to continue the lazy pretense that the world is constructed like a TV sit-com. And that's probably an even bigger problem than the Blue Dogs being Blue Dogs.




Excellent sociological/spiritual background & reference-

Michael Lerner - Obama Health Care Shoulds

http://www.tikkun.org/article.php?story=20090723205552487


Bait and Switch - How "public option" was sold.  Must read for everyone who cares

http://www.pnhp.org/blog/2009/07/20/bait-and-switch-how-the-“public-option”-was-sold/


Norman Solomon | Spinning Health Care
http://www.truthout.org/072309R?n
Norman Solomon, Truthout: "'I want to cover everybody,' President Obama said at his news conference Wednesday night. 'Now, the truth is that unless you have a - what's called a single-payer system, in which everybody's automatically covered, then you're probably not going to reach every single individual ...' The same conventional wisdom keeping single payer off Washington's table has been spinning for various 'reform' plans with such accelerated RPMs that at this point the nation's 'health care debate' is suffering from a severe case of vertigo."


Marc Ash | Why Health Care Isn't Going Away
http://www.truthout.org/073009R?n
Marc Ash, Truthout: "Watching the Dixiecrats supposedly impose fiscal responsibility on the 'unrealistic liberals,' who, in theory, would go off and provide health care to all Americans if someone didn't put a stop to them, you have to wonder if this isn't all for show."


Pelosi: House Democrats Have the Votes on Health Care  Tnx Janie Shephard
http://www.truthout.org/072309A?n
David Espo, The Associated Press: "Democrats command the votes needed to pass a sweeping health care bill through the House, Speaker Nancy Pelosi said Wednesday, an unexpected statement that quickly drew a biting response from conservative members of the party's rank-and-file demanding changes in President Barack Obama's trademark legislation."


http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/2009/07/house-talks-break-down--will-waxman-steam-roll-blue-dogs.php?ref=fpb

House Talks Break Down--Will Waxman Steam Roll Blue Dogs?

By Brian Beutler - July 24, 2009, 2:53PM

Just about an hour ago, negotiations between Blue Dogs on the House Energy and Commerce Committee, and chairman Henry Waxman broke down, perhaps irreconcilably.


Beth Cardosi | Single-Payer System Cuts Barriers to Care
http://www.truthout.org/073009V?n
Beth Cardosi, The Sun News: "I'm a physician in South Carolina. I have firsthand experience regarding our broken, wasteful health care system. On a daily basis I care for the uninsured who have no jobs (often because of layoffs or illness) and have no money or access to health care providers. These people often come to the emergency departments with minor issues that could be handled simply as an outpatient if there were a place for them to be treated, or they are seen with life-threatening illnesses because they couldn't receive the proper treatment for their chronic illness (i.e. high blood pressure and diabetes) or couldn't receive preventive care and now have untreatable cancer. These people show up where the care is the most expensive because they won't get turned away."


Roger J. Newell | American Health Care: View From Expatriate Who Came Home
http://www.truthout.org/072209V?n
Roger J. Newell, The Oregonian: "As the health care reform debate revs up, the vested interests in the status quo warn against any alterations that might damage 'the world's best health care system.' In the 1980's I was a temporary resident in Great Britain, first as a graduate student, later as a pastor."


New Rule: Not Everything in America Has to Make a Profit   by Bill Maher  

How about this for a New Rule: Not everything in America has to make a profit. It used to be that there were some services and institutions so vital to our nation that they were exempt from market pressures. Some things we just didn't do for money. The United States always defined capitalism, but it didn't used to define us. But now it's becoming all that we are.


Dean Baker | Good Medicine: Why Not for Everyone?
http://www.truthout.org/072709A?n
Dean Baker, Truthout: "As part of his health care package, President Obama proposed creating an independent commission of medical experts that would determine the medical procedures for which Medicare will pay.... President Obama describes this as promoting good medicine. He has a case, but there is one problem with this picture. If the plan is to promote good medicine, why are we just doing it for the elderly receiving Medicare? Why don't we want good medicine for everyone?"


Nine More Go to Jail for Single Payer
http://www.truthout.org/072909B?n
David Swanson, After Downing Street: "Following a pattern of civil resistance in Washington D.C. and around the country, citizens in Des Moines Iowa on Monday risked arrest to press for the creation of single-payer healthcare, the establishment of healthcare as a human right, and an end to the deadly practices of Iowa's largest health insurance company, Wellmark Blue Cross Blue Shield."


Dear BC --


Using his line-item veto power, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger just made $489 million in NEW cuts to California's budget. Together, we can stop him and save lives -- but we don't have much time.

These new budget cuts will hurt people. These cuts may even kill people.

Even worse, these cuts are in addition to the devastating cuts included in the budget agreement passed by the legislature last week. Below are just a few of the horrific details. Arnold's new budget cuts will:

  • Cut HIV/AIDS services by at least $52 million
  • Eliminate $178 million for services that provide children with health care
  • Reduce support to domestic violence victim services by $16 million

This doesn't have to happen. The state legislature has the power to override these vetoes and save these vital services that Gov. Schwarzenegger is trying to destroy.

First, Assembly Speaker Karen Bass and Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg need to call legislators back to Sacramento for a special session to override the Governor's horrific vetoes. But, quite honestly, the chances of this happening are small unless Californians demand it.

To stop these cuts before they take effect, we have to act now. That's why we need you to contact Speaker Bass and Senate President Pro Tem Steinberg right now and ask them to call legislators back to Sacramento for a veto override session. Just click here to make your voice heard ASAP:

http://www.couragecampaign.org/OverrideTheCuts

After hearing the news, State Senator Mark Leno told the media that "my colleagues and I will fight these devastating cuts with everything we have."

Bass, Steinberg and Leno are claiming that the vetoes are illegal and plan to go to court to stop the cuts from taking place.

We applaud this action, but we don't have to wait for the courts to rule. The Legislature can stop these cuts by overriding the vetoes right now. It's time for Californians to stand up and insist that our legislators take immediate action and pledge to reverse Gov. Schwarzenegger's new budget cuts.

Time is short. You can try to stop these devastating new cuts by calling on Speaker Bass and Senate President Pro Tem Steinberg right now to override the Gov. Schwarzenegger's line-item vetoes. Just click here to make your voice heard today:

http://www.couragecampaign.org/OverrideTheCuts