Wow. Our senior senator is <a
href=”http://www.boston.com/news/local/articles/2005/12/05/kennedy_joins_mass_healthcare_push”>actively
lobbying for significant health care reform on Beacon Hill. That’s
pretty unusual. But it sounds like he’s been very involved:
US Senator Edward M. Kennedy, who rarely gets involved in
debates on
Beacon Hill, has jumped into the battle to expand healthcare coverage
in Massachusetts by phoning legislative leaders, lobbying worried
business owners, and delivering a pep talk to rank-and-file lawmakers.
And apparently he favors aspects of DiMasi’s plan, including qualified
support for the personal mandate and the employer assessment.
Is it good for a senator to get involved in state policy? Knowing TK’s
longtime committment to the issue, which is clearly personal as well as
politically advantageous, I welcome it.
It’s too important to quibble about overstepping bounds. Kennedy has clout and I’m glad he’s using it (judiciously of course).
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I think too that he knows that a MA reform of health care will inform the national debate, just as MA gay marriage has sparked (for better or worse, oftentime worse) debate in the rest of the country.
never hurt’s to have THE Senator on board and helping out. I suspect he’s especially good with the businesses and the rank and file. I’d be interested to know if it was EMK’s idea to get involved, or if DiMasi/Traviligni reached out to him. Either way, it’s good and it complicates things for Romney. He and THE Senator have worked together on state issues in the past (generally of the very trivial sort), but with national ambitions on his mind 24/7, he wouldn’t dare sign a Ted Kennedy endorsed health care bill? would he?
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I can hear Bill Frist tattooing Romney in Iowa now for having signed tax raising, liberal endorsed, health care reform.
I jokingly commented on that back in June. I said at the time that the easiest way to stop Romney in 2008 was to have Ted Kennedy and other Massachusetts liberals say nice things about him now. Perhaps they should do just that once he decides he’s not going to run for reelection. Only a couple more weeks until he’s supposed to announce!
you never know with THE Senator. Then again, I’m still convinced that Romney is merely auditioning to get a VP slot on the “no really, we’re conservatives” ticket with McCain.
Holding my breath til Romney announces. He SAYYYYYS he’s going to within a few weeks.
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He also said he would decide in the fall, and that he was for stem cell research before he was against it.
… and for the record, 12/21 is the last day of the fall. So I guess Mitt’s sticking to his word, for now.
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Interesting how he becomes head of the RGA, only to screw over the RGA by bolting on them and leaving the corner office ripe for the taking. If ANYONE else was RGA Chair they’d be BS at him for holding out this long.