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US: Tea Partiers rally in Washington DC against health care bill

March 17, 2010
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On Tuesday, a Tea Party rally was held in Washington, DC to protest the $875 billion health care bill. Tea Party protests, a series of nationally-coordinated protests across the United States beginning in early 2009, play a key role in opposing the Democratic Party's legislation on radically transforming the health care industry in U.S., which is about 1/6 of the economy.

Activists from across the country rallied outside Democratic congressional offices in Washington and demand meetings with members of Congress, according to Fox News reports. House Democrats received a formal memo from the office of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, listing tips for how targeted representatives should handle the crowds of activists.

"Tens of thousands of conservative and Tea Party activists will be on the Hill as part of what they are dubbing a 'Surge Against Obamacare,'" reads the memo, which also includes a checklist of provisions in the current bill to counter the "caricature of the reform bill presented by right-wing media outlets."

The checklist says: "Reduces the deficit; Cracks down on Medicare waste, fraud, and abuse; Provides historic tax credit for small businesses and individuals to purchase health insurance."

The rally, dubbed the "Code Red Health Care Rally," featured a host of Republican speakers, including Reps. Mike Pence, R-Ind.; Michele Bachmann, R-Minn.; Tom Price, R-Georgia; and Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn.

"Kill the bill," shouted protesters, as a string of Tea Party leaders spoke out against the massive health care overhaul.

Tim Phillips, president of Americans for Prosperity, a conservative political advocacy group, attributes the Tea Party's organized push to kill the legislation as reason for its hold-up.

"I think that the Tea Party movement and activists and rallies like today are the reason this bill isn't already passed," said Phillips, who was a featured speaker at the protest, Fox News writes on its web site. "They're trying to cram this 2,000-page bill down the throat of the American people," Phillips said of the legislation.

Meantime, the Democratic Party leaders are considering the possibility of using the House Rules Committee to avoid an actual vote on the Senate’s bill, according to leadership aides, Politico website writes. They would do this by writing what’s called a “self-executing rule,” meaning the Senate bill would be attached to a package of fixes being negotiated between the two chambers — without an actual vote on the Senate’s legislation. Under this scenario, the Senate bill would be automatically attached to the reconciliation package, if the House passes reconciliation. In other words, Bill A would just become part of Bill B if the House passes Bill B, and the Senate could then vote on a reconciliation package before sending it to the president. This allows House members to approve the broader measure without actually voting on it. This would allow them to deal with the Senate bill without forcing their members to go on record in support of unpopular items, like the now-infamous Cornhusker Kickback or the so-called Louisiana Purchase, that could be used against them on the campaign trail in the fall, according to Politico.com.

But the pressure to pass the bill in an yes and no vote is huge and the Speaker Nancy Pelosi is working hard to get enough votes to pass the controversial bill.

Laura Ingraham, a conservative radio talk show host, said on Wednesday at the Fox and Friends morning program that she agrees with the estimates that the Democratic Party has only 211 votes for passing the health care bill versus 220 votes either who already said that would not for the bill or are not decided (this include all the members of the Republican Party members and some so-called “blue-dog-Democrats,” fiscal conservatives from the party in power. 216 votes are needed to pass the bill.

On Tuesday, the U.S. Congress telephone system was shot down due to an avalanche of phone calls from people. One of the reason for it was the appeal of America's most influential conservative, Rush Limbaugh, a radio talk show host with an estimated number of listeners of 21 million per week. Here is an excerpt from the transcript of what Limbaugh said on March 16 on his program, aired from 12PM to 3PM EST: "Folks, you know, I very seldom -- as you well know for 21 years -- encourage phone calls and e-mails and letters to members of Congress. The reason that I don't do it is that I never want the charge to be leveled that whatever response you gave was not genuine, that you had been talked into it or motivated and inspired or manipulated into doing it. I think it is pedal-to-the-metal time, and even if you have been e-mailing and faxing and calling, I think it's time to intensify it. You call the local offices. You call the Washington office of these people, the Democrats and so forth. The Republicans are like Martians: They can't stop this. The Martians couldn't stop it, the Republicans can't stop it. Not with votes. They don't have the votes to stop it, but you can."

Limbaugh urged voters to visit a Republican website's "Code red" page where all undecided members of Congress are listed, calling their Washington offices as well, directly in their home districts.

See related story: March 20: Tea Partiers gather in Washington in opposition of health care bill

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