Posted by
Defend America on Monday, March 22, 2010 10:35:24 PM
Senate Democrats get favorable ruling
By MANU RAJU |
3/22/10 10:26 PM EDT
A ruling by Senate parliamentarian Alan Frumin handed Democrats a
major victory Monday night, beating back a GOP push to declare a key
tax proposal in the health care bill out of order.
After hearing arguments on both sides, Frumin said that Democratic
plans to push back an excise tax on so-called Cadillac insurance plans
until 2018 was within the purview of budget rules allowable under the
filibuster-proof reconciliation process. The GOP had challenged the
language on the grounds that it violated a 1974 budget law because of
its impact on the Social Security statute, and was thus subject to a
point of order that would doom the bill in the Senate.
Now Republicans say there are a series of other challenges they plan to
levy against the bill in the coming days, and believe there is still a
chance to knock out the Cadillac tax by arguing it violates the
so-called Byrd rule, named after Sen. Robert Byrd (D-W.Va.), which
states that extraneous provisions not related to the budget can be
stripped from reconciliation packages. Frumin has not yet ruled on that
objection.
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0310/34840.html