Early on Thursday morning, in a 51-48 vote, the Senate took the first concrete step toward dismantling Obamacare, when it voted to instruct key committees to draft legislation repealing Barack Obama's signature health insurance program. Republicans needed a simple majority to clear the repeal rules, instructing committees to begin drafting repeal legislation, through the upper chamber, with the vote falling largely along party lines.
Rand Paul was the lone Republican to vote against the budget resolution because it didn’t balance. Paul said in a statement after the vote that while he supports nixing ObamaCare "putting nearly $10 trillion more in debt on the American people’s backs through a budget that never balances is not the way to get there."
Meanwhile, no Democrat supported the repeal rules. Instead, Democrats rose one by one from their seats on the Senate floor in protest to state why they were voting against the resolution. In dramatic fashion, Bernie Sanders warned that if the GOP resolution moved forward Americans would die.
"Up to 30 million Americans will lose their health care with many thousands dying as a result," he said. "Because when you have no health insurance and you can't go to a doctor or a hospital, you die."
Sanders also mocked the Republican effort saying the GOP have never united around an alternative to Obamacare. "They want to kill ACA but they have no idea how they are going to bring forth a substitute proposal," declared Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont.
Dianne Feinstein who had surgery to install a pacemaker, missed the hours-long "vote-a-rama" session that began Wednesday evening. Lawmakers were able to use the hours-long voting block to force a vote on any amendment to the budget resolution. Some 180 amendments were filed.
(Excerpt) Read more at zerohedge.com ...
