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Home Front: Politix
How much longer until Blanche Lincoln calls it quits, too?
2010-01-09
It may only be a matter of time before Arkansas' Democratic Senator Blanche Lincoln calls it quits. According to Rasmussen's latest poll of Arkansas likely voters, all four potential Republican rivals are trouncing Ms. Lincoln. Two out of five voters say they view her very unfavorably while only 5% say the same about State Senator Gilbert Baker, her best-known GOP challenger, who leads Ms. Lincoln by 51% to 39%.

Ms. Lincoln may have effectively thrown in the towel when she cast her vote clearing the way for passage of ObamaCare in the Senate. Fifty-one percent of Arkansas voters strongly oppose ObamaCare, and 51% consider cost-control the biggest problem with health care. Arkansas voters are no dummies. They realize that ObamaCare won't reduce their health-care costs but would saddle their state with more unfunded mandates. Mr. Baker, playing off the naked political payoffs to other Democratic Senators who voted for ObamaCare, quipped that Ms. Lincoln of had brought home "nothing more than unfunded mandates and government-controlled health care."

Ms. Lincoln's strategy to salvage her electoral bid seems to be capitalizing on voters' anger with fellow Democrat Ben Nelson's sweetheart Medicaid deal for Nebraska. She has publicly called for the political deal to be removed from the final bill and told reporters at a Kiwanis lunch this week that "the people of Arkansas didn't send me to Washington to be a horse trader."

Ms. Lincoln hasn't said whether she will vote for the final bill. However, given that she has fallen in line with the Democratic leadership at every step, she's unlikely to cast the only opposing Democratic vote and kill the bill. Washington is rife with suggestions that the Obama administration should provide jobs for legislators who lose their seats because of ObamaCare. Ms. Lincoln perhaps will be at the head of the line.
Posted by:Fred

#3  She is quoted as saying she like the attention that she was getting, in the fawning over her vote.
From the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette
Several weekends ago, everyone anxiously awaited Lincoln’s vote on the first major health care hurdle for the Senate — the procedural motion to move Majority Leader Harry Reid’s health-care bill to the Senate floor. With 59 votes securely lined up and 60 votes needed, all eyes were on Lincoln as she took to the Senate floor.

“I will vote for cloture on the motion to proceed on this bill,” declared Lincoln, who added, “I will not vote in favor of the proposal that has been introduced by Leader Reid.”

Later, it came out that the drama was all for show. Lincoln intended to vote for the bill all along. Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., almost let the cat out of the bag to reporters the day before the vote. News came later that Lincoln confided to fellow holdout Sen. Mary Landrieu, D-La., on Friday evening that she would vote for the motion but that she wanted to the be the 60th vote.

Why would Lincoln want to be the last holdout before finally giving in? Was this all a carefully timed chess move meant to keep Lt. Gov. Bill Halter from jumping in the Democratic primary race for her Senate seat?

As Lincoln weighed her decision in Washington, Halter was greeting needy Arkansans in Little Rock at a free health clinic while rumors of his Senate candidacy swirled.

By making a deliberate point of being the deciding vote, she took away HalterÂ’s excuse to jump in Â… at least for now.


She's dead, Jim.
Posted by: Sherry   2010-01-09 15:26  

#2  My bet: she stays long enough to pass ObamaCare and then becomes an ambassador somewhere pleasant.
Posted by: Steve White   2010-01-09 15:02  

#1  She is politically dead in Ark already. The only thing to be decided, assuming she falls in line like the servile bitch of the Reid and Pelosi that she is, is the date she officially calls it quit s - either now, or after she is tossed out of office later this year by the voters.
Posted by: OldSpook   2010-01-09 12:11  

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