July 23rd, 2009:

via Blue Dog Coalition.
via Blue Dogs Fill Their Bowls with Cash.

The fiscally conservative Democratic Blue Dog Coalition was formed in 1995 with the goal of representing the center of the House of Representatives and appealing to the mainstream values of the American public. The Blue Dogs are dedicated to a core set of beliefs that transcend partisan politics, including a deep commitment to the financial stability and national security of the United States. Currently there are 51 members of the Blue Dog Coalition. Click here to learn more…

The Blue Dog Coalition is a fiscally and socially conservative group of center-right Democrats formed recently, 1995 to be exact, as a backlash to the Republican sweep of  the House of Representatives in 1994, called the “Republican Revolution”. The original 23 members formed the Blue Dog Coalition because they were upset about the direction that the party was moving in the House. The Blue Dogs blamed the progressive caucus, and their liberal agenda, for loosing the majority in 1994. The term “Blue Dog” comes from the view that they are “Yellow Dog Democrats choked blue by liberals”.

Liberals took a beating that year in part because of President Clinton’s philosophy that in order to win elections Democrats must move to the right and talk more like Republicans. That type of thinking is still wafting through the halls of Congress today. What Democrats really need to do is to talk more like Democrats.

Today the conservative Blue Dog’s numbers have grown to 52 members. This group is large enough to be a serious player in either making or breaking President Obama’s agenda as evidenced this week by being invited to the White House to meet with the President and discuss the forward motion of health care reform. If this coalition votes as a single bloc for the type of health reform that the country disparately needs and the President desires, then the legislation will clear the House. This is the nexus that the Blue Dogs have created. If they vote as a bloc for another, lesser version, something else, then the likelihood of the House passing a public option is very slim.

Representative Mike Ross (D-AR), Chairman of the Blue Dog Health Care Task Force, issued a statement on July 7th (PDF) unifying the Blue Dog’s stance in favor of a “public option trigger” plan. The plan would not instate a public option into law unless the compromises with the insurance companies failed.

Washington, DC – Today (July 7, 2009), Representative Mike Ross (D-AR), Chairman of the Blue Dog Health Care Task Force, issued the following statement as lawmakers in both the House and Senate continue to push forward with negotiations on health care reform legislation.

“As Blue Dogs, we agree that injecting stiff competition in the marketplace is critical to the success of health care reform and should be a top goal of lawmakers as legislation makes its way through both the House and Senate.

“A proven effective method of increasing competition and choice in the marketplace is to require that private industry adopt reforms in order to meet specific availability and cost targets. Failure to meet these goals would then trigger a public option that would compete on a level playing field, filling the void in the absence of adequate competition.

“The Blue Dogs share the President’s goal of reforming the health care system to bring down costs and provide more choices, and we are encouraged by the Administration’s willingness to remain open to a number of different options for accomplishing these goals. We also agree that increasing competition and choice in the marketplace is non-negotiable, and we look forward to working with our colleagues in both the House and Senate to write a bill that can pass both chambers.”

The Blue Dogs have enough clout to get this passed, no matter how appeasing it may seem. Insurance companies are going to hit this naughty “trigger” point over and over without any consequence, and then Congress will have to take up this matter anew only this time there will have been enough time elapsed for the Republicans to mount asufficient counter strategy to kill the public option altogther. The “public option trigger” is just another way to delay and then kill the public option. But the Blue Dogs have enough clout to get this out of the House, so be warned, we will be hearing more about this.