If you’ve convinced the AMA to run ads against you, you’ve really done something wrong.
The American Medical Association is hardly some partisan hack group. But both Bob Corker and Lamar! Alexander have succeeded in pissing them off. Now attack ads are running against both of them right here in Tennessee.
Calling it a “critical vote” and "devestating" to doctors, the AMA begged Corker and Alexander to block pay cuts to physicians who care for Medicare patients, including the elderly and military families. Instead, Corker and Alexander joined a partisan filibuster to prevent the Senate from taking any action.
That filibuster succeeded by a single vote.* If either one of them had the courage to support the American people over the Republican party, the Bill would have passed.
Maybe the AMA is wrong, you ask? Maybe Corker and Alexander were right?
Then why did the same Bill pass by UNANIMOUS CONSENT last year? And why is the White House performing all sorts of bizarre accounting tricks to buy the Senate more time to get this Bill passed?
(Even President Bush is fighting to block these pay cuts! Why aren’t Corker and Alexander?)
There is no reason to change your mind and filibuster the Bill this year unless you are suddenly willing to screw over Tennessee’s doctors and families just for the opportunity to screw over Democrats in the process.
Senators Corker and Alexander have made their choice. Tennesseans should remember that when will make theirs at the ballot box.
- Calvin Rye
*Why a single vote? Because the GOP had to let as many endangered Republicans as possible vote for the bill. All the GOP Senators who voted with the AMA and the American people are up for election this year in tight races. That alone should tell you how much this filibuster was all about politics and nothing about doing the right thing.
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