Scott Ott's Examiner Scrappleface: Reid to print health bill on back of donor checks
By: Scott Ott
Examiner Columnist
October 9, 2009
News fairly unbalanced. We report. You decipher.
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid has seized upon a new strategy for passing the increasingly unpopular health care reform bill, including a public option, according to an unnamed source close to Reid.
Pundits and politicians have speculated that Reid would seek to pass "empty shell" legislation to dodge a filibuster, and then amend the "vapor bill" to include the public option health insurance plan, because amendment approval needs only a simple majority.
However, the anonymous source said today that Reid actually plans to print 100 campaign contribution checks, $250,000 for each senator, with the Democrat health care reform bill text on the back of each check in three-point Helvetica type printed with black light ink.
Once a senator endorses the check to deposit or cash it, he has voted 'Yes' on health care reform. The tactic has been used by marketers for years to induce unwitting customers to subscribe to services, but experts say this is the first known legislative application of the technique.
The source said that if Reid's latest effort to ramrod the unpopular concept of government-run health care through the Senate fails, he still has more options.
"Harry is fully prepared to line the halls of the Senate office building with public school children," he said. "Each kid will have a large photo of a senator, with the legislation superimposed on the image itself in invisible ink. The students will then converge on each senator asking for an autograph."
The Majority Leader's office refused to comment, noting only that Reid will do "whatever it takes to give the public what they should want whether they do or not."
Examiner columnist Scott Ott is editor in chief of ScrappleFace.com, the world's leading family-friendly news satire source.
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