The Politics of the Thing

Next Tuesday, Massachusetts elects a new Senator, and the polls indicate that it will be close.  If Scott Brown wins, he won't be voting for the Senate version of the health care bill that the Senator currently in the seat, Paul Kirk, voted for.  The other candidate, Martha Coakley, supports the current version of the bill. This is very much a Democrats versus Republicans situation, complicated as always by the ins and outs of Massachusetts politics.  But the uncertainty has got the legislators responsible for the current version of the health care reform bill quite nervous.

And other compromises put together to get that bill in the first place remain shaky, or are already unraveling.  It's likely to be a difficult weekend for legislators on Capitol Hill.