(via @seanhackbarth) For the very commonsense reason that you can’t trust the people who would be pulling the trigger. No, really: that’s what she said.

A moderate Republican who has previously broken with her party to support President Obama’s $787 billion stimulus bill said Sunday that she does not support the idea of using a so called “trigger” on the public health insurance option as part of health care reform legislation.

Asked on CNN’s State of the Union if the use of the trigger would make inclusion of the public option more acceptable, Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, unequivocally replied “no.”

“The problem with trigger is it just delays the public option,” Collins told CNN Chief National Correspondent John King, “because the people who are going to be making the determination about whether the market is competitive enough, want the public option.”

Note that this doesn’t mean that Sen. Olympia Snowe is going to take the same position (although it doesn’t mean that she’ll be taking a different one, either); but Sen. Collins’ position on this does make it clear that the ‘public trigger’ scenario for a government option in health care is not actually bipartisan. Please also note that Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D, NH) apparently needed only eight months as a Senator to forget how to answer straightforward questions in a straightforward manner:

New Hampshire Democrat Sen. Jeanne Shaheen refused to answer directly when asked whether Collins’ position indicated that President Obama should either not fight for inclusion of the public option in the final bill or, alternatively, pursue a legislative strategy that relied solely on Democratic votes for health care reform.

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Hey, who here thinks that the Nation, ThinkProgress, Washington Monthly, Firedoglake, and the rest of the Journolist stenographers are going to reference this?

(For those who can’t see it: it shows Democratic Senator Chuck Schumer bragging about cutting out the very funding that a good number of ostensibly-unrelated Left-bloggers and writers are trying to pin on the GOP, in the person of Senator Susan Collins.  And never mind the fact that the cutting was done as a spectacularly unsuccessful attempt to bribe the GOP into signing on to the Democrats’ debt bill; or that it was an incredibly tacky unsuccessful bribe in the first place.  Reality-based thinking is somewhat… flexible for the Online Left.)

Yes, neither did I.  Even the ones that aren’t overtly obediently writing whatever they get told to write are busy with their uncritical willingness to accept Democratic talking points as gospel truth (as if it’s our fault that it takes a Cabinet appointment to make a Democrat pay his taxes).  So it’s almost certainly foolish to expect that the dogs linked above will even dare bark at their masters.  Never a good idea to make those who feed you angry, right?

Anyway, see Michelle Malkin, Don Surber, Protein Wisdom, The Sundries Shack, Legal Insurrection, Q & O, AoSHQ, Hot Air, and my unworthy self for more details of what is proving to be all the evidence that you need that not only is the Left-sphere being fed its points: it’s being fed its points sloppily.  Frankly, any of the above could have done a better hit job, even if you assume (as well you should) that we’d be intending to sabotage it…

Moe Lane

Crossposted to Moe Lane.

I’m here at CPAC, where I’ve had the opportunity to meet briefly with Senate GOP Leader Mitch McConnell to talk over current issues. After a strong speech (which you might ultimately be able to find here), McConnell addressed questions from several bloggers.

To me, the most notable answer from McConnell came in response to a question from Fausta - when she asked his thoughts on Michael Steele’s suggestion that the RNC might not support the re-election of Senators Snowe, Collins and Specter, given their votes for the Obama-Reid-Pelosi Debt Spending Plan. McConnell first threw cold water on the idea - saying that he would support the re-election of his Senate GOP colleagues. Then he predicted that Arlen Specter would be a more dependable vote in the future, saying:

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What do Arlen Specter, Susan Collins, and Olympia Snowe have in common? Arlen Specter, Susan Collins, and Olympia Snowe are, together, the reason we will be, come Monday (or Friday, if President Obama departs entirely from character and keeps his word for once), $787,000,000,000.00 further in debt, with nothing but ultra-funded pet pork projects in heavily Democratic districts to show for it.

Bravo, Arlen Specter, Susan Collins, and Olympia Snowe. Bravissimo, in fact. The entire House GOP stood united not once, but twice, in opposition to this unread, unstimulative, wasteful excuse for a “stimulus” package. They did it despite potential political fallout in their own districts, even though they — unlike their Senate counterparts — have to run for reelection every two years (thereby giving them far less time to paper over irresponsible votes and actions).

The Senate GOP did the same — twice — with three notable exceptions: Arlen Specter, Susan Collins, and Olympia Snowe. The three Republican senators, the former from Pennsylvania and the latter two from Maine, provided the votes necessary to get the initial pork-filled debt/spending bill out of the Senate and into conference, and then, when the Senate Democrats could only muster 57 votes in favor of the final version of this monstrosity (a feat which required Obama to send a private jet to Ohio to fetch Sherrod Brown (D) from his mother’s funeral to cast a late-night ballot in favor), Arlen Specter, Susan Collins, and Olympia Snowe chipped in the final three votes necessary to pass a borrow-and-spend bill the size of the 15th largest economy on the planet.

The Democrats wrote this bill, and they unanimously passed it in the Senate (in the House it faced featured bipartisan opposition). Rather than allowing those responsible for its contents to own the results, though, Arlen Specter, Susan Collins, and Olympia Snowe were faced with the irrepressible need to chip in to the effort, casting the necessary votes to pass a bill they have not read and which will accomplish none of its stated aims.

Arlen Specter, Susan Collins, and Olympia Snowe. Three Republicans whose desire to put their constituents and countrymen further into debt for no apparent reason clearly supersedes their duty to even read that legislation they are casting the deciding votes on.

Arlen Specter, Susan Collins, and Olympia Snowe. Three Benedict Arnolds of the modern Republican party whom we can do without, thank you very much.

CNN’s Political Ticker reports that with Ted Kennedy apparently unavailable for a Senate vote tomorrow, Harry Reid is trying to line up one more Republican to vote for the Democrat spending bill. The concern is that without Kennedy, the bill has only the minimum number of votes required to pass: 60. And the three GOP supporters had made clear that their support was conditional on there being 61 votes — so none could be described as the decisive vote that passed the package.

According to Roll Call (subscription required), Reid has a backup plan in case he can’t get another Republican:

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From the Politico

A rep for Collins told us their offices are swamped, both in Maine and in D.C. Collins’ spokesman Kevin Kelley said most are calling to thank Collins for her support.

When calls to the United States Senate are running 10 to 1 against the plan, no freakin’ way Susan Collins is being told thanks.

(202) 224-2523 is her phone number. Don’t let her office be deluded.

Arlen, Olympia, and Susan sold out America and voted for the stimulus.

Arlen Specter went on Sean Hannity’s show and said John McCain was wrong. The stimulus, according to Arlen, is $780 billion, not the $827 billion McCain said.

Collins said

she could not support a bill as large as the $819.5 billion package passed by the House last week.

“We don’t want a package that is too small because that will end up just wasting money. On the other hand, we’re very leery of having an enormous package that would not be necessary and would just boost the federal deficit,” Collins told CNN as Nelson nodded in agreement.

According to the Congressional Budget Office, in a statement released as the voting was happening in the Senate, the total bill costs $838.2 billion.

So Specter, Collins, and Snowe all voted for a bill that is larger than any one of them claimed it was or wanted.

Will they vote for the final version then? Bigger question: will they vote before the CBO releases an estimate on the conference version?

Multiple sources are reporting that Republican Senators Arlen Specter, Olympia Snowe, and Susan Collins have reached an agreement with Democrats on a final $780 billion version of the so-called “stimulus” package.

Way to sell out your team, folks.

Update by Jeff: According to the AP, Democrats expect this “bipartisan” agreement to be little more than a formality necessary to get the bill through the Senate and into conference, where they plan to restore the $140B decrease negotiated by Benedict ArnoldArlen Specter, Benedict ArnoldSusan Collins, and Benedict ArnoldOlympia Snowe.

I hope you enjoy the short-lived feather in your cap this compromise will be, Senators. All you’ve done is pave the way for this bill to get far enough along in the process to have everything you negotiated out put right back in — and at that point there’ll be nothing you can do to stop it.

Again, well done.

Sen. Richard Burr (R-NC) just said in a radio interview that only two “Republican” Senators are still actively attempting to provide the Democrats “bipartisan” cover for their nearly $1,000,000,000,000.00 borrow-and-spend bill. Based on what I’ve been hearing from around the Hill, and Roll Call’s report that Sen. Collins (R-ME) was having misgivings about betraying her party and constituents, those two are (definitely) Arlen Specter (PA) and (most likely) Olympia Snowe (ME).

In the radio interview, Burr said nobody knows if the vote, initially planned for 7pm, will actually happen tonight (translation: despite his typically hotheaded rhetoric, Harry Reid lacks the votes to give himself “bipartisan” cover and therefore to make this bill’s passage politically worthwhile), and that ” out of every 10 calls coming in about the [so-called] stimulus, 9.9 of them are against the bill.”

Keep calling Senators Specter, Snowe, and Collins at 202-224-3121. Tell them that if this trillion dollar borrow-and-spend-on-pork plan is going to pass, it needs to do so as a Democrat-only measure.

The Democrats campaigned on a platform of unadulterated liberalism, which they pledged to implement if they gained enough seats in both houses to do so. They have the votes to pass this and other policies that are doomed to fail once implemented; the Republicans’ job is simply to propose principled alternatives, and to make Democrats own their own proposals on a party-line basis.

Call Senators Specter, Snowe, and Collins at 202-224-3121. Tell them not to help the Democrats drag this country’s economy into the gutter.

[UPDATE]: HA! In your FACE, Allahpundit. 60/34. Which still means that we’re putting in charge of our taxes somebody who can’t do his.

But Senator Collins (R-ME) wasn’t having any of it.

Oh, did I say “Obama’s advocate?” I meant to say “Andrea Mitchell, objective journalist for NBC News.” Be sure to go all to the end; the point where Ms. Mitchell plaintively asks why such a moderate Republican as Senator Collins (R-ME) is thinking to hold the line on this one is almost worth it right there. Mind you, Allahpundit’s right: Geithner is going to get confirmed.

But what the heck: I’ll take the under. 63/36.

Crossposted at Moe Lane.