All but four Republicans and zero Democrats in the House of Representatives voted for budget chariman Rep. Paul Ryan’s 2012 budget proposal that turns Medicare into a voucher program, slashes education funding and further cuts taxes for the rich (amusingly, House Dems almost caused Republicans to vote for an even harsher budget). Needless to say, this plan is DOA in the Senate.

Yesterday, Congress approved the budget deal worked out by President Obama, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, and Speaker of the House John Boehner last week to avoid a government shutdown. In the House, dozens of Republicans defected and it only passed with the help of Democrats (though of majority of the caucus voted against it). The Senate also easily defeated bills to defund Planned Parenthood and health care reform – votes which were promised as part of the same budget deal.

Senate Republicans attached as amendment to another bill a repeal to health care reform (something that is opposed by a majority of Americans) that predictably failed on party lines. The Senate did overwhelmingly pass a minor change to the law offered by Democrats, voting to strip out a paperwork requirement for businesses, charities, and state and local governments that made them file income tax forms every time they purchase $600 or more in goods.

Of course, we know that the right intends to take their fight against health care reform to the Supreme Court. But several of the conservative justices will have problems finding it unconstitutional when you consider some of their previous opinions.

Today, Republicans in the U.S House passed as their first major bill the ”Repealing the Job-Killing Health Care Law Act” (though it doesn’t “kill” jobs, but who cares about facts?). Of course, it’s not going anywhere. Senate Majority Harry Reid has said the Senate will not even vote on it. This was little more than a symbolic vote to please their Tea Party supporters (though they went back on their promise to “replace” the law with something on their own. This was just straight repeal). Republicans will try to undermine the law in others ways, specifically by targeting funding, but even that’s difficult given that most federal health care funding is mandatory.

Interestingly, only 3 Democrats voted for repeal even though 13 of the 34 Democrats who voted against the law last year are still in office. Perhaps this is because public opposition has softened considerably since. All in all, this isn’t the political winner Republicans thought it would be. People know this is a waste of time and wanted them to focus on the economy. And Democrats got another chance to argue in favor of the law, which people are starting to see some of the early benefits of.

Congress passed a bill providing benefits to veterans’ caregivers that will go to President Obama. The Senate confirmed Judge Denny Chin to fill an opening on a New York-based appeals court.; he will be the only Asian-American currently serving on a U.S. Court of Appeals. However, there are 23 judicial nominations still pending on the Senate calendar. This is just some of the massive obstruction perpetrated by the GOP.

Rep. Chris Van Hollen has introduced the first in what could be a series of legislative attempts to undo some of the damage of the the Supreme Court’s Citizen United ruling to campaign finance reform. The bill is picking up at least some Republican support. Also, Congressional Democrats have begun pushing legislation giving government regulators greater authority to block big increases in health insurance premiums, in what is sure to be one of many legislative improvements to health care reform over the next few years.

And thanks to Sen. Russ Feingold, Congress is likely to wisely deny themselves pay raises this year.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid has filed for a cloture vote to take place on Monday for the financial regulatory reform bill. At least one Republican vote is needed, but with Republicans seemingly seeing that the momentum is against them on this issue, it’ll be a big test to see if they can hold firm in opposition. In any case, the bill is likely to pass soon and a conference version will likely be ahead of schedule, with the original thinking being that President Obama would sign this into law around September and the anniversary of Lehman Brothers, etc. Now that they will probably have more time to work on other legislation, a debate is now brewing on what the Democrats should tackle next.

The White House originally indicated their next priority was energy/climate change legislation, but Harry Reid (whom is facing a tough re-elected race in Nevada) and some Latino Democrats are pushing for immigration reform. While some fear taking up such a controversial issue in an election year, they argue that Democrats ought to show Latino voters they care about their issues and not take their votes for granted, especially in light of the draconian immigration law that encourages racial profiling that was passed in Arizona. Sens. Chuck Schumer and Lindsey Graham have introduced a bill in the Senate, and Speak of the House Nancy Pelosi has said that if the Senate can get it done the House would follow.

My personal preference, however, is to go with the climate bill. A version already passed the House and Sens. John Kerry, Graham and Joe Lieberman are introducing “compromise” legislation in the Senate on Monday, so it’s already closer to getting done. Plus, I think immigration reform might actually be more moveable with a potential Republican Congress next year than climate change… But hey, why not shoot for both? The Democrats ought to get as much of their agenda passed as possible while they have the votes.

UPDATE: A bad sign for the energy bill,  but it doesn’t look good for immigration reform either. Reid says he’s committed to both and Kerry says the EPA is studying the climate bill.

UPDATE II: A compromise to move both along?

On a roll! With health care and student loan reform, the nuke treaty, and now this, this week is the happiest I’ve been since the early days after the inauguration.

President Barack Obama is making 15 recess appointments and blaming Senate Republicans for forcing his hand.

In a written statement, Obama says the positions include key members of his economic team, as well as members of the National Labor Relations Board and the head of Customs and Board Protection.

Obama says the Senate has the responsibility to accept or reject his nominees, but that Republicans won’t even do that.

Obama says he must act and fill the jobs on an interim basis. Congress is out of session on a break for the Easter and Passover holidays.

The White House says the appointees have been awaiting a vote for an average of seven months. Obama is naming people to serve in the departments of the Treasury, Commerce, Homeland Security and other agencies.

The era of putting up with GOP obstruction is officially over. And to that I say, yes we can.

UPDATE: Some of the appointments include help for former Dallas mayor Ron Kirk who is currently the U.S. Trade Representative.

After a marathon, overnight session of Democrats handily defeating dozens of GOP amendments one after the other, the Senate passed the reconciliation bill. However, the Senate parliamentarian ruled that a couple of very minor provisions related to Pell Grants (remember this bill covers student loan reform as well) had to be stricken, so the House must pass it again. But this is will be easily done later today so it is no big deal. After that, President Obama will sign it into law as he did the main bill on Tuesday.

After a long debate (and I’m not just talking about today’s crazy floor proceedings given how long this has gone on!), the House of Representatives has passed both the Senate’s health care reform bill, which goes immediately to President Obama to be signed into law, and a reconciliation bill full of fixes that the House wanted. You can read a good summary of the details here. The reconciliation bill would also drastically reform student loan programs by completely removing private lender middlemen from the process. Special kudos go to Speaker Pelosi for getting her caucus together, though the White House also had to promise an executive order to get pro-life Dems in line.

The Senate will take up the reconciliation bill on Tuesday and hopefully pass it this week. If that happens, it will be a historic victory for President Obama and Democrats, and, well, all Americans who desperately needed a change from the status quo of our current health care system.

The House of Representative by a vote of 152-4 approved and sent to the Senate a bill that would ban junk food in schools and require new and healthy nutritional standards to be developed for food sold in all school cafeterias and vending machines.

The Senate rejected a proposed comission to tackle the deficit, largely because it would have required Congress to either completely accept or reject its recommendations without the ability to make changes. President Obama has issued an executive order to create something similiar, however. The Senate did accept pay-as-you-go limits on federal spending and to raise the debt ceiling without a single Republican vote on either. The Senate also confirmed (with a bipartisan mix of votes) Ben Bernanke for a second term as chairman of the Federal Reserve.

As for health care reform? Who the hell knows.

On the one year anniversary of President Barack Obama’s election, Democrats aren’t feeling as great about things as they probably hoped:

In a stunning upset, Republican Scott Brown, a little-known state senator just weeks ago, Tuesday trounced Democrat Martha Coakley to win a Massachusetts U.S. Senate seat and jolt Washington’s Democratic leaders with a victory that imperils President Barack Obama’s agenda, led by his bid to overhaul the nation’s health care system.

Brown, 50, mobilized voters in one of the nation’s most Democratic states — voters frustrated by the sluggish economy, angry about big government and uneasy about changes in health care. He led Coakley, 56, who conceded defeat shortly before 10 P.M., by 52 to 47 percent with 99 percent of precincts reporting.

With his victory, the first time since 1972 that a Republican has won a Massachusetts Senate race, Brown will take the “Kennedy seat” occupied by Sen. Edward Kennedy for 47 years before his death in August and once held by John F. Kennedy before he became president in 1961.

What went wrong?  Most agree Coakley ran a simply awful campaign, and the Republican base was much more energized. This is definitely a wake up call to President Obama and Congressional Democrats to start delivering if they don’t want to to risk losing control this November.

The irony cannot be lost that Senator Kennedy, who long championed health care reform, was replaced by a Republican who opposes it and will deny Senate Democrats the 60 votes needed for its passage. But all hope is not lost:

To their credit, Washington Democrats haven’t given up. The White House is weighing a plan to pass the Senate bill immediately through the House, which would, with Obama’s signature, make it law automatically without Scott Brown or anyone else in the Senate getting another crack at it. Then the Democrats would use “reconciliation” budget rules to fix problems in the Senate version with 51 votes, per the agreement Obama has been working on for the last couple of weeks. This is a messy approach but doable.

Indeed, this will require holding moderate Democrats who fear they will suffer the same fate as Coakley if they support health care reform, while convincing House liberals to go along with the Senate version of the bill with the promise of improving it later.

If I were them, I’d do it. The Senate bill is far from perfect but still better than nothing. And its problems can be fixed through separate legislation. Let’s pass this thing and move on.

From TNR:

According to a pair of senior Capitol Hill staffers, one from each chamber, House and Senate Democrats are “almost certain” to negotiate informally rather than convene a formal conference committee. Doing so would allow Democrats to avoid a series of procedural steps–not least among them, a series of special motions in the Senate, each requiring a vote with full debate–that Republicans could use to stall deliberations, just as they did in November and December.

“There will almost certainly be full negotiations but no formal conference,” the House staffer says. “There are too many procedural hurdles to go the formal conference route in the Senate.”

One reason Democrats expect Republicans to keep trying procedural delays is that the Republicans have signaled their intent to do so. On Christmas Eve, when the Senate passed its bill, Minority Leader Mitch McConnell memorably vowed in a floor speech that “This fight isn’t over. My colleagues and I will work to stop this bill from becoming law.”

Sounds like a good plan to me and hopefully this means final passage will happen significantly sooner than it otherwise would. My only concern would be if this means that the Senate bill is less likely to get changed as House Dems just to agree go with it for the sake of saving time, but we can’t really speculate until we get more details on this.