Hark, fellow peasants, the House of Lords hath charitably queried its masters and shall permit a rather uncouth “bill of laws” to sully the golden carpets and golden chairs of its exclusive bordello of gold and money and diamonds. We are not worthy recipients of your showerings of mercy, ye angels! MORE »

Democratic Sens. Blanche Lincoln and Mary Landrieu finally called their own bluff and announced at the last minute that they would, controversially, vote to allow the Senate to debate a piece of legislation it has spent most of this year crafting, to help provide affordable medical care to people. What heroes. Their procedural votes for their own party’s major bill cost the nation hundreds of millions of dollars in pork handouts. That’s how Serious About The Deficits they are. MORE »

BEN NELSON WILL NOT INCUR THE PROMISED/FEARED WRATH OF YOUR WONKETTE: The Democratic Senator will vote “aye” on the health care bill, ergo the celebratory Americana disco accoutrement at left. “This weekend, I will vote for the motion to proceed to bring that debate onto the Senate floor. The Senate should start trying to fix a health care system that costs too much and delivers too little for Nebraskans.” Fine, Ben Nelson, you are excused from time-out. [Omaha World-Herald]

• New controversial medical study ensures that cervical cancer will be the breast cancer of next week. One more’s a trendpiece! [New York Times]
• Members of Congress were very busy and shouty last night in trying to decide who they hated more: Obama or Geithner… [Washington Post]
• …while Catholic bishops easily picked Obama. [AP]
• Please do let the nebbishy hypochondriacs in your life know about the Vicks nasal spray recall. Or actually don’t. [CNN]
• Oprah the Human is self-canceling Oprah the Show in September 2011 so she can work on her own cable teevee station side-project. [WSJ]
• US citizens will probably not be allowed to visit Cuba again after all. By and large this should come as a huge relief to any Cuban familiar with American spring break cultural practices.. [The Hill]

CANCEL YOUR DISCO DANCING PLANS! Whoa it’s a Drudge Siren, who died and what was the hooker’s name? No, damnit, this is a health care update! Harry Reid has filed a motion to proceed with debate on his Senate health care bill, and a cloture vote is scheduled for 8 p.m. this Saturday. This will be the first of two procedural votes requiring 60 votes before a vote on the final bill. Joe Lieberman has said he’ll vote for this one, but three other self-centered liars from “Real America” are still thought to be Wavering. They should come around. If not, your Wonkette will type unusually mean things about them, every day, until they’re voted out of office. [TPM]

RedState’s #1 duosyllabic unisex clown Moe Lane has a lot of big feelings about the recent announcement that some panel now suggests women don’t have to get annual mammograms until they are 50. Now: Moe Lane isn’t an oncologist, nurse, researcher, lawyer, insurance company employee, or federal government employer per se, but he feels pretty confident that HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius’ recommendation that everyone ignore the panel’s findings is some sort of big government conspiracy thing, maybe, to secretly strengthen bureaucracy or something (?). So confident, in fact, that RedSate has a new proto-failed meme: “The War on Breasts.” MORE »

• HERE YOU GO: The ABSOLUTELY TRUE (completely arbitrary) conventional wisdom regarding the CBO’s scoring of Harry Reid’s Senate health care bill has been that it needs to come in at less than $900 billion, or the entire reform effort would collapse, and Trig’s army would finally seize its opportunity cross the Rubicon. The report’s coming out now: $849 billion. Now, for Harry Reid, it’s just a matter of convincing several members of his own party to not join Republicans in a filibuster to block this important bill from reaching an open debate on the Senate floor. Debates have well-known Stalinist agendas, according to a website. [Politico]

Strife among the Olds! The principal actor in this particular Olds Drama, as in all Olds Dramas, is the elderly peacebomber John McCain, who is something like 87 years old. Standing opposite John McCain is the corrupt League of Olds, the AARP. Once friends, now foes, after the AARP recently *ruined everything* by endorsing ObamaCare, the chief tenet of which — and you can read this for yourself in plain language, on any number of Internet sites — is to kill white women and children over 65 years old. John McCain is so furious about this endorsement that he plans to use his powers as the elected President of the United States to bomb the AARP, so as to liberate it. MORE »

Mexican deerhunting gang target and fat dunderhead Lou Dobbs went on Bill O’Reilly’s show last night to discuss, let’s see here, who gives a fuck. But skip ahead to :35 for a comical moment in which O’Reilly asks, dead seriously and out of nowhere, “Is Barack Obama the Devil?” Lou Dobbs doesn’t miss a beat and immediately begins his meandering answer, with utter Seriousness. This is a conversation between two theoretically self-aware adult humans! MORE »

Here’s the RNC’s fancy new web ad arguing that Ben Nelson or any other moderate Democrats would be hypocrites if they didn’t filibuster a motion to proceed on a health care bill. They claim that this would be akin to John Kerry’s famous “for it before I was against it” line on Iraq funding in 2004, which is wrong, although John Kerry is still terrible at speaking. But! We do appreciate the RNC’s production here, for the first time ever. The menacing, twitching figures, the repetition, the gritty industrial vibe. Too bad no one will ever see it. [Washington Independent]

Oh look, Harry Reid has filed a motion to bring his health care bill to the Senate floor any day now! He hopes to start the debate next week after the CBO finishes scoring his bill, which has to be under $900 billion, or everyone will die. MORE »