White House Tells Reid to Cut Deal with Lieberman, BUT....

By GottaLaff

Here is the report via Taegan:

The White House is encouraging Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) "to cut a deal with Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-CT) and eliminate the proposed Medicare expansion in the health reform bill," Politico reports.

"But Reid is described as so frustrated with Lieberman that he is not ready to sacrifice a key element of the health care bill, and first wants to see the Congressional Budget Office cost analysis of the Medicare buy-in. The analysis is expected early this week."

Said a White House official: "There is a weariness and a lot of frustration that one person is holding up the will of 59 others. There is still too much anger and confusion at one particular senator's reversal."

Meanwhile, Roll Call reports Senate Democrats plan to meet tonight at 5:30 p.m. for another special caucus on health care reform.

For more anger at Traitor Joe, and a possible solution, see Thom Hartmann's take here.

If this is accurate, what is the White House thinking?

Meanwhile, I got a tweet that we're trying to check out:

BOB SHRUM just said Obama will use reconciliation to blow off Lieberman

Not that the tweet means much, nor do we know whether that was just Shrum's opinion, or if he was passing on information. I have a tweet in to David Shuster, and Jason Leopold has a direct line to Shrum, so I'll update asap.

P.S. Lieberman needs to be stripped of his chairmanship now. Right now.

P.P.S. Tweet from my Twitter pal Lizz Winstead (co-creator of The Daily Show):

If someone has a photo of Lieberman in assless chaps spanking a male hooker wearing a Ned Lamont mask - now would be the time to release it.

Now you know why we're pals.