As it stands now, the Senate bill sets a lower limit to which businesses must provide insurance. Under a certain size, the business is exempt from the requirement.
Somehow--the AP article he quoted did not explain by what process this would happen--the Democrats intend to insert new language into the bill the Senate has already passed which will force businesses to count part-time workers as full-time. The intent is to keep businesses from skirting the law by hiring part-time workers.
Assume that the bill which exists now requires a business with 50 full-time employees to provide health insurance. A hypothetical business with 45 full-time employees and 5 part-time employees doesn't have to provide health insurance to its employees.
The Democrats wish to change the bill so that this business must count its five part-time employees as "full time" and thusly the business is lawfully obligated to provide health insurance for its employees.
Like Limbaugh, I want to know how the Democrats intend to insert this language. The Senate bill has been passed--it passed on 12/24/09--and you can't change a bill which has been passed without again voting on it. The House cannot insert this language; it's the Senate bill and all the House can do is vote it up or down. In order for the Democrats to make this change in a constitutional fashion the bill has to go back to the Senate for amendment.
Here's how it could work: the House passes a bill which is a photocopy of the Senate bill but for this change. Then the Senate and the House go into commmitee, where the Senate says, "Yep, that's good enough for us." Wham bam and it goes to Obama's desk for a signature.
All of this assumes the Democrats have the votes. If the Democrats had the votes right now Obama would not be running around the country trying to drum up support for the thing. They'd be voting on it if they had the votes now. Instead Obama's on his magical mystery tour while Pelosi and Reid are twisting arms back in D.C.
I still maintain that we are going to get this pile of dogshit, whether we want it or not. The Democrats need it, and they've got control of both houses of Congress as well as the White House, and so they're going to ram it down our throats.
And with this provision, a lot of businesses are going to simply do away with part-time employees.
The Democrats are trying to sell this crap as "compassion" and "fairness" but who do you think is going to be hardest hit by the loss of part-time jobs? If you said "the poor" and "single women" you would be pretty damn close to the mark.
The Democrats don't give a rat's ass about the poor. The only people the Democrats care about is themselves and their power.