Bad News from Oregon - We'll Have to Wait

A few hours after my optimistic posting yesterday about what I hoped would be an educative debate about health care as a right, I learned from Representative Mitch Greenlick that HJR 100, which would have put the question onto the November ballot, died in the Oregon Senate without a vote.

(Follow this link to read Representative Greenlick's floor speech about rights.)

Another Oregonian (not Rep. Greenlick) passed on to me a speculation that apart from a crowded Senate session and an end-of-session clutter of bills waiting for action, some Democrats may have feared that if the question of health care as a right got onto the November ballot and lost, it might undermine other health care reform efforts.