Altmire the wind watcher

I see that Rep. Jason Altmire, D-Blue Dog, is warming up to the Senate version of the health-care bill after being one of the 39 Democrats who rejected the House version. What a surprise!

He would have us believe that cost containment is better addressed in the Senate version. As this is the holiday season, I would dearly like to accept this assertion in the spirit of goodwill.

But the image of the former UPMC lobbyist pouring over the 2,700 pages of the bill while making appreciative noises is for me set aside by another image: of Mr. Altmire looking out the window and seeing which way the wind is blowing the flags on Capitol Hill.

If he does vote for the bill now, he will conveniently have it both ways. He will be like those people who offer to help clean up the kitchen after the work is done.

Sorry, but those sort of people fool nobody.

By the way, the individual deals made in the Senate to win 60 votes from nest-feathering Democrats were sleazy in the extreme. The Republicans are now looking into whether these deals were unconstitutional. As it was ever thus in politics, I don't see how this could be unconstitutional, but what a sorry spectacle.

Almost as sorry as watching a House member watching the weather vane.