A couple of weeks ago, I wrote a post detailing the role of the Senate parliamentarian in making a determination of whether the budget reconciliation process was an option for health-care.

Now the chickens have come to roost.

The Senate Parliamentarian has ruled that President Barack Obama must sign Congress’ original health care reform bill< before the Senate can act on a companion reconciliation package, senior GOP sources said Thursday.

What this means is that as soon as the House votes on the Senate bill, it must in fact be signed into law by the President before any attempt at reconciliation can proceed. With the parliamentarian's ruling, Democrats will effectively be voting for federal funding on abortion. Period. Stop. That might go over in the most liberal districts in the country, but its certain political death of any blue dog Democrat.

The ruling serves to eliminate the ambiguity that Pelosi has been trying to leverage among House Democrats. Their current reality is that a vote for healthcare is a vote to make the legislation law, and that the reconciliation process being talked about would be at the mercy of the same parliamentary rulings that affirmed the requirement that the President sign the bill into law--in other words, reconciliation is and always has been a mirage.

On a related note, Pelosi is going backwards in the vote count. With current vacancies, she needs to keep the defections down below 37. There are 25 no and 'likely no' votes out there right now. Stupak and his gang of 12 are not in that total. The have indicated that they are persuadable, but its hard to see how at this point. With the Stupak gang, the defections kill the bill.

Indications are that House leadership knows this, as they have pushed back against the White House's demands that they pass it by the 18th. That arbitrary dead-line would have insured a vote before the two week recess, since no one on the Obama team wants Congress to go home to their districts and face the angry hordes.

Further complicating matters is the Hispanic Caucus, which could also vote no on the basis of the bill's immigration provisions.

I almost feel sorry for Nancy.

Almost.