As the vote on Obamacare approaches, things are moving swiftly.

No one really knows where things stand, but Pelosi etal have a long row to hoe to make sure the bill passes.

Yes Dave, Matheson has declared he will vote NO. I personally think that he cut a deal with the leadership to keep his mouth shut as long as possible so they could create their inevitability illusion.

No real surprises in the declarations that are coming a lot faster now, except for perhaps one.

Bart Stupak, the nominal leader of the pro-Life 12, canceled a press conference he had scheduled. Word is that Obama has offered an executive order to cover his butt on the abortion issue. Obama would simply direct federal agencies to ignore the Congressional mandate to fund abortions, and that of course would be challenged in the courts with the end game fairly predictable.

The pro-choice caucus went nuts when they heard this, but if its merely a ploy, Nancy keeps them in line.

I suspect he canceled the press conference for the same reason Matheson declared his position so late in the game--the leadership asked him to. It is quite revealing though that they are actively negotiating with Stupak again after writing him off earlier. It strongly suggests that they haven't found all the votes they need and going over the ground they've already covered in hopes of squeezing out a few more.

The real question is whether Stupak is looking for a way to vote for the bill, and just needs a plausible excuse. Hard to say. The Stupak dozen are now the Stupak six, but that's more than enough to defeat the bill when you fold in the Republicans and the declared NO votes. The last time I checked there were 10 undeclared Democrats--remarkable this late in the game.