If this WSJ article is right, Democrats are opening themselves up for a huge new flood of well-deserved criticism. They’re also heading for a constitutional challenge. Here’s what the WSJ is reporting:

Top Senate Democrats are close to finalizing their health bill and could unveil a measure as soon as early this week that would include stiffer penalties on employers who fail to provide health coverage.

Senate leaders plan to submit the bill to the Congressional Budget Office for a cost estimate as soon as Monday, and make the legislation public as soon as Tuesday, according to a person familiar with the negotiations.

The CBO score is partially predictable in that this mandate won’t add to the federal deficit. Still, the bill won’t be effective because it’s still cheaper to pay a $750 fine than buy health insurance for employees.

Most importantly, Democrats still haven’t explained how their legislation will make health care less expensive. They won’t talk about that because they can’t explain it. That’s because their plan doesn’t make health care less expensive. I wrote here that “the Democrats’ legislation will make things worse for the vast majority of people.” We’re mired in a deep recession and the Democrats are proposing to raise small businesses’ operating cost one way or the other. How stupid is that?

I don’t know of a thoughtful economist who thinks that adding to small business’s expenses during a deep recession is a good way of creating jobs. I’m betting that King could rattle off a long list of economists that think the best way to create jobs that pull us out of this recession is to decrease small businesses’ expenses.

Mr. Reid spent the weekend shoring up support for the bill from Democrats in the chamber. But some key moderate Democrats signaled Sunday that they remain uneasy about main planks of the legislation. “I certainly am not excited about a public option where states would opt out,” Sen. Ben Nelson (D., Neb.) said on CNN’s “State of the Union.”

I haven’t seen a statement by Evan Bayh but I’m betting that he won’t support the Democrats’ plan. Another senator sure to influence the debate is Mary Landrieu. Here’s what she recently said:

Health care reform is necessary to drive down costs for consumers and businesses, but it must not be allowed to increase the federal debt, Landrieu said. Moderates in Congress have succeeded in making that principle a priority, she said.

She said she backs more tax credits for small businesses and wants to let small businesses pool together to buy insurance. She opposes plans to require employers to pay for coverage. She also wants to make sure reform legislation gives states more flexibility in making their own health care changes. “We cannot fall into this same old same old one-size-fits all” approach, she said.

That certainly puts her opposite this emerging proposal. Sen. Landrieu hasn’t had a high profile thus far in the health care debate but that’s about to change. As chairlady of the Small Business and Entrepreneurship Committee, she’ll be asked by small businesses to stand up for them. Her opposition will give other moderates the political cover they need to oppose Reid’s bill.

As usual, Ed nails the Democrats’ problems with this post:

Typically, businesses could pay more than $750 per month for some health insurance plans for each employee. The cheap fine allows businesses to opt out altogether at a very low cost, forcing employees into the public option.

Also, this looks like a bribe of sorts to keep employers out of court. An employer mandate may have similar constitutional problems as an individual mandate, at least for those employers whose business does not cross state lines. However, businesses can afford to hire more and better lawyers than individuals in order to challenge it. If they see this as a cheap mechanism to dump medical coverage costs, we can expect them to cheer it rather than sue and put the whole scheme in jeopardy of a Supreme Court reversal.

However, the optics of this look bad, and will look worse in practice. The Senate will create a huge out for the business world at the expense of the individual workers, and when they take it, people will realize they’ve been had, especially the class warriors that comprise the narrowing base of the Democrats. The only people stuck with an onerous mandate will be individuals, forced for the first time in American history to purchase a product in order to legally reside in the US.

When we look back at the path health care legislation took, we’ll realize that this is just another attempt by Democrats to force single-payer down our throats. The bad news for Democrats is that bloggers like Ed and myself will be there next November to remind voters that the Democrats wanted to stick small businesses and individuals with additional expenses when they could least afford it. (Let me know how that works out for you, Democrats.)

Technorati: Mandates, Employers, Individuals, Small Businesses, Health Care Costs, Harry Reid, Chuck Schumer, Evan Bayh, Ben Nelson, Mary Landrieu, Democrats, Election 2010

Cross-posted at California Conservative