HEALTH CARE — HOUSE GOP LET BILL TO AID 9/11 FIRST-RESPONDERS AND RECOVERY WORKERS FAIL: While the Senate is infamous for its legislation routinely being blocked by minority obstruction, the House of Representatives yesterday took after the upper chamber when a measure “that would have provided up to $7.4 billion in aid to people sickened by World Trade Center dust” failed to pass even though a majority, 255-159, voted for it. The bill was aimed at “9/11 rescue and recovery workers who fell ill after working in the trade center ruins.” House leadership used a procedural method that let the bill come to floor without amendments but required a two-thirds majority for passage. Only 12 Republicans joined Democrats to support the bill. Rep. Peter King (R-NY), one of the 12, said the GOP would have likely added an amendment “that could ban the bill from covering illegal immigrants who were sickened by World Trade dust.” GOP leadership urged its members to vote against the bill, calling it a “massive new entitlement program.” Rep. Anthony Weiner (D-NY) ripped into Republicans for voting against the bill as a protest against not being able to offer amendments, screaming on the House floor, “You vote ‘yes’ if you believe ‘yes!'” Lamenting the GOP’s obstruction, he said, “We see it in the United States Senate every day, where members say, ‘We want amendments, we want debate…but we’re still a ‘no.'” Without an aid bill, “a judge and teams of lawyers have been urging 10,000 former ground zero workers to sign on to a court-supervised settlement” splitting “$713 million among people who developed respiratory problems and other illnesses after inhaling trade center ash.” The settlement would cover less than a tenth of the assistance in the House bill. Health problems caused by dust from the World Trade Center include “breathing ailments with symptoms similar to asthma” and “heartburn or acid reflux.” “Studies have shown that firefighters who worked on the debris pile suffer from elevated levels of sarcoidosis, an inflammatory disease,” and many workers “fear that the dust is giving people cancer, although scientific studies have failed to find evidence of such a link.”