Some Thoughts on Today's Health Care Summit
Today's healthcare "discussion" was replete with instances where Obama and the Democrats failed to provide any substantive counterpoint to the contentions raised by Republicans. These include the expected increases in individual premiums, increased taxes during unfavorable economic conditions, increased government intervention in the healthcare industry and lack of bipartisanship during the creation of the 2,400 page monstrosity.
One of the most excrutiating - and yet unsuprising - aspects of the summit today was the President assuming the role of arbiter and authority of what was appropriate for discussion. Nearly all of the questions posed by the Republicans today are the same as those the general public has sought answers to over the past year. Yet we saw Obama continuing to try to assert some moral high ground by deeming some many of the Right's concerns not worthy of a response.
Throughout much of the day, the President appeared flustered, unprepared and displayed a lack of knowledge about the piece of legislation we're all about to have to live with.
Perhaps the biggest star of the day was Rep. Paul Ryan, a fast rising star among the GOP leadership. Ryan made his point in a way even the charismatic and double-talking Obama couldn't weasel his way out of.
From the Christian Science Monitor:
Obama called the Republicans on their use of props, as well as their standard talking points. But any members of the public watching the proceedings may well have come away thinking that the Republicans had more to say than just “no.”Rep. Paul Ryan (R) of Wisconsin, the ranking member of the House Budget Committee, came armed with numbers about the Senate Democratic bill from the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office.Calling the Senate bill “full of gimmicks and smoke-and-mirrors,” Representative Ryan said it “has 10 years of tax increases, about a half a trillion dollars, with 10 years of Medicare cuts, about half a trillion dollars, to pay for six years of spending.”“Now, what’s the true 10-year cost of this bill in 10 years?” he continued. “That’s $2.3 trillion.”Obama sought to frame the numbers differently, but Ryan had made his point. If Obama gets credit for welcoming Republicans to the table, the Republicans get credit for coming prepared.
At times the Democrats and Obama looked flustered and were clearly on the defensive. The President got testy with Sen. McCain and Rep. Cantor (click here for the play by play), and at one point hinted strongly that the Demcrats may use reconciliation to pass health care reform.
From Obama's closing remarks:
"The question that I'm going to ask myself and I ask of all of you is, 'Is there enough serious effort that in a months time or a few weeks time or six weeks time, we could actually decide something?' And if we can't, I think we've got to go ahead and make some decisions and then that's what elections are for."
Republicans have basically said they want to start over with a clean slate and figure out what both sides can agree on. Democrats say no to this idea, claiming that it is just not feasible to do it piecemeal. According to several recent polls, the American people are siding with the Republicans on this one (CNN, Rasmussen and Fox News).
The big winner today was the GOP. They showed up ready and willing to do battle. Democrats definitely didn't win any support from today's performance. I think (and this is somewhat of a general consensus) that the Democrats/Administration intended to use today to prove that they were trying to work with the Republicans and that Republicans just weren't willing. This would have paved the way for reconciliation. Unfortunately for them, the Demcrats didn't plan on Republicans like Cantor (who showed up with a copy of the bill-all 2700 pages of it) and Paul Ryan (who showed up with the CBO scoring of the bill). It was almost as if Republicans were saying "bring it on" on the topic of reconciliation.
Of course, neither side really intended to accomplish anything today. After all, if they had, they would have held a small meeting with a handful of representatives from both parties and the administration, and hashed things out in private. Today's show, complete with C-Span's cameras, was never going to net any kind of agreement.