Obama Charts New Health Care Course

NY Times:

Speaking to enthusiastic supporters at a fundraiser here, President Obama on Thursday evening presented his clearest plan yet to move forward with comprehensive health care legislation, saying that he wanted to meet with Democrats, Republicans and independent experts, lay out the facts for the American people and then, he said, “I think that we have got to move forward on a vote.”

Mr. Obama said he would first work with Congress to enact a jobs package that would encourage new hiring, which he said was “the thing that is most urgent right now, in the minds of Americans all across the country.” But he also said that he would take the time to refute false statements and misunderstandings about the health care legislation and to hear alternate ideas from Republicans.

After “several weeks” of work, he said, he would be prepared to live with whatever decision is made by Congress, but he also warned that voters, too, would be watching and would decide at the polls in November whether lawmakers had made the right choice.

Mr. Obama still did not chart a specific legislative strategy for moving a bill through Congress.

But the president’s comments, in prepared remarks at the fundraiser at the Capitol Hilton and then in response to a question submitted by a supporter from Milwaukee, offered more clarity about how he plans to proceed on the health care legislation than the White House has provided in the two and half weeks since a Republican, Scott Brown, won the special election for Senate in Massachusetts.

The victory by Mr. Brown, who was sworn in on Thursday, effectively stalled the health care legislation by ending the Democrats’ 60-vote supermajority in the Senate, which would have allowed them to defeat a Republican filibuster and advance the health care measure.

Congressional Democratic leaders and the White House have been groping for a way forward on the health care legislation. Their main strategy seems to be to work on devising changes to the Senate-passed health care bill that could be attached to a budget measure, which would allow it to be approved by a simple majority. The House could then approve both the Senate bill and the changes and send them in tandem to Mr. Obama for his signature.

The House speaker, Nancy Pelosi, and the Senate majority leader, Harry Reid, attended a meeting with Mr. Obama at the White House on Thursday, but officials said that no firm decisions were reached.

At the fundraiser for the Democratic National Committee later on Thursday, however, Mr. Obama said that once Congressional Democrats had worked out their differences and settled on a final bill, he would push for a vibrant, public debate over the health care legislation. He said he planned “to call on our Republican friends to present their ideas.”

“What I’d like to do is have a meeting whereby I am sitting with the Republicans, sitting with the Democrats, sitting with health care experts and let’s just go through these bills,” Mr. Obama said. “Their ideas, our ideas. Let’s walk through them in a methodical way, so that the American people can see and compare what makes the most sense. And then I think that we have got to move forward on a vote. We have got to move forward on a vote.”

Mr. Obama said that Americans were apprehensive about the health care legislation because there was too much misinformation that he would now work to clear up.

“They are certain that they would have to go onto a government plan, which isn’t true,” the president said. “But that’s still a perception a lot of people have. They are still pretty sure that they would have to give up their doctor. They are still pretty sure that if they are happy with their health care plan, that it’s bad for them. They are still positive that this is going to add to the deficit. So there is a lot of information out there that people understandably are concerned about.”

He continued, “That’s why I think it’s very important for us to have a methodical, open process over the next several weeks, and then let’s go ahead and make a decision. And it may be that if Congress decides, if Congress decides we’re not going to do it, even after all the facts are laid out, all the options are clear, then the American people can make a judgment as to whether this Congress has done the right thing for them or not. And that’s how democracy works, and there will be elections coming up and they will be able to make a determination and register their concerns one way or another during election time.”

At one point, as the president insisted that he would continue to fight for the health care bill, the crowd chanted, “Yes, we can! Yes, we can!”

Despite their enthusiasm and Mr. Obama’s, it is no longer clear that Senate leaders could muster even 51 votes to make fast-tracked changes to the Senate-passed health bill, let alone the 60 votes it would take to approve a revised measure under the normal rules.

In the House, Ms. Pelosi, too, now faces an uphill climb. Perhaps the toughest differences are those that separate Senate and House Democrats, disagreements that were in the process of being resolved when the election in Massachusetts upended the entire process. House Democrats, for instance, still fiercely oppose a proposed tax on high-cost, employer-sponsored insurance policies that Senate Democrats included in their bill and that Mr. Obama has said he supports.

Howie P.S.: H/t to Booman. The WaPo has a shorter report from AP. Their headline quotes Obama as saying we should "'Take our time' on finalizing health care." Many would observe we already have. C-SPAN was there to bring us his remarks and his responses to questions @ the DNC last night. His new plan forward is outlined in the Q&A. Watching the whole video (44:59), will take some time, too. Aravosis and Sargent are dismayed that Obama actually acknowledged the possiblity that health reform may not happen.