Top Democratic aides and health care reformers are of basically a single mind about President Obama’s planned February 25 health care summit: Why the heck not!
Moments after Obama made the announcement in an interview with Katie Couric, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi issued pre-cooked statements supporting the President’s call, suggesting a high degree of co-ordination. That could ease the concerns of liberals, some of whom worried that Obama might be repeating the same mistakes he made last year in a quixotic quest for bipartisanship.
“If this is what it takes–if doing this will make Democrats say, ok, go ahead and use their majorities to pass reform, then do it,” said Richard Kirsch, director of the reform campaign Health Care for America Now.
Kirsch says Democrats have to remember that this isn’t going to make Republicans any less intransigent. “They’re still going to vote no,” he said. “Their entire political strategy is to burn the House down, whether or not people get caught inside.”
“The point is, if it’s helpful to clarify for people, remind people, that Republicans don’t have ideas to really address the health care problems, and will say no to anything–if it does that it’s good,” Kirsch said. “If this is helps, then so be it. But at this point its up to Democrats to use their majorities to pass reform.”
And that’s basically what aides in both the House and Senate think: that the meeting can be used to clearly differentiate who is fighting for what, while deflating the GOP charge that the reform process has been too secretive.
One potential, but subsidiary, worry for House Democrats? That by bringing Republicans into the room, Obama could choose, or be forced, to triangulate between the progressive position (the House bill) and the GOP’s, leaving their concerns about the Senate bill unaddressed.
But at the highest echelons of the Democratic leadership structure, there’s simply no concern that this is a punt or a political misstep that could weaken, or doom reform.
And that’s just as the White House sees it.
According to administration officials, Obama wants to put Republicans on the spot to debate the merits of their health care proposals.
Obama will make it clear that he supports the bills passed by the House and Senate last year and won’t “let this moment slip away,” said one White House aide.
All this may explain why Republicans, by and large say they welcome the summit…but only if Democrats scrap their year of work on reform and adopt the GOP health care platform.
Additional reporting by Christina Bellantoni.
