Frank Gaffney to Ron Reagan: “Your father would be ashamed of you.” Watch.
Where do we stand now after the first day in a while with real developments on heath care reform? Brian Beutler recaps.
Statement from the White House on end of the day health care meeting …
“The senators provided the president with an update on the process of merging the Finance and HELP bills, and they discussed the key principles that reform legislation must meet: providing more stability and security for those with insurance, expanding access to those without it, cutting costs, providing consumers with greater choice and competition, and doing so without adding to the deficit.”
The last debate in the New Jersey governor’s race was tonight. Here’s what happened.
Sen. Reid’s statement …
“Today’s meeting was a continuation of the productive health insurance reform conversations we have had in the Senate throughout the week. I am encouraged with how close we are to delivering access to quality, affordable health insurance to all Americans in a fiscally responsible way. The role of the President and his health care team has been critical to our efforts in the last week and will be even more important as we move forward.
“We’ll continue to work together to seek broad consensus on the key issues before us and to craft the strongest possible bill that can garner 60 votes. We will also continue to do our best to represent the views of all members of the Senate who have a genuine desire to see reform succeed. But our mission is clear: the American people want quality, affordable health insurance and failure is not an acceptable option. I am optimistic that we are close to laying a proposal before the full Senate that will do just that.”
It seems like virtually every Republican who’s got something to prove or wants to keep up their rep in the GOP purity derby is endorsing right-wing third party candidate Doug Hoffman over GOP nominee Dede Scozzafava in the upcoming election to fill the open seat in New York’s 23rd congressional district. And now Sarah Palin has gotten into the act too.
No doubt there are others. But the only marquee conservative Republican who’s really making an effort on Scozzafava’s behalf is Newt Gingrich, who, whatever else you can say about the guy, knows something about coalition building. Read More
Our sources say not to be so sure about that new Politico report about Pelosi not having the votes for a robust public option.
A lot of conflicting reports out this morning on where public option stands. The White House meeting late yesterday between President Obama and Senate Democratic leaders has yielded its own flurry of accounts of what went down.
Let’s try to sort it all out: Read More
McClatchy: “Suicide bomber strikes suspected nuclear weapons site in Pakistan”