Obama to Uneasy Democrats: Please Walk the Plank for Me But If It Doesn't Work Out Here's Plan B

The President and the Democratic leadership have been pushing hard on the idea that the Democrats should ram their unpopular health care bill through by using reconciliation--no matter how many Democrats in swing districts lose their jobs over it this November.But Laura Meckler had an important story in the Wall Street Journal yesterday that is bound to give many of the nervous moderate Democrats

The President’s Health Care Plan—Not a Game Changer

It is hard to see how the health care plan the President released this morning changes anything.There is nothing new in it save a health insurance rate regulatory board that is an awkward political proposal at best. What powers would it really have and how would it operate in conjunction with the states already charged with insurance company oversight are just two of the first questions it does

Wellpoint and Their “39%” Rate Increase

Wellpoint is getting killed in the press over a “39%” rate increase for their individual health insurance block in California.HHS Secretary Sebelius has pointed to the Wellpoint individual rate increases demanding an explanation. The President even brought it up in his interview on Sunday. At a time Democrats are fond of calling insurance executives “villains” this story just adds more fuel to

The Health Care Summit—Who’s Gonna Win the Photo-Op?

Getting Democrats and Republicans to constructively engage on health care is the best way to make progress.To date, the Democrats have blown health care reform once again by being too arrogant in thinking they could just ram their version through.The Republicans have no health care proposal. Their “black book” list of ideas they handed the President in Baltimore is a collection of second and

A Way Out of the Health Care Wilderness?

I just came across an interview that I will suggest we all may have missed and perhaps charts the way out of this health care reform wilderness we now seem to be in.It was on February 2nd and was between the Washington Post’s Ezra Klein and rising Republican House star Paul Ryan (WI).Ezra asked Ryan about the bipartisan Wyden-Bennett bill as a place for both sides to find common ground. It’s a

“Plan B” Has Begun

With word that the House is likely to take up the repeal of the health insurance industry anti-trust exemption it is now clear the Democratic leadership has begun Plan B.It is also clear that this is much more a part of a political Kabuki dance then any substantive effort at even piecemeal health care reform.The House probably has the votes to pass the repeal. The Senate does not. I doubt that

Friday in Baltimore--The Way to Actually Accomplish Something

Intentionally or unintentionally, my sense is that the White House came out of Baltimore thinking they are now on to something, and I hope the Republicans took the same lesson away.Constructive good faith political engagement in Washington actually works.It is just incredible that House Minority Leader John Boehner has had not direct contact with the White House for about a year. A pox on both