The Blair House Project

Be careful what you wish for . . .

For months, Congressional Republicans have been moaning about how Democrats have excluded them from the process of drafting health care reform legislation.  Anyone who gets their information from a source other than FoxNews knows it's a preposterous charge.  President Obama and Senate Democrats bent over backwards to give Republicans a role, in the naive hope of passing bipartisan reform legislation.  But despite concession after concession, not a single Republican signed on to the bill that passed the Senate in December.  This week, at the televised "Blair House Summit", Republicans were given yet another - and likely final - opportunity to demonstrate they have something of value to contribute to the debate.  They blew it.

I doubt that many people watched the so-called summit live, but thanks to C-SPAN's video archive it offered a palatable alternative to the interminable evening Olympic coverage.  In reality, it had little to do with health care and everything to do with the November midterm elections.  Republicans simply don't want to pass health care reform - that has been clear almost from the start - but equally they don't want to emerge as the party of "no" or, worse yet, the party of "bought and paid for".  Hence the morally and intellectually bankrupt rhetoric about "death panels", "government takeovers", "socialized medicine", "Obamacare", etc., all intended to scare and inflame the electorate, rather than create a measured and constructive debate.  Republicans are now demanding that Democrats throw out the bills passed by the House and Senate last year and start afresh.  But to what purpose?  Presumably so they can yet again delay and obstruct legislation, then blame the Democrats for the failure to deliver the reform most Americans want and need. 

By convening the summit, Obama called the Republicans' bluff.   He sprung a trap and the Republicans walked right in.  After suffering a major public relations debacle when they invited Obama to answer questions from their House delegation on live television, the Republican leadership should have been better prepared this time around.  This was their chance to show that they actually do believe in the concept of health care reform and have a plan that accomplishes the goal better than the much-maligned Senate bill.  But they arrived at Blair House armed not with facts and policy points, but with more empty rhetoric and tired talking points.  One Republican speaker after another repeated - with almost comical regularity - the phrases scripted by their spindoctors. "Let's scrap this Bill." "Let's start over." "Let's take a clean sheet of paper."  "Let's go step-by-step."  In other words, "let's do nothing".
 
Congressional Democrats were also in attendance and they had their prepared scripts too, but this was Obama's show and he gave a masterful performance.  He spoke at length and with consummate authority.  Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell's complaint that the Democrats were consuming a disproportionate amount of time drew the polite but pointed response that Barack Obama is the President and his time didn't count against the Democratic allotment - in other words, he would take as much time as he wanted.  Obama appeared thoughtfully receptive to the few "policy" positions the Republicans actually raised (the usual litany of tort reform, combating insurance fraud and allowing insurance companies to compete across state lines).  But as the President listened to Republicans recite the same old objections to the Senate bill, his responses were duly polite but his body language showed thinly disguised impatience, at times verging even on contempt.  I suspect this was the product of extensive rehearsal, but it was effective and made for good political theatre.

The tone was set early on when Sen. Lamar Alexander foolishly chose to misrepresent the findings of the Congressional Budget Office report on the proposed national health insurance exchange, claiming it showed that health insurance premiums would rise if the plan were implemented.  Obama cut him off in mid-sentence to point out that he was wrong - what the CBO report actually said was that premiums for existing policies would fall; however, the average premium would increase, but only because increased competition would expand choice and improve value, thereby encouraging some people to trade up to a better policy.  That was but one example.  Throughout the day-long discussion Obama appeared consummately in command of the facts; the Republicans appeared utterly oblivious to them.

There were some exchanges on points of substance, but they were few and far between.  After House Minority Leader John Boehner delivered a rambling attack on the Senate Bill, calling it a "dangerous experiment" that would "bankrupt America" (fact check - according to the CBO the Senate Bill would reduce the deficit), Obama took him to task for interrupting a substantive policy discussion on deficit reduction by rehashing "the standard talking points".  The tone resembled that of a weary schoolteacher addressing a child who once again hadn't finished his homework assignment.  And as House Minority Whip Eric Cantor began to speak, with piles of paper stacked up in from him for the benefit of the cameras, Obama, with exactly the right trace of sarcasm, cut in: "Let me just guess; that's the 2,400 page health care bill; is that right?"  And after listening to Cantor pontificate about the complexity of the legislation he responded:  "When we do props like this, stack it up, repeat 2,400 pages, etc., the truth of the matter is that health care's very complicated.  We can try to pretend that it's not, but it is.  These are the kind of political things we do that prevent us from having a conversation."  And so it continued.  Throughout the day the tone was polite, the atmosphere chilly, the accomplishment nil.

The Democrats emerged from the meeting appearing newly-emboldened, the Republicans newly embittered and threatening dire consequences if the Democrats try to enact health care reform using the "reconciliation" process - that novel concept of majority rule.  The meeting may not have advanced the cause of bipartisan legislation but it did expose the fundamental philosophical difference between the parties.  Republicans regard health care as a privilege not a right and favor corporate interests over the public welfare.  Their failure to engage in constructive discussion will be used against them - and rightfully so - in November.  It remains to be seen what kind of bill finally becomes law; it will at the very best fall far short of what progressives expected from Obama, but ironically it may go further than the what would have emerged had Republicans engaged in the legislative process rather than attempted to thwart it.  Perhaps the Republicans have now finally learned that no matter how much they may dislike Barack Obama, they underestimate him at their own peril.