Summoned to the Healthcare Summit
The lead story in today’s New York Times is titled, “President Plans a Joint Summit on Health Care.” It describes a bipartisan meeting the President is planning for February 25, a televised event designed to allow Republicans to present their ideas and join Democrats at the bargaining table.
The event is designed to meet Republican demands for their participation in a transparent process televised on C-Span. It was announced by President Obama in an interview during the Super Bowl and builds upon his successful meeting with Republicans at the end of January.
The Republican reaction, as might be expected, was lukewarm, and they called upon President Obama to start the process again from the beginning, throwing away months of negotiations, a demand they know he will refuse to meet. Whether they use this demand to refuse participation in the summit at all remains to be seen.
Whether this meeting will result in any real progress remains to be seen, and many think it is being used as a ploy to force the Republicans to take a stand on specific issues rather than just saying no. It may even be a precursor to a more radical attempt to use reconciliation to patch up the differences between the House and Senate legislation.
