Time for Iron Man---and WILL

[sisters6]

The H>..... with this bipartisan crap--past time Pres. Obama to develop an Iron WILL related to health care reform


http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/06/28/AR2009062802285_pf.html


Time for Iron Man

By E.J. Dionne Jr.
Monday, June 29, 2009

Every general studies the mistakes of the last war, and President Obama's style has been much influenced by the difficulties of Bill Clinton's presidency.

In particular, Obama has shied away from handing Congress his own plans on "stone tablets," a phrase much loved by senior adviser David Axelrod, and instead allowed it room to legislate.
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And then there's his centerpiece campaign to reform the health-care system.

Obama's initial approach of laying out principles and giving Congress latitude was the right response to Clinton's mistake of offering a detailed proposal, only to see it mocked and rejected. Yet two big problems confront health-care reform that only Obama's intervention can solve.

The first is the absence of substantial Republican support for comprehensive change. Max Baucus, the Democratic chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, has done everything short of making ethanol a reimbursable prescription drug to win the heart of his good Republican friend from Iowa, Chuck Grassley.

I'm told that Grassley, under immense pressure from Republican colleagues not to deal at all, has informed Baucus that he cannot sign on to a bill if it is supported by only one other Republican, the sensible Olympia Snowe of Maine. Grassley needs more cover from more conservative colleagues.

This creates a terrible dynamic in which Baucus is pushed toward one concession after another. It's a setup for a sellout. And the compromise Baucus is likely to produce cannot be the final word.
f.
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Then there is the issue of offering a government-run health plan as one alternative in a reformed insurance market.
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The key is that no compromise should be allowed to undermine the long-term goals of covering everybody and containing costs. Concessions made for purely political reasons could produce an unworkable monstrosity of a bill.

Obama's lobbying helped to save climate change legislation, and he now needs to weigh in more forcefully on health care. He should toughen Baucus's negotiating strategy, and he'll have to mediate among liberals. He doesn't need stone tablets, just an iron will.

[blm]

1. What a COWARD. Grassley needs 'cover' to do what he KNOWS is right. "Wah...I need cover, mommy.'

Dumbass COWARD.

[redqueen]

2. "It's a setup for a sellout.

And the compromise Baucus is likely to produce cannot be the final word."

Amen.

We need a strong public option, not watered down co-op BS.

[sisters6]

4. Amen.

[redqueen]

3. Kick

cause I thought this was a good piece.

[sisters6]

5. so did I. thanks