February 15, 2010

Let's Make a Deal?

By Jeffrey Folks
President Obama has suggested a half-day bipartisan meeting, to be televised live on February 25, to discuss moving his health care agenda forward. Considering what has transpired this year, Obama's half-day TV special will probably be a lot more like "Cold Case" than "Let's Make a Deal." Either way, it sounds like a big loser. As Representatives John Boehner and Eric Cantor note, Republicans have been asking for just such a meeting since May. Since that time, however, they have been shut out of health care negotiations in the House and Senate, and the president's promised "openness and transparency" have yet to materialize. Now, after ten months of closed-door meetings among Democrats in Congress, union officials, industry lobbyists, and the White House, the president is offering an entire half-day of free and open discussion. The discussion, however, will be anything but free and open, because it is not about starting over, nor is it about allotting...(Read Full Article)