It appears the House and Senate may be at an impasse at moving forward and the President will try to break that impasse by offering his own proposal.
President Obama plans to use the already-passed House and Senate bills as a starting point for next week's health care summit with Republican leaders, Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius said Tuesday.
snip
Sebelius said the president's proposal is unlikely to include a government-run insurance plan that is anathema to most Republicans. The public option is part of the House-approved bill but was dropped from Senate legislation
Sebelius: Current bills will be starting point for health summit
More, after the fold.
The House bill has a public option. The Senate bill does not. With 50 votes in the Senate, a public option could be passed through reconciliation.
"A lot of the Republican members of the House and Senate said on day one when this debate began that they would love to work with the president, but they could not work around the public option. Now that [we] don't have a public option, I'm hoping they're good to their word and come to the summit not just with their ideas but with a proposal.
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Without a public option, Sebelius says insurers must be willing to accept tougher regulation, limits on what they can charge and the ability to turn away people who may be sick. A former health insurance commissioner in Kansas, Sebelius said she envisions a major role for state regulators, but, "If it's not going to happen at the state level, you need some minimum oversight at the federal level -- how much they spend on health care, and how much they spend on CEO salaries and advertising."
Sebelius: Current bills will be starting point for health summit
We need a health insurance reform bill and the only way to get one passed is to fix it through reconciliation in the Senate and then pass both bills in the House.
I am quite disappointed that the President, for the umpteenth time, finds a way to give up the public option, but I still think we need a bill that will help people. Even if there is no public option, and I have not given up on that, we still need to fix the bill as much as possible and then pass something that helps people.
To quote nyceve:
We must begin to organize a massive and unprecedented telephone call in campaign for passage of healthcare reform, to begin at 9AM EST on February 24th and extend through the entire day of the presidential healthcare meeting on February 25th.
This senior Congressional aide (who asked at this time to remain anonymous), advised that nothing less than a citizen outpouring the likes of which members of Congress have never seen, will be sufficient to get healthcare legislation passed.
Organizing 1,000,000 HCR calls to Capitol Hill on February 24 & 25
Eve and slinkwrwink are working with Darcy Burner and the Progressive Congress Action Fund to help organize a million calls for healthcare reform during the summit on February 24 and 25.
Call Capitol Hill to convince your Senators and Representatives to fix healthcare, and then to pass it! We're trying to do a million calls on February 24th and 25th. Our elected officials need to know that you want them to finish the job!
The Progressive Congress Action Fund and two Daily Kos bloggers launched a campaign today calling on lawmakers to fix the Senate bill through reconciliation and pass it. The "Fix It and Pass It" campaign is asking progressives to make 1 million calls to lawmakers on Feb. 24-25 asking them to finish
Go here to sign up to help: Fix It and Pass It Project
For those intested, here is the Board of that group:
ProgressiveCongress.org Board of Directors
•U.S. Rep. Raul Grijalva - Congressional Progressive Caucus Co-Chair (volunteer)
•U.S. Rep. Barbara Lee - Congressional Progressive Caucus Co-Chair emeritus (volunteer)
•Robert Borosage, Chair of Board - Founder and Co-director of Campaign for America’s Future
•Joan Blades - Co-Founder of MoveOn.org
•Wes Boyd – Co-Founder of MoveOn.org
•John Cavanagh – Executive Director, Institute for Policy Studies
•Lisa Hasegawa – Executive Director, National Coalition for Asian Pacific American Community Development
•Keith Harper - Partner and Head, Native American Affairs Practice Group, Kilpatrick Stockton LLP
•Amy Isaacs – Former National Director, Americans for Democratic Action
•Jeff Krehely - Center for American Progress, Director of LGBT Research and Communications Project
•Conrad Martin – Executive Director, Fund for Constitutional Government
•Larry Mishel – President of the Economic Policy Institute
•Markos Moulitsas – Founder of DailyKos.com
•Angela Oh - Attorney, teacher, and public lecturer
•Stephen Shaff – Founder and President of Community Vision Consultants
•Katrina Vanden Heuvel – Publisher and Editor-in-Chief, The Nation
That's right. Markos, two Congress folks, and others are on the Board and Darcy Burner is the Executive Director.
The million call movement is supported by Democracy for America, Howard Deans' group. See AWESOME NEWS! Democracy For America Is Onboard With Us!
If you have not signed up already to make calls, go here: Fix It and Pass It Project
Please make calls for fixing and then passing a bill. Unless we have a massive effort, I think health insurance reform may be dead. The politicians have proved unable to do it so far. It is up to the people.
A million calls will wake up many political office holders. We need everyone.
I believe this movement is going to grow and grow and fully expect more organizations to get on board. We are the change we have been waiting for, if we act.
And if you can, send $10 or even $25 to help support this effort.
It's time to fix and pass health insurance reform. Please act. If we don't, it looks like no one will and more people wil die for lack of helath care. These bills are far, far from perfect, but we need to make the best out of this situation. Fix it as much as the Senate allows with 50 votes and Biden and then pass both.
Update I: Greg Sergant on the Plum Line is reporting possible progress:
Okay, contrary to what you’ve been hearing, House and Senate Dem leaders are in fact edging towards reaching a deal on a health care reform package to take to next week’s big summit, leadership aides tell me.
The aides also say that Senate Dem leaders are warming to the idea of using reconciliation to fix their bill after the summit — suggesting an endgame may be taking shape.
snip
"We’re getting closer," the Senate aide says of reconciliation, adding that the leadership is more likely to pursue that course if the summit doesn’t yield any kind of compromise with Republicans, as expected. "People want to get rid of health care. They want it off the agenda. The simplest answer is that reconciliation may be the most expedient way to do it."
Worth reading the entire article:
Endgame? House, Senate Edge Towards Deal On Bill For Health Summit