Today in Washington D. C. - Oct 9, 2009

The biggest news that rocked Washington D.C., was the announcement that President Obama had won a Nobel Peace Price. But most people are asking , why and for what. There will be plenty of comments coming out today. But the initial comments by Jennifer Loven, AP's chief White House corespondent sums up the shock: "He won! For what? For one of America's youngest presidents, in office less than nine months . . . The prize seems to be more for Obama's promise than for his performance. . . . He has no standout moment of victory that would seem to warrant a verdict as sweeping as that issued by the Nobel committee. . . . The Nobel committee, it seems, had the audacity to hope that he'll eventually produce a record worthy of its prize."

Senate is in recess until Tuesday afternoon. But we can expect plenty of back room committee going on especially with Democrats! Yesterday, the Senate rejected an amendment to the fiscal year 2010 Commerce-Justice-Science appropriations bill (H.R. 2847) from Sen. John McCain (R-AZ), which would have cut $20 million in grants for telecom facilities. Also rejected was a motion from Sen. John Ensign (R-NV) to return the bill to committee and cut funding by $3.4 billion. Also, the Senate voted 76-22 to adopt the conference report for H.R. 2997, the $121 billion fiscal year 2010 Agriculture appropriations bill.

Much was made of yesterday’s news about a CBO score for Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus’ (D-MT) health care reform bill, but several news stories today help clarify that that the CBO score  1) is not meaningful when the bill being cobbled together by democrats is not the same bill analyzed and 2) it didn’t sweep away the publics concerns with President Obama’s push for an expensive health care reform.

In fact, much of the criticism continues to come from a number of Democrats. The Hill reported last night that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi criticized the Baucus bill. “Pelosi (D-Calif.), an advocate of the government-run health insurance option left out of the Senate Finance Committee chairman’s bill, criticized the means by which Baucus kept costs down. ‘The savings come off the backs of the middle class,’ Pelosi told a closed-door caucus meeting.”

In the Senate, Baucus’ proposal faced criticism from both sides of the Democrat caucus. Politico reports that 30 liberal Democrat senators, led by Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-OH), signed a letter urging Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) to include a government-run insurance plan in the final Senate bill, which was not included in Baucus’ plan.  But Reid received a letter from 10 Democrat senators “protesting an annual $4 billion tax on the medical device industry as a killer of jobs and research,” a key source of revenue in the Baucus bill.

Meanwhile, The Washington Post reports today, “The industry heavyweights President Obama neutralized through the summer are agitating that the health-care bills in Congress violate agreements they made with the White House, leave 25 million Americans uninsured and have the potential to increase medical costs. One day after Democrats celebrated the news that a bill drafted in the Senate Finance Committee would not increase the deficit, the prospects for speedy enactment of landmark reform grew murkier. Industry leaders, who have held their tongues for months, spoke in increasingly dire tones Thursday about the impact of the Democratic proposals, raising the specter of an eleventh-hour lobbying campaign to defeat Obama's centerpiece domestic policy goal.”

The White House had been pleased with support for their efforts from the AMA and certain hospitals.  But according to The Post, “The American Medical Association is concerned because the 10-year $829 billion cost of the Senate bill does not include $200 billion in promised higher Medicare payments. Hospital executives, meanwhile, complained that the legislation would leave 25 million people without coverage in 2019. The uninsured place a high burden on hospitals, which are required by law to treat everyone who arrives at an emergency department, regardless of citizenship or ability to pay. Those costs result in debt for hospitals and higher fees for people with insurance.”

Though the Baucus bill was presented as a major achievement and a breakthrough for a CBO score that didn’t massively add to the deficit, Democrats are still at odds over key provisions in the bill and health industry groups are increasingly uncomfortable with deals the made with the White House in light of many of those provisions.  As reported yesterday, Democrats are starting with two flawed pieces of legislation and will then be stitching them together behind closed doors. As Sen. McConnell put it, “the real bill will soon be cobbled together in a secret conference room somewhere in the Capitol by a handful of Democrat senators and White House officials.” And that’s why the CBO score that Democrats are so proud of today is really a farce and; much less consequential. than being touted in the press.

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Tags: CBA, government healthcare, Harry Reid, US Congress, US House, US Senate, Washington D.C., Nobel Peace Price, Barack Obama To share or post to your site, click on "Post Link". Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service. Thanks!