Franken is finally declared the winner.
Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy
Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy
Tuesday, June 30, 2009
When the Game Goes into Extra Innings
Minnesota finally has an second senator!!!
Franken is finally declared the winner.
Franken is finally declared the winner.
Saturday, June 27, 2009
Politics 101: Taking on the Lobbies
Politics in Action on the Health Care Debate:
Baucus ups pressure on health groups
AARP threatens senators on health care reform
Lobbies take to the airwaves
Baucus ups pressure on health groups
AARP threatens senators on health care reform
Lobbies take to the airwaves
Politics 101: Climate Bill Fallout
Don't cross your party's leadership
Politico.com: 6/26/09
Where in the world is Ciro Rodriguez? UPDATED
After all the arms had been twisted, only two four Democrats gave their leadership an unpleasant surprise at the end of the climate change vote -- and are firmly in Pelosi-Obama doghouse:
Texas Rep. Ciro Rodriguez and Rep. Alcee Hastings from Florida, according to House sources.
UPDATE: House leadership sources add two more who reportedly said "yes" and voted "no" -- Rep. Jim Costa (D-Calif.) and Solomon Ortiz (D-Texas).
Rodriguez had told leadership that he was a likely yes -- but then cast a quick "no" vote and practically sprinted from the chamber, frustrating floor managers whose shouts of "Rodriguez!" rang through the House as the final anxious votes were cast.
At one point, New York Rep. Anthony Weiner bounced from a huddle of leadership members and began calling the rep's name, like a wayward toddler, as he scanned the Speaker's Lobby and the adjacent balcony.
"He cast his 'no' and then ran the hell out of there," said a member of the whipping team, still steaming after the vote. "We tried him at his office and they said he was gone."
Hastings confounded Pelosi by choosing Thursday to depart for a human rights conference -- despite the pleas of the White House, who needed every vote they could muster to win the 219-212 squeaker.
A third member who has irked the powers-that-be: Rookie upstate New York Rep. Eric Massa, who voted "no" despite a photo op with President Obama. Massa has also alienated many in Pelosi's team by introducing a House pay freeze jointly with Sen. Russ Feingold (D-Wisc.).
By Glenn Thrush 07:37 PM
_____________________________________________________
House passes climate-change bill
By LISA LERER & PATRICK O'CONNOR 6/27/09
Politico.com
Democrats narrowly passed historic climate and energy legislation Friday evening that would transform the country’s economy and industrial landscape.
But the all-hands-on-deck effort to protect politically vulnerable Democrats by corralling the minimum number of votes to pass the bill, 219-212, proves that there are limits to President Barack Obama's ability to use his popularity to push through his legislative agenda. Forty-four Democrats voted against the bill, while just eight Republicans crossed the aisle to back it.
Despite the tough path to passage, the legislation is a significant win for House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Ca.) and the bill’s two main sponsors – House Energy and Commerce committee chairman Henry Waxman (D-Ca.) and Massachusetts Rep. Edward Markey (D) – who modified the bill again and again to get skeptical members from the Rust Belt, the oil-producing southeast and rural Midwest to back the legislation.
“We passed transformational legislation which takes us into the future,” Pelosi said at a press conference following the vote, after she and other leaders took congratulatory phone calls from Obama, former Vice President Al Gore and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid.
“It has been an incredible six months, to go from a point where no one believed we could pass this legislation to a point now where we can begin to say that we are going to send President Obama to Copenhagen in December as the leader of the of the world on climate change,” said Markey, referring to world climate talks scheduled this winter.
After months of negotiations, 211 Democrats and eight Republicans voted for the bill of more than 1,200 pages, setting the legislation on a path towards the Senate. There, it faces a far more uncertain future given the opposition of key moderates and the already-heated battle over health care.
Republicans are sure to try and use against other Democrats in 2010, with accusations that they raised electricity bills for already-strapped consumers in the midst of a deep recession.
Indeed, the National Republican Congressional Committee wasted little time before blasting out a press release targeting more than two dozen Democrats for supporting “Democrats’ ongoing crusade against economic recovery.”
“I’m in a tough spot. I really am,” Rep. John Salazar (D-Colo.), one of the Democrats who opposed the bill, said before the vote, citing his fears the legislation could raise energy costs and hurt the coal industry in his low-income, rural district.
“Either way I’m going to get creamed.”
Democratic leadership attempted to protect their most vulnerable freshman by cajoling yes votes from more senior members such as Lloyd Doggett of Texas.
Doggett announced his change of heart from “strong objection” earlier in the day during the final stage of the floor debate.
Doggett told POLITICO that he made his switch after speaking to Obama and having lengthy conversations with Waxman, Markey, Gore and Pelosi, but ultimately, he decided to support the bill so he could have a seat at the negotiating table when California Sen. Barbara Boxer introduces it in the Senate later this summer.
“It has been a difficult and significant decision,” Doggett said. “I just decided that I will have a better chance to make changes later in the process if I acted in good faith now. But don't think this means I'm signing off on the conference report,” he said.
When the bill passed, the chamber erupted in applause, and colleagues shook Markey and Waxman's hands. Even some Republicans clapped, mocking the Democrats for casting what they deemed a politically unpopular vote.
The vote itself proceeded with much less drama than hung in the chamber for most of the day leading up to the much anticipated roll call; Democrats looked relieved and Republicans resigned as they watched votes register on the big board above the House floor.
Fence-sitting Republicans such as Washington Rep. Dave Reichert and New Jersey Rep. Leonard Lance waited to vote “yes” on the bill, in a game of chicken with moderate Democrats.
Many of those moderate Democrats, like freshman Rep. Bobby Bright of Alabama, also waited until the end of the roll call to cast votes against the package.
In the end, Democrats had the votes they needed, and many veteran moderates were able to cast votes in favor of the bill without hanging junior Democrats out to dry. One possible exception – Maryland Rep. Frank Kratovil, a freshman – accepted handshakes from colleagues after casting an early vote in favor of the package.
The debate leading up to the vote was nevertheless intense.
Democrats touted the legislation as a measure that would improve national security, create jobs, protect the environment and reestablish the United States as a world leader. Republicans slammed the bill as an economic catastrophe.
“I look forward to spending the next 100 years trying to fix this legislation,” said California Republican Brian Bilbray.
“This is the biggest job killing bill that’s ever been on the floor of the House of Representatives. Right here, this bill,” said House Minority Leader John Boehner. “And I don’t think that’s what the American people want.”
Donning reading glasses, Boehner then delayed the roll call vote by reading page-by-page through a 300-page managers’ amendment Democrats added at around 3 a.m. on Friday.
Boehner seemed to relish the hour-long stunt, picking out the bill’s most obscure language and then pontificating about what it might – or might not – mean. Republicans laughed along with him and roared with applause when he was done.
The complex bill mandates a 17-percent cut in greenhouse gas emissions by 2020 and a 83-percent cut by 2050, reductions that will be accomplished by putting a price on carbon dioxide through a cap-and-trade system. It mandates that 20 percent of electricity comes from renewable sources and increased energy efficiency by 2020. And the legislation gives electric utilities, coal plants, energy-intensive manufacturers, farmers, petroleum refiners, and other industries special protections to help them transition to new, less-fossil fuel-intensive ways of doing business.
It will also raise electricity prices for consumers by $175 a year per household by 2020, according to a report by the Congressional Budget Office, significantly less than the $3,000 price hike predicted by Republicans who say the “energy tax” will increase energy bills and the cost of consumer goods.
Obama praised the House for taking a “bold and necessary step,” then wasted no time in turning up the heat on the upper chamber. “Now it's up to the Senate to take the next step. And I'm confident that in the coming weeks and months the Senate will demonstrate the same commitment to addressing what is a tremendous challenge and an extraordinary opportunity,” he said in a statement.
The White House played a significant role in drumming up support for the legislation, which is a key piece of the administration’s first-year agenda. The administration is under pressure to make significant progress towards cutting greenhouse gas emissions before the Copenhagen international climate talks next December.
A long list of Cabinet secretaries, key staffers and even Obama himself lobbied undecided members. Gore, the don of the climate-change world, spent several days calling on the fence lawmakers.
The legislation spilt both the environmental and business communities. Although environmentalists have pushed for stricter controls on greenhouse-gas emissions for more than a decade, more left-wing groups like Greenpeace wanted stronger emissions reductions and fewer protections for greenhouse-gas guzzling industries like coal. While some electric utilities, auto manufacturers, and Fortune 500 companies supported the bill, large business associations like the Chamber of Commerce argued that it would impose a crippling regulatory burden on the economy that would push factories and jobs abroad.
The House chamber took on the feeling of a momentous vote on Friday, with lobbyists, administration officials and even the stray senator –in this case, Udall – working the hallways off the floor to convince fence sitters in one direction or another. After the rule vote, Markey quickly collared Holt for a brief conversation.
“We are fond of seeing headlines that say this is the Democrats’ toughest challenge yet,” said House Whip James Clyburn, tweaking the media’s hyperbole. “Well, today that what quite true.”
He joined many other Democrats in giving the ultimate credit to Pelosi making the difference on the vote.
“Nancy Pelosi was the whip on this,” he said.
Politico.com: 6/26/09
Where in the world is Ciro Rodriguez? UPDATED
After all the arms had been twisted, only two four Democrats gave their leadership an unpleasant surprise at the end of the climate change vote -- and are firmly in Pelosi-Obama doghouse:
Texas Rep. Ciro Rodriguez and Rep. Alcee Hastings from Florida, according to House sources.
UPDATE: House leadership sources add two more who reportedly said "yes" and voted "no" -- Rep. Jim Costa (D-Calif.) and Solomon Ortiz (D-Texas).
Rodriguez had told leadership that he was a likely yes -- but then cast a quick "no" vote and practically sprinted from the chamber, frustrating floor managers whose shouts of "Rodriguez!" rang through the House as the final anxious votes were cast.
At one point, New York Rep. Anthony Weiner bounced from a huddle of leadership members and began calling the rep's name, like a wayward toddler, as he scanned the Speaker's Lobby and the adjacent balcony.
"He cast his 'no' and then ran the hell out of there," said a member of the whipping team, still steaming after the vote. "We tried him at his office and they said he was gone."
Hastings confounded Pelosi by choosing Thursday to depart for a human rights conference -- despite the pleas of the White House, who needed every vote they could muster to win the 219-212 squeaker.
A third member who has irked the powers-that-be: Rookie upstate New York Rep. Eric Massa, who voted "no" despite a photo op with President Obama. Massa has also alienated many in Pelosi's team by introducing a House pay freeze jointly with Sen. Russ Feingold (D-Wisc.).
By Glenn Thrush 07:37 PM
_____________________________________________________
House passes climate-change bill
By LISA LERER & PATRICK O'CONNOR 6/27/09
Politico.com
Democrats narrowly passed historic climate and energy legislation Friday evening that would transform the country’s economy and industrial landscape.
But the all-hands-on-deck effort to protect politically vulnerable Democrats by corralling the minimum number of votes to pass the bill, 219-212, proves that there are limits to President Barack Obama's ability to use his popularity to push through his legislative agenda. Forty-four Democrats voted against the bill, while just eight Republicans crossed the aisle to back it.
Despite the tough path to passage, the legislation is a significant win for House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Ca.) and the bill’s two main sponsors – House Energy and Commerce committee chairman Henry Waxman (D-Ca.) and Massachusetts Rep. Edward Markey (D) – who modified the bill again and again to get skeptical members from the Rust Belt, the oil-producing southeast and rural Midwest to back the legislation.
“We passed transformational legislation which takes us into the future,” Pelosi said at a press conference following the vote, after she and other leaders took congratulatory phone calls from Obama, former Vice President Al Gore and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid.
“It has been an incredible six months, to go from a point where no one believed we could pass this legislation to a point now where we can begin to say that we are going to send President Obama to Copenhagen in December as the leader of the of the world on climate change,” said Markey, referring to world climate talks scheduled this winter.
After months of negotiations, 211 Democrats and eight Republicans voted for the bill of more than 1,200 pages, setting the legislation on a path towards the Senate. There, it faces a far more uncertain future given the opposition of key moderates and the already-heated battle over health care.
Republicans are sure to try and use against other Democrats in 2010, with accusations that they raised electricity bills for already-strapped consumers in the midst of a deep recession.
Indeed, the National Republican Congressional Committee wasted little time before blasting out a press release targeting more than two dozen Democrats for supporting “Democrats’ ongoing crusade against economic recovery.”
“I’m in a tough spot. I really am,” Rep. John Salazar (D-Colo.), one of the Democrats who opposed the bill, said before the vote, citing his fears the legislation could raise energy costs and hurt the coal industry in his low-income, rural district.
“Either way I’m going to get creamed.”
Democratic leadership attempted to protect their most vulnerable freshman by cajoling yes votes from more senior members such as Lloyd Doggett of Texas.
Doggett announced his change of heart from “strong objection” earlier in the day during the final stage of the floor debate.
Doggett told POLITICO that he made his switch after speaking to Obama and having lengthy conversations with Waxman, Markey, Gore and Pelosi, but ultimately, he decided to support the bill so he could have a seat at the negotiating table when California Sen. Barbara Boxer introduces it in the Senate later this summer.
“It has been a difficult and significant decision,” Doggett said. “I just decided that I will have a better chance to make changes later in the process if I acted in good faith now. But don't think this means I'm signing off on the conference report,” he said.
When the bill passed, the chamber erupted in applause, and colleagues shook Markey and Waxman's hands. Even some Republicans clapped, mocking the Democrats for casting what they deemed a politically unpopular vote.
The vote itself proceeded with much less drama than hung in the chamber for most of the day leading up to the much anticipated roll call; Democrats looked relieved and Republicans resigned as they watched votes register on the big board above the House floor.
Fence-sitting Republicans such as Washington Rep. Dave Reichert and New Jersey Rep. Leonard Lance waited to vote “yes” on the bill, in a game of chicken with moderate Democrats.
Many of those moderate Democrats, like freshman Rep. Bobby Bright of Alabama, also waited until the end of the roll call to cast votes against the package.
In the end, Democrats had the votes they needed, and many veteran moderates were able to cast votes in favor of the bill without hanging junior Democrats out to dry. One possible exception – Maryland Rep. Frank Kratovil, a freshman – accepted handshakes from colleagues after casting an early vote in favor of the package.
The debate leading up to the vote was nevertheless intense.
Democrats touted the legislation as a measure that would improve national security, create jobs, protect the environment and reestablish the United States as a world leader. Republicans slammed the bill as an economic catastrophe.
“I look forward to spending the next 100 years trying to fix this legislation,” said California Republican Brian Bilbray.
“This is the biggest job killing bill that’s ever been on the floor of the House of Representatives. Right here, this bill,” said House Minority Leader John Boehner. “And I don’t think that’s what the American people want.”
Donning reading glasses, Boehner then delayed the roll call vote by reading page-by-page through a 300-page managers’ amendment Democrats added at around 3 a.m. on Friday.
Boehner seemed to relish the hour-long stunt, picking out the bill’s most obscure language and then pontificating about what it might – or might not – mean. Republicans laughed along with him and roared with applause when he was done.
The complex bill mandates a 17-percent cut in greenhouse gas emissions by 2020 and a 83-percent cut by 2050, reductions that will be accomplished by putting a price on carbon dioxide through a cap-and-trade system. It mandates that 20 percent of electricity comes from renewable sources and increased energy efficiency by 2020. And the legislation gives electric utilities, coal plants, energy-intensive manufacturers, farmers, petroleum refiners, and other industries special protections to help them transition to new, less-fossil fuel-intensive ways of doing business.
It will also raise electricity prices for consumers by $175 a year per household by 2020, according to a report by the Congressional Budget Office, significantly less than the $3,000 price hike predicted by Republicans who say the “energy tax” will increase energy bills and the cost of consumer goods.
Obama praised the House for taking a “bold and necessary step,” then wasted no time in turning up the heat on the upper chamber. “Now it's up to the Senate to take the next step. And I'm confident that in the coming weeks and months the Senate will demonstrate the same commitment to addressing what is a tremendous challenge and an extraordinary opportunity,” he said in a statement.
The White House played a significant role in drumming up support for the legislation, which is a key piece of the administration’s first-year agenda. The administration is under pressure to make significant progress towards cutting greenhouse gas emissions before the Copenhagen international climate talks next December.
A long list of Cabinet secretaries, key staffers and even Obama himself lobbied undecided members. Gore, the don of the climate-change world, spent several days calling on the fence lawmakers.
The legislation spilt both the environmental and business communities. Although environmentalists have pushed for stricter controls on greenhouse-gas emissions for more than a decade, more left-wing groups like Greenpeace wanted stronger emissions reductions and fewer protections for greenhouse-gas guzzling industries like coal. While some electric utilities, auto manufacturers, and Fortune 500 companies supported the bill, large business associations like the Chamber of Commerce argued that it would impose a crippling regulatory burden on the economy that would push factories and jobs abroad.
The House chamber took on the feeling of a momentous vote on Friday, with lobbyists, administration officials and even the stray senator –in this case, Udall – working the hallways off the floor to convince fence sitters in one direction or another. After the rule vote, Markey quickly collared Holt for a brief conversation.
“We are fond of seeing headlines that say this is the Democrats’ toughest challenge yet,” said House Whip James Clyburn, tweaking the media’s hyperbole. “Well, today that what quite true.”
He joined many other Democrats in giving the ultimate credit to Pelosi making the difference on the vote.
“Nancy Pelosi was the whip on this,” he said.
Friday, June 26, 2009
Why is being a moderate hard?
Democrats scramble for climate bill votes
By LISA LERER & PATRICK O'CONNOR 6/25/09 8:43 PM EDT http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0609/24232.html#ixzz0JYL1mStO&D
Democratic leaders are working furiously to corral votes for a controversial climate change measure, hoping to build a big enough margin so that vulnerable Democrats can be freed to vote against it.
At the White House on Thursday, President Barack Obama declared: “Now is the time to act.”
Former Vice President Al Gore, who had planned to rally Democrats en masse in Washington, stayed home in Tennessee so he could press members one by one via telephone.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi plied undecided members with chocolate
-covered Dove bars in a series of small group meetings. White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel worked the phones, and administration officials were expected to whip members at a White House luau Thursday night.
By late Thursday, aides and lawmakers said Democrats were within a dozen of the 218 votes needed to pass the legislation. Democratic sources said their leaders aimed to lock in 230 yes votes — and leaning on key Blue Dogs such as Reps. Earl Pomeroy of North Dakota and South Dakota’s Stephanie Herseth Sandlin so that more vulnerable members such as Reps. Eric Massa of New York and Maryland’s Frank Kratovil can vote no.
Asked if she was confident of prevailing, Rep. Diana DeGette (D-Colo.), the chief deputy whip, said: “I’m not confident about anything. But I will say we are closing in on the numbers. We feel good about the way things are going today.”
Much of the support for the legislation is a testament to the work of the bill’s main sponsors, Energy and Commerce Chairman Henry Waxman and Massachusetts Rep. Ed Markey, who spent months negotiating the details of the legislation to satisfy lawmakers from across the country. The final 1,201-page bill includes compromises for Michigan auto interests, Rust Belt manufacturers, Texas oil refineries, Midwestern farmers and Southeastern coal companies.
Obama highlighted those compromises on Thursday, calling the legislation “balanced” and “sensible” in a brief public statement designed to nudge undecided Democrats into the yes column.
“I urge every member of Congress, Democrat and Republican, to come together and support this legislation,” he said during a brief Rose Garden event. “I know this is going to be a close vote.”
Throughout the day, undecided members leveraged their votes to lobby for additional changes to be made to the bill.
“Everyone is concerned that their region is going to get hit harder than others,” said Michigan Democrat Bart Stupak. “We still have a long ways to go with this bill.”
Behind the scenes, the administration worked furiously to help the Democratic leadership garner support for the legislation. Obama, Energy Secretary Steven Chu and other administration officials have been calling skeptical lawmakers from both parties for weeks. Energy adviser Carol Browner met with several on-the-fence lawmakers Thursday.
Emanuel met Wednesday with Kratovil and a group of other Democratic freshmen: Reps. Bobby Bright of Alabama, Jim Himes of Connecticut, Larry Kissell of North Carolina, Betsy Markey of Colorado and Mark Schauer of Michigan. Minnesota Democrat Tim Walz was invited for a Thursday meeting.
White House adviser David Axelrod explained the importance of the legislation in a morning meeting with the entire Democratic Caucus, telling the assembled lawmakers that the bill is a priority for the president. He also highlighted the legislation’s importance to independent voters and said voters would reward Democrats at both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue “for governing,” according to one attendee.
During Thursday afternoon’s votes, Pelosi cruised the floor, talking to member after member. The day before, Ed Markey and a key staffer held a long conversation with Ohio Democratic Rep. Tim Ryan.
Ryan, who said he plans to vote for the bill, had some concerns about manufacturing interests in Ohio.
“This green revolution is supposed to benefit the Midwest and places like Ohio, not just California, New York and New England,” he said. “And I think they get that.”
Waxman and Markey held a series of meetings with fence-sitters late Wednesday night, calling together moderate Republicans, upstate New Yorkers, Democrats from the Ways and Means Committee and farm-state Democrats.
Members of the Democrats’ whip team hit the floor Thursday with district-by-district statistics showing that the legislation would save money for members’ constituents.
During the last votes of the day, Markey, Texas Rep. Gene Green — a very reluctant supporter — and Caucus Chairman John Larson leaned over Texas Rep. Henry Cuellar in a heated discussion until Cuellar finally shook Markey’s hand and the huddle broke up. That scene played out again and again throughout the day as Democrats felt the full weight of the White House and its leadership bear down on them.
One holdout, Pomeroy, said he’s a pretty hard “no” and seemed resistant to any external pressure.
“I’m here to represent North Dakota, and we only have one guy: me,” the senior Ways and Means Committee member said. “I know how badly the speaker wants this bill, but I have a job to do. On this one, I don’t feel any pressure at all.”
“I’d hate to be a wavering member on this one,” Pomeroy said.
Reichert, who’s getting heavy pressure on both sides of the aisle, said he’s “still in the investigative stage,” with a wry grin that suggested his vote was still in play.
Democratic leadership aides expect five to 10 Republicans to vote for the bill, including California Rep. Mary Bono Mack, who supported it in the Energy and Commerce Committee. Other Republicans that Democrats hoped would cross over include Mike Castle of Delaware, Vernon Ehlers of Michigan, Mark Kirk of Illinois and Dave Reichert of Washington.
Republican Whip Eric Cantor (R-Va.) and his team are working hard to hold as many moderates as possible in order to force more centrist Democrats to back the legislation. Those efforts focused on some of the same members being targeted by Democrats, like Castle and Kirk, but also other lawmakers from environmentally friendly corners of the country, such as Wisconsin Rep. Tom Petri.
And on Thursday, House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio) threw down the gauntlet.
“Mark my words,” he said. “The American people are going to remember this vote. This will be a defining moment and a defining vote in this Congress.”
____________________________________________________
For moderates, it's not easy being green
By LISA LERER 6/25/09 8:18 AM EDT http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0609/24177.html#ixzz0JYMZSfZA&D
As House Democrats race toward a Friday floor vote on a controversial energy and climate change bill, moderate lawmakers on both sides of the aisle are feeling a little like Kermit the Frog.
It’s not easy being green.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and about a dozen emissaries are cornering skeptical Democrats across the Capitol, warning them that a vote against the bill will come back to haunt them. Top White House officials — including chief of staff Rahm Emanuel — are calling in on-the-fence members for high-pressure meetings.
Across the aisle, Republican leaders are trying to lock down their own caucus in near-unanimous opposition — the better to make the bill, which they dub an “energy tax,” a major campaign issue in 2010.
Moderates — in both parties — are stuck in the middle of what David Wasserman, House editor of the Cook Political Report, calls a “treacherous vote.”
Here are the members who’d most like to climb under a lily pad.
The freshmen: Reps. Frank Kratovil Jr., Walt Minnick, Bobby Bright and Eric Massa
Republicans are paying close attention to how freshman Democrats from conservative districts vote on the bill. While longer-serving Democrats from Republican-leaning districts might be able to explain the difficult vote to their constituents, freshmen may not have the political experience or goodwill back home to survive it.
“Most of my constituents are saying that if you vote for this, you won’t return to Congress,” said Massa. “This is 80-20 back home.”
Freshmen are complaining that Pelosi has given them too little time to review the whopping 1,200-plus-page bill. As of Wednesday, several said they remained undecided.
Kratovil, a freshman Democrat on the Agriculture Committee who will probably find himself in the Republicans’ cross hairs next fall, spent the early part of the week reviewing changes to the bill, along with a 107-page report on the issue written by the Congressional Research Service.
“I’m looking at some of the issues that have been resolved on the Ag Committee,” Kratovil said. “I’m optimistic these issues will be resolved.”
But he’s still on the fence, saying he needs to know more details about the final bill before he will know for sure which way he’s going to vote. “For me, it’s the details,” he said.
The schemers: Reps. Charlie Melancon and Mark Kirk
Both Melancon and Kirk are eyeing statewide office, and their political ambitions are certainly influencing their votes on the bill. Melancon has all but officially declared his challenge to Republican Sen. David Vitter (R-La.). And in Illinois, Republicans are pressuring Kirk to run for Obama’s old Senate seat in 2010.
Melancon voted against the bill, which is close to a nonstarter in oil-rich Louisiana, when it was before the House Energy and Commerce Committee. With the GOP already ready running radio ads against him, he’s expected to oppose the bill again this week.
Kirk remains on the fence, saying he has concerns about the lack of funding for nuclear energy and coal interests in his state.
“We don’t want to de-industrialize Michigan, Illinois and Wisconsin,” Kirk said after a meeting
with Pelosi and Reps. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) and Ed Markey (D-Mass.) , the sponsors of the legislation.
Opposing the bill could hurt him, however, in Chicago and other more liberal corners of the state. So voting for the bill, note political observers, could indicate some serious senatorial ambitious.
The farmers: Reps. Tim Walz and Mark Schauer
Agriculture Committee Chairman Collin Peterson is backing the bill after cutting a deal on Tuesday with Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Henry Waxman — but that doesn’t mean the rest of his committee is quite as ready to sign off on the legislation.
“I did get a cordial invitation to go talk to Rahm on Thursday,” said Walz, a Minnesota Democrat, who was spotted deep in conversation with Peterson on the House floor on Wednesday but remained undecided about the bill. “We need to try and learn by Thursday, for sure, where we’re at.”
The bill is expected to pick up the endorsements of several farm and ranching associations, a fact that could give some farm-state lawmakers the necessary cover to back it. But the Farm Bureau, a major agricultural lobbying association, continues to oppose the bill as “seriously flawed.”
The Republicans: Reps. Mike Castle, Dan Lungren and Dave Reichert
Democrats aren’t the only ones who could get burned by the bill.
Vulnerable Republicans from suburban districts could also find themselves in a difficult position if they vote with their party and oppose the legislation.
Waxman and Markey held a second meeting with moderate Republicans on Wednesday, urging them to back the legislation. A vote against the legislation, Democrats warn, could later allow them to label Republican candidates as against creating new green jobs, decreasing dependence on foreign oil and transitioning to a clean energy economy.
Those arguments have resonated with at least one Republican: California Rep. Mary Bono Mack voted for the bill in the Energy and Commerce Committee. Her Southern California district is rich with wind, solar and other renewable energy resources, making it nearly impossible for her to oppose the proposal, she said last week.
Energy producers: Reps. Mike Ross, Zack Space and Baron Hill
Although Democratic Reps. Mike Doyle of Pennsylvania and Rick Boucher of Virginia back the bill, their support might not be enough to convince other Rust Belt Democrats.
Some Midwestern and Southern members worry the bill could hurt coal and oil interests back home, as well as raise energy costs for already-strapped consumers.
Rep. Mike Ross (D-Ark.), who opposes the legislation, even introduced his own legislation on Tuesday that would expand oil and gas exploration.
“Energy-producing folks are going to need a good explanation back home to cast a vote for this thing,” said Wasserman. “This is a fascinating tug of war between guys like Boucher and guys like Bobby Bright, who would not support the measure over his dead body.”
_______________________________________________
By LISA LERER & PATRICK O'CONNOR 6/25/09 8:43 PM EDT http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0609/24232.html#ixzz0JYL1mStO&D
Democratic leaders are working furiously to corral votes for a controversial climate change measure, hoping to build a big enough margin so that vulnerable Democrats can be freed to vote against it.
At the White House on Thursday, President Barack Obama declared: “Now is the time to act.”
Former Vice President Al Gore, who had planned to rally Democrats en masse in Washington, stayed home in Tennessee so he could press members one by one via telephone.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi plied undecided members with chocolate
-covered Dove bars in a series of small group meetings. White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel worked the phones, and administration officials were expected to whip members at a White House luau Thursday night.
By late Thursday, aides and lawmakers said Democrats were within a dozen of the 218 votes needed to pass the legislation. Democratic sources said their leaders aimed to lock in 230 yes votes — and leaning on key Blue Dogs such as Reps. Earl Pomeroy of North Dakota and South Dakota’s Stephanie Herseth Sandlin so that more vulnerable members such as Reps. Eric Massa of New York and Maryland’s Frank Kratovil can vote no.
Asked if she was confident of prevailing, Rep. Diana DeGette (D-Colo.), the chief deputy whip, said: “I’m not confident about anything. But I will say we are closing in on the numbers. We feel good about the way things are going today.”
Much of the support for the legislation is a testament to the work of the bill’s main sponsors, Energy and Commerce Chairman Henry Waxman and Massachusetts Rep. Ed Markey, who spent months negotiating the details of the legislation to satisfy lawmakers from across the country. The final 1,201-page bill includes compromises for Michigan auto interests, Rust Belt manufacturers, Texas oil refineries, Midwestern farmers and Southeastern coal companies.
Obama highlighted those compromises on Thursday, calling the legislation “balanced” and “sensible” in a brief public statement designed to nudge undecided Democrats into the yes column.
“I urge every member of Congress, Democrat and Republican, to come together and support this legislation,” he said during a brief Rose Garden event. “I know this is going to be a close vote.”
Throughout the day, undecided members leveraged their votes to lobby for additional changes to be made to the bill.
“Everyone is concerned that their region is going to get hit harder than others,” said Michigan Democrat Bart Stupak. “We still have a long ways to go with this bill.”
Behind the scenes, the administration worked furiously to help the Democratic leadership garner support for the legislation. Obama, Energy Secretary Steven Chu and other administration officials have been calling skeptical lawmakers from both parties for weeks. Energy adviser Carol Browner met with several on-the-fence lawmakers Thursday.
Emanuel met Wednesday with Kratovil and a group of other Democratic freshmen: Reps. Bobby Bright of Alabama, Jim Himes of Connecticut, Larry Kissell of North Carolina, Betsy Markey of Colorado and Mark Schauer of Michigan. Minnesota Democrat Tim Walz was invited for a Thursday meeting.
White House adviser David Axelrod explained the importance of the legislation in a morning meeting with the entire Democratic Caucus, telling the assembled lawmakers that the bill is a priority for the president. He also highlighted the legislation’s importance to independent voters and said voters would reward Democrats at both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue “for governing,” according to one attendee.
During Thursday afternoon’s votes, Pelosi cruised the floor, talking to member after member. The day before, Ed Markey and a key staffer held a long conversation with Ohio Democratic Rep. Tim Ryan.
Ryan, who said he plans to vote for the bill, had some concerns about manufacturing interests in Ohio.
“This green revolution is supposed to benefit the Midwest and places like Ohio, not just California, New York and New England,” he said. “And I think they get that.”
Waxman and Markey held a series of meetings with fence-sitters late Wednesday night, calling together moderate Republicans, upstate New Yorkers, Democrats from the Ways and Means Committee and farm-state Democrats.
Members of the Democrats’ whip team hit the floor Thursday with district-by-district statistics showing that the legislation would save money for members’ constituents.
During the last votes of the day, Markey, Texas Rep. Gene Green — a very reluctant supporter — and Caucus Chairman John Larson leaned over Texas Rep. Henry Cuellar in a heated discussion until Cuellar finally shook Markey’s hand and the huddle broke up. That scene played out again and again throughout the day as Democrats felt the full weight of the White House and its leadership bear down on them.
One holdout, Pomeroy, said he’s a pretty hard “no” and seemed resistant to any external pressure.
“I’m here to represent North Dakota, and we only have one guy: me,” the senior Ways and Means Committee member said. “I know how badly the speaker wants this bill, but I have a job to do. On this one, I don’t feel any pressure at all.”
“I’d hate to be a wavering member on this one,” Pomeroy said.
Reichert, who’s getting heavy pressure on both sides of the aisle, said he’s “still in the investigative stage,” with a wry grin that suggested his vote was still in play.
Democratic leadership aides expect five to 10 Republicans to vote for the bill, including California Rep. Mary Bono Mack, who supported it in the Energy and Commerce Committee. Other Republicans that Democrats hoped would cross over include Mike Castle of Delaware, Vernon Ehlers of Michigan, Mark Kirk of Illinois and Dave Reichert of Washington.
Republican Whip Eric Cantor (R-Va.) and his team are working hard to hold as many moderates as possible in order to force more centrist Democrats to back the legislation. Those efforts focused on some of the same members being targeted by Democrats, like Castle and Kirk, but also other lawmakers from environmentally friendly corners of the country, such as Wisconsin Rep. Tom Petri.
And on Thursday, House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio) threw down the gauntlet.
“Mark my words,” he said. “The American people are going to remember this vote. This will be a defining moment and a defining vote in this Congress.”
____________________________________________________
For moderates, it's not easy being green
By LISA LERER 6/25/09 8:18 AM EDT http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0609/24177.html#ixzz0JYMZSfZA&D
As House Democrats race toward a Friday floor vote on a controversial energy and climate change bill, moderate lawmakers on both sides of the aisle are feeling a little like Kermit the Frog.
It’s not easy being green.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and about a dozen emissaries are cornering skeptical Democrats across the Capitol, warning them that a vote against the bill will come back to haunt them. Top White House officials — including chief of staff Rahm Emanuel — are calling in on-the-fence members for high-pressure meetings.
Across the aisle, Republican leaders are trying to lock down their own caucus in near-unanimous opposition — the better to make the bill, which they dub an “energy tax,” a major campaign issue in 2010.
Moderates — in both parties — are stuck in the middle of what David Wasserman, House editor of the Cook Political Report, calls a “treacherous vote.”
Here are the members who’d most like to climb under a lily pad.
The freshmen: Reps. Frank Kratovil Jr., Walt Minnick, Bobby Bright and Eric Massa
Republicans are paying close attention to how freshman Democrats from conservative districts vote on the bill. While longer-serving Democrats from Republican-leaning districts might be able to explain the difficult vote to their constituents, freshmen may not have the political experience or goodwill back home to survive it.
“Most of my constituents are saying that if you vote for this, you won’t return to Congress,” said Massa. “This is 80-20 back home.”
Freshmen are complaining that Pelosi has given them too little time to review the whopping 1,200-plus-page bill. As of Wednesday, several said they remained undecided.
Kratovil, a freshman Democrat on the Agriculture Committee who will probably find himself in the Republicans’ cross hairs next fall, spent the early part of the week reviewing changes to the bill, along with a 107-page report on the issue written by the Congressional Research Service.
“I’m looking at some of the issues that have been resolved on the Ag Committee,” Kratovil said. “I’m optimistic these issues will be resolved.”
But he’s still on the fence, saying he needs to know more details about the final bill before he will know for sure which way he’s going to vote. “For me, it’s the details,” he said.
The schemers: Reps. Charlie Melancon and Mark Kirk
Both Melancon and Kirk are eyeing statewide office, and their political ambitions are certainly influencing their votes on the bill. Melancon has all but officially declared his challenge to Republican Sen. David Vitter (R-La.). And in Illinois, Republicans are pressuring Kirk to run for Obama’s old Senate seat in 2010.
Melancon voted against the bill, which is close to a nonstarter in oil-rich Louisiana, when it was before the House Energy and Commerce Committee. With the GOP already ready running radio ads against him, he’s expected to oppose the bill again this week.
Kirk remains on the fence, saying he has concerns about the lack of funding for nuclear energy and coal interests in his state.
“We don’t want to de-industrialize Michigan, Illinois and Wisconsin,” Kirk said after a meeting
with Pelosi and Reps. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) and Ed Markey (D-Mass.) , the sponsors of the legislation.
Opposing the bill could hurt him, however, in Chicago and other more liberal corners of the state. So voting for the bill, note political observers, could indicate some serious senatorial ambitious.
The farmers: Reps. Tim Walz and Mark Schauer
Agriculture Committee Chairman Collin Peterson is backing the bill after cutting a deal on Tuesday with Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Henry Waxman — but that doesn’t mean the rest of his committee is quite as ready to sign off on the legislation.
“I did get a cordial invitation to go talk to Rahm on Thursday,” said Walz, a Minnesota Democrat, who was spotted deep in conversation with Peterson on the House floor on Wednesday but remained undecided about the bill. “We need to try and learn by Thursday, for sure, where we’re at.”
The bill is expected to pick up the endorsements of several farm and ranching associations, a fact that could give some farm-state lawmakers the necessary cover to back it. But the Farm Bureau, a major agricultural lobbying association, continues to oppose the bill as “seriously flawed.”
The Republicans: Reps. Mike Castle, Dan Lungren and Dave Reichert
Democrats aren’t the only ones who could get burned by the bill.
Vulnerable Republicans from suburban districts could also find themselves in a difficult position if they vote with their party and oppose the legislation.
Waxman and Markey held a second meeting with moderate Republicans on Wednesday, urging them to back the legislation. A vote against the legislation, Democrats warn, could later allow them to label Republican candidates as against creating new green jobs, decreasing dependence on foreign oil and transitioning to a clean energy economy.
Those arguments have resonated with at least one Republican: California Rep. Mary Bono Mack voted for the bill in the Energy and Commerce Committee. Her Southern California district is rich with wind, solar and other renewable energy resources, making it nearly impossible for her to oppose the proposal, she said last week.
Energy producers: Reps. Mike Ross, Zack Space and Baron Hill
Although Democratic Reps. Mike Doyle of Pennsylvania and Rick Boucher of Virginia back the bill, their support might not be enough to convince other Rust Belt Democrats.
Some Midwestern and Southern members worry the bill could hurt coal and oil interests back home, as well as raise energy costs for already-strapped consumers.
Rep. Mike Ross (D-Ark.), who opposes the legislation, even introduced his own legislation on Tuesday that would expand oil and gas exploration.
“Energy-producing folks are going to need a good explanation back home to cast a vote for this thing,” said Wasserman. “This is a fascinating tug of war between guys like Boucher and guys like Bobby Bright, who would not support the measure over his dead body.”
_______________________________________________
Thursday, June 25, 2009
Wednesday, June 24, 2009
Tuesday, June 23, 2009
Medicaid Battle?
States Fight Medicaid Expansion
By JONATHAN WEISMAN
Wall Street Journal
6/23/09
WASHINGTON -- Some governors are pushing to scale back or kill proposals to expand Medicaid to provide health-care coverage to the uninsured, raising a new challenge to President Barack Obama's effort to overhaul the system.
Medicaid, the health-care program for the poor, is funded through a combination of federal and state tax money. Proposals in the House and Senate would expand the program to cover at least a third of the nation's 46 million uninsured, but states are worried they would get stuck with a big part of the tab.
Several governors, including Democratic Gov. Christine Gregoire of Washington and Republican Gov. Haley Barbour of Mississippi, plan to come to Washington this week to discuss health issues with White House and congressional officials. Medicaid is expected to be a primary topic.
"[W]e're wary of additional financial obligations when we're struggling to cover the obligations we have," said Jonathan Seib, a Gregoire health-policy adviser.
In private meetings, Senate Democrats working on health care have assured the governors that the federal government will assume all the costs for the expansion at first, followed by a transition to shared responsibility. House Democrats are pressing to have the federal government take on the full cost permanently.
The governors say their states aren't likely to ever return to the tax receipts they saw before the recession, much less the higher receipts they would eventually need to cover the cost of expanding Medicaid to people with incomes as high as 150% of the poverty line.
Sen. Diane Feinstein, a California Democrat, said Sunday the issue could be a deal breaker for her.
California is in "a state of financial catastrophe," she said on CNN's "State of the Union." "[I]f you change the Medicaid rate, for example, it has an impact on California between $1 billion and $5 billion a year. Now, how could I support that?" she asked. "It would take down the state."
Currently, government-sponsored coverage of children offered by a combination of Medicaid and the State Children's Health-Insurance Program generally extends to 200% of the poverty line, or $36,620 for a family of three, $44,100 for a family of four. Parents are generally covered by Medicaid up to 67% of the poverty line, or $14,800 for a family of four. Adults without dependent children often aren't covered by Medicaid at all.
The House Democratic plan would offer coverage to any uninsured American with incomes up to 133% of the poverty line, with the federal government assuming all the cost of expansion. Proponents haven't said what that will cost.
A proposal by the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee may go up to 150% of the poverty line. The federal government would assume all the cost for five years. During the next five years, the states would gradually assume half the cost.
The Senate Finance Committee is working on legislation along the same lines, but not as generous. Pregnant women would be covered up to 150% of the poverty line. Childless adults could be closer to 115%, a senior committee aide said.
White House officials appear to be looking at other options for the uninsured poor.
"It's too early in the process to determine how low-income individuals without health insurance will be covered," said Kenneth Baer, a spokesman for the White House budget office.
By JONATHAN WEISMAN
Wall Street Journal
6/23/09
WASHINGTON -- Some governors are pushing to scale back or kill proposals to expand Medicaid to provide health-care coverage to the uninsured, raising a new challenge to President Barack Obama's effort to overhaul the system.
Medicaid, the health-care program for the poor, is funded through a combination of federal and state tax money. Proposals in the House and Senate would expand the program to cover at least a third of the nation's 46 million uninsured, but states are worried they would get stuck with a big part of the tab.
Several governors, including Democratic Gov. Christine Gregoire of Washington and Republican Gov. Haley Barbour of Mississippi, plan to come to Washington this week to discuss health issues with White House and congressional officials. Medicaid is expected to be a primary topic.
"[W]e're wary of additional financial obligations when we're struggling to cover the obligations we have," said Jonathan Seib, a Gregoire health-policy adviser.
In private meetings, Senate Democrats working on health care have assured the governors that the federal government will assume all the costs for the expansion at first, followed by a transition to shared responsibility. House Democrats are pressing to have the federal government take on the full cost permanently.
The governors say their states aren't likely to ever return to the tax receipts they saw before the recession, much less the higher receipts they would eventually need to cover the cost of expanding Medicaid to people with incomes as high as 150% of the poverty line.
Sen. Diane Feinstein, a California Democrat, said Sunday the issue could be a deal breaker for her.
California is in "a state of financial catastrophe," she said on CNN's "State of the Union." "[I]f you change the Medicaid rate, for example, it has an impact on California between $1 billion and $5 billion a year. Now, how could I support that?" she asked. "It would take down the state."
Currently, government-sponsored coverage of children offered by a combination of Medicaid and the State Children's Health-Insurance Program generally extends to 200% of the poverty line, or $36,620 for a family of three, $44,100 for a family of four. Parents are generally covered by Medicaid up to 67% of the poverty line, or $14,800 for a family of four. Adults without dependent children often aren't covered by Medicaid at all.
The House Democratic plan would offer coverage to any uninsured American with incomes up to 133% of the poverty line, with the federal government assuming all the cost of expansion. Proponents haven't said what that will cost.
A proposal by the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee may go up to 150% of the poverty line. The federal government would assume all the cost for five years. During the next five years, the states would gradually assume half the cost.
The Senate Finance Committee is working on legislation along the same lines, but not as generous. Pregnant women would be covered up to 150% of the poverty line. Childless adults could be closer to 115%, a senior committee aide said.
White House officials appear to be looking at other options for the uninsured poor.
"It's too early in the process to determine how low-income individuals without health insurance will be covered," said Kenneth Baer, a spokesman for the White House budget office.
Saturday, June 20, 2009
Monday, June 15, 2009
Courting the Doctors
Obama pleads for support of health system overhaul
By CHARLES BABINGTON
Associated Press
6/15/09
CHICAGO – President Barack Obama asked skeptical doctors Monday to get behind an overhaul of the nation's health care system, declaring it a "ticking time bomb" for the budget that could force America to "go the way of GM."
The difficulty of his task was evident when he said he's against capping awards in malpractice lawsuits, a top priority for doctors, and earned a smattering of boos — a remarkable public response to a popular president accustomed to cheering audiences.
Flying to his hometown to speak at the annual meeting here of the American Medical Association, Obama struck back forcefully at those speaking out against his efforts to reshape the health care delivery system to bring skyrocketing health care costs under control and expand coverage to the millions of uninsured.
He had his sharpest rhetoric yet for critics, calling them "naysayers," "fear-mongers" and peddlers of "Trojan horse" falsehoods who should be ignored. He warned interest groups and lobbyists not to use "fear tactics to paint any effort to achieve reform as an attempt to socialize medicine."
"There are those who will try and scuttle this opportunity no matter what," Obama said.
The president directly took on criticism on Sunday from former Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney, though not by name. Romney, widely expected to consider another run at the White House in 2012, called Obama's support for creating government-sponsored insurance as an option alongside private coverage a "Trojan horse" for a single-payer system like Great Britain's.
"When you hear the naysayers claim that I'm trying to bring about government-run health care, know this: they are not telling the truth," Obama said.
Even before Obama spoke, Republicans offered push-back.
GOP Rep. Tom Price of Georgia — a former orthopedic surgeon — accused Obama of pushing a "government takeover" of health care. Speaking to reporters on a conference call organized by the Republican National Committee, Price contended that a committee that Obama's administration has established to study the effectiveness of various medical treatments would turn into a "rationing board" to overrule doctors and deny patients care.
The president said for the first time publicly that health care reform, including covering the almost 50 million Americans who have no insurance, will cost about $1 trillion over 10 years.
"That's real money, even in Washington," he said. "But remember: That's less than we are projected to have spent on the war in Iraq. And also remember: Failing to reform our health care system in a way that genuinely reduces cost growth will cost us trillions of dollars more in lost economic growth and lower wages."
Aides have said previously that the administration wants to keep the cost around $1 trillion, while also acknowledging it may go higher.
Obama has taken steps in recent days to outline just where that money could be found.
For instance, he wants to cut federal payments to hospitals by about $200 billion and cut $313 billion from Medicare and Medicaid over 10 years. He also is proposing a $635 billion "down payment" in tax increases and spending cuts in the health care system.
Obama traveled to Chicago to talk to the 250,000-physician group in hopes of persuading doctors not to fight him. The nation's doctors, like many other groups, are divided over the president's proposals.
He drew hearty applause with a focus on the particular concerns of the medical profession: telling them any system that relies on them "to be bean-counters and paper-pushers" is out of whack and that his push to investigate best-practices and eliminate unnecessary procedures "is not about dictating what kind of care should be provided."
"I need your help, doctors," he said. "To most Americans, you are the health care system. Americans me included just do what you recommend. That is why I will listen to you and work with you to pursue reform that works for you."
But the malpractice issue is the most provocative with this audience. Doctors chafe at the rising and eye-popping costs of malpractice insurance, and support limits on malpractice lawsuits.
Obama started by sympathizing with doctors "who feel like they are constantly looking over their shoulder for fear of lawsuits" and with their desire for some way to curb them. The crowd burst into loud support.
"Don't get too excited yet. ... Just hold onto your horses here, guys," Obama said as he prepared delivered the disappointing news.
"I want to be honest with you. I'm not advocating caps on malpractice awards," the president.
He explained that he thinks such limits would be unfair to harmed patients_ a line interrupted by boos. Instead, he said, without offering specifics, that expensive "excessive defensive medicine" can be curbed in other ways.
Democrats have long opposed caps on medical malpractice payouts — something former President George W. Bush pushed for.
In Washington, GOP Sens. Jon Kyl and Mitch McConnell, the Senate's minority leader, announced legislation that would bar the federal government from using medical effectiveness research to deny care. Obama administration officials have argued repeatedly that their goal is to collect more information for patients and doctors, not prevent anyone from getting needed treatments.
Trial lawyers' groups also stepped up their efforts.
The Center for Justice and Democracy, which says it advocates for injured consumers, attorneys and others, released a letter to Obama signed by 64 survivors of medical malpractice saying they didn't want to be used as a "political bargaining chip" in the president's efforts to win support from doctors.
"We are extremely concerned that the rights of medical malpractice patients may be stripped away as part of your national health care proposal," they wrote.
The main lobby for trial lawyers also disputed Obama's statement that it's "a real issue" that doctors order more tests and treatments to avoid legal liability.
"The notion that 'defensive medicine' is leading to higher health care costs is not supported by empirical data or academic literature," Les Weisbrod, president of the American Association for Justice, said in a statement after Obama's speech.
"Limiting the legal rights of injured patients will do nothing to lower health care costs or aid the uninsured," Weisbrod said.
Obama co-sponsored legislation with Hillary Rodham Clinton when both were in the Senate in 2005 that would have created a program to allow patients to learn of medical errors and establish negotiated compensation with the offer of an apology.
Obama said he's "open" to requiring all Americans to have health insurance, while stressing that the plan would permit continuing assistance for those who cannot afford it on their own. A "health care exchange" would be set up to provide additional options for the uninsured.
"A big part of what led General Motors and Chrysler into trouble," he said, "were the huge costs they racked up providing health care for their workers — costs that made them less profitable and less competitive with automakers around the world."
"If we do not fix our health care system," Obama said, "America may go the way of GM — paying more, getting less, and going broke."
Obama has been speaking privately with lawmakers about his ideas and publicly with audiences, such as a town hall style meeting last week in Green Bay, Wis. Obama and administration officials have blanketed the nation in support of his broad ideas, and Vice President Joe Biden on Sunday said it's up to Congress to pin down the details on how to pay for them.
More on Obama's Visit to the AMA
Success?
Taking on the Insurance Lobby
By CHARLES BABINGTON
Associated Press
6/15/09
CHICAGO – President Barack Obama asked skeptical doctors Monday to get behind an overhaul of the nation's health care system, declaring it a "ticking time bomb" for the budget that could force America to "go the way of GM."
The difficulty of his task was evident when he said he's against capping awards in malpractice lawsuits, a top priority for doctors, and earned a smattering of boos — a remarkable public response to a popular president accustomed to cheering audiences.
Flying to his hometown to speak at the annual meeting here of the American Medical Association, Obama struck back forcefully at those speaking out against his efforts to reshape the health care delivery system to bring skyrocketing health care costs under control and expand coverage to the millions of uninsured.
He had his sharpest rhetoric yet for critics, calling them "naysayers," "fear-mongers" and peddlers of "Trojan horse" falsehoods who should be ignored. He warned interest groups and lobbyists not to use "fear tactics to paint any effort to achieve reform as an attempt to socialize medicine."
"There are those who will try and scuttle this opportunity no matter what," Obama said.
The president directly took on criticism on Sunday from former Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney, though not by name. Romney, widely expected to consider another run at the White House in 2012, called Obama's support for creating government-sponsored insurance as an option alongside private coverage a "Trojan horse" for a single-payer system like Great Britain's.
"When you hear the naysayers claim that I'm trying to bring about government-run health care, know this: they are not telling the truth," Obama said.
Even before Obama spoke, Republicans offered push-back.
GOP Rep. Tom Price of Georgia — a former orthopedic surgeon — accused Obama of pushing a "government takeover" of health care. Speaking to reporters on a conference call organized by the Republican National Committee, Price contended that a committee that Obama's administration has established to study the effectiveness of various medical treatments would turn into a "rationing board" to overrule doctors and deny patients care.
The president said for the first time publicly that health care reform, including covering the almost 50 million Americans who have no insurance, will cost about $1 trillion over 10 years.
"That's real money, even in Washington," he said. "But remember: That's less than we are projected to have spent on the war in Iraq. And also remember: Failing to reform our health care system in a way that genuinely reduces cost growth will cost us trillions of dollars more in lost economic growth and lower wages."
Aides have said previously that the administration wants to keep the cost around $1 trillion, while also acknowledging it may go higher.
Obama has taken steps in recent days to outline just where that money could be found.
For instance, he wants to cut federal payments to hospitals by about $200 billion and cut $313 billion from Medicare and Medicaid over 10 years. He also is proposing a $635 billion "down payment" in tax increases and spending cuts in the health care system.
Obama traveled to Chicago to talk to the 250,000-physician group in hopes of persuading doctors not to fight him. The nation's doctors, like many other groups, are divided over the president's proposals.
He drew hearty applause with a focus on the particular concerns of the medical profession: telling them any system that relies on them "to be bean-counters and paper-pushers" is out of whack and that his push to investigate best-practices and eliminate unnecessary procedures "is not about dictating what kind of care should be provided."
"I need your help, doctors," he said. "To most Americans, you are the health care system. Americans me included just do what you recommend. That is why I will listen to you and work with you to pursue reform that works for you."
But the malpractice issue is the most provocative with this audience. Doctors chafe at the rising and eye-popping costs of malpractice insurance, and support limits on malpractice lawsuits.
Obama started by sympathizing with doctors "who feel like they are constantly looking over their shoulder for fear of lawsuits" and with their desire for some way to curb them. The crowd burst into loud support.
"Don't get too excited yet. ... Just hold onto your horses here, guys," Obama said as he prepared delivered the disappointing news.
"I want to be honest with you. I'm not advocating caps on malpractice awards," the president.
He explained that he thinks such limits would be unfair to harmed patients_ a line interrupted by boos. Instead, he said, without offering specifics, that expensive "excessive defensive medicine" can be curbed in other ways.
Democrats have long opposed caps on medical malpractice payouts — something former President George W. Bush pushed for.
In Washington, GOP Sens. Jon Kyl and Mitch McConnell, the Senate's minority leader, announced legislation that would bar the federal government from using medical effectiveness research to deny care. Obama administration officials have argued repeatedly that their goal is to collect more information for patients and doctors, not prevent anyone from getting needed treatments.
Trial lawyers' groups also stepped up their efforts.
The Center for Justice and Democracy, which says it advocates for injured consumers, attorneys and others, released a letter to Obama signed by 64 survivors of medical malpractice saying they didn't want to be used as a "political bargaining chip" in the president's efforts to win support from doctors.
"We are extremely concerned that the rights of medical malpractice patients may be stripped away as part of your national health care proposal," they wrote.
The main lobby for trial lawyers also disputed Obama's statement that it's "a real issue" that doctors order more tests and treatments to avoid legal liability.
"The notion that 'defensive medicine' is leading to higher health care costs is not supported by empirical data or academic literature," Les Weisbrod, president of the American Association for Justice, said in a statement after Obama's speech.
"Limiting the legal rights of injured patients will do nothing to lower health care costs or aid the uninsured," Weisbrod said.
Obama co-sponsored legislation with Hillary Rodham Clinton when both were in the Senate in 2005 that would have created a program to allow patients to learn of medical errors and establish negotiated compensation with the offer of an apology.
Obama said he's "open" to requiring all Americans to have health insurance, while stressing that the plan would permit continuing assistance for those who cannot afford it on their own. A "health care exchange" would be set up to provide additional options for the uninsured.
"A big part of what led General Motors and Chrysler into trouble," he said, "were the huge costs they racked up providing health care for their workers — costs that made them less profitable and less competitive with automakers around the world."
"If we do not fix our health care system," Obama said, "America may go the way of GM — paying more, getting less, and going broke."
Obama has been speaking privately with lawmakers about his ideas and publicly with audiences, such as a town hall style meeting last week in Green Bay, Wis. Obama and administration officials have blanketed the nation in support of his broad ideas, and Vice President Joe Biden on Sunday said it's up to Congress to pin down the details on how to pay for them.
More on Obama's Visit to the AMA
Success?
Taking on the Insurance Lobby
Saturday, June 13, 2009
Deficit Politics
White House Sends Signals on Deficit
By GERALD F. SEIB
Wall Street Journal
6/12/09
Think of the federal budget deficit as a nasty virus lurking inside President Barack Obama's plans, threatening both his efforts at economic recovery and his broader agenda. This virus will need long-term treatment -- years of it.
But the deficit also is becoming a significant short-term psychological problem that the administration has to deal with now. Put simply, if the administration can't convince the financial markets, the Congress and the public that it really, truly will cut into the deficit over time, even if it can't do so for a while, the long-term economic and political problems get a lot worse.
This week the warning signs began popping up. In financial markets, long-term interest rates rose to their highest level of the year, at least in part out of concerns over big government borrowing in the years ahead, raising a new threat to recovery in the housing industry.
And on the political side, Republicans showed they think the deficit is an issue they can use to good effect to attack the president. Sen. George Voinovich of Ohio, a longtime scold on fiscal responsibility, took to the Senate floor Wednesday to declare that Mr. Obama "must not be serious about addressing the growing national debt, or worse yet doesn't understand the fiscal crisis we are in, or even worse than that he just doesn't care."
All this is hardly lost on the president and his aides, of course, so they also have been busy this week trying to counteract any notions they are complacent about a projected $7 trillion in deficits over the next decade, even as they disperse billions of dollars to stimulate the economy and rescue the financial system.
First, Mr. Obama Tuesday called on Congress to pass legislation enshrining "pay-go" budget practices that require lawmakers to find a dollar of savings or taxes for every new dollar spent. (Skeptics, some within the president's own party, immediately noted that the proposal came with a multitrillion-dollar loophole because it would exclude from pay-go rules Medicare payments to doctors, changes in the estate and gift taxes, the Alternative Minimum Tax and extension of the Bush-era tax cuts.)
At the same time, the White House is preparing a plan to squeeze billions of additional dollars out of Medicare costs, which are the cause of so many long-term deficit woes. That comes a few weeks after Mr. Obama ordered cabinet members to find $100 million in administrative savings in their budgets, and pledged to find bigger savings elsewhere, a step that proved too token to have much psychological impact.
As all that suggests, the administration is embarking on some serious signal-sending to convince the world that it's on the case and committed to at least keeping the deficit as a share of gross domestic product to historically acceptable levels.
"I think we have been careful from the beginning to highlight that in the midst of a dangerous problem you need fiscal stimulus, but that in the long run the debt-to-GDP ratio has to be on a sustainable path," says Lawrence Summers, head of the White House's National Economic Council.
Administration officials also insist that the recent bond-market move to push up interest rates is less rooted in fears about government spending than some claim. The increases are as much the result of a belief that economic recovery is happening faster than expected, they argue, noting that the stock market and interest rates are rising in tandem.
"The journalistic narrative on the increases in interest rates" has "given more weight to concerns about the deficit" than is justified, argues one senior administration official.
In any case, officials say they recognize more will be needed over time. Eventually, the president will have to propose ways to hold down Social Security costs. And Obama aides continue talk of an eventual tax-reform plan that will generate more revenue.
But the big elephant in this room is health care. In the eyes of most Obama aides, the most important deficit-fighting measure of the next few months is the effort to pass a health-care overhaul that expands coverage without costing more federal dollars, and that makes systemic changes that hold down overall health costs.
The federal government, as the nation's single biggest buyer of health care, has more at stake in cost containment than anybody else. "We are addressing health care...because if you don't address that, you're on an unsustainable path on deficits," says Peter Orszag, the head of the president's Office of Management and Budget.
Mr. Obama was even more succinct in a Wisconsin appearance Thursday. Talking about inflation in health costs, he said simply: "If we don't get a handle on it, we're not going to be OK."
___________________________________________________________
GOP blew up budget themselves
CYNTHIA TUCKER
Atlanta Journal Constitution
6/14/09
It would be easier to take Republicans seriously on government spending now if they’d ever complained about spending during the tenure of President George W. Bush — especially during the six years when they controlled government and could have cut spending dramatically. They could have fought the Pentagon on expensive and unnecessary weapons, eliminated farm subsidies to wealthy growers and pared back Medicare.
Instead, they did just the opposite. They slashed taxes and substantially increased government spending, burning through the estimated $800 billion annual surplus the federal government had accumulated under Bill Clinton. The Republican-dominated Congress even passed a huge entitlement, the fiscally foolish prescription drug plan for the elderly.
Now, though, with Democrats in control, Republicans are fiscal conservatives again — or so they say. All the fuss about mounting deficits prompted President Barack Obama to tell Congress last week that he’d reintroduce the “pay as you go’” law, which expired in 2002. It would require new spending programs be paid for with budget cuts or revenue increases. And it’s not a bad idea.
But, believe it or not, Obama’s recent spending has contributed only a couple of shovels-full toward digging this deep fiscal hole. The recession, which slashed tax receipts, did much more.
And policies implemented by the previous administration were like a giant backhoe from the movie “Transformers” — digging, digging, digging.
President Bush chose to overthrow Saddam Hussein and hide the costs off-budget, becoming the first president to go to war without a tax increase to pay for it. By the time all U.S. troops have left Iraq, that war is likely to have cost two trillion dollars. And Bush’s tax cuts would have left us in a fiscal slough even without the recession. With an aging population and more spending on entitlements, there’s a growing gap between revenue coming in and revenue going out.
For all the Republicans’ criticism of the stimulus package, Obama and the Democratic-controlled Congress were right to pour money into the fight against the Great Recession. Most economists agree that the federal government shouldn’t worry about deficits when the economy is edging toward the apocalypse. The $787 billion stimulus package is a key reason Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke now sees “green shoots” suggesting an economic upswing by next year.
Obama isn’t off the hook, of course. If he runs for re-election in 2012 and the country is still swimming in red ink, he’ll have a huge problem. So there’s every political reason to believe he’ll have come up with a plan to reduce deficits before then.
But with Republicans trying to reclaim the mantle of fiscal conservatism, they ought to have something important to contribute to the debate. They don’t. The plan introduced by House Republicans, which they claim would save $75 billion a year, has specific spending cuts amounting to only about $5 billion. During the March budget debate, Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) slammed “earmarks,” but Republicans grabbed a substantial portion of them for their districts.
They spent no time fighting against huge money-wasters such as agricultural subsidies. Instead, Republicans such as Georgia Sen. Saxby Chambliss helped protect subsidies for agribusinesses. Worse, the GOP’s signature economic prescription is cutting taxes. That’s voodoo economics, just as it was when George H.W. Bush said so in 1980.
If that’s the best the GOP can do on fiscal conservatism, they won’t regain credibility any time soon.
_____________________________________________________
Video of First Article
By GERALD F. SEIB
Wall Street Journal
6/12/09
Think of the federal budget deficit as a nasty virus lurking inside President Barack Obama's plans, threatening both his efforts at economic recovery and his broader agenda. This virus will need long-term treatment -- years of it.
But the deficit also is becoming a significant short-term psychological problem that the administration has to deal with now. Put simply, if the administration can't convince the financial markets, the Congress and the public that it really, truly will cut into the deficit over time, even if it can't do so for a while, the long-term economic and political problems get a lot worse.
This week the warning signs began popping up. In financial markets, long-term interest rates rose to their highest level of the year, at least in part out of concerns over big government borrowing in the years ahead, raising a new threat to recovery in the housing industry.
And on the political side, Republicans showed they think the deficit is an issue they can use to good effect to attack the president. Sen. George Voinovich of Ohio, a longtime scold on fiscal responsibility, took to the Senate floor Wednesday to declare that Mr. Obama "must not be serious about addressing the growing national debt, or worse yet doesn't understand the fiscal crisis we are in, or even worse than that he just doesn't care."
All this is hardly lost on the president and his aides, of course, so they also have been busy this week trying to counteract any notions they are complacent about a projected $7 trillion in deficits over the next decade, even as they disperse billions of dollars to stimulate the economy and rescue the financial system.
First, Mr. Obama Tuesday called on Congress to pass legislation enshrining "pay-go" budget practices that require lawmakers to find a dollar of savings or taxes for every new dollar spent. (Skeptics, some within the president's own party, immediately noted that the proposal came with a multitrillion-dollar loophole because it would exclude from pay-go rules Medicare payments to doctors, changes in the estate and gift taxes, the Alternative Minimum Tax and extension of the Bush-era tax cuts.)
At the same time, the White House is preparing a plan to squeeze billions of additional dollars out of Medicare costs, which are the cause of so many long-term deficit woes. That comes a few weeks after Mr. Obama ordered cabinet members to find $100 million in administrative savings in their budgets, and pledged to find bigger savings elsewhere, a step that proved too token to have much psychological impact.
As all that suggests, the administration is embarking on some serious signal-sending to convince the world that it's on the case and committed to at least keeping the deficit as a share of gross domestic product to historically acceptable levels.
"I think we have been careful from the beginning to highlight that in the midst of a dangerous problem you need fiscal stimulus, but that in the long run the debt-to-GDP ratio has to be on a sustainable path," says Lawrence Summers, head of the White House's National Economic Council.
Administration officials also insist that the recent bond-market move to push up interest rates is less rooted in fears about government spending than some claim. The increases are as much the result of a belief that economic recovery is happening faster than expected, they argue, noting that the stock market and interest rates are rising in tandem.
"The journalistic narrative on the increases in interest rates" has "given more weight to concerns about the deficit" than is justified, argues one senior administration official.
In any case, officials say they recognize more will be needed over time. Eventually, the president will have to propose ways to hold down Social Security costs. And Obama aides continue talk of an eventual tax-reform plan that will generate more revenue.
But the big elephant in this room is health care. In the eyes of most Obama aides, the most important deficit-fighting measure of the next few months is the effort to pass a health-care overhaul that expands coverage without costing more federal dollars, and that makes systemic changes that hold down overall health costs.
The federal government, as the nation's single biggest buyer of health care, has more at stake in cost containment than anybody else. "We are addressing health care...because if you don't address that, you're on an unsustainable path on deficits," says Peter Orszag, the head of the president's Office of Management and Budget.
Mr. Obama was even more succinct in a Wisconsin appearance Thursday. Talking about inflation in health costs, he said simply: "If we don't get a handle on it, we're not going to be OK."
___________________________________________________________
GOP blew up budget themselves
CYNTHIA TUCKER
Atlanta Journal Constitution
6/14/09
It would be easier to take Republicans seriously on government spending now if they’d ever complained about spending during the tenure of President George W. Bush — especially during the six years when they controlled government and could have cut spending dramatically. They could have fought the Pentagon on expensive and unnecessary weapons, eliminated farm subsidies to wealthy growers and pared back Medicare.
Instead, they did just the opposite. They slashed taxes and substantially increased government spending, burning through the estimated $800 billion annual surplus the federal government had accumulated under Bill Clinton. The Republican-dominated Congress even passed a huge entitlement, the fiscally foolish prescription drug plan for the elderly.
Now, though, with Democrats in control, Republicans are fiscal conservatives again — or so they say. All the fuss about mounting deficits prompted President Barack Obama to tell Congress last week that he’d reintroduce the “pay as you go’” law, which expired in 2002. It would require new spending programs be paid for with budget cuts or revenue increases. And it’s not a bad idea.
But, believe it or not, Obama’s recent spending has contributed only a couple of shovels-full toward digging this deep fiscal hole. The recession, which slashed tax receipts, did much more.
And policies implemented by the previous administration were like a giant backhoe from the movie “Transformers” — digging, digging, digging.
President Bush chose to overthrow Saddam Hussein and hide the costs off-budget, becoming the first president to go to war without a tax increase to pay for it. By the time all U.S. troops have left Iraq, that war is likely to have cost two trillion dollars. And Bush’s tax cuts would have left us in a fiscal slough even without the recession. With an aging population and more spending on entitlements, there’s a growing gap between revenue coming in and revenue going out.
For all the Republicans’ criticism of the stimulus package, Obama and the Democratic-controlled Congress were right to pour money into the fight against the Great Recession. Most economists agree that the federal government shouldn’t worry about deficits when the economy is edging toward the apocalypse. The $787 billion stimulus package is a key reason Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke now sees “green shoots” suggesting an economic upswing by next year.
Obama isn’t off the hook, of course. If he runs for re-election in 2012 and the country is still swimming in red ink, he’ll have a huge problem. So there’s every political reason to believe he’ll have come up with a plan to reduce deficits before then.
But with Republicans trying to reclaim the mantle of fiscal conservatism, they ought to have something important to contribute to the debate. They don’t. The plan introduced by House Republicans, which they claim would save $75 billion a year, has specific spending cuts amounting to only about $5 billion. During the March budget debate, Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) slammed “earmarks,” but Republicans grabbed a substantial portion of them for their districts.
They spent no time fighting against huge money-wasters such as agricultural subsidies. Instead, Republicans such as Georgia Sen. Saxby Chambliss helped protect subsidies for agribusinesses. Worse, the GOP’s signature economic prescription is cutting taxes. That’s voodoo economics, just as it was when George H.W. Bush said so in 1980.
If that’s the best the GOP can do on fiscal conservatism, they won’t regain credibility any time soon.
_____________________________________________________
Video of First Article
Does Business Know What It Wants?
Has Government Crossed the Line?
From bank bailouts to auto bailouts to executive pay, business is increasingly nervous about the heavy hand of the Obama Administration
By Theo Francis
Business Week
6/13/09
It remains an open question whether the much-heralded "green shoots" truly signal a turn toward a U.S. economic recovery. What's clearer is that the business backlash against government is well under way.
Not so long ago, business and policymakers alike were calling for Uncle Sam to step in and stop the bleeding—in the financial sector, at the automakers, in the housing and job markets. Most of the sniping that occurred came as various government figures criticized one another for doing too little. Now, however, the grousing is shifting to arguments that the government is overstepping that subjective line between helpful intervention and harmful meddling, including in areas where business only recently welcomed Uncle Sam's dollars.
"They're making business decisions in a way that is political," John A. Allison IV, chairman of BB&T Bank (BBT), told BusinessWeek at a Beltway gala on June 11. BB&T was cleared this past week to return $3.1 billion in federal bailout money. "Where does it stop? The people making the decisions don't have the knowledge of the industries, of the institutions, to make good business decisions."
Go-Go Government Intervention
Certainly, last week brought plenty of revelations about the government's role as an activist investor, both now and at the height of the crisis. The Treasury unveiled broad principles for executive compensation and backed legislation to give the Securities & Exchange Commission and shareholders more say in how compensation policy is shaped; it also appointed a "pay czar" to police compensation at the seven companies that have received repeated federal aid.
The Food & Drug Administration got the go-ahead to regulate tobacco as a drug. The Supreme Court stood aside, letting the Obama Administration's plan for Fiat (FIA.MI) to acquire Chrysler go through, despite arguments by some creditors that it stood on end the usual bankruptcy process. And the Administration's role became clearer in everything from picking board members and top executives to "changing the culture" of also-bankrupt General Motors.
On Capitol Hill, indignant lawmakers listened as Bank of America (BAC) CEO Kenneth Lewis described the pressure he felt late last year at the hands of Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke and then-Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson to go consummate the acquisition of an ever-shakier Merrill Lynch.
"Campaign for Free Enterprise"
So perhaps it should come as no surprise that the U.S. Chamber of Commerce—perhaps the business lobby's most persistent voice against government regulation—picked this week to launch its "Campaign for Free Enterprise." Declaring that "capitalism is at a crossroads," Chamber officials called the effort to "defend and advance America's free enterprise values in the face of rapid government growth and attacks by anti-business activists…one of the most important and necessary initiatives in [the Chamber's] nearly 100-year history." Two days later, the Chamber sent an open letter to Senator John Thune (R-S.D.) supporting a "transparent exit strategy to ensure the timely withdrawal of the federal government from these most extreme and unusual forms of intervention."
The Republican Party of Florida put it a little more bluntly, headlining its criticism of the Obama Administration's forays into business (and some other issues) "Back in the USSR" and decrying that the Administration has more czars—over health care, autos, executive pay, and more—than did three centuries of Romanov rule. (Never mind that some of the U.S. czars date to GOP Administrations or that the Romanovs and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics didn't exactly overlap.)
The Administration's approach has real dangers. Attempting to reorganize and tinker with the culture of a giant corporation like GM is risky in the best of times. Taxpayers may find themselves hopelessly entangled in lost corporate causes, with billions of loans never returned. Companies that are shackled with pay restrictions may lose top talent to those that aren't.
Countless historical examples show the potential for unintended consequences from well-intended policies. (Just one example: the costly distortions in employee titles and pursuit of tax loopholes that followed imposition of government wage and price controls.)
Business Used to Want Federal Assistance
Of course, business was happy to get federal funds when they were being doled out by the fistful over the past eight months. The Chamber, for example, lauded Congress for the original $700 billion financial-system bailout; pushed for aid to the automakers; sought borrowing assistance for the nuclear, coal, and other industries; and called for stimulus spending and subsidies for transportation, broadband, housing, auto sales, and small business, as well as exporters.
And while Florida state GOP chief Jim Greer criticized the stimulus bill as laden with pork-barrel spending while it was being hammered out, he also made sure to praise its "important funding for certain essential services" and pushed to "ensure that Florida receives its full share and is able to use any federal economic stimulus dollars coming to our state."
Some lawmakers, too, are now calling for the government to back off where they once demanded more involvement. As The Washington Post's Steve Pearlstein points out, for example, Senator Steve Corker (R-Tenn.) criticized last fall's plan to aid automakers because it didn't demand enough from the companies in the way of restructuring. But more recently, Corker is pushing legislation to force the auto companies to reimburse dealers whom they want to restructure out of existence.
Time for a Backlash
Regardless of where you stand on the political spectrum, you could view this shift as a good sign, a return to something approaching normalcy. With a full-blown crisis raging, after all, it's politically awkward to stand in the way entirely, says Julian E. Zelizer, a political historian with Princeton University's Woodrow Wilson School of Public Affairs. "When everyone's losing their savings, it's hard for business to say the government shouldn't do anything," he says. "Now, there's some sense of calm for business to be more critical again."
Similarly, the President's political opponents have an easier time making hay out of what is, after all, a core issue to the GOP. Especially with cultural issues like gay marriage and abortion apparently lacking the traction they once had, "this is an issue Republicans have been able to do well with in the past," Zelizer says.
At the same time, the increasingly vocal backlash also illustrates a classic corporate dynamic—albeit with some unusual twists—says Heather Elms, an American University associate professor of international business. Ordinarily, she notes, corporate management is paid to use its discretion in balancing the interests of various stakeholders—shareholders, bondholders, employees, and government, among others. "To some extent, the crises at these companies are evidence that they weren't doing a very good job, so you have all these stakeholders stepping in and saying no, this is how you do it," Elms says. "Now the government is saying we want some strings attached to that, and the managers are saying we don't want you to mess around with our discretion."
Government Is Different
Of course, the government isn't like other stakeholders. While shareholders, employees, and customers can only vote with their feet, the government can force many of the changes it wants, as it did by statute when it came to limiting pay at banks taking federal aid, and with its deep pockets at the automakers, who might not have found bankruptcy financing elsewhere. Moreover, markets are flexible and can adjust fairly quickly, but statutes tend to linger.
"There's an inevitability that things aren't going to work out exactly the way they were intended," Elms adds. "People tend to ascribe great powers of thought and reasoning to executives and politicians, but they're exploring here, they're experimenting, and none of them knows exactly what to do."
From bank bailouts to auto bailouts to executive pay, business is increasingly nervous about the heavy hand of the Obama Administration
By Theo Francis
Business Week
6/13/09
It remains an open question whether the much-heralded "green shoots" truly signal a turn toward a U.S. economic recovery. What's clearer is that the business backlash against government is well under way.
Not so long ago, business and policymakers alike were calling for Uncle Sam to step in and stop the bleeding—in the financial sector, at the automakers, in the housing and job markets. Most of the sniping that occurred came as various government figures criticized one another for doing too little. Now, however, the grousing is shifting to arguments that the government is overstepping that subjective line between helpful intervention and harmful meddling, including in areas where business only recently welcomed Uncle Sam's dollars.
"They're making business decisions in a way that is political," John A. Allison IV, chairman of BB&T Bank (BBT), told BusinessWeek at a Beltway gala on June 11. BB&T was cleared this past week to return $3.1 billion in federal bailout money. "Where does it stop? The people making the decisions don't have the knowledge of the industries, of the institutions, to make good business decisions."
Go-Go Government Intervention
Certainly, last week brought plenty of revelations about the government's role as an activist investor, both now and at the height of the crisis. The Treasury unveiled broad principles for executive compensation and backed legislation to give the Securities & Exchange Commission and shareholders more say in how compensation policy is shaped; it also appointed a "pay czar" to police compensation at the seven companies that have received repeated federal aid.
The Food & Drug Administration got the go-ahead to regulate tobacco as a drug. The Supreme Court stood aside, letting the Obama Administration's plan for Fiat (FIA.MI) to acquire Chrysler go through, despite arguments by some creditors that it stood on end the usual bankruptcy process. And the Administration's role became clearer in everything from picking board members and top executives to "changing the culture" of also-bankrupt General Motors.
On Capitol Hill, indignant lawmakers listened as Bank of America (BAC) CEO Kenneth Lewis described the pressure he felt late last year at the hands of Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke and then-Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson to go consummate the acquisition of an ever-shakier Merrill Lynch.
"Campaign for Free Enterprise"
So perhaps it should come as no surprise that the U.S. Chamber of Commerce—perhaps the business lobby's most persistent voice against government regulation—picked this week to launch its "Campaign for Free Enterprise." Declaring that "capitalism is at a crossroads," Chamber officials called the effort to "defend and advance America's free enterprise values in the face of rapid government growth and attacks by anti-business activists…one of the most important and necessary initiatives in [the Chamber's] nearly 100-year history." Two days later, the Chamber sent an open letter to Senator John Thune (R-S.D.) supporting a "transparent exit strategy to ensure the timely withdrawal of the federal government from these most extreme and unusual forms of intervention."
The Republican Party of Florida put it a little more bluntly, headlining its criticism of the Obama Administration's forays into business (and some other issues) "Back in the USSR" and decrying that the Administration has more czars—over health care, autos, executive pay, and more—than did three centuries of Romanov rule. (Never mind that some of the U.S. czars date to GOP Administrations or that the Romanovs and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics didn't exactly overlap.)
The Administration's approach has real dangers. Attempting to reorganize and tinker with the culture of a giant corporation like GM is risky in the best of times. Taxpayers may find themselves hopelessly entangled in lost corporate causes, with billions of loans never returned. Companies that are shackled with pay restrictions may lose top talent to those that aren't.
Countless historical examples show the potential for unintended consequences from well-intended policies. (Just one example: the costly distortions in employee titles and pursuit of tax loopholes that followed imposition of government wage and price controls.)
Business Used to Want Federal Assistance
Of course, business was happy to get federal funds when they were being doled out by the fistful over the past eight months. The Chamber, for example, lauded Congress for the original $700 billion financial-system bailout; pushed for aid to the automakers; sought borrowing assistance for the nuclear, coal, and other industries; and called for stimulus spending and subsidies for transportation, broadband, housing, auto sales, and small business, as well as exporters.
And while Florida state GOP chief Jim Greer criticized the stimulus bill as laden with pork-barrel spending while it was being hammered out, he also made sure to praise its "important funding for certain essential services" and pushed to "ensure that Florida receives its full share and is able to use any federal economic stimulus dollars coming to our state."
Some lawmakers, too, are now calling for the government to back off where they once demanded more involvement. As The Washington Post's Steve Pearlstein points out, for example, Senator Steve Corker (R-Tenn.) criticized last fall's plan to aid automakers because it didn't demand enough from the companies in the way of restructuring. But more recently, Corker is pushing legislation to force the auto companies to reimburse dealers whom they want to restructure out of existence.
Time for a Backlash
Regardless of where you stand on the political spectrum, you could view this shift as a good sign, a return to something approaching normalcy. With a full-blown crisis raging, after all, it's politically awkward to stand in the way entirely, says Julian E. Zelizer, a political historian with Princeton University's Woodrow Wilson School of Public Affairs. "When everyone's losing their savings, it's hard for business to say the government shouldn't do anything," he says. "Now, there's some sense of calm for business to be more critical again."
Similarly, the President's political opponents have an easier time making hay out of what is, after all, a core issue to the GOP. Especially with cultural issues like gay marriage and abortion apparently lacking the traction they once had, "this is an issue Republicans have been able to do well with in the past," Zelizer says.
At the same time, the increasingly vocal backlash also illustrates a classic corporate dynamic—albeit with some unusual twists—says Heather Elms, an American University associate professor of international business. Ordinarily, she notes, corporate management is paid to use its discretion in balancing the interests of various stakeholders—shareholders, bondholders, employees, and government, among others. "To some extent, the crises at these companies are evidence that they weren't doing a very good job, so you have all these stakeholders stepping in and saying no, this is how you do it," Elms says. "Now the government is saying we want some strings attached to that, and the managers are saying we don't want you to mess around with our discretion."
Government Is Different
Of course, the government isn't like other stakeholders. While shareholders, employees, and customers can only vote with their feet, the government can force many of the changes it wants, as it did by statute when it came to limiting pay at banks taking federal aid, and with its deep pockets at the automakers, who might not have found bankruptcy financing elsewhere. Moreover, markets are flexible and can adjust fairly quickly, but statutes tend to linger.
"There's an inevitability that things aren't going to work out exactly the way they were intended," Elms adds. "People tend to ascribe great powers of thought and reasoning to executives and politicians, but they're exploring here, they're experimenting, and none of them knows exactly what to do."
Friday, June 12, 2009
The Ice Age Cometh
TimeBy Mike Murphy Monday, Jun. 22, 2009
Despairing Republican friends have been asking me what I think we should do to rebuild the GOP and begin our certain and inevitable comeback. My answer disappoints them: "Build an ark."
I say this because I've made a career out of counting votes, and the numbers tell a clear story; the demographics of America are changing in a way that is deadly for the Republican Party as it exists today. A GOP ice age is on the way.
Demographic change is irritating to politicos, since it works on elections much as rigged dice do on a Las Vegas craps table: it is a game changer. For years, Republicans won elections because the country was chock-full of white middle-class voters who mostly pulled the GOP lever on Election Day. Today, however, that formula is no longer enough.
It was a huge shock to the GOP when Barack Obama won Republican Indiana last year. The bigger news was how he did it. Latino voters delivered the state. Exit polls showed that they provided Obama with a margin of more than 58,000 votes in a state he carried by a slim 26,000 votes. That's right, GOP, you've entered a brave new world ruled by Latino Hoosiers, and you're losing.
In 1980, Latino voters cast about 2% of all votes. Last year it was 9%, and Obama won that Hispanic vote with a crushing 35-point margin. By 2030, the Latino share of the vote is likely to double. In Texas, the crucial buckle for the GOP's Electoral College belt, the No. 1 name for new male babies--many of whom will vote one day--is Jose. Young voters are another huge GOP problem. Obama won voters under 30 by a record 33 points. And the young voters of today, while certainly capable of changing their minds, do become all voters tomorrow.
Rather than face up to all this, too many in the GOP are stuck in a swoon of nostalgia. Most of our party leaders come from bloodred GOP states or safe districts, so they are far more at home in the tribal politics of Republican primaries than in those of the country as a whole. You could say their radio dials are stuck on AM. The result is we hear a lot about going back to "the winning ways of Ronald Reagan." Well, I love Reagan too. But demographics no longer do. In 1980, Reagan beat Jimmy Carter by 10 points. If that contest were held again today, under the current demographics of the electorate per exit polls, the election would be much closer, with Reagan probably winning by about 3 points.
It is true that attitudes change. A magnificent Republican renewal may still be possible. Conservatism is traditionally energized by a reaction to liberal excess, and the unabashedly leftish tilt of the Obama Administration's domestic agenda does give hope. But demography is a powerful force. Waiting and hoping didn't do much for the Whigs. I prefer a Republican reformation right now.
Young voters need to see a GOP that is more socially libertarian, particularly toward gay rights. With changing demographics come changing attitudes, and aping the grim town elders from Footloose is not the path back to a Republican White House. The pro-life movement can still be a central part of the GOP--it has support among all ages (and a slim majority of Latino voters)--but the overall GOP view on abortion must aggressively embrace the big tent.
________________________________________________________
Jay Cost
Real Clear Politics
6/12/09
Mike Murphy's new column in Time recycles many of the arguments proffered by Democrats who have been arguing that their majority will be enduring. I've dealt with these at length, and rather than rehash them here, I'll point you in the direction of my essays on the subject. See here, here, and here.
Instead, I want to point out the peculiar argument that's contained in this snippet:
Despairing Republican friends have been asking me what I think we should do to rebuild the GOP and begin our certain and inevitable comeback. My answer disappoints them: "Build an ark."
I say this because I've made a career out of counting votes, and the numbers tell a clear story; the demographics of America are changing in a way that is deadly for the Republican Party as it exists today. A GOP ice age is on the way....It was a huge shock to the GOP when Barack Obama won Republican Indiana last year. The bigger news was how he did it. Latino voters delivered the state. Exit polls showed that they provided Obama with a margin of more than 58,000 votes in a state he carried by a slim 26,000 votes. That's right, GOP, you've entered a brave new world ruled by Latino Hoosiers, and you're losing.
Of course, it was just four years ago that George W. Bush pulled in a historically large number of Latinos to the Republican Party. The exit poll had it at 44%. Some thought that was overestimated, and other estimates had it around 39%. Either way, a significant pull. This is something that seems to me to be worth mentioning when making an argument about the enduring Democratic majority. Yet it rarely is.
Anyway, Murphy's math is correct on Latinos in Indiana. The exit poll estimate has them giving Obama a plurality of something like 58,000 votes. However, his conclusion - "a brave new world ruled by Latino Hoosiers" - is completely overdrawn, which I think is characteristic of these demographics-mean-GOP-doom arguments.
The reason is...drumroll please...white voters! Shock of shocks, right? Yet it's true! In 2004, John Kerry won 34% of the white vote. In 2008, Obama won 45%. That's an 11-point improvement, and it made a significant difference. McCain won about 218k more white Hoosiers than Obama did. Bush won 681k more whites than Kerry.
So, Hispanics moved. But so also did white voters, and their movement was much more substantial.
Like I said, I'm not terribly interested in rehashing all the various arguments for why the enduring Democratic majority argument is problematic. I've done it already. I'll only say that Murphy's argument is consistent with what I've seen many times. The proponents of this hypothesis end up putting forward numbers that somehow don't tell the full story.
If it's allocating all non-white voters to the Democrats, doing an apples-to-oranges comparison of 1988 to 2008, ignoring recent elections that cut against the hypothesis, inventing ad hoc psychological concepts to explain falsifying evidence away, or whatever - there often seems to be something a little askew in the presentation of this argument. That's not to imply that anybody is cooking the books. Far from it! I have great respect for Murphy, as well as those with whom I've argued on this subject. And to a certain extent, I think they're on to something.
Maybe the trick is how do you approach the data. Do you do so looking to test your hypothesis, or to find instances that support it? The latter is a dangerous endeavor, for in a data set as large as American national elections (!), you can always find something, somewhere that appears to support your theory. But that's not how data should be used to evaluate arguments.
For what it's worth, my take is that this theory relies far too heavily on the concept of realignment - something that political scientists have begun to move beyond, and for good reason. I think realignment is a highly problematic category. Almost inevitably, the data needs to be squeezed here and stretched there to fit into the proper form.
One final objection to Murphy's piece.
He writes:
In 1980, Reagan beat Jimmy Carter by 10 points. If that contest were held again today, under the current demographics of the electorate per exit polls, the election would be much closer, with Reagan probably winning by about 3 points.
In 1980, Reagan beat Jimmy Carter by 10 points. If that contest were held again today, under the current demographics of the electorate per exit polls, the election would be much closer, with Reagan probably winning by about 3 points.
I object to this type of analysis - re-running old elections with contemporary demography to argue for some new alignment. I've seen this before. The problem is that each candidate's share per demographic group is locked in the past while the size of the group is updated for today. This is arbitrary! For instance, Reagan won about 60% of the two-party vote among whites that year.
Carter won about 40%. A lot of Carter's white support came from the South - where he ran extremely close in Alabama, Arkansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Tennessee. Plus, he won Georgia and West Virginia. Since 1980, all of these states have shifted rightward. Other states in our fine Republic have shifted leftward, and the preferences of different types of voters have shifted as well. So, if we were to rerun the exact same election in 2008, the candidates' shares of each group would surely be different, in ways we cannot predict. So, maybe if we re-ran 1980 again, Reagan's overall lead would have dropped. Maybe it would have increased. Who knows? This is why I think this intellectual exercise has little analytical payoff.
Thursday, June 11, 2009
Dems vs. Dems on health bill
By CARRIE BUDOFF BROWN 6/11/09 4:18 AM EDT
Updated: 6/11/09 5:26 PM EDT
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0609/23616.html#ixzz0IBDYg7EA&D
President Barack Obama's plan for a government health insurance program has touched off an increasingly fierce Democratic civil war on Capitol Hill, as liberals fearful about squandering the chance to achieve that goal are taking aggressive steps to keep moderates in line.
When Sen. Ben Nelson (D-Neb.) called the public plan a deal breaker, a progressive group co-founded by Joe Trippi launched a campaign in Nebraska accusing the senator of being a "sellout" for special interests.
After a strategy memo by the centrist Democratic think tank Third Way cautioned Democrats on overreaching on a public plan, Daily Kos bloggers went on the attack, and Third Way now faces a coordinated effort to pressure Third Way donors.
Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-La.) is the next target. On Tuesday, she said she opposed the public plan. By Wednesday, the liberal Health Care for America Now was drawing up a plan to change her mind.
"It is all about Democrats," said Adam Green, chief executive officer of Change Congress, which launched the Nelson campaign. "We only need 50 votes. We could conceivably have 60 votes on our own if we keep Democrats unified. It is a matter of convincing Democrats whose conventional wisdom is based on the old political order. This is an extremely popular proposal spearheaded by an extremely popular president, and it is OK to support it."
Amid the signs of party discord, Obama is stepping up his personal efforts to push a public plan, with his first health-care town hall event Thursday in Green Bay, Wisc. On Monday, he’ll travel to Chicago to address the annual meeting of the American Medical Association, which is not on board with a government insurance program.
AMA President Nancy Nielsen has raised concerns that the public option would underpay doctors, and the group will tell the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions committee at a hearing Thursday that it opposes the proposal, which could deal a serious blow to Obama's effort to convince lawmakers and voters that a government plan is the way to go.
Still, the White House appeared to be testing out a new sales-pitch Wednesday, with Press Secretary Robert Gibbs saying of the debate on Capitol Hill, “You're likely to hear two very important words: choice and competition. A public option . . . is nothing more than the ability to provide more choice through competition.”
Obama has talked repeatedly about securing Republican votes on health care reform, but he first has to win over the moderate Democrats who have refused to commit. The president could get around them by using the reconciliation process, which allows a bill to win passage on 51 votes instead of a filibuster-proof 60.
Yet this voting bloc still appears to matter, given the prolonged absences of Sens. Ted Kennedy and Robert Byrd, the vacant seat in Minnesota and the still-sizable number of undecided Senate moderates.
Sen. Evan Bayh of Indiana is undecided but said he is keeping an "open mind." The same goes for Sen. Jon Tester of Montana. Interest groups are closely watching Sen. Kent Conrad of North Dakota, Sen. Tom Carper of Delaware, and Sens. Blanche Lincoln and Mark Pryor of Arkansas.
Change Congress considers its effort with Nelson a success – and other wavering Democrats can expect the same if they don't back the public plan, Green said. Democrats in Nebraska
encouraged the group to "kill him with kindness," but Change Congress decided open pressure was the better route, sending 3,000 direct mail pieces and placing $10,000 in Internet ads.
Nelson is no longer calling the public plan a "deal breaker."
"That is the model everyone should use to make sure Democrats follow Barack Obama's lead on the public option," Green said. "When Democratic politicians are siding with special interest contributors over constituents, we have to call them out on it."
Nelson maintains that he has been consistent. On Wednesday, he said he could not back a public plan that jeopardized the private insurance coverage for 200 million Americans but he will "look at any public plan that is presented."
"Those people who are out there attacking us are using the whack-a-mole approach – anyone who sticks their head up and says, 'I won't be supporting a single payer plan,' they whack," Nelson said.
The public insurance option remains the single biggest obstacle to a bipartisan bill, snarling the parties – and wings within each party – in a debate over the power of government, the role of the free market and the need to cover the uninsured.
Senate negotiators, who have been struggling to come up with a compromise, continued their efforts Wednesday to no avail. Members of the Senate Finance Committee and the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee were examining a proposal from Conrad to create nonprofit cooperatives to compete with private insurers. Conrad, a Finance Committee member who said he was asked by Chairman Max Baucus (D-Mont.) to come up with a compromise, shuttled between the two committees late Wednesday in a bid to build support.
But underscoring the split, Sen. John Rockefeller (D-W.Va.), a Finance Committee member, introduced a new proposal Wednesday for a public insurance plan aimed squarely at appealing to the Senate's liberal members.
A spokesman for Health Care for America Now, a major liberal advocacy organization, said Wednesday that it will not support Conrad's alternative to the public plan because it would not seem to have the bargaining clout to control costs or keep insurers honest.
Conrad said he doesn't really care what they think.
"I am unaware that HCAN has any votes on the floor on the U.S. Senate," Conrad said. "I am dealing with votes in the Finance Committee and the floor of the U.S. Senate. I am frankly not terribly interested in what these myriad groups all think. I am interested in what people who vote think."
When a reporter pointed out that the groups represent the base of the Democratic Party, Conrad questioned their end game.
"Are they interested in the name of something or are they interested in getting a result that delivers on what is behind the name?" Conrad said. "I am interested in actually achieving a result. Not a label, but an alternative to the delivery model of for-profit insurance companies."
Landrieu surprised health care groups Tuesday when she said didn't want the public plan. The Louisiana Democrat sent a letter to Health Care for America Now earlier this year, saying she supports "a choice of a private insurance plan, including keeping the insurance you have if you like it or a public insurance plan." But she reaffirmed her opposition Wednesday. "I'm not for it," she said without hesitation as she walked into the Senate chamber.
Richard Kirsch, campaign manager for Health Care for America Now, said his group is likely to go up soon with TV ads in Louisiana.
Democrats need a reminder, Kirsch added.
"For every insurance industry lobbyist," he said, "there are tens of thousands of people at home who don't share the view of the insurance industry lobbyist."
Updated: 6/11/09 5:26 PM EDT
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0609/23616.html#ixzz0IBDYg7EA&D
President Barack Obama's plan for a government health insurance program has touched off an increasingly fierce Democratic civil war on Capitol Hill, as liberals fearful about squandering the chance to achieve that goal are taking aggressive steps to keep moderates in line.
When Sen. Ben Nelson (D-Neb.) called the public plan a deal breaker, a progressive group co-founded by Joe Trippi launched a campaign in Nebraska accusing the senator of being a "sellout" for special interests.
After a strategy memo by the centrist Democratic think tank Third Way cautioned Democrats on overreaching on a public plan, Daily Kos bloggers went on the attack, and Third Way now faces a coordinated effort to pressure Third Way donors.
Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-La.) is the next target. On Tuesday, she said she opposed the public plan. By Wednesday, the liberal Health Care for America Now was drawing up a plan to change her mind.
"It is all about Democrats," said Adam Green, chief executive officer of Change Congress, which launched the Nelson campaign. "We only need 50 votes. We could conceivably have 60 votes on our own if we keep Democrats unified. It is a matter of convincing Democrats whose conventional wisdom is based on the old political order. This is an extremely popular proposal spearheaded by an extremely popular president, and it is OK to support it."
Amid the signs of party discord, Obama is stepping up his personal efforts to push a public plan, with his first health-care town hall event Thursday in Green Bay, Wisc. On Monday, he’ll travel to Chicago to address the annual meeting of the American Medical Association, which is not on board with a government insurance program.
AMA President Nancy Nielsen has raised concerns that the public option would underpay doctors, and the group will tell the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions committee at a hearing Thursday that it opposes the proposal, which could deal a serious blow to Obama's effort to convince lawmakers and voters that a government plan is the way to go.
Still, the White House appeared to be testing out a new sales-pitch Wednesday, with Press Secretary Robert Gibbs saying of the debate on Capitol Hill, “You're likely to hear two very important words: choice and competition. A public option . . . is nothing more than the ability to provide more choice through competition.”
Obama has talked repeatedly about securing Republican votes on health care reform, but he first has to win over the moderate Democrats who have refused to commit. The president could get around them by using the reconciliation process, which allows a bill to win passage on 51 votes instead of a filibuster-proof 60.
Yet this voting bloc still appears to matter, given the prolonged absences of Sens. Ted Kennedy and Robert Byrd, the vacant seat in Minnesota and the still-sizable number of undecided Senate moderates.
Sen. Evan Bayh of Indiana is undecided but said he is keeping an "open mind." The same goes for Sen. Jon Tester of Montana. Interest groups are closely watching Sen. Kent Conrad of North Dakota, Sen. Tom Carper of Delaware, and Sens. Blanche Lincoln and Mark Pryor of Arkansas.
Change Congress considers its effort with Nelson a success – and other wavering Democrats can expect the same if they don't back the public plan, Green said. Democrats in Nebraska
encouraged the group to "kill him with kindness," but Change Congress decided open pressure was the better route, sending 3,000 direct mail pieces and placing $10,000 in Internet ads.
Nelson is no longer calling the public plan a "deal breaker."
"That is the model everyone should use to make sure Democrats follow Barack Obama's lead on the public option," Green said. "When Democratic politicians are siding with special interest contributors over constituents, we have to call them out on it."
Nelson maintains that he has been consistent. On Wednesday, he said he could not back a public plan that jeopardized the private insurance coverage for 200 million Americans but he will "look at any public plan that is presented."
"Those people who are out there attacking us are using the whack-a-mole approach – anyone who sticks their head up and says, 'I won't be supporting a single payer plan,' they whack," Nelson said.
The public insurance option remains the single biggest obstacle to a bipartisan bill, snarling the parties – and wings within each party – in a debate over the power of government, the role of the free market and the need to cover the uninsured.
Senate negotiators, who have been struggling to come up with a compromise, continued their efforts Wednesday to no avail. Members of the Senate Finance Committee and the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee were examining a proposal from Conrad to create nonprofit cooperatives to compete with private insurers. Conrad, a Finance Committee member who said he was asked by Chairman Max Baucus (D-Mont.) to come up with a compromise, shuttled between the two committees late Wednesday in a bid to build support.
But underscoring the split, Sen. John Rockefeller (D-W.Va.), a Finance Committee member, introduced a new proposal Wednesday for a public insurance plan aimed squarely at appealing to the Senate's liberal members.
A spokesman for Health Care for America Now, a major liberal advocacy organization, said Wednesday that it will not support Conrad's alternative to the public plan because it would not seem to have the bargaining clout to control costs or keep insurers honest.
Conrad said he doesn't really care what they think.
"I am unaware that HCAN has any votes on the floor on the U.S. Senate," Conrad said. "I am dealing with votes in the Finance Committee and the floor of the U.S. Senate. I am frankly not terribly interested in what these myriad groups all think. I am interested in what people who vote think."
When a reporter pointed out that the groups represent the base of the Democratic Party, Conrad questioned their end game.
"Are they interested in the name of something or are they interested in getting a result that delivers on what is behind the name?" Conrad said. "I am interested in actually achieving a result. Not a label, but an alternative to the delivery model of for-profit insurance companies."
Landrieu surprised health care groups Tuesday when she said didn't want the public plan. The Louisiana Democrat sent a letter to Health Care for America Now earlier this year, saying she supports "a choice of a private insurance plan, including keeping the insurance you have if you like it or a public insurance plan." But she reaffirmed her opposition Wednesday. "I'm not for it," she said without hesitation as she walked into the Senate chamber.
Richard Kirsch, campaign manager for Health Care for America Now, said his group is likely to go up soon with TV ads in Louisiana.
Democrats need a reminder, Kirsch added.
"For every insurance industry lobbyist," he said, "there are tens of thousands of people at home who don't share the view of the insurance industry lobbyist."
Tobacco: Congress v. Interests
No smoking: Vote could bring new limits
Historic anti-smoking vote grants new power over marketing, ingredients
AP
Thurs., June 11, 2009
WASHINGTON - The Senate struck a historic blow against smoking in America Thursday, voting overwhelmingly to give regulators new power to limit nicotine in the cigarettes that kill nearly a half-million people a year, to drastically curtail ads that glorify tobacco and to ban flavored products aimed at spreading the habit to young people.
President Barack Obama, who has spoken of his own struggle to quit smoking, said he was eager to sign the legislation after minor differences with a House version are worked out — and the House planned a vote for Friday. Cigarette foes said the measure would not only cut deaths but reduce the $100 billion in annual health care costs linked to tobacco.
Fierce opposition by the industry and tobacco-state lawmakers had prevented passage for years, along with veto threats by the George W. Bush White House. In the end, the nation's biggest tobacco company supported the measure, though rivals suggested that was because it could lock in Philip Morris' share of the market.
Cigarette smoking kills about 400,000 people in the United States every year, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. About 45 million U.S. adults are smokers, though the prevalence has fallen since the U.S. surgeon general's warning 45 years ago that tobacco causes lung cancer.
The legislation, one of the most dramatic anti-smoking initiatives since the surgeon general's report, would give the Food and Drug Administration authority to regulate the content, marketing and advertising of cigarettes and other tobacco products.
"This legislation represents the strongest action Congress has ever taken to reduce tobacco use, the leading preventable cause of death in the United States," declared Matthew Myers, president of Campaign for Tobacco-free Kids.
The 79-17 Senate vote sent the measure back to the House, which in April passed a similar but not identical version. House acceptance of the Senate bill would send it directly to Obama, who said Thursday that final passage "will make history by giving the scientists and medical experts at the FDA the power to take sensible steps."
"At any given moment, millions are struggling with their habit or worrying about loved ones who smoke," said Obama.
His signature would then add tobacco to other huge, nationally important areas that have come under greater government supervision since his presidency began. Those include banking, housing and autos. Still to come, if Congress can agree: health care.
New rules and regulationsSupporters of FDA regulation of tobacco have struggled for more than a decade to overcome powerful resistance — from the industry and elsewhere. In 2000 the Supreme Court ruled 5-4 that the agency did not have the authority under current law to regulate tobacco products, and the Bush administration opposed several previous efforts by Congress to write a new law.
Thursday's legislation gives the FDA power to evaluate the contents of tobacco products and to order changes or bans on those that are a danger to public health. The agency could limit nicotine yields but not ban nicotine or cigarettes.
Regulators could prohibit tobacco companies from using candy or other flavors in cigarettes that tend to attract young smokers, and restrict advertising in publications often read by teenagers. Rules on sales to minors would be toughened, as would warning labels. Tobacco companies would have to get FDA approval for new products, and would be barred from using terms such as "light" or "mild" that imply a smaller health risk.
Costs of the new program would be paid for through a fee imposed on tobacco companies.
"This is a bill that will protect children and will protect America," said Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., a leading supporter. "Every day that we don't act, 3,500 American kids — children — will light up for the first time. That is enough to fill 70 school buses."
The Congressional Budget Office estimated that FDA regulation could reduce underage smoking by 11 percent over the next decade.
The bill, said American Heart Association CEO Nancy Brown, "provides a tremendous opportunity to finally hold tobacco companies accountable and restrict efforts to addict more children and adults."
The tobacco lobby, contended Durbin, has long been the most powerful lobby on Capitol Hill, "and they managed to create an exemption in virtually every law so that no federal agency could take a look at them and regulate them."
But the industry has also taken hits in recent years as the dangers of smoking became more apparent and states moved to limit smoking in public places. In 1998 the industry agreed to pay the states $206 billion to help cover health care costs, and this year Congress raised the federal cigarette tax by 62 cents, to $1.01 a pack, to fund a health care program for children.
Reducing health care costsThe nation's largest tobacco manufacturer, Philip Morris, USA, has come out in support of the legislation. Its parent company, Altria Group, said in a statement that on balance, "the legislation is an important step forward to achieve the goal we share with others to provide federal regulation of tobacco products."
Its main rivals, however, have voiced opposition, arguing in part that FDA restrictions on new products will lock in Philip Morris' share of the market.
Lawmakers portrayed the bill as a major first step in bringing down health care costs, an essential goal of the health care overhaul legislation that is the top priority of the Obama administration this year.
"This bill may do more in the area of prevention, if adopted, than anything else we may include in the health care bill in the short term," said Sen. Christopher Dodd, D-Conn., who managed the legislation on the Senate floor in the absence of the ailing Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., who has long promoted FDA regulation.
Opponents, led by Republican Sen. Richard Burr of the tobacco-growing state of North Carolina, argued that the FDA, which is in charge of ensuring the safety of food and drug products, was the wrong place to regulate an item that is injurious to health.
He also contended that the bill would restrict tobacco companies, including several based in his state, from developing new products that might be less harmful to users. He unsuccessfully proposed the creation of a new agency that would both regulate tobacco products and encourage efforts to make cigarettes less harmful.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/31233307
_______________________________________________
Tobacco bill a sharp change for lawmakers
FDA could soon regulate ingredients, marketing, ads for tobacco products
AP
Thurs., June 4, 2009
WASHINGTON - In the half-century since the surgeon general issued his culture-changing report linking smoking to lung cancer, the tobacco industry has had little trouble defeating efforts to regulate cigarettes and other products. That could change this year.
The Senate is debating legislation that would give the Food and Drug Administration authority to control ingredients going into tobacco products, restrict marketing and ads aimed at young people, and ban words such as "light" or "low tar" that may mislead people about the health risks of smoking.
The legislation, said Matthew Myers, president of Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids, is "by far the strongest bill to reduce tobacco use that this nation has ever seriously considered."
Myers and other supporters, such as the American Heart Association and the American Lung Association, say the stars may finally be aligned for decisive action on the tobacco issue. The House passed a similar bill by a wide margin and President Barack Obama supports it. It also commands a majority in the Senate, although tobacco-state senators say they won't give up without a filibuster fight.
Previous restriction efforts limitedFederal dependence on the tobacco industry goes back at least to the post-Civil War era, when a tobacco tax became an important revenue source. Franklin Roosevelt made tobacco a protected crop and cigarettes were included in the C-rations of World War II soldiers, introducing smoking to millions of young men.
The 1964 surgeon general's report made official what many people already suspected — that smoking is deadly — but the next year Congress, under pressure from the industry and tobacco-state legislators, succeeded in watering down new health warning labels on cigarette packs.
In 1969, Congress did ban cigarette ads on television and radio but at the same time ended free anti-smoking ads on the airways and restricted the authority of the Federal Trade Commission to require stronger warning labels.
Myers said that the first time Congress acted in opposition to the tobacco industry was in 1984, when it passed legislation to strengthen warning labels.
In the late 1980s and again in 1990, lawmakers agreed to ban smoking on commercial air flights. "It was such a radical change," said Sen. Frank Lautenberg, D-N.J., of that initial effort to prohibit smoking in a public area. Since then, he said, "we've had to creep and crawl every step of the way."
But popular attitudes toward smoking have been changing. Cigarette smoking has dropped from 51 percent of men and one-third of women in 1965 to 24 percent of men and 18 percent of women in 2006.
States have also taken the lead in banning smoking from public areas. Nancy Brown, head of the American Heart Association, noted that North Carolina, the country's biggest tobacco producer, recently passed one of the nation's toughest clean indoor air acts.
The regulation battle takes a turnOne turning point came in 1994 when tobacco company CEOs, at a hearing held by anti-smoking champion Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., one after another denied that smoking was addictive.
With that, said Brown, "people realized that the tobacco industry will stop at nothing to deceive Americans."
In 1996, the FDA sought to assert jurisdiction over tobacco products, beginning a legal battle that continues to this day.
The next year, Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., fell three votes short of overcoming a filibuster of legislation approving a massive settlement deal between major tobacco companies and the states and including FDA authority.
With that defeat, a more narrow deal was reached the next year under which the companies agreed to pay the states $206 billion for health care costs and anti-smoking campaigns.
The Supreme Court in a 5-4 vote in 2000 ruled that the FDA did not have the authority under current law to regulate tobacco. Since then the House and Senate have both approved bills giving legal status to the FDA but have not been able to agree on a common bill.
FDA authority was stripped out of the final version of a 2004 act signed by President George W. Bush that ended a Depression-era price support system for tobacco growers, replacing it with a buyout program that provided an incentive for many tobacco farmers to switch to other crops.
The decrease in tobacco farmers and workers in the tobacco industry is one reason the FDA bill is meeting less resistance from tobacco-state lawmakers this time around. Another is the realization that reducing the costs of tobacco-related health problems, estimated at nearly $100 billion a year, is essential to the drive to overhaul the nation's health care system.
Still, old habits die hard. It was only last year that Lautenberg persuaded the Senate to stop selling tobacco products at its shops and close all of its smoking rooms.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/31100432/
______________________________________________
Over the course of his nearly quarter-century Senate career, Minority Leader Mitch McConnell , who hails from the tobacco-rich state of Kentucky , has received $419,025 from the tobacco industry, more than any other member of Congress , according to the Center for Responsive Politics , a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization that analyzes the influence of money on politics and policy.
North Carolina Republican Sen. Richard Burr , who led the opposition to the bill, is the second highest recipient and netted $359,100 from tobacco-related political action committees and individual contributions. His state is the nation's largest tobacco grower and is home to R.J. Reynolds , the nation's second largest tobacco manufacturing company, which contributed $196,850 to Burr's campaigns.
Georgia Sen. Saxby Chambliss , the ranking Republican on the Senate Agriculture Committee , is the third highest recipient with $228,700 . Kentucky Sen. Jim Bunning , who's up for re-election next year and is considered the most vulnerable Senate Republican, ranks eighth with $194,166 .
All oppose giving additional tobacco regulatory powers to the FDA , an agency they argue doesn't have adequate resources for the task. They say cigarette companies' campaign contributions didn't color their positions on the legislation.
The measure passed the Senate Thursday on a vote of 79-17.
"I voted against the FDA tobacco bill because I'm opposed to the overregulation of an industry that's already highly regulated, from farmer to manufacturer," Chambliss said. "The bill saddles the already overburdened FDA with even more oversight duties, and does nothing to reduce the rate of smoking among Americans — cigarettes already on the shelves will remain on the market."
Burr, who's received nearly $196,850 from Reynolds , worked with Sen. Kay Hagan , D- N.C. , for a week to stymie the FDA regulation bill. Their amendment, which was defeated 60-36, would have created a new agency to regulate tobacco, with fewer restrictions than the underlying bill.
Virginia Democratic Sens. Mark Warner and Jim Webb supported the measure, as did Altria Group , the Richmond, Va. , company that owns Philip Morris . Altria contributed $78,418 to Warner.
"We think it's important to stay active in the political process," said William Phelps , an Altria spokesman. "We're proud of our commitment to the political process on behalf of our employees and shareholders."
Critics say the measure gives Altria a competitive advantage in using its deep coffers to meet FDA requirements.
McConnell staffers point out that though Altria contributed $79,650 to his campaigns, the senator's opposition to the measure differed from the company's stance.
"Mandating the FDA to regulate and approve the use of tobacco would be a distortion of the agency's mission and a tremendous misuse of its overstretched priorities," McConnell said. "We should focus FDA resources on protecting the public health, not burdening it with an impossible assignment."
Contributions to federal candidates, committees and parties from the industry have fallen dramatically since the late 1990s, when companies gave almost $10 million each year, according to the Center for Responsive Politics . In 2006, the tobacco industry donated $3.5 million , with Altria Group and Reynolds American contributing the most. Donations from the industry overwhelmingly favor Republicans, who lost control of Congress in 2006 after more than a decade of dominance.
When Senator John McCain introduced FDA regulatory legislation in 1998, the company spent a reported $100 million successfully fighting it. But since then, Philip Morris has had a crucial realization. With 50% of the U.S. tobacco market already safely in the company's pocket - and more than 50% of 18- to 25-year-old smokers loyal to its top brand, Marlboro - restrictive legislation will effectively lock in its market dominance, preventing any competitors from taking a bite out of Philip Morris' very lucrative business. (See vintage cigarette propaganda.)
The company's main rival, R.J. Reynolds, manufacturer of Camel cigarettes, is still in dismay over Philip Morris' reversal from regulation opponent to champion, and the third largest cigarette manufacturer, Lorillard, has labeled the legislation the Marlboro Monopoly Act. Both argue that as the new restrictions cut off most remaining avenues available for advertising and ban marketing stunts like free-sample cigarette giveaways, the companies' ability to "communicate" (i.e., gain market share) with potential and existing smokers about their products will be blocked. In addition, the administrative costs of complying with FDA regulations favor large manufacturers over smaller ones.
But there's another key reason Philip Morris lobbied hard for FDA regulation, aligning itself with strange bedfellows like the Campaign for Smoke-Free Kids, the American Lung Association and longtime antismoking crusaders Senator Ted Kennedy and Representative Henry Waxman. "Philip Morris wants the public-health community to join them in finding the holy grail: the safe cigarette," says Gregory Connolly, a tobacco expert and professor at the Harvard School of Public Health. Simply put, figuring out how to produce a less harmful tobacco product and getting an FDA seal of approval could open up a whole new, potentially huge consumer market.
There is nothing in the FDA legislation that expressly favors Philip Morris when it comes to innovation and new product development, but the company has far deeper pockets, putting it at a distinct advantage over its competitors. In 2007, the same year that nearly identical FDA legislation was introduced in Congress, Philip Morris opened a 450,000-sq.-ft. (42,000 sq m) research facility in Richmond, Va. The complex is filled with hundreds of employees, including scientists studying new tobacco technologies that Philip Morris is hoping to get through the new FDA approval process.
"Working on products that are potentially less harmful is something we've been working on for some time," says company spokesman William Phelps. A June 10 market-research report from the firm Fitch Ratings says Philip Morris spent $232 million on tobacco research and "reduced-harm products" in 2008. And just in case the FDA agrees with Big Tobacco (and some scientists) that chewing instead of smoking the leaf is "safer," Philip Morris and R.J. Reynolds have acquired the largest and second largest chewing-tobacco companies, respectively, in the past four years. (See a video of France's smoking ban.)
This support of increased government oversight, which Philip Morris first endorsed in 2001, has given even some backers of the bill pause. "It is a concern that the tobacco industry is involved" in the legislation, admits David Burns, a leading tobacco researcher who has testified in court that "light" cigarettes are no less harmful than regular ones and has conducted studies for the World Health Organization and U.S. government. Big Tobacco "has a very dark and aggressive history of trying to change both science and public policy to its economic favor," he says. Still, like the vast majority in the public-health community, Burns is in favor of FDA regulation that will hold tobacco companies responsible for the claims they make. (The tobacco industry will have nonvoting seats on a new FDA scientific-advisory board for tobacco issues to be created under the legislation.)
Waxman, chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee and a champion of the new legislation, says while "there is no such thing as a safe cigarette," the FDA regulatory structure will allow for research into how to reduce the harm of tobacco. "It's unusual to be on the same side as Philip Morris," he admits. "But their reasons are not our reasons. The bill is a good bill. If they happened to support it, that's fine with me."
But the notion that it's even possible to "reduce the harm" of tobacco is making some public-health officials bristle, even as tobacco executives' mouths are watering. "If we get someone to quit, it's far better than giving someone something with lower levels of toxins. You may delay it, but you're still going to die," says Connolly. (Despite his concerns, Connolly supports the new regulatory bill.) Critics also worry that having an implied stamp of approval on tobacco products from the FDA - which has traditionally governed the manufacture and sale of things like cosmetics, food and pharmaceuticals deemed safe - could give the misleading impression that cigarettes aren't health hazards.
Still, after all the negative publicity and revelations about Big Tobacco over the past two decades, it's hard to imagine there's a whole untapped market of Americans who will jump at the chance to enjoy supposedly "harm-reduced" tobacco and nicotine. But when the alternative is fighting a (money-) losing battle against regulation, it's a gamble Philip Morris is happy to take.
Historic anti-smoking vote grants new power over marketing, ingredients
AP
Thurs., June 11, 2009
WASHINGTON - The Senate struck a historic blow against smoking in America Thursday, voting overwhelmingly to give regulators new power to limit nicotine in the cigarettes that kill nearly a half-million people a year, to drastically curtail ads that glorify tobacco and to ban flavored products aimed at spreading the habit to young people.
President Barack Obama, who has spoken of his own struggle to quit smoking, said he was eager to sign the legislation after minor differences with a House version are worked out — and the House planned a vote for Friday. Cigarette foes said the measure would not only cut deaths but reduce the $100 billion in annual health care costs linked to tobacco.
Fierce opposition by the industry and tobacco-state lawmakers had prevented passage for years, along with veto threats by the George W. Bush White House. In the end, the nation's biggest tobacco company supported the measure, though rivals suggested that was because it could lock in Philip Morris' share of the market.
Cigarette smoking kills about 400,000 people in the United States every year, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. About 45 million U.S. adults are smokers, though the prevalence has fallen since the U.S. surgeon general's warning 45 years ago that tobacco causes lung cancer.
The legislation, one of the most dramatic anti-smoking initiatives since the surgeon general's report, would give the Food and Drug Administration authority to regulate the content, marketing and advertising of cigarettes and other tobacco products.
"This legislation represents the strongest action Congress has ever taken to reduce tobacco use, the leading preventable cause of death in the United States," declared Matthew Myers, president of Campaign for Tobacco-free Kids.
The 79-17 Senate vote sent the measure back to the House, which in April passed a similar but not identical version. House acceptance of the Senate bill would send it directly to Obama, who said Thursday that final passage "will make history by giving the scientists and medical experts at the FDA the power to take sensible steps."
"At any given moment, millions are struggling with their habit or worrying about loved ones who smoke," said Obama.
His signature would then add tobacco to other huge, nationally important areas that have come under greater government supervision since his presidency began. Those include banking, housing and autos. Still to come, if Congress can agree: health care.
New rules and regulationsSupporters of FDA regulation of tobacco have struggled for more than a decade to overcome powerful resistance — from the industry and elsewhere. In 2000 the Supreme Court ruled 5-4 that the agency did not have the authority under current law to regulate tobacco products, and the Bush administration opposed several previous efforts by Congress to write a new law.
Thursday's legislation gives the FDA power to evaluate the contents of tobacco products and to order changes or bans on those that are a danger to public health. The agency could limit nicotine yields but not ban nicotine or cigarettes.
Regulators could prohibit tobacco companies from using candy or other flavors in cigarettes that tend to attract young smokers, and restrict advertising in publications often read by teenagers. Rules on sales to minors would be toughened, as would warning labels. Tobacco companies would have to get FDA approval for new products, and would be barred from using terms such as "light" or "mild" that imply a smaller health risk.
Costs of the new program would be paid for through a fee imposed on tobacco companies.
"This is a bill that will protect children and will protect America," said Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., a leading supporter. "Every day that we don't act, 3,500 American kids — children — will light up for the first time. That is enough to fill 70 school buses."
The Congressional Budget Office estimated that FDA regulation could reduce underage smoking by 11 percent over the next decade.
The bill, said American Heart Association CEO Nancy Brown, "provides a tremendous opportunity to finally hold tobacco companies accountable and restrict efforts to addict more children and adults."
The tobacco lobby, contended Durbin, has long been the most powerful lobby on Capitol Hill, "and they managed to create an exemption in virtually every law so that no federal agency could take a look at them and regulate them."
But the industry has also taken hits in recent years as the dangers of smoking became more apparent and states moved to limit smoking in public places. In 1998 the industry agreed to pay the states $206 billion to help cover health care costs, and this year Congress raised the federal cigarette tax by 62 cents, to $1.01 a pack, to fund a health care program for children.
Reducing health care costsThe nation's largest tobacco manufacturer, Philip Morris, USA, has come out in support of the legislation. Its parent company, Altria Group, said in a statement that on balance, "the legislation is an important step forward to achieve the goal we share with others to provide federal regulation of tobacco products."
Its main rivals, however, have voiced opposition, arguing in part that FDA restrictions on new products will lock in Philip Morris' share of the market.
Lawmakers portrayed the bill as a major first step in bringing down health care costs, an essential goal of the health care overhaul legislation that is the top priority of the Obama administration this year.
"This bill may do more in the area of prevention, if adopted, than anything else we may include in the health care bill in the short term," said Sen. Christopher Dodd, D-Conn., who managed the legislation on the Senate floor in the absence of the ailing Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., who has long promoted FDA regulation.
Opponents, led by Republican Sen. Richard Burr of the tobacco-growing state of North Carolina, argued that the FDA, which is in charge of ensuring the safety of food and drug products, was the wrong place to regulate an item that is injurious to health.
He also contended that the bill would restrict tobacco companies, including several based in his state, from developing new products that might be less harmful to users. He unsuccessfully proposed the creation of a new agency that would both regulate tobacco products and encourage efforts to make cigarettes less harmful.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/31233307
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Tobacco bill a sharp change for lawmakers
FDA could soon regulate ingredients, marketing, ads for tobacco products
AP
Thurs., June 4, 2009
WASHINGTON - In the half-century since the surgeon general issued his culture-changing report linking smoking to lung cancer, the tobacco industry has had little trouble defeating efforts to regulate cigarettes and other products. That could change this year.
The Senate is debating legislation that would give the Food and Drug Administration authority to control ingredients going into tobacco products, restrict marketing and ads aimed at young people, and ban words such as "light" or "low tar" that may mislead people about the health risks of smoking.
The legislation, said Matthew Myers, president of Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids, is "by far the strongest bill to reduce tobacco use that this nation has ever seriously considered."
Myers and other supporters, such as the American Heart Association and the American Lung Association, say the stars may finally be aligned for decisive action on the tobacco issue. The House passed a similar bill by a wide margin and President Barack Obama supports it. It also commands a majority in the Senate, although tobacco-state senators say they won't give up without a filibuster fight.
Previous restriction efforts limitedFederal dependence on the tobacco industry goes back at least to the post-Civil War era, when a tobacco tax became an important revenue source. Franklin Roosevelt made tobacco a protected crop and cigarettes were included in the C-rations of World War II soldiers, introducing smoking to millions of young men.
The 1964 surgeon general's report made official what many people already suspected — that smoking is deadly — but the next year Congress, under pressure from the industry and tobacco-state legislators, succeeded in watering down new health warning labels on cigarette packs.
In 1969, Congress did ban cigarette ads on television and radio but at the same time ended free anti-smoking ads on the airways and restricted the authority of the Federal Trade Commission to require stronger warning labels.
Myers said that the first time Congress acted in opposition to the tobacco industry was in 1984, when it passed legislation to strengthen warning labels.
In the late 1980s and again in 1990, lawmakers agreed to ban smoking on commercial air flights. "It was such a radical change," said Sen. Frank Lautenberg, D-N.J., of that initial effort to prohibit smoking in a public area. Since then, he said, "we've had to creep and crawl every step of the way."
But popular attitudes toward smoking have been changing. Cigarette smoking has dropped from 51 percent of men and one-third of women in 1965 to 24 percent of men and 18 percent of women in 2006.
States have also taken the lead in banning smoking from public areas. Nancy Brown, head of the American Heart Association, noted that North Carolina, the country's biggest tobacco producer, recently passed one of the nation's toughest clean indoor air acts.
The regulation battle takes a turnOne turning point came in 1994 when tobacco company CEOs, at a hearing held by anti-smoking champion Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., one after another denied that smoking was addictive.
With that, said Brown, "people realized that the tobacco industry will stop at nothing to deceive Americans."
In 1996, the FDA sought to assert jurisdiction over tobacco products, beginning a legal battle that continues to this day.
The next year, Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., fell three votes short of overcoming a filibuster of legislation approving a massive settlement deal between major tobacco companies and the states and including FDA authority.
With that defeat, a more narrow deal was reached the next year under which the companies agreed to pay the states $206 billion for health care costs and anti-smoking campaigns.
The Supreme Court in a 5-4 vote in 2000 ruled that the FDA did not have the authority under current law to regulate tobacco. Since then the House and Senate have both approved bills giving legal status to the FDA but have not been able to agree on a common bill.
FDA authority was stripped out of the final version of a 2004 act signed by President George W. Bush that ended a Depression-era price support system for tobacco growers, replacing it with a buyout program that provided an incentive for many tobacco farmers to switch to other crops.
The decrease in tobacco farmers and workers in the tobacco industry is one reason the FDA bill is meeting less resistance from tobacco-state lawmakers this time around. Another is the realization that reducing the costs of tobacco-related health problems, estimated at nearly $100 billion a year, is essential to the drive to overhaul the nation's health care system.
Still, old habits die hard. It was only last year that Lautenberg persuaded the Senate to stop selling tobacco products at its shops and close all of its smoking rooms.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/31100432/
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By Halimah Abdullah,
Mcclatchy Newspapers – Thu Jun 11, 7:14 pm ET
WASHINGTON — Among the 17 senators who voted against allowing the Food and Drug Administration to regulate tobacco are some of the top recipients of campaign contributions from the tobacco industry, which has donated millions of dollars to lawmakers in the past several campaign cycles.
Over the course of his nearly quarter-century Senate career, Minority Leader Mitch McConnell , who hails from the tobacco-rich state of Kentucky , has received $419,025 from the tobacco industry, more than any other member of Congress , according to the Center for Responsive Politics , a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization that analyzes the influence of money on politics and policy.
North Carolina Republican Sen. Richard Burr , who led the opposition to the bill, is the second highest recipient and netted $359,100 from tobacco-related political action committees and individual contributions. His state is the nation's largest tobacco grower and is home to R.J. Reynolds , the nation's second largest tobacco manufacturing company, which contributed $196,850 to Burr's campaigns.
Georgia Sen. Saxby Chambliss , the ranking Republican on the Senate Agriculture Committee , is the third highest recipient with $228,700 . Kentucky Sen. Jim Bunning , who's up for re-election next year and is considered the most vulnerable Senate Republican, ranks eighth with $194,166 .
All oppose giving additional tobacco regulatory powers to the FDA , an agency they argue doesn't have adequate resources for the task. They say cigarette companies' campaign contributions didn't color their positions on the legislation.
The measure passed the Senate Thursday on a vote of 79-17.
"I voted against the FDA tobacco bill because I'm opposed to the overregulation of an industry that's already highly regulated, from farmer to manufacturer," Chambliss said. "The bill saddles the already overburdened FDA with even more oversight duties, and does nothing to reduce the rate of smoking among Americans — cigarettes already on the shelves will remain on the market."
Burr, who's received nearly $196,850 from Reynolds , worked with Sen. Kay Hagan , D- N.C. , for a week to stymie the FDA regulation bill. Their amendment, which was defeated 60-36, would have created a new agency to regulate tobacco, with fewer restrictions than the underlying bill.
Virginia Democratic Sens. Mark Warner and Jim Webb supported the measure, as did Altria Group , the Richmond, Va. , company that owns Philip Morris . Altria contributed $78,418 to Warner.
"We think it's important to stay active in the political process," said William Phelps , an Altria spokesman. "We're proud of our commitment to the political process on behalf of our employees and shareholders."
Critics say the measure gives Altria a competitive advantage in using its deep coffers to meet FDA requirements.
McConnell staffers point out that though Altria contributed $79,650 to his campaigns, the senator's opposition to the measure differed from the company's stance.
"Mandating the FDA to regulate and approve the use of tobacco would be a distortion of the agency's mission and a tremendous misuse of its overstretched priorities," McConnell said. "We should focus FDA resources on protecting the public health, not burdening it with an impossible assignment."
Contributions to federal candidates, committees and parties from the industry have fallen dramatically since the late 1990s, when companies gave almost $10 million each year, according to the Center for Responsive Politics . In 2006, the tobacco industry donated $3.5 million , with Altria Group and Reynolds American contributing the most. Donations from the industry overwhelmingly favor Republicans, who lost control of Congress in 2006 after more than a decade of dominance.
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Time
By KATE PICKERT / WASHINGTON
6/12/09
The U.S. Senate on Thursday struck the most devastating legislative blow in history to Big Tobacco, giving the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) authority over the industry. The new bill, which passed in the House in April, includes tough new restrictions on advertising like allowing only black-and-white text ads in magazines with substantial youth readerships, mandates that manufacturers prove or stop using claims like "light" and "low tar," bans flavored cigarettes (except menthol) and makes provisions for large, graphic warning labels. So why, then, is tobacco giant Philip Morris, unlike its industry brethren, celebrating the unprecedented oversight?
When Senator John McCain introduced FDA regulatory legislation in 1998, the company spent a reported $100 million successfully fighting it. But since then, Philip Morris has had a crucial realization. With 50% of the U.S. tobacco market already safely in the company's pocket - and more than 50% of 18- to 25-year-old smokers loyal to its top brand, Marlboro - restrictive legislation will effectively lock in its market dominance, preventing any competitors from taking a bite out of Philip Morris' very lucrative business. (See vintage cigarette propaganda.)
The company's main rival, R.J. Reynolds, manufacturer of Camel cigarettes, is still in dismay over Philip Morris' reversal from regulation opponent to champion, and the third largest cigarette manufacturer, Lorillard, has labeled the legislation the Marlboro Monopoly Act. Both argue that as the new restrictions cut off most remaining avenues available for advertising and ban marketing stunts like free-sample cigarette giveaways, the companies' ability to "communicate" (i.e., gain market share) with potential and existing smokers about their products will be blocked. In addition, the administrative costs of complying with FDA regulations favor large manufacturers over smaller ones.
But there's another key reason Philip Morris lobbied hard for FDA regulation, aligning itself with strange bedfellows like the Campaign for Smoke-Free Kids, the American Lung Association and longtime antismoking crusaders Senator Ted Kennedy and Representative Henry Waxman. "Philip Morris wants the public-health community to join them in finding the holy grail: the safe cigarette," says Gregory Connolly, a tobacco expert and professor at the Harvard School of Public Health. Simply put, figuring out how to produce a less harmful tobacco product and getting an FDA seal of approval could open up a whole new, potentially huge consumer market.
There is nothing in the FDA legislation that expressly favors Philip Morris when it comes to innovation and new product development, but the company has far deeper pockets, putting it at a distinct advantage over its competitors. In 2007, the same year that nearly identical FDA legislation was introduced in Congress, Philip Morris opened a 450,000-sq.-ft. (42,000 sq m) research facility in Richmond, Va. The complex is filled with hundreds of employees, including scientists studying new tobacco technologies that Philip Morris is hoping to get through the new FDA approval process.
"Working on products that are potentially less harmful is something we've been working on for some time," says company spokesman William Phelps. A June 10 market-research report from the firm Fitch Ratings says Philip Morris spent $232 million on tobacco research and "reduced-harm products" in 2008. And just in case the FDA agrees with Big Tobacco (and some scientists) that chewing instead of smoking the leaf is "safer," Philip Morris and R.J. Reynolds have acquired the largest and second largest chewing-tobacco companies, respectively, in the past four years. (See a video of France's smoking ban.)
This support of increased government oversight, which Philip Morris first endorsed in 2001, has given even some backers of the bill pause. "It is a concern that the tobacco industry is involved" in the legislation, admits David Burns, a leading tobacco researcher who has testified in court that "light" cigarettes are no less harmful than regular ones and has conducted studies for the World Health Organization and U.S. government. Big Tobacco "has a very dark and aggressive history of trying to change both science and public policy to its economic favor," he says. Still, like the vast majority in the public-health community, Burns is in favor of FDA regulation that will hold tobacco companies responsible for the claims they make. (The tobacco industry will have nonvoting seats on a new FDA scientific-advisory board for tobacco issues to be created under the legislation.)
Waxman, chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee and a champion of the new legislation, says while "there is no such thing as a safe cigarette," the FDA regulatory structure will allow for research into how to reduce the harm of tobacco. "It's unusual to be on the same side as Philip Morris," he admits. "But their reasons are not our reasons. The bill is a good bill. If they happened to support it, that's fine with me."
But the notion that it's even possible to "reduce the harm" of tobacco is making some public-health officials bristle, even as tobacco executives' mouths are watering. "If we get someone to quit, it's far better than giving someone something with lower levels of toxins. You may delay it, but you're still going to die," says Connolly. (Despite his concerns, Connolly supports the new regulatory bill.) Critics also worry that having an implied stamp of approval on tobacco products from the FDA - which has traditionally governed the manufacture and sale of things like cosmetics, food and pharmaceuticals deemed safe - could give the misleading impression that cigarettes aren't health hazards.
Still, after all the negative publicity and revelations about Big Tobacco over the past two decades, it's hard to imagine there's a whole untapped market of Americans who will jump at the chance to enjoy supposedly "harm-reduced" tobacco and nicotine. But when the alternative is fighting a (money-) losing battle against regulation, it's a gamble Philip Morris is happy to take.
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