White House Tidbits re: Health Care issues

CHICAGO TRIBUNE has a guide to the White House health-reform players: Rahm Emanuel, Jim Messina, Nancy-Ann DeParle, Phil Schiliro, Peter Orszag and Dan Pfeiffer. (The Trib needs to get a Pfeiffer file photo!)

TOP TALKER -- DEMS TRY TO BOX OUTCHAMBER -- POLITICO's Lisa Lerer: 'The White House and congressional Democrats are working to marginalize the Chamber of Commerce ... by going around the group and dealing directly with the CEOs of major U.S. corporations. Since June, senior White House officials have met directly with executives from more than 55 companies, including Chamber members Pfizer, Eastman Kodak and IBM. 'We prefer the approach - particularly in this climate - where the actual people who are on the front lines, running businesses, trying to create jobs, come and advise us on policy,' senior White House adviser Valerie Jarrett told POLITICO ...

'Chamber officials say the White House is scapegoating the Chamber and other trade associations as a way of dividing the business community, a move that could help the administration made headway on health care reform, climate change legislation and regulatory reform. 'It's happening with the deliberate hope and attention to weaken the influence of this institute and the business community in town,' said Bruce Josten, executive vice president for government affairs at the Chamber. 'When they launch a frontal assault against free enterprise and the Chamber of Commerce, I can guarantee it is not lost on any trade association executives or staff in this town.' ... Executives from a huge swath of companies have attended breakfasts, lunches, dinners and coffees with Jarrett, Obama, chief of staff Rahm Emanuel and senior economic adviser Larry Summers in recent months. On June 25, for example, Obama and Jarrett ate lunch with the CEOs of Honeywell, PepsiCo, Avon, IBM, Pfizer and Aon. Six days later, they sat down with executives from Verizon, Nucor, Starbucks and Wal-Mart. And last week, they met with CEOs from Amazon.com, FPL Group, Eastman Kodak and Kraft.'

'A ROADMAP TO HEALTH-CARE OVERHAUL BY CHRISTMAS' -- Commentary by Bloomberg's Albert R. Hunt: 'Republican Senator Olympia Snowe remains the single most important member of Congress on this issue. Democrats might be able to pass a bill without her; it will be hard. Rahm Emanuel will be a central figure in crafting any Senate-approved measure and the final bill. The White House chief of staff may have to delegate much of the Afghanistan account and any plans for a stealth stimulus, spending most of his time on health-care deliberations. ... For all the focus on the public option, ultimately the issue of affordability and how to pay for the overhaul will be more important. ... Veteran observers have no doubt there will be several doomsday moments and dismiss the notion that everything will be approved and reconciled by Thanksgiving, the target deadline. The odds are a measure will pass -- assuming Snowe stays on board -- with Christmas lights and music in the background when Obama signs it.'

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The Morality of Health Care Reform, Pt. 2

Posted: 24 Sep 2009 03:30 PM PDT

"We are determined to make every American citizen the subject of his country's interest and concern; and we will never regard any faithful law-abiding group within our borders as superfluous. The test of our progress is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much; it is whether we provide enough for those who have too little."

Franklin D. Roosevelt, Second Inaugural Address

"Sixty years after Roosevelt's Second Inaugural, that egalitarian test, I think, is still the best measure of our progress and humanity, and the core of The Triumph of Meanness is the contention that as a nation we are failing that test."

Nicolaus Mills, The Triumph of Meanness - America's War Against Its Better Self.

Home of the Mean

As with the election of Barack Obama last fall, the health care reform debate presents us with another opportunity to decide what kind of country we want to be. But that making that choice requires an unvarnished look at the country we have become.

In the seventy-plus years since Roosevelt's Second Inaugural, and the dozen years since Nicolaus Mills' offered his assessment that "as a nation we are failing" at "providing enough for those who have too little," we have actually become a country where a surprising number believe that those who have too little don't deserve to have any more than they do. It's a phenomenon at play in our reactions to any number of current crises, including health care reform.

Continue reading "The Morality of Health Care Reform, Pt. 2"...

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Image by ♥ LB pics ♥ via Flickr

OF INTEREST . . .

Albeit mortal, Edward "Ted" Kennedy was one of our contemporary heroes.

OF NOTE . . . . . . .

With the progenitor of the Ryan White Act gone now, who will continue to sponsor our care and needs?

OF COURSE . . . .

With the spokesman for health reform now no longer in need of it himself, who will speak up for the poor and the downtrodden? What is to be the qualibre for Tedicare now that he has gone?

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