Despite a speech that was heavy on policy specifics -- including new tax cuts for small businesses, a push to repeal Don't Ask, Don't Tell, and campaign finance -- perhaps the most ambiguity was found in President Obama's health-care reform remarks. He unequivocally endorsed moving the bill forward, emphasizing that the problems with our health-care system have not gone away despite a changing political climate. But he did not provide specific directions that some hoped for, leading to some confusion among members of Congress.
"Here's what I ask of Congress, though: Do not walk away from reform. Not now. Not when we are so close. Let us find a way to come together and finish the job for the American people," Obama said. While that message was reassuring for reformers, many have spent the past week hoping to hear how the president expects to pass the bill without 60 votes in the Senate -- or how he intends to amend it to gain more votes. Nonetheless, Democrats in different chambers were pleased, even though they differed on who needs to do what to get the bill over the line.
"His message was right on," top House Democrat Chris Van Hollen told me, noting that the president mentioned several times the House's accomplishments in passing much of his agenda as the Senate stalls. "It was a message to the Senate: Let's get moving."
Sen. Ben Nelson, a moderate who was coaxed to vote for the Senate's version of the health-care bill, heard a different story. "The ball is pretty much in the House's court," he told reporters. "I think the Senate did it. I was the 60th vote."
Of course, the House also passed its version of a health-care reform bill months before the Senate finished its own. The last few weeks have been spent negotiating a compromise between the two, but the arrival of a 41st Republican senator in Washington has thrown a wrench in the works, making a conference report unlikely to pass the Senate. Now, the main hope of finishing reform is having the House pass a version of the bill that can be matched in the Senate through the budget reconciliation process, which only requires a simple majority. The president, however, did not endorse this path explicitly.
"There is plenty of time to work out the details," Rep. Jan Schakowsky said. "What people were wanting to hear is that this is not off the agenda. I think he was also sending a message to the Senate -- get it done through reconciliation."
Told that members of the House were focused on a reconciliation bargain that would allow the House to pass the Senate's bill, Nelson suggested that it was possible: "We have to see what that amounts to." He also seemed hopeful that the president's speech might attract a few Republican votes.
Your correspondent does not share that hope, but nonetheless Nelson seemed confident that Republicans would pay a political price for sitting on the sidelines as the Democrats worked to get a critical bill over the line.
"When the lust for power gets ahead of your love of patriotism," he warned, "that's a problem for the American people."
-- Tim Fernholz
