President Obama's health care speech wasn't just directed at the more than 2,000 AMA members assembled in a Chicago hotel, CQ Politics reports.
Obama was simultaneously speaking to the large number of Americans that polling indicates are still ambivalent about his plans to extend health care coverage.
Democratic polling suggests that as many as three-quarters of adults are generally satisfied with their current insurance plans. And a new Rasmussen Reports poll finds that Americans are evenly split over the idea of creating a government-run insurance plan to compete with private health plans, as Obama has proposed.
New York Times: "Opening a week in which health care will dominate attention in
Congress, the president's speech on Monday was the latest example of an
oft-used ploy to press his case: appearing before skeptical audiences,
confident of his powers of persuasion but willing as well to say what
his listeners do not want to hear."
And, as many predicted, Roll Call reports "the politics of fear began to dominate the health care reform debate
Monday -- much as it did in 1993 and 1994 during the fight over
President Bill Clinton's plan -- as both sides raged about the dire
consequence of each other's approach."
In the U.S. Senate, details from the Finance Committee plan are emerging, reports the Wall Street Journal.
"The committee is close to settling on a plan that would create
state-run marketplaces where private health-insurance companies would
compete to offer coverage. To answer demands from Democrats including
Mr. Obama that a public plan be offered as well, the committee is
heavily favoring nonprofit cooperatives that would be governed by their
members and would compete inside the new insurance exchanges, people
familiar with the matter said."
"The plan under consideration would require all Americans to obtain
insurance, with penalties eventually reaching 75% of the cost of the
least expensive plan, one aide said."
Meanwhile, the Congressional Budget Office's preliminary analysis of Sen. Ted Kennedy's (D-MA) Affordable Health Choices Act is out and the results are shocking. Ezra Klein notes the bill "would cost $1 trillion over 10 years, which is less than some feared,
but increase insurance coverage by only about 16 million people, which
is a lot less than some hoped."
The Fix notes the six senators to watch on health care.
