Jake Tapper is reporting that Obama is meeting with sixteen conservaDem Senators and Lieberman today to discuss healthcare reform.
They are: Senators Mark Pryor and Blanche Lincoln of Arkansas, Mark Warner of Virginia, Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire, Mary Landrieu of Louisiana, Evan Bayh of Indiana, Claire McCaskill of Missouri, Tom Carper of Delaware, Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania, Mark Begich of Alaska, Mark Udall and Michael Bennet of Colorado, Ben Nelson of Nebraska, Bill Nelson of Florida, Kay Hagan of North Carolina, Herb Kohl of Wisconsin, and Independent Democrat Joe Lieberman of Connecticut.
The meeting is scheduled for 4:15 pm ET, in the Cabinet Room.
One of these problem children, Ben Nelson, said of last night's speech, "I think it was a bit of a game-changer." Enough of a game changer to bring Nelson and his colleagues around? We'll see. At any rate, is good that Obama is going to be leaning on these guys a bit.
As far as the content of the meeting goes, I hope that Obama makes the point Matt Yglesias made well today:
If you accept the idea that there’s a moral imperative to provide security to the insured, health care to the uninsured, and a fighting chance of bending the long-term cost curve, then the idea that you would hold all those objectives hostage to the fact that insurance companies want to maximize the degree to which the new legislation benefits them is, frankly, obscene.
It’s worth noting, after all, that even the versions of health reform in congress that do include a public option would be better for the insurance industry than no bill at all. It seems to me you ought to be able to look an insurer executive or lobbyist in the eye and tell him, "I’m casting a vote that will help you get even richer" even while voting "yes" on the House version. To hold out for Baucuscare or nothing requires a sort of disturbed mindset that I’ve puzzled over before. And it’s striking that the people holding this position not only haven’t given any sort of actual reason for their view, but they’ve barely been asked to give a reason. Instead the press has overwhelmingly let them get away with going meta and saying they think a public option should be dropped because it "doesn’t have the votes." Alternatively, they’re allowed to just lie and say they oppose a public option because it will (how? through magic?) seize control of the entire market. They’re never put on the spot about the contradiction between public option opposition and a desire to make the package cheaper, and they’re certainly never put on the spot about why on earth this one thing is so overwhelmingly important that they would sink the whole package if they don’t get their way.
It's good to see Matt turn his argument that holding out for a public option is irrational around to reflect on the other side, because the refusal of any Democrat to vote for a bill with a public option isn't just irrational, it is highly immoral. For too long the Blue Dogs and the conservaDems have been allowed to hold their collective breath in their policy tantrums without being called to account for it. I hope that ends today in the Cabinet Room.