Obama met with the House Democratic caucus this morning. Sam Stein has a report on his message:
The president, according multiple attendees, played the role of political prognosticator during his roughly 30 minute address before Democratic caucus members on Capitol Hill. Addressing, implicitly, those conservative Democrats who are worried about voting for a nearly trillion dollar health care overhaul, he insisted that they would not be safe from partisan attack even if they opposed the bill.
"He certainly talked about the politics and he said that the Republicans want us to fail and no one should feel if they as a Democrat helped us to fail that they would be [free of their attacks]," said Rep. Henry Waxman, chair of the powerful Ways and Means Committee.
"None of you can expect the Republicans not to go after you if you vote against this bill," Waxman continued, channeling the president. "They want this bill to go down for their own partisan reasons."
Another high-ranking Democratic hill staffer briefed on the meeting put it this way: "Obama's main message was that the GOP won't go any easier on you if you vote against the bill. It's a tough vote, yes, but they're going to take heat either way."
There's more here:
The president, according to a senior Democratic aide who attended his discussion, told House Dems that newly-elected Rep. Bill Owens proved that members could run on a platform of comprehensive reform and still be elected to Congress.
"He said to look at Bill Owens," the aide recalled. "There is a House seat that's been in Republican hands for more than one hundred years. But Owens didn't run away from reform. He campaigned on it. And he still got elected."
That's a very good message for the Blue Dogs to hear from their President. It won't make a damned bit of difference to Minnick or Taylor or Tanner who were never going to vote for it anyway, but good for him for calling out those large numbers who wouldn't be risking much at all in supporting this bill.
In his prepared remarks after the meeting he pushed again for passage:
I just came from the Hill where I talked to the members of Congress there, and I reminded them that opportunities like this come around maybe once in a generation. Most public servants pass through their entire careers without a chance to make as important a difference in the lives of their constituents and the life of this country. This is their moment, this is our moment, to live up to the trust that the American people have placed in us -- even when it's hard; especially when it's hard. This is our moment to deliver.
I urge members of Congress to rise to this moment. Answer the call of history, and vote yes for health insurance reform for America.
His full remarks are below the fold.
THE PRESIDENT: Good afternoon, everybody. I just want to say a few words about the landmark vote that the House of Representatives is poised to take today -- a vote that can bring us one step closer to making real the promise of quality, affordable health care for the American people.
For the better part of a year now, members of the House and the Senate have been working diligently and constructively to craft legislation that will benefit millions of American families and millions of American businesses who urgently need it. For the first time ever, they've passed bills through every single committee responsible for reform. They've brought us closer than we have ever been to passing health insurance reform on behalf of the American people.
Now is the time to finish the job. The bill that the House has produced will provide stability and security for Americans who have insurance; quality, affordable options for those who don't; and lower costs for American families and American businesses. And as I've insisted from the beginning, it is a bill that is fully paid for and will actually reduce our long-term federal deficit.
This bill is change that the American people urgently need. Don't just take my word for it. Consider the national groups who've come out in support of this bill on behalf of their members: The Consumers Union supports it because it will create -- and I quote -- "a more secure, affordable health care system for the American people."
The American Medical Association and the American Nurses Association support it on behalf of doctors and nurses and medical professionals who know firsthand what's broken in our current system, and who see what happens when their patients can't get the care they need because of insurance industry bureaucracies.
The National Farmers Union supports this bill because it will control costs for farmers and ranchers, and address the unique challenges rural Americans face when it comes to receiving quality care.
And the AARP supports it because it will achieve the goal for which the AARP has been fighting for decades -- reducing the cost of health care, expanding coverage for America's seniors, and strengthening Medicare for the long haul.
Now, no bill can ever contain everything that everybody wants, or please every constituency and every district. That's an impossible task. But what is possible, what's in our grasp right now is the chance to prevent a future where every day 14,000 Americans continue to lose their health insurance, and every year 18,000 Americans die because they don't have it; a future where crushing costs keep small businesses from succeeding and big businesses from competing in the global economy; a future where countless dreams are deferred or scaled back because of a broken system we could have fixed when we had the chance.
What we can do right now is choose a better future and pass a bill that brings us to the very cusp of building what so many generations of Americans have sought to build -- a better health care system for this country.
Millions of Americans are watching right now. Their families and their businesses are counting on us. After all, this is why they sent us here, to finally confront the challenges that Washington had been putting off for decades -- to make their lives better, to leave this country stronger than we found it.
I just came from the Hill where I talked to the members of Congress there, and I reminded them that opportunities like this come around maybe once in a generation. Most public servants pass through their entire careers without a chance to make as important a difference in the lives of their constituents and the life of this country. This is their moment, this is our moment, to live up to the trust that the American people have placed in us -- even when it's hard; especially when it's hard. This is our moment to deliver.
I urge members of Congress to rise to this moment. Answer the call of history, and vote yes for health insurance reform for America.
Thanks.