Here's excerpts from comments by Speaker Pelosi and Majority Leader Reid after their meeting with President Obama on Tuesday afternoon:
(Transcript below the fold.)
The good news is that both Reid and Pelosi say they want a public option, but consider:
- Reid says he's open to getting "something like a public option." What in the world does that mean?
- Although Pelosi said the public option was "essential" to passing a bill in the House, she was less firm on what would happen after the House-Senate conference committee. She says as of "right now" a public option will be in the House legislation, but suggests that could change after we see "what the Senate puts forth."
- Pelosi used the phrase "triggered public option" which suggests she thinks it could be sold as a form of the public option.
- Pelosi said she believed that a "triggered public option" would actually be tougher on the health insurance industry than one put in place "now." That sounds like baloney. Moreover, under current proposals the public option wouldn't be put in place until 2013 anyway, so there's already something like a "negative trigger," in which would allow Congress to kill the public option before it comes to life.
Overall, Pelosi's language seemed carefully crafted to give her room to back off the promises she has made in the past few days and weeks. To be clear: she still supports a public option. But the fact that she wants wiggle room is alarming.
Video transcript:
REID: We're going to do our very best to have a public option or something like a public option before we finish this work.
PELOSI: On the public option, I believe that a public option will be essential to our passing a bill in the House of Representatives...[snip]...because as the President has said, and I listened to him very carefully, he believes that the public option is the best way to keep the insurance companies honest and to increase competition in order to lower costs and improve quality.
PELOSI: If somebody has a better idea how to do that, put it on the table. For the moment, however, as far as our House members are concerned the overwhelming majority of them support a public option.
QUESION: Would a trigger be an acceptable alternative?
PELOSI: Well, this is, as I say, the legislative process, and right now we will have a public option in our bill...[snip]...where we go, seing what the Senate puts forth and the rest is another place.
But I've said it before, and I'll say it again, the health insurance industry, which is out there fighting the public option tooth and nail, because it does increase competition which they don't want, they'd be better getting a public option now than one that is triggered, because if you have a triggered public option, it's because the insurance industry has demonstrated that they're not cooperating, they're not doing the right thing, and I think they'll have a tougher public option to deal with.
