The House speaker, Nancy Pelosi of California, unveiled her party’s battle plan on Friday for selling major health care legislation during the August recess.
Ms. Pelosi, speaking to reporters, acknowledged that Democrats face a steep challenge in explaining the complex legislation to the American public. But she said she was confident that once people understand the plan, they will support it.
“When you talk with the general public, it is about what it means for them,” Ms. Pelosi said.
And she said she expected Republicans and private special interests, particularly the health insurance industry, to make a full assault on the Democratic legislation.
“This is going to be carpet bombing,” she said. “Carpet bombing, slash and burn, shock and awe – anything you want to say to describe what the insurance companies will do to hold on to their special advantage, which exploits the patients and holds the American consumer at the mercy of the insurance company.”
Ms. Pelosi acknowledged that Democrats were still wrestling with the best ways to pay for the nearly $1 trillion, 10-year cost of the health care legislation, which aims to provide insurance to nearly all Americans.
So far, House Democrats have proposed an income surtax on the highest-earners to cover a big chunk of the price-tag. But the Senate has expressed little interest in such a broad-based tax, and Ms. Pelosi expressed some frustration that the Senate Finance Committee had not come forward with its plans.
“Frankly, I hoped we’d have seen more from the Senate Finance Committee,” shes aid. “So we could have a little better idea of where we might find common ground with the Senate as we go forward on the pay-fors.”
Ms. Pelosi likened the Democrats’ efforts to sell the health care legislation to the party’s push to derail then President Bush’s plans to overhaul Social Security in 2005.
“Before our grassroots mobilization and message campaign, 60 percent of the seniors supported what the president was doing and after we were finished 70 percent supported what we were doing,” she said. “So we know what we are up against.”
Ms. Pelosi said Congressional Democrats would follow President Obama’s lead. “We echo his message across the country,” she said.
“He is an enormous intellectual asset,” Ms. Pelosi added. “He has been intellectually engaged and again, communication-wise he has engaged with the American people.”
In recent days, Ms. Pelosi and other Democratic leaders have experienced extraordinary tumult as they weathered criticism of the legislation from the fiscally conservative Blue Dog Coalition on the right, and then from more progressive lawmakers who revolted against some of the compromises made to appease the Blue Dogs.
“You’ve had difficult meetings all week,” a reporter said. “Can you tell us about your methods to reach consensus?”
In an unguarded moment, Ms. Pelosi, whose deft political maneuvers catapulted her through the ranks of the House Democratic leadership to make her the first woman speaker in United States history, shared her secret.
“Chocolate,” she said.
And she was only half-kidding. Ms. Pelosi, who represents San Francisco, keeps stashes of Ghirardelli chocolate squares strategically placed throughout her suite of offices in the Capitol.source: http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com
No comments:
Post a Comment