Another Health Care Plan
President Obama intends to deliver up his own health care proposal on Monday, a couple of days prior to the health care summit he is hosting on Thursday, that will be televised. Details of the president’s proposal is going to be published on the internet at Whitehouse.gov at 10 a.m.
A few provisions have emerged, such as a proposal that will expand federal oversight of insurance companies to control excessive rate increases, The Times’s Robert Pear and David Herszenhorn noted. The proposals under study by the White House are intended to bridge some gaps between the previous House and Senate bills.
Republican reception to the proposals ahead of the summit have been mixed, although Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell said in television interviews on Sunday that he and his Republican colleagues would go to the summit. House and Senate lawmakers return to Capitol Hill today after their prolonged President’s Day/snowstorm break.
A number of G.O.P. lawmakers have been in town late last week, appearing at the Conservative Political Action Conference, where their opposition to overhauling the nation’s health care system has been well-received by those attending. Although Democrats for many months have brushed Republicans as belonging to the “Party of No” – from rejecting the president’s stimulus bundle to health care, conference speakers tried to turn that negative into a positive by saying it’s O.K. to say no to what they see as large federal government programs.
