New York Times — Health Care Leaders Say Obama Overstated Their Promise to Control Costs
Did I say $2 trillion in savings? Never mind. It’s complicated.
President Obama got his health care week rolling by announcing $2 trillion in voluntary cuts from the industry, as the big boys of the health business lined up to get the best treatment in the president’s health care plan.
But as the local hospitals and doctors heard that the president was excited to announce that they could cut their costs 1.5 percent a year for the next decade, the big wigs who were gripping and grinning with Obama on Monday found themselves beset by outraged healers. The big wigs explained that they told Obama they could eventually decrease the size of the cost increases over an unspecified period by 1.5 percent annually.
The trillions of dollars difference could be a major hindrance to the Obama plan which promises eventual cost savings after huge initial deficit spending to get the program up and running. Without the savings, the president would have to come up with another source of revenue – like taxing employee health insurance.
Writer Robert Pear explains that that Obama may have misunderstood or may have pushed a version of the truth more to his liking.
“‘Nancy-Ann DeParle, director of the White House Office of Health Reform, said ‘the president misspoke’ on Monday and again on Wednesday when he described the industry’s commitment in similar terms. After providing that account, Ms. DeParle called back about an hour later on Thursday and said: ‘I don’t think the president misspoke. His remarks correctly and accurately described the industry’s commitment.’”
Financial Times — Pelosi hits out at CIA on torture claims
The looming question at the White House – how far will Nancy Pelosi go to save her own skin? The House speaker upped the ante on Thursday by accusing the CIA of lying to her and congress consistently over a period of seven years.
Accusing the CIA of lying is right up there with waking sleeping bears and barracuda fishing in terms of risky behavior, so Pelosi obviously either feels like she is out of options or has the CIA dead to rights.
Either one is bad news for the White House because the President will either have upheaval in the House as his most current signature initiative – health care – is waiting for a rapid-fire passage or a crisis in confidence in America’s main source of foreign intelligence.
Writers Demetri Sevastopulo and Andrew Ward explain: “Ms Pelosi’s press conference on Thursday was a sign of her determination to fight back in a dispute that threatens serious damage to her authority as the top Democrat on Capitol Hill.
By picking a fight with the CIA, however, she appears to have added further fuel to the controversy and ensured that the issues of torture and terrorism remain high on the US political agenda.
Her intervention is unlikely to have been welcomed by the White House, which has stressed its preference for focusing on forward-looking issues.
The White House does not want a “truth commission”, which would poison the political atmosphere and damage chances for bipartisan co-operation on legislation.
The controversy shows how the Democrats’ push for a torture investigation risks backfiring on the party, by giving Republicans a chance to go on the offensive over national security policy.”
Wall Street Journal — Obama to Revamp Military Panels for Detainees
Barack Obama seems to have become a war president. Aside from escalating the Afghan war, withholding detainee abuse photos, considering the possibility of detaining some enemy combatants indefinitely without trial and now keeping military tribunals for terrorists.
Writers Jess Bravin and Evan Perez reveal that the administration’s rumored move to keep the Bush military courts going is real and will be announced today.
Liberals continue to be shocked by the moves Obama makes and denounce the tribunals as “designed to ensure convictions” – which is exactly what conservatives like about them.
But the big issue still looming is where to keep the baddies and which ones to try where and which ones just to hold onto.
“It is unclear where commission trials would be held. President Obama has ordered Guantanamo closed by January 2010, and officials say it is unlikely trials could be concluded there by then.
Officials said no final decisions had been made on which detainees would face commissions. Alleged Sept. 11, 2001, terror mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and four co-defendants are among the nine current commission defendants. Although they are accused of the most serious crimes, they are likely to be easier to charge and convict in a regular court because they have boasted about their role in the terror attacks.”
Strassel — Democrats Discover Gitmo’s Virtues
As members of Congress line up to oppose the Obama administration’s efforts to bring the Guantanamo Bay bad guys here, the administration is discovering its inner Dick Cheney.
The political realities of importing terrorists to American prisons may have been part of what has led to the administration’s change of heart of how to deal with the jihadis we already have and still at large.
Kim Strassel provides a nice reality check on ho we got from having “lost our moral center” to being back in the detainment business.
“The administration might have the ability to shuffle some funds and [close Guantanamo without congressional funding]. But it is already four months into its one-year deadline, and transfers take time. The other option is for the administration to start triangulating, blaming Congress for not funding the program, and pushing back the deadline.
If so, Guantanamo will join the growing list of security tools that President Obama once criticized as out of keeping with American values but has since discovered are very in keeping with protecting the nation. Wiretapping, renditions, military tribunals, Gitmo — it turns out the Bush people weren’t a bunch of yahoos but often thoughtful defenders against terrorism. This is all progress, though America might wonder if it could have been spared the intervening drama.
Washington Post — Prosecutor To Interview Rove Today, Sources Say
While consecutive presidential administrations have been on bad terms before, the continuing effort in the Obama administration to dredge up nasty business from George W. Bush’s time in office is exceptional.
Today, the President Bush’s former political advisor, Karl Rove, will be talking to a U.S. attorney tapped by Obama to look for criminal wrongdoing in the firings of several other U.S. attorneys during the Bush administration –f irings Democrats believe were politically motivated.
U.S. attorneys are political appointees who serve at the will and pleasure of the president, so the Rove probe seems far-fetched. But because Obama has so far resisted the most extreme calls in his party for retribution against the Bushies, his own inquests get relatively little notice.
“Legal experts say that a particular source of interest for [the prosecutor] will be statements that officials made to the inspector general and to Congress about the episode, which could lead to charges of perjury or obstruction of justice. Outcry over the firings contributed to the departure of Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales, his chief of staff, D. Kyle Sampson, and Deputy Attorney General Paul J. McNulty.
The prosecutor firings also are the subject of intense interest from the House Judiciary Committee, which sued former Bush aides Harriet E. Miers and Joshua B. Bolten for access to testimony and documents. Rove is also tentatively scheduled to provide closed-door testimony to House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers (D-Mich.) and other members of the panel next month.”
