With his health care reform effort on the ropes after taking a beating all summer in town halls across America, President Barack Obama is finally hitting back, making a long overdue house call to the House chamber on Sept. 9 to convince a chaotic Congress and frightened, misinformed public to jump on his bandwagon before it's too late.
President Obama tried to learn from the mistakes made by President Bill Clinton and his spouse--now his secretary of state--Hillary Clinton. Rather than unilaterally create a health care reform proposal behind closed doors and hand it to Congress to rubber stamp, as the Clintons attempted to do 16 years ago, President Obama laid out very broad goals--affordability, reduced costs, portability and insurance reform--but left it up to Congress to not only come up with the details of legislation, but to do so in a bipartisan fashion.
President Obama erred too far on the side of caution. He was much too optimistic, and perhaps even naive--not just about the ability of Congress to come to an agreement without a strong hand to guide them (organizing congressional action is like herding cats!), but in expecting the Republicans to work with him in any good-faith effort to achieve real reform.
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