WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama is trying to persuade a weary public and wavering Democrats to get behind his frantic, late-stage push on health care, while Republicans dig in and demand starting from scratch after a year’s worth of work.

“Now, despite all the progress and improvements we’ve made, Republicans in Congress insist that the only acceptable course on health care is to start over. But you know what? The insurance companies aren’t starting over,” Obama said in his weekly radio and Internet address Saturday.

“I just met with some of them on Thursday, and they couldn’t give me a straight answer as to why they keep arbitrarily and massively raising premiums — by as much as 60 percent in states like Illinois. If we do not act, they will continue to do this.”

Republicans were not swayed.

“It’s not too late: We can, and we must, stop this government takeover of health care,” said Rep. Parker Griffith, a retired physician and a first-term congressman from Alabama who switched parties in December and delivered the GOP message.

The competing addresses underscored the urgency behind Obama’s last-ditch push for immediate health care reform. Without a victory — and quickly — Democrats move into a fast-approaching election season without a major, tangible accomplishment that affects voters’ pocketbooks. And with a chasm remaining between the two parties, Democrats considered passing the overhaul with votes just from their party.

That process would let the 59 Senate Democrats declare victory with a simple majority instead of a 60-vote count. It also would allow Obama’s team to get back to talking about the economy, which has shed more than 8 million jobs since the recession began.

Obama is pleading with Democrats to overcome divisions to seize a historic moment to remake the health care system during this election year. The White House wants to pass a health care overhaul and then campaign on it. Voters will pick candidates to serve 36 Senate seats; the entire House is up for re-election.

White House officials hope the immediate changes in the health overhaul would be enough to satisfy voters’ expectations — and Democratic lawmakers who were hardly unified in support of the plan.

If Democrats pass the plan, voters would find greater consumer protections and a ban on discriminating against customers with previous ailments. Small businesses would receive a tax credit this year, insurance companies would no longer be able to drop patients’ coverage if they become sick, and plans would be required to offer free preventive care to customers.

Griffith said leaders of the Democratic Party he left last year were missing the point.

“For them, health care reform has become less about the best reforms and more about what best fits their ‘Washington knows best’ mentality — less about helping patients and more about scoring political points,” he said. “This is no idle observation. I’ve witnessed it firsthand.
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Obama turns up heat for health care overhaul plan

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Obama took charge of the health care debate on the 399th day of his presidency Monday by proposing a 10-year, $950 billion plan opposed by Republicans and not yet endorsed by Democrats.
White House spokesman Robert Gibbs called it “a starting point” for bipartisan debate at a health care summit Obama will lead on Thursday. But within minutes, Republicans in Congress denounced the plan, which is designed to reduce health care costs and expand coverage to 31 million people.

“The well has been poisoned,” said Sen. Judd Gregg, R-N.H. “Mixing two bad bills together doesn’t make a good bill.”

SEEKING COMPROMISE: Obama’s health care bill revision
THE OVAL: Plan combines Senate and House bills

It’s uncertain whether Democrats can pass the plan in an election year, even if they impose procedures to prevent Republicans from blocking Senate action. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., and other leaders sounded positive, but left unclear is whether enough moderate Democrats facing tough re-election races would support it.

“This is sort of the last, best hope for enacting the bill,” said Robert Greenstein, executive director of the liberal Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. “It’s now about to be a very exciting spectator sport. It is neither a slam dunk, nor is it hopeless.”

Obama’s plan is a compromise between Democratic bills that narrowly passed the House in November and the Senate on Dec. 24. Merging the two was delayed a month after Republican Scott Brown’s upset election to the Senate from Massachusetts, which cost Democrats the supermajority needed to pass the bill’s earlier version.

“This is the president putting forward what was the emerging consensus when they still had 60 votes,” said Diane Rowland of the non-partisan Kaiser Family Foundation.

Obama’s proposal would expand Medicaid for the poor and offer tax credits to middle-income people who would have to buy insurance. It tries to contain costs by taxing expensive health policies and slowing the growth of Medicare. It would prevent insurance companies from denying coverage because of pre-existing conditions.

Some of the changes would increase subsidies to make insurance more affordable, delay the tax on high-cost plans until 2018 and give the government power to block rate increases.

Barring support from Republicans, the White House hopes to use a legislative tactic that would require only 51 votes for passage in the Senate, where Democrats still control 59 votes.

“The president expects and believes the American people deserve an up-or-down vote on health reform,” said White House communications director Dan Pfeiffer. “Our proposal is designed to give ourselves maximum flexibility.”

Even if Obama can win 51 votes in the Senate, House passage is uncertain. He dropped moderate Democratic Rep. Bart Stupak’s provision barring the use of federal subsidies to pay for abortions. He also included more taxes and fees to pay for higher spending.

Democratic Whip James Clyburn said with Obama’s changes, “we’ve got a much better atmosphere in the House to get it more than 218 votes.”

Copyright 2010 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

In a make or break move, President Barack Obama on Friday challenged three dozen Republicans and Democrats to participate in a one-of-a-kind televised summit this month to thrash out a deal on health care.

House Republicans immediately greeted the invite to the Feb. 25 event with derision, casting doubt on whether it would yield any bipartisan agreement to extend coverage to millions of Americans and rein in medical costs. “We need answers before we know if the White House is more interested in partisan theater than in facilitating a productive dialogue about solutions,” said Kevin Smith, a spokesman for House Republican leader John Boehner of Ohio.

But Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., was more receptive, saying he would work with the White House “to maximize the effectiveness of the meeting.”

The summit is considered a last, best attempt to revive Obama’s yearlong quest, now stalled after Democrats lost their filibuster-proof Senate majority. Yet since Obama proposed the summit last weekend, Republicans and Democrats have voiced skepticism, with some in the GOP wondering if it would be nothing but a spectacle that could benefit the president at their expense.

By presiding over a meeting with three dozen lawmakers trying to get a word in edgewise, Obama may be able to dominate the conversation and the visual images. That’s what many Democrats say he did at a Jan. 29 session when he faced a roomful of GOP House members in Baltimore, controlling the microphone for much of the event.

The Baltimore event proved riveting for many Americans because it ranged over many topics and included numerous moments of partisan sparring. A half-day televised session on the complexities of health care may prove much less inviting to the average viewer.

In its invitation, the White House argued that remaking health care was imperative, and Obama challenged Democrats and Republicans to come up with comprehensive bills before the Blair House event — legislation that would be posted online.

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U.S. unveils offer to help Iran purchase medical isotopes

The United States and other nations seeking to restrain Iran’s nuclear ambitions are offering to help the Islamic republic purchase medical isotopes on the international market, administration officials said Tuesday.

The offer, officials said, is meant to persuade Iran to halt its controversial push to produce fuel for a medical research reactor. U.S. officials say Tehran’s enrichment plan — it announced this week that it is producing higher-grade enriched uranium than ever before — is evidence that it is pursuing fuel for a bomb.

The previously undisclosed proposal came as President Obama told reporters that his administration is “developing a significant regime of sanctions” to impose on Iran. He said that action at the U.N. Security Council, which is currently stymied by China’s objections to a fourth round of sanctions on Iran, “will be one aspect of that broader effort.”

U.N. sanctions do not prohibit Iran from obtaining the medical isotopes on the open market, which is how many nations — including the United States — get them for medical purposes.

“Rather than operate a reactor, this would be a more cost-effective and efficient approach,” one U.S. official said, speaking on the condition of anonymity. There are a handful of key producers around the world, including Russia.

Obama, during a news conference at the White House, said Iran appeared to have spurned his offers of engagement, including a potential deal to convert some of Iran’s low-enriched uranium into the fuel necessary to keep an aged research reactor producing medical isotopes for an estimated 850,000 patients.

“I think that we have bent over backwards to say to the Islamic Republic of Iran that we are willing to have a constructive conversation,” he said. But, he added, “the door’s still open.”

Iran initially agreed in October to the fuel-swap proposal, but then for weeks sent conflicting signals about the proposed arrangement. The Americans had viewed the idea as both a confidence-building measure and an effort to remove the bulk of Iran’s stockpile of enriched uranium from its soil.

“They rejected it, although one of the difficulties in dealing with Iran over the last several months is it’s not always clear who’s speaking on behalf of the government, and we get a lot of different mixed signals,” Obama said.

Last week, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad suddenly announced that Iran was again interested in the swap concept, but days later he ordered Iranian scientists to begin production of the higher-enriched uranium. The conversion is taking place at a pilot facility, and Iran lacks the technical knowledge to convert the more highly enriched uranium into the specialized fuel rods needed for the reactor.

“That indicates to us that despite their posturing that their nuclear power is only for civilian use, that they, in fact, continue to pursue a course that would lead to weaponization,” Obama said.

Iran has viewed production of its own isotopes as a source of pride, which might make it reluctant to buy them from abroad. Indeed, the Obama administration’s new offer might be intended mostly to placate China that it is trying every diplomatic approach.

Some analysts faulted the administration for first pursuing the swap offer, arguing that it opened the door for Iran to go after higher levels of enrichment. “They should have started with isotopes,” said Henry Sokolski, executive director of the Nonproliferation Policy Education Center in Washington. “Going to something sensible after you’ve promised something stupid and generous is a hard sell.”

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By Abukar Arman

Indonesian Muslims take part in an anti U.S.-Israel-Egypt protest in front of the Egyptian embassy in Jakarta on Jan. 17, demonstrating against an underground wall being built to block a network of tunnels crossing Egypt’s border with the Gaza Strip. (Photo: Bay Ismoyo/ AFP-Getty Images)

The recent Egyptian government’s decision to seal the few “tunnels of life” that allowed people of Gaza to bypass the ongoing inhumane economic strangulation—along with its harassment and cruel treatment of the participants of Gaza Freedom March and the Viva Palestina humanitarian convoy—earned it a prominent position in history’s page of shame. A page crowded by wealthy Arab nations who failed the Palestinian people and abandoned them at their most vulnerable time.

However, by no means should that sideline drama veil or in any way divert attention away from the root cause of the problem—the over six decades of oppression imposed upon the Palestinian people.

In that period, the state of Israel has occupied Palestine with an iron fist, denying Palestinians the right to self-determination and coercing part of their “elite” to surrender to what seems like a condition of eternal subjugation. However, the gravest of the Palestinian sufferings is embodied in the suffering of the people of Gaza as they endure a vicious economic strangulation unilaterally imposed by Israel. And despite worldwide condemnation of that egregious draconian policy, Israel continues to operate with impunity, devoid of conscience.

In their 575-page report released last September, the fact-finding mission on Israel’s disproportionate use of force in Gaza appointed by the U.N. Human Rights Commission has confirmed the ugly truth that most of the Western media were inoculated to under-report or outright ignore. The mission was led by Judge Richard Goldstone, former member of the South African Constitutional Court and former Chief Prosecutor of the United Nations International Criminal Tribunals for the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda. While the report also blamed Hamas, it highlighted that “there was strong evidence to establish that numerous serious violations of international law, both humanitarian law and human rights law, were committed by Israel during the military operations in Gaza. … Actions amounting to war crimes and possibly, in some respects, crimes against humanity, were committed by the Israel Defense Force.”

According to Article 39 of the report, the Israeli forces intentionally targeted and attacked Al Quds Hospital in the adjacent ambulance depot in Gaza with white phosphorous shells, an internationally banned chemical substance that, among other things, instantaneously burns the human being into skeleton.

Although the key recommendation of Goldstone was for the U.N. Security Council to pass a resolution mandating a credible investigation into the war-crimes allegations by the International Criminal Court, no such action has been taken.

In reaction to the report, the U.S. Congress—while succumbing to the “Israel Lobby”—has passed a non-binding resolution condemning the Goldstone Report. The resolution was intended to express unequivocal blind loyalty to Israel, and to pressure the Obama administration to use its veto power (as a permanent member of the Security Council) against any resolution that might expose Israel. Apparently, the strategy worked; the report is now piling dust in the oblivion.

For whatever it’s worth, it is this kind of culture of impunity that, according to Goldstone, “emboldens Israel and her conviction of being untouchable.” This concern was immediately dismissed as anti-Semitic by loyalists and supporters of oppressive Zionism. Never mind that Judge Goldstone is Jewish and is a supporter of Israel’s right to exist.

Make no mistake, anti-Semitism is a real racist phenomenon; however, the politically motivated excessive use of the term to character-assassinate and silence legitimate critics and peace and justice advocates, such as former President Jimmy Carter and Archbishop Desmond Tutu, simply defeats the purpose.

Meanwhile, though the Obama administration is showing signs of discomfort with the current Israeli government, the U.S. foreign policy toward Middle East is still driven by unconditional loyalty.

As the Obama administration tries to reduce the post-9/11tension between the United States and the Islamic world and rein in the rapid growth of extremism, the Palestine issue remains an open sore that is festering in America’s foreign policy. While the current administration has attempted to demonstrate its intention of becoming an honest broker by appointing a credible diplomat—former Senator George Mitchell—as the Middle East envoy, Israel continues its belligerent oppression and expansionist policy by defiantly building new settlements.

Led by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman, Israel is adamant to continue the ever-expanding land grab driven by illegal home demolitions and confiscations, daily dreadful human rights abuses at check points, random imprisonment and assassinations, suppression of independent media, and systematic ethnic cleansing of Palestinians. This, needless to say, has frustrated the Obama administration, whose out-of-the-ordinary reaction to Netanyahu’s visit to the United States has caused Israel a big embarrassment.

In an article intended to rally the troops against Obama, Jerusalem Post’s hawkish columnist, Caroline Glick, wrote, “It isn’t every day that a visiting leader from a strategically vital U.S. ally is brought into the White House in an unmarked van in the middle of the night rather than greeted like a friend at the front door; is forbidden to have his picture taken with the president; is forced to leave the White House alone, through a side exit.”

Though this was not a decision to stop or even suspend the roughly $3 billion of unrestricted aid given to Israel every year, it still turned many heads and galvanized the usual suspects to come after Obama with all sorts of accusations.

Not since 1990 when then Secretary of State James Baker sent a blunt public message to then Israeli Prime Minister Ytsakh Shamir, telling him “call us when you are serious about peace … the telephone number is 1-202-546-1414,’ has U.S. leadership sent Israel a stern message that its actions are unacceptable.

At the end of the day, convincing Israel to do the right thing and stop establishing new facts on the ground to further complicate an already complex political issue will require more than symbolism. And nothing substantive is likely to happen until the United States modifies its one-sided Middle East policy. Meanwhile, Israel will continue business as usual. It might invade Gaza again. Some opinion makers in Israel are already boasting about what “Operation Cast Lead 2″ would look like with the use of “advanced Israeli-made Marakava 4 tanks.”

Nothing equates to oppression more than the inaction of an apathetic witness.

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Muffled Screams of Gaza

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas on Sunday blamed U.S. President Barack Obama for delaying the resumption of Middle East peace talks by not standing firm on his demand to see a complete freeze in West Bank settlements.

In an interview with the German magazine Der Spiegel, Abbas said that he would not rescind his own stance on the matter. He added that the Palestinians expected Obama to convince Israel to announce a complete freeze, accusing the American administration of having changed its stance on the matter.

He told the daily that the optimism he had felt following Obama’s election had waned, and he was no longer satisfied with the American president’s performance.
Abbas has made similar remarks over the last few months, both with regard to his disappointment with Obama as well as his demand for a settlement freeze as a condition for re-launching peace talks.

Obama’s special Mideast envoy, George Mitchell, has laid blame for the stalled talks on Abbas.

Mitchell believed the Palestinians were showing little enthusiasm for talks because inaction was safer than reentering dialogue when the outcome was so uncertain, the London-based A-Sharq-al-Awsat reported a few days ago.

Mitchell has urged Europe to step up pressure on Abbas in an attempt to kick-start stalled peace talks with Israel, said the paper.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu agreed late last year to a 10-month temporary construction freeze, but the Palestinians have declared that to be insufficient.
Source. haaretz.com

WASHINGTON, Oct 17 (Reuters) – U.S. President Barack Obama lashed out on Saturday against the “deceptive and dishonest” efforts of health insurance companies, who he said are trying to kill healthcare reform, no matter the cost to the country.

Sharpening his attack on insurers, Obama also signaled support for a congressional review of the insurance industry’s long-standing exemption from federal anti-trust laws. Some Democrats want the privilege repealed.

The Democratic president’s push to revamp the $2.5 trillion U.S. healthcare industry, his top domestic policy priority, received a big boost this week when the Senate Finance Committee approved its version of a reform measure with the support of Republican Senator Olympia Snowe.

Many experts expect some version of a healthcare bill will pass this year, but there are still major disagreements on details, including whether the measure will include a government-run insurance program, the “public option.”

“For the first time ever, all five committees in Congress responsible for health reform have passed a version of legislation,” Obama said in his weekly radio address. “As I speak to you today, we are closer to reforming the health care system than we have ever been in history.”

However, he acknowledged the overhaul still must clear significant hurdles before becoming law. “And there are still those who would try to kill reform at any cost,” he said.

For decades, whenever we have tried to reform the system, the insurance companies have done everything in their considerable power to stop us,” Obama said.

“And they’re earning these profits and bonuses while enjoying a privileged exception from our anti-trust laws, a matter that Congress is rightfully reviewing,” he said.

BATTLE INTENSIFIED THIS WEEK

The battle over reform between angry Democrats and health insurers intensified when the industry trade group America’s Health Insurance Plans (AHIP) issued a report on Monday, on the eve of the finance committee’s vote, saying Senate healthcare legislation would lead to increases in annual insurance premiums of as much as $4,000 by 2019.

Democrats denied the findings, citing a report by the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office that said the Finance Committee bill would make health coverage affordable to millions of Americans who do not have it and slow the growth of healthcare costs.

Defending insurers’ position, AHIP spokesman Robert Zirkelbach said, “We are not trying to stop reform as some have suggested. We want reform that will work and can be sustained, and we are offering solutions to address the concerns.”

He said threats to repeal the industry’s anti-trust exemption — the McCarran-Ferguson Act, which kept regulation in the states’ hands — was “retaliation for us speaking out.”

Obama maintained, however, that the insurance industry “is rolling out the big guns and breaking open their massive war chest — to marshal their forces for one last fight to save the status quo.”

“They’re filling the airwaves with deceptive and dishonest ads. They’re flooding Capitol Hill with lobbyists and campaign contributions. And they’re funding studies designed to mislead the American people,” he said.

Democratic leaders in Congress began work this week on merging the various committees’ proposals on healthcare while keeping party liberals and moderates — and Snowe — happy.

Senate Republicans demanded Democrats allow more time to debate the details of the sweeping plan. Obama has set the end of the year as his goal for passing a measure that would begin to slow increases in healthcare costs, regulate the insurance market and expand health coverage without increasing the federal budget deficit.

Health insurers’ shares dropped this week after news of the finance committee’s vote.

Obama vowed an overhaul will go through.

“Every time we get close to passing reform, the insurance companies produce these phony studies as a prescription and say, ‘Take one of these, and call us in a decade.’ Well, not this time,” Obama said. (Editing by Todd Eastham)
Obama: health insurers ‘deceptive and dishonest’

WASHINGTON, Oct 14 (Reuters) – President Barack Obama on Wednesday proposed another $13 billion in spending next year — or $250 per person — to help some 57 million senior citizens, disabled people and military veterans weather the economic recession.

The funds would extend the one-year $250 “Economic Recovery Payments” program approved this year as part of the $787 billion economic stimulus package, but administration officials said it should not be viewed as the start of a second stimulus plan.

“Even as we seek to bring about recovery, we must act on behalf of those hardest hit by this recession,” Obama said in a statement urging Congress to approve the plan.

“These payments will provide aid to more than 50 million people in the coming year, relief that will not only make a difference for them, but for our economy as a whole,” he said.

An administration official said the president would not insist that the $13 billion program be paid for by offsetting cuts in federal spending. The official said in the context of a recession, such spending is often not offset.

“We’re going to have a conversation with Congress about the details, but one of the things the president will insist on in that conversation is that whatever way it’s structured, Social Security solvency would not be adversely affected,” the official said, referring to the government retirement program.

Congress would need to draft legislation enacting the measure and approve it.

Obama’s call for Congress to expand the program of $250 payments for another year comes as people receiving Social Security benefits face the prospect of no cost of living increase next year.

NEGATIVE INFLATION

Consumer Price Index figures used to compute the cost of living adjustments are due on Thursday and are expected to show negative inflation over the past year, administration officials said, speaking on condition of anonymity.

In such cases, they said, Social Security benefits remain at the same level as the previous year.

A spokesman for the Senior Citizens League, a nonpartisan seniors advocacy group, said the one-time payment does not come close to what seniors will lose without an actual cost of living adjustment in their Social Security checks next year.
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Obama asks Congress to back new payments to elderly