ShareThisWASHINGTON - Barring a political miracle, the likelihood that there will be no heath care overhaul bill passed by Congress this year is strong. Back to the status quo, which, in fact, we never left.
With 49 million Americans lacking health care coverage, the government is about to reach another milestone -- government programs soon will pay for more than half of all health care spending in the United States.
As Massachusetts's new senator, Scott Brown, took his seat to become the Republicans' best hope of killing the Democrats' health care legislation by virtue of denying the Democrats 60 votes to break filibusters, President Barack Obama warned of the high cost of doing nothing.
There is little dispute about that. The number of uninsured in the world's richest nation will rise. Those with pre-existing health conditions will continue to be discriminated against. Health care costs will continue to skyrocket. More families will go into bankruptcy or foreclosure because of sickness.
Obama now speaks with passion on the need for heath care reform. But his words sound desperate. He has shown no ability to unify Democrats, let alone bring recalcitrant Republicans to the table. Obama was never able to explain exactly how health care would be overhauled, how much it would cost middle class families or precisely how it would benefit those who have insurance.
The White House has never had a coherent, steady, persuasive message about health care. It let the naysayers ridiculous claims that the government would set up "death panels" to decide which seniors would live and which would die take root.
Instead of presenting the best thinking of experts in a White House-endorsed bill for Democrats on Capitol Hill to champion, Obama left the hard work of crafting a bill up to warring factions within his party. Republicans sat on the sidelines, complaining loudly, and Obama let them convince millions of Americans that the Democrats were clueless about how to reform health care.
The debate bogged down on confusing rhetoric. The concept of a "public option," which only means that consumers could buy affordable insurance from the government if they could find no suitable private policies, became a mantra of opponents seeming to indicate that the evils of socialism were creeping into the American way of life.
Instead of guiding the debate and making the various options understandable, Obama muddied the waters. He warned the chances of passage would decline in 2010 because one-third of the Senate and the entire House are up for re-election -- Congress notoriously does little in election years. But his urgency never translated to action.
Obama likes to be liked. He talks persuasively about the need for civility in politics. But it is time for him to knock heads together, threaten reluctant Democrats with political retribution and work on Republicans who agree that revamping health insurance is a giant piece of the health care/jobs puzzle. Less Jimmy Carter, more Lyndon Johnson.
It is also time for him to get the pork out of the package. Backroom deals such as the Cornhusker Kickback, that would have awarded Sen. Ben Nelson's home state of Nebraska special help for its Medicaid program, or the $300 million Louisiana Purchase to reward Sen. Mary Landrieu's state's Medicaid coffers sullied the whole health care overhaul effort. Nelson's much maligned deal will be scuttled, but Landrieu is fighting for hers, Despite the grim trouble the health care plan is in, unbelievably, Democrats still cling to hidden special deals inserted to make the overall bill palatable for swing legislators.
Obama came into office vowing to end politics as usual. He hasn't.
His first priority in 2009 was to reduce health care costs and extend insurance to more Americans. So far he has failed.
This has become a monumental problem for him as he struggles to regain credibility that he is able to help fix the many problems facing us.
Scripps Howard columnist Ann McFeatters has covered the White House and national politics since 1986. E-mail amcfeatters(at)hotmail.com
WHITE HOUSE WATCH
