The Hill: Ross says Waxman Has made Blue Dogs an Offer That Addresses All 10 of Their Concerns

[flpoljunkie]

House inches forward; Senate may scrap public option

By Mike Soraghan
Posted: 07/27/09 11:35 PM

House Energy and Commerce Chairman Henry Waxman said he hopes to restart work on healthcare legislation Wednesday after cobbling together the beginnings of a possible agreement with centrist Blue Dog Democrats.

Meanwhile, the AP reported Monday night that the Senate Finance Committee is close to striking a bipartisan compromise that does not include a so-called public option, a top priority of President Obama and House Democratic leaders. AP also reported that the Senate committee will not call for an employer healthcare mandate, which is included in the House measure.

Reps. Waxman (D-Calif.) and Mike Ross (D-Ark.) emerged from more than three hours of negotiations late Monday to say that the Blue Dogs were weighing an offer from Waxman. Blue Dogs have asked Waxman to get a cost estimate for the bill.

"The chairman has made an offer," said Ross, who is the lead Blue Dog on healthcare reform."We have asked that he get a (Congressional Budget Office) score, that is, find out how much it would cost. We're going to review it and see if it's something we can accept."

Ross and Waxman would not discuss any specifics of the proposal. But Ross said it addresses all 10 of the concerns Blue Dogs have raised with the bill.

more...

http://thehill.com/leading-the-news/house-inches-forward-senate-may-scrap-public-option-2009-07-27.html

[Phoebe Loosinhouse]

1. No public option and no employer mandate out of Finance

Isn't that something?

[flpoljunkie]

2. Quite a bit of something. Here's more on the Blue Dogs from a New Yorker article

From 'Health Care Reform and Congress'
by Hendrick Hertzberg

The most consequential opposition to the reforms now under consideration is coming from a small group of Blue Dog Democrats, who protest that the plan does too little to control costs. To the extent that their concern is genuine, and not just a reflexive deference to wealth (they vociferously oppose a modest surtax on the top one per cent, whose effective tax rates have dropped by fifteen per cent since 1979, while their after-tax incomes have more than tripled), they have a point. But it’s a minor point. The prospective reform has more cost-containment provisions than past attempts, and, thanks in part to those same Blue Dogs, it is acquiring more such elements by the day—for example, the proposal for an independent commission able to set Medicare payment rates, which Obama has also embraced.

But the Blue Dogs are playing a dangerous game of chicken. Even if they’re right that reform would do too little about costs, the alternative—which, as the President has repeatedly pointed out, is the status quo—would do nothing. Ultimately, real cost control will require a strong push away from fee-for-service medicine. In Massachusetts, which three years ago enacted its own version of near-universal health insurance, the cost of expanded coverage has created pressure for just such a push. That state’s experience suggests that the cost problem, too, will be easier to solve under a reformed system, with all its other benefits, than under the one we have now.

http://www.newyorker.com/talk/comment/2009/08/03/090803taco_talk_hertzberg

[joeglow3]

3. I thought this was supposed to done in the open for the public to see.

No back room negotiations. Amazing that how much we think things have changed, they are still the same.

[Better Believe It]

4. Concerns???? How about "blue dog" demands?