Health care summit: Dems admit it's a sham

Mike Allen at Politico reveals the real purpose behind today's health care summit:

After a brief period of consultation following the White House health reform summit, congressional Democrats plan to begin making the case next week for a massive, Democrats-only health care plan, party strategists told POLITICO.

A Democratic official said the six-hour summit was expected to “give a face to gridlock, in the form of House and Senate Republicans.”

Democrats plan to begin rhetorical, and perhaps legislative, steps toward the Democrats-only, or reconciliation, process early next week, the strategists said.

After the summit, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid planned to take the temperature of their caucuses.

“The point [of the summit] is to alter the political atmospherics, and it will take a day or two to sense if it succeeded,” the official said.

This was clear from the very beginning.  In opening remarks for the Republicans, Senator Lamar Alexander (R-TN) asked the president and the Democrats to renounce the use of the Senate budget reconciliation rule to pass health care reform.  Of course, that did not happen.

It is interesting to watch the Democrats trying so hard to appear collegial for the cameras. Some are better than others.  Harry Reid is awful at it.  He practically called Alexander a liar in his opening remarks, stating that the senator was entitled to his own opinion, but he was not entitled to his own facts.