How They Did It

TNR

Jonathan Cohn, The New Republic | Full Story | When the president and his closest advisers huddled in the Oval Office last August, they had every reason to panic. Their signature piece of legislation, comprehensive health care reform, was mired in the Senate Finance Committee and the public was souring on it. Unemployment was on the march, and all this talk about preexisting conditions and insurance exchanges barely registered above the Fox News pundits screaming, “Death panel!” Suddenly, health care reform was under attack everywhere--even in the West Wing.

All week, the group had debated whether to scale back the reform effort. Now, a decision point had come, according to several people who were in the room. Press Secretary Robert Gibbs said he couldn’t keep telling reporters that there was progress on reform when, in fact, it plainly wasn’t happening. Counselor David Axelrod, who viewed health care as a political graveyard, presented a stark view of the president’s falling poll numbers. Axelrod didn’t argue that it was time to abandon comprehensive reform, but Vice President Joe Biden and chief of staff Rahm Emanuel did. Make a quick deal that would extend insurance coverage to parents and children, they urged, and put off broader action until later. Neither man had substantive qualms with comprehensive reform. They simply saw it sucking the political life out of the new presidency, just like it did to Bill Clinton more than a decade ago.

Their political logic was impeccable. And, at another time, Barack Obama might have heeded it. Universal health care had not been a defining cause for him before his presidential bid. During one of his first policy tutorials on the subject, back in 2006, advisers were dismayed that he spent the session typing away on his BlackBerry--attention they believed that he desperately needed to spend mastering intricacies.

Focus had come with the campaign and, later, the first months of his presidency. By August, Obama could square off against any health care wonk in the country, including the ones who worked for him. Still, the passion he discovered wasn’t ultimately about the substance of health care policy--not entirely, anyway. Obama had come to view this debate as a proxy for the deepest, most systemic crises facing the country. It was a test, really: Could the country still solve its most vexing problems? If he abandoned comprehensive reform, he would be conceding that the United States was, on some level, ungovernable. Besides, several aides recall him saying, “I feel lucky.”

After the meeting broke up, a few of his advisers milled in the hallways outside the Oval Office, pondering the prospect of taking up such a high-risk strategy because the president “felt lucky.” As one of them later told me, “It was like, holy shit.” >>

Published 10.05.21 12:10:17 -0500 GMT | Posted by Andrew Garib on 10.05.21 | On the Web at: http://saveandrewgarib.com/articles/779 |