Obama Wants Health-Care Summit to Revamp Bill

Posted in Health Insurance

February 9th, 2010

President Barack Obama is determined to push his health care legislation despite recent Congressional changes and hopes that by putting together a health care summit, he will be able to give legislation the momentum it needs. He plans to sit down with Republican and Democratic lawmakers to exchange ideas on the issue and wants this meeting to occur this month.

Obama’s Plans for the Summit

On Sunday, Obama said that he would work to find a truce between the Democrats and Republicans, seeing that Republicans are against that Democratic bill and now Republicans can stop the bill with a filibuster.

He told CBS in an interview Sunday, “I want to come back and have a large meeting, Republicans and Democrats, to go through systematically all the best ideas that are out there and move it forward.” His hopes with the meeting are that Republicans can put their ideas on the table so that the bill can be revamped in a way that will make at least a majority of both parties happy.

Will the Summit Work?

Members of Obama’s own party have expressed skepticism about its ability to break the impasse. Because the two parties have such vastly different ideas about how to reshape the system, it may be difficult for them to come to any type of agreement.

Republicans don’t agree with the Democrats’ idea to provide subsidies to 30 million uninsured Americans, among other ideas. Whether the two parties will be able to come to an agreement on ideas at the summit on Feb. 25 has yet to be seen.