Obama's summit

I have been able to watch about half of Obama's Health Care Summit meeting. I think it has been very worthwhile -- mostly because it showed what could be an effective process for making legislation.

All the central legislators of an issue sitting around a table with a moderator who keeps the discussion on topic, calls people out when they start reciting practiced talking points or going into campaign mode, tells people when their facts are wrong, and yet maintained a tone of civility in the proceedings.

I thought it was a masterful display of Obma's encyclopedic knowledge of the issue and his ability to keep a discussion on topic and -- amazingly with this many politicians -- to hold down the political rhetoric.

No doubt the Republicans would have a different evaluation, but I kept thinking: why can't our legislative process operate this way? They might actually get something done.

Obama was not a neutral moderator, of course. He had the opening and closing remarks, and he was obviously defending his bill. But he held to his offer: show me a good idea and, if it works better than what we have proposed, we'll include it. But he didn't let them get away with posturing or distorting the facts.

He had somewhat testy exchanges with both John McCain and John Boehner, when they presented a litany of talking points. Boehner kept talking about polls that show the American people don't want this legislation. Obama came back with something like: If I did nothing but listen to the way you have mischaracterized the bill, I wouldn't want it either. But if you ask the people whether they want the individual parts of what is actually in the bill, they are in favor of them. It's when you go on tv and call it a massive government takeover of health care and scare seniors into thinking we're taking away their Medicare, then we have a problem.

And then to McCain, he said:

Let me just make this point, John, because we are not campaigning anymore. We can spend the remainder of the time with our respective talking points going back and forth. We were supposed to be talking about insurance reform. Obviously I'm sure that Harry Reid and Chris Dodd and others who went through an exhaustive process through both the House and the Senate with the most hearings, the most debates on the floor, the longest markup in 22 years on each of these bills, will have a response for you. My concern is, if we do that, we are essentially back on Fox News and MSNBC on the split screen. My hope would be is that we can just focus on the issues about how we get a bill done.

I judge it another success for Obama's demonstrating his process. It may not get any Republican votes in Congress, but I think it will play well at home, for anyone watching.

Ralph