Democrats quietly working to resuscitate healthcare overhaul

President Obama's campaign to overhaul the nation's healthcare system is officially on the back burner as Democrats turn to the task of stimulating job growth, but behind the scenes party leaders have nearly settled on a strategy to salvage the massive legislation.

They are meeting almost daily to plot legislative moves while gently persuading skittish rank-and-file lawmakers to back a sweeping bill.

This effort is deliberately being undertaken quietly as Democrats work to focus attention on more-popular initiatives to bring down unemployment, which the president said was a priority in his State of the Union address on Wednesday.

Many have concluded that the only hope for resuscitating the healthcare legislation is to push the issue off the front page and give lawmakers time to work out a new compromise and shift public perception of the bill.

"A little bit of time and quiet could help," said Arkansas Sen. Mark Pryor, a conservative Democrat who was among a group of centrist Democrats from the House and Senate who met last week to discuss a way forward on healthcare.

"Human nature being what it is, it's always easier to be against something than to be for it. And if you create any uncertainty with change, opponents can jump on that and just try to scare people. . . . That has been hard to overcome politically," Pryor said. "Maybe over time, people will have a chance to understand what is in the legislation."

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-San Francisco) and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) particularly want to give members time to recover from the shock of Republican Scott Brown's victory in the Massachusetts Senate race two weeks ago. The election cost Democrats their filibuster-proof Senate majority.

But in the coming weeks, Pelosi and Reid hope to rally House Democrats behind the healthcare bill passed by the Senate while simultaneously trying persuade Senate Democrats to approve a series of changes to the legislation using budget procedures that bar filibusters.

SOURCE: Los Angeles Times

Healthcare reform not dead, says Van Hollen; Boehner agrees

Healthcare is not dead, according to a high-ranking Democratic lawmaker -- a point conceded by the top House Republican.

Despite the GOP election upset in Massachusetts two weeks ago, a key House Democrat told “Fox News Sunday” host Chris Wallace that House leaders are working with their Senate counterparts to move a healthcare reform compromise.

“We're still looking at a way to do comprehensive legislation. Certainly, certain provisions have to be dropped out. The Nebraska deal and other portions of that -- even Sen. Nelson has said he doesn't want that in the bill. … But the goal is still to try to get comprehensive healthcare passed,” Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee Chairman Rep. Chris Van Hollen (Md.) said on Sunday morning.

Republicans had considered the legislation all but dead after voters replaced former Sen. Ted Kennedy's (D) seat with Republican Sen.-elect Scott Brown, who ran on a pledge to be the 41st senator to filibuster the healthcare bill.

But House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio) conceded on a different show that the controversial measure was alive.

“We've seen all week Speaker Pelosi, Majority Leader Reid continuing to scheme and plot trying to find some way to get their big government takeover of healthcare enacted,” Boehner said on NBC’s “Meet The Press,” pledging that Repubicans would be “vigilant in exposing this.”

SOURCE: The Hill