Chinese Lobbyists Yield Influence In Congress...They Own U.S.

China's Lobbying Efforts Yield New Influence, Openness On Capitol Hill


Ten years ago, U.S. lawmakers publicly accused the China Ocean Shipping Co. of being a front for espionage and blocked plans to expand its Long Beach, Calif., port terminal over fears that Chinese spies would use it to snoop on the United States.

By last year, Congress was seeing the state-owned Chinese behemoth in a far kinder light. Sen. John F. Kerry (D-Mass.) authored a resolution applauding the company for employing thousands of Americans and helping keep the waters of Alaska clean. Rep. Stephen F. Lynch (D-Mass.) hailed the firm on the House floor, calling its chief executive "a people's ambassador" to the United States after it rescued Boston's port -- and thousands of jobs -- when a European shipping line moved out.

The congressional about-face illustrates a dramatic increase in China's influence on Capitol Hill, where for years its lobbying muscle never matched its ballooning importance in world affairs. Members of Congress, lobbyists and other observers said China's new prominence is largely the result of Beijing's increasingly sophisticated efforts to influence events at the center of U.S. power -- and a growing realization among U.S. lawmakers that China has become a critical economic player across America.

Although many Americans still view China with deep suspicion because of its communist system and human rights record, the results of Beijing's image-and-influence campaign are clear. Members of Congress "are starting to understand that the Chinese are not communist but that the Chinese are Chinese," said Rep. Earl Blumenauer (D-Ore.). China is Oregon's biggest export market after Canada.

"China is an overarching backdrop to almost everything that I am involved with," said the seven-term congressman, adding that on matters as diverse as the U.S. economy, climate change and energy policy, "China is something that no one can ignore."

For years, as China steadily rose to global economic and political heights, it all but ignored the U.S. Congress, with outreach to American lawmakers left to friends in the business community. But now China has launched a multimillion-dollar lobbying effort so effective that it is challenging the heralded efforts of nemesis Taiwan.

A decade ago, U.S. politicians of all stripes routinely subjected China to attacks. Now acts of benevolence are more likely -- such as a resolution commemorating the 2,560th birthday of Chinese philosopher Confucius, which the House overwhelmingly approved in October.

"There was originally this kind of anti-communist view of China," said Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), who in 1979 became the first U.S. mayor to visit China when she ran San Francisco. "That's changing. . . . China is a socialist country but one that is increasingly becoming capitalistic."

The new openness toward China is often subtle and not shared by all. But an undeniable evolution is taking place, congressional staffers and analysts said, as members of Congress, many with increasing numbers of large and small businesses in their districts that depend on trade with China, are now far more likely to kill or water down measures opposed by Beijing.

While China maintains a huge trade surplus with the United States, U.S. exports to China have surged in recent years. In 2008, according to the U.S.-China Business Council, exports to China grew in 85 percent of congressional districts. China is now the third-biggest market for U.S. goods, after Canada and Mexico.

"People in Congress are not stupid," said Minxin Pei, a professor of politics at Claremont McKenna College. "A few years ago, China-bashing was costless. Now they will get phone calls from worried CEOs. China is creating jobs in their congressional districts."

Zhou Wenzhong, China's avuncular ambassador, has visited about 100 senators and representatives in their districts during his four-year-old tenure in Washington. But he said it wasn't simply lobbying and shoe-leather efforts that have helped China's image in Congress.

"It's because of our common interests that more and more members have seen the importance of this relationship," he said. "I think their understanding of China is much deeper."

An Evolving Outreach

Until the late 1990s, the Chinese Embassy employed only one diplomat focused on congressional affairs. It was a dead-end job for functionaries who rarely left the embassy, then located in a dour former hotel on Connecticut Avenue.

China counted on U.S. business groups, such as the American Chamber of Commerce, to lobby on its behalf. But with China's accession to the World Trade Organization in 2001, those U.S. groups became reluctant to work on behalf of an increasingly potent competitor.

That spurred China to up its game on Capitol Hill, as did other events.

In the mid-1990s, Taiwan's success in lobbying for a visa for then-President Lee Teng-hui to attend a reunion at Cornell University and give a speech infuriated China and helped precipitate a crisis in the Taiwan Strait.

Then, in 2005, the state-owned China National Offshore Oil Corp. tried to buy the U.S. oil conglomerate Unocal but ran into a lobbying operation backed by the American giant Chevron, which had the competing bid. The Chinese spent $4 million on lobbying. But it lost to Chevron as Congress passed a resolution opposing the Chinese-led takeover on security grounds.
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Last year, China opened a $200 million citadel of an embassy overlooking Van Ness Street -- showcasing its rising fortunes and its focus on Washington. There, the beefed-up congressional affairs office now numbers at least 10 diplomats, most of whom have studied in U.S. universities, speak perfect English and are familiar with American ways.

"The Chinese have for years been wielding a lot of influence," said Rep. J. Randy Forbes (R-Va.), who heads the Congressional China Caucus, which has taken a tough line on Beijing. "They've liked to do it under the radar. But as there's been more light shed on it, they've had to change their ways."

China's handling of troublesome U.S. politicians has evolved, too. When Sens. Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) and Lindsey O. Graham (R-S.C.) proposed legislation in 2005 that would slap a 27.5 percent tariff on Chinese goods unless China revalued its currency, Beijing took a new tack. Instead of denouncing the pair on the front page of the People's Daily, as it might have in the past, the Foreign Ministry in Beijing welcomed them on a visit to China. At the end of his trip, Schumer told reporters that he was no longer sure he would push for a vote on the bill and that he was "more optimistic that this can be worked out than we were in the past."

From 2005 to 2009, China for the first time hosted more U.S. politicians and congressional staff members than Taiwan, according to LegiStorm.com, a congressional watchdog. China has also tripled the amount it spends on lobbying firms, including such powerhouses as Patton Boggs and Hogan & Hartson, since 2006 -- although it continues to be outspent by Taiwan.

Feinstein said the views of her colleagues have become more sophisticated with time. They know that China holds a massive amount of U.S. debt and that it imports a lot of goods -- $11 billion worth from her state alone last year. "I have never seen a country change as fast in 30 years as China has done," she said.

Neutralizing Taiwan

Washington used to be home to two types of "China people," known to insiders as the Red team, which supported China, and the Blue team, which backed Taiwan. These days China's rising influence has succeeded in bolstering the Reds.

In 1991, Rep. Nancy Pelosi traveled to China and unfurled a banner on Tiananmen Square in remembrance of those who died during the 1989 crackdown on pro-democracy demonstrators. Last year, as speaker of the House, Pelosi returned to China, and although she continued to raise human rights issues, she focused far more on climate change and, as a congressional staffer said, "minded her P's and Q's."

Some legislators who used to be considered firmly in Taiwan's camp now lean toward China.

Del. Eni F.H. Faleomavaega, a nonvoting, 11-term member from American Samoa, is the influential chairman of the House Foreign Affairs subcommittee on Asia, the Pacific and the Global Environment and for years was considered a solid backer of Taiwan. But over the past year, the Democrat has watered down or killed pro-Taiwan legislation and resolutions.

Faleomavaega partly credited China's improved lobbying for the shift. "Our friendliest allies -- Germany, Great Britain, France and Japan -- know how to work the system," he said. "China is just trying to catch up."

China's strongest backers in Congress are also becoming more vocal, especially the 60-member U.S.-China Working Group, led by Reps. Rick Larsen (D-Wa.) and Mark Steven Kirk (R-Ill.), who represent districts that do considerable trade with China.

"We bought China when it was low," Larsen quipped. "There was nowhere for it to go but up."



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Sources: Washington Post, Politico, MSNBC

Senate Increases National Deficit By $290B

Senate Lifts Debt Ceiling By $290B


A $290 billion increase in the Federal debt ceiling narrowly cleared Congress on Thursday, giving Treasury just enough leeway to pay the government’s bills into February and setting the stage for a showdown over fiscal policy early next year.

Senate Republicans insisted that 60 votes be required for passage and then held back their own members in order to force as many Democrats as possible to walk the plank on what has never been a popular or easily explained decision back home.

The same issue returns with a vengeance Jan. 20th when senators will be asked to vote on a still larger, long-term debt increase within days of President Barack Obama’s new budget and State of the Union address.

Treasury’s daily statements this week indicate it is still about $65 billion under its current $12.1 trillion ceiling, and conservatives argued that special measures could be invoked still to avert default over New Year’s. But with Congress leaving for the holidays, Senate Banking Committee Chairman Chris Dodd (D-Conn.) said that failure to act would have been “catastrophic” for the U.S. internationally. And Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus (D-Mont.) said that payments to Social Security recipients were also at risk.

“The bottom line is we have no choice,” Baucus told his colleagues. “We have to approve it.”

Between now and the January votes, there will be renewed efforts to try to reach some compromise on a bipartisan deficit reduction commission championed by the leadership of the Senate Budget Committee and more than a third of the full Senate. Without these votes, Treasury has no chance of prevailing, and the White House is already promising to take a more aggressive stance on deficits in its 2011 budget, due about Feb. 1.

But with the economy still fragile, Obama can’t afford to ignore the political threat of high unemployment and demands in his party for greater efforts to spur job creation. And for a man who campaigned on the promise of going through the budget page-by-page, the president has been remarkably silent on the new spending — and billions of dollars in parochial projects — included in annual appropriations bills approved this month.

In recent days, Obama has signed measures totaling more than $1 trillion with scarcely a comment. And going into House-Senate negotiations on health reform, he faces a major task now in convincing the public that the bill’s often tenuous financing schemes will actually hold up and not make the debt worse.

The bitter residue of that historic health care debate hung over the proceedings in the Senate on Thursday. And amid all the Christmas Eve hugs on the Senate floor, the debt ceiling vote was a moment of old-fashioned revenge for what many top Republicans view as a political betrayal last November after they joined in a bipartisan vote supporting the financial industry rescue plan championed by the Bush administration’s own Treasury Department.

The Democratic Senate campaign apparatus — overseen by Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), a strong ally of Wall Street — later ran highly effective ads attacking Republicans for supporting big bankers. And Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) has never forgiven Democrats for those tactics and worked hard to hold back his colleagues.

“Mitch is hard over on this,” said one Republican, and the sole concession on the 60-39 roll call was among Midwest neighbors: retiring Sen. George Voinovich (R-Ohio) voted “yes” allowing Sen. Evan Bayh (D-Ind.), up for reelection next year, to vote “no.”

Sen. Judd Gregg (R-N.H.) had been a second Republican vote Democrats had hoped for — and one that might have been there if a real crisis arose.

As the ranking Republican on the Senate Budget Committee, Gregg had played a lead part in negotiating a deal with Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) this week guaranteeing him a chance to amend the next debt ceiling increase next month with legislation setting up a bipartisan deficit reduction task force or commission.

The 18-member group would be charged with making recommendations by the end of 2010, which would be voted on in the next Congress in 2011. Gregg is insistent that there be a statutory requirement that the House and Senate consider the commission’s findings under expedited proceedings, without amendment.

In return for getting a sure vote on his proposal, he had argued in Republican circles for more bipartisan support Thursday for the short-term debt ceiling adjustment. But ultimately he voted no in apparent deference to McConnell’s strategy.

“We’ll be back in January to consider yet another increase in the credit limit that probably will only allow us to borrow through the middle of next year if we’re lucky,” Gregg said in a statement later. “While it is critical to protect the government’s ability to meet its financial obligations, Congress should not consider passing a long-term debt limit increase unless the legislation also includes enforceable and meaningful measures to curb out-of-control government borrowing and spending.”

In explaining his vote for the debt increase, Voinovich also alluded to the January debate and the promise by Reid for a vote then on the Gregg commission, also backed by Senate Budget Committee Chairman Kent Conrad (D-N.D.)

“As one who knows all too well about our debt crisis, unbalanced budgets and unfunded liabilities — and one who is keenly aware of how closely the United States is being watched by the international community — I felt conscience-bound to vote for this short-term debt extension,” the Ohio Republican said. “For too long, I have felt alone in the desert in my calls for reform. ... I am … I am truly grateful for the leadership of Sens. Conrad and Gregg and was happy to help move this issue forward.

To hammer home the point further, Conrad released a letter immediately after the debt vote, urging Obama to come off the fence and back the commission. Signed by more than 30 senators, the letter takes note that the president has signaled he intends to make “deficit and debt reduction a center piece” of his State of the Union address.

“To accomplish these goals, we believe it is necessary to put in place a process that is bipartisan, accountable, comprehensive and which assures a vote on recommendations before the end of this Congress. Your support for and involvement in such a process is crucial for it to be a success.”


Sources: Politico

Richard Burr & State Prosecutors Probe Constitutionality Of Ben Nelson's Deal

Several State Prosecutors Probing Nelson Health Care Deal



The top Prosecutors in seven states are probing the constitutionality of a political deal that cut a funding break for Nebraska in order to pass a federal health care reform bill, South Carolina's Attorney General said Tuesday.

Attorney General Henry McMaster said he and his counterparts in Alabama, Colorado, Michigan, North Dakota, Texas and Washington state — all Republicans — are jointly taking a look at the deal they've dubbed the "Nebraska compromise."

"The Nebraska Compromise", which permanently exempts Nebraska from paying Medicaid costs that Texas and all other 49 states must pay, may violate the United States Constitution — as well as other provisions of Federal law," Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott said.

McMaster's move comes at the request of Republican U.S. Sens. Lindsey Graham and Jim DeMint of South Carolina.

We have serious concerns

In a letter to McMaster, Graham singled out the deal to win Nebraska Sen. Ben Nelson's vote on the massive health care bill the Senate is expected to adopt Thursday. Nelson held out as fellow Democrats worked to get 60 votes to foreclose a GOP filibuster and the bill was amended to shield Nebraska from the expected $45 million annual cost tied to expanding Medicaid programs.

"We have serious concerns about the constitutionality of this Nebraska compromise as it results in special treatment for only one state in the nation at the expense of the other 49," Graham and DeMint wrote.

Nebraska wasn't alone in getting Medicaid breaks. Vermont, Louisiana and Massachusetts also got help with their programs.

Along with Texas, officials in Washington, Alabama, Colorado and Michigan confirmed they were working with McMaster.

North Dakota Attorney General Wayne Stenehjem said he wasn't sure what could be done while the federal legislation remained under debate. Officials in the other states did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Meanwhile on Tuesday, Tennessee's Republican Senate Speaker Ron Ramsey called for his state's attorney general to investigate the deal.

Ramsey, McMaster and Michigan's Mike Cox are running for governor in their states.

"Whether in the court of law or in the court of public opinion, we must bring an end to this culture of Corruption," McMaster said. The negotiations "on their face appear to be a form of vote buying paid for by taxpayers," he said.

We'll assist anyone

McMaster is encouraging a South Carolina citizen to step forward to sue to challenge the measure if it is signed into law. "We'll assist anyone to the extent that we're able," McMaster said.

Also Tuesday, U.S. House Majority Whip Jim Clyburn, D-S.C., said Republicans need to stop complaining about deals their colleagues made.

"Rather than sitting here and carping about what Nelson got for Nebraska, I would say to my friends on the other side of the aisle: Let's get together and see what we can get for South Carolina," Clyburn said.

For instance, Clyburn expects states will get more help covering Medicaid expansion costs. Critics say the federal government's coverage of 91 percent of those future costs will disappear, leaving states with huge holes in their budgets. Clyburn says the legislation the federal share should be 95 percent, with states picking up no more than 5 percent.

South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford said the federal legislation is "well intended," but called it "fundamentally flawed in the same way the stimulus efforts were in that the states and the taxpayers are left footing the bill."

Sanford this spring was the nation's only governor to take a state legislature to Federal and State court to block federal stimulus money.




Schumer Goes Hunting, Bags Nelson



The perils of "Political hunting" trips range from mockery — as with Sen. John Kerry’s (D-Mass.) expensive gear — to mortal danger — as in ending up on the wrong end of Dick Cheney’s 28-gauge.

But Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) had another story in mind when he traveled recently to Nebraska, a cautionary tale told to him early in his career by an older, urban-oriented New Jersey congressman who had made the mistake of accepting a hunting invitation from a Midwestern colleague.

“He shot the dog,” Schumer recalled, referring to the outcome of the Jersey pol’s inept marksmanship.

Schumer did not shoot the dog. He bagged three pheasants. And six weeks later, he bagged Sen. Ben Nelson (D-Neb.), serving as key negotiator as Nelson held the fate of landmark health care legislation in the balance.

While the two Senate Democrats didn’t spend their morning in a field outside Omaha talking business, the hunting trip will go down as a key, if unconventional, detour on the road to the Democrats’ most important modern legislative accomplishment.

The senator from Brooklyn woke up early the morning of Nov. 8, a day after he’d watched Nebraska thump Oklahoma on the gridiron. He put on a blaze orange hunting vest and hat, refusing only the boots (“too big”). He received a crash course on shotgun safety and marveled at the dogs.

“They were just amazing,” he said of the pointers and retrievers. “I always thought hunting dogs were just for companionship.”

Then the senator from New York saw a pheasant, took aim and pulled the trigger. Nothing happened.

“He didn’t get the safety off, so he couldn't shoot,” his host, Nelson, recalled with a chuckle Tuesday morning. “You have to push the safety off to shoot. He figured that out.”

The next pheasant wasn’t so lucky.

“He thought I shot it,” said Nelson. “I said, ‘No, I know I didn’t shoot ‘cause I didn’t shoot.’ And I said, ‘So you either scared it to death or you hit it.’ He was ready to jump up and down.”

Schumer bagged, his companions told him, three pheasants that early November day in Nebraska, though he was “never 100 percent sure they weren’t helping me.”

Schumer and Nelson's friendship began in 2005, when Schumer was named chairman of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee. Nelson was considering retiring instead of seeking reelection in a conservative-oriented state in 2006, and Schumer told POLITICO that when he assumed the DSCC chairmanship, Nelson was his first call.

The logic was clear, Schumer said: “He runs, we win; if he doesn’t run, we lose.” So he gave in, he says, to extensive demands from the Nebraskan, and Nelson cruised to what turned out to be an easy reelection.

Schumer’s bond with the Senate moderates he helped elect and reelect in 2006 and 2008 has powered his remarkable ascent within the chamber. Two years ago, Schumer seemed in danger of being overshadowed by his state’s junior senator, Hillary Clinton, or elbowed aside in the Senate leadership by Obama mentor Dick Durbin.

Beyond Majority Leader Harry Reid, the architect of the Democrats' successful health care strategy, Schumer has emerged as the dominant political force and go-to negotiator on Reid's leadership team. And the Senate is on the verge of passing landmark legislation that's deeply controversial in states such as Nelson's, a lesson Schumer said was drummed into him by the people he met that weekend in Omaha.

The apparent political victory has further enhanced Schumer’s stature. The jokes about the most dangerous place in Washington being between him and a camera have gone stale, replaced by a widespread recognition that he has evolved into one of the essential players on the American political landscape and, quite likely, a future majority leader.

The hunting story became legend in the Senate last month after Nelson passed photographs of the orange-clad, gun-toting Harvard grad, dead bird in hand, around an amused caucus lunch. But it also belongs in the broader legend of Schumer, the political animal par excellence.

“Chuck always wants to know where the other guy is coming from,” said Rep. Anthony Weiner (D-N.Y.), a former Schumer staffer, who added that he wasn’t surprised that Schumer acquitted himself well.

“He has handled more guns at crime bill press conferences than most hunters,” he said.

Indeed, word of Schumer’s hunting exploits was greeted with astonishment on both sides of the simmering gun control wars, in which Schumer came of age as a central player. His work on the Brady Bill’s handgun restriction turned him into, literally, a National Rifle Association poster child. The NRA’s favorite image pictures Schumer grinning under bright blue earmuffs as he demonstrates the deadliness of a stubby assault weapon.

“He just must have needed Nelson's vote very badly to do that,” said Tom King, the president of the New York State Rifle and Pistol Association, who called Schumer “patently anti-gun.”

Schumer says, however, that he favors only common sense and regionally varied restrictions on guns, and he has long bragged of winning, at summer camp, an NRA sharpshooting prize with a .22 rifle.

“It surprised me he went out with Ben Nelson shooting, but it doesn’t surprise me that he shot a couple of birds,” said Jim Kessler, a former Schumer aide who later founded Americans for Gun Safety, a gun control group that was later folded into the group Third Way. “In 1994, if Chuck thought the way to win the assault weapons ban vote was to go out and hunt with [former Democratic Rep.] Bill Brewster of Oklahoma and shoot three birds, he would have done it.”

Schumer and Nelson differ slightly about the origins of the hunting trip. Schumer recalls Nelson telling him, in the spring, “You have to come out.”

“I’ve always wanted to go hunting,” he said.

“I thought he was kidding at first; I said 'sure,’” Nelson said. “And I finally said, 'If you are serious, I can arrange this.' And he was, and so I did.”

Schumer and Nelson also shot skeet. They also tooled around on ATVs, with Schumer’s wife, former New York City Transportation Commissioner Iris Weinshall, hanging onto the back of Nelson’s vehicle. (Her city job hadn’t involved much off-roading.) Schumer posed with his dead quarry, though he left it for Nelson to dress, before they retired to the lodge for a lunch of pheasant.

(“He would definitely want to eat it,” Kessler said of his former boss. “He’s got to eat it. He’d eat anything.”)

They did not, both senators said, talk health care.

“There wasn’t any lobbying effort, just two guys having fun and going hunting and watching football,” said Nelson.

But the Nebraska senator’s warm regard for the New Yorker, and their relationship of trust, would prove central to getting the final health care deal done. Last Wednesday night, Nelson gave a list of must-haves to Schumer and Reid. At times on Thursday, Schumer was calling Nelson every 15 minutes, as part of what the Nebraskan called “pre-negotiations.” By nightfall, with progress being made, Reid asked Nelson to join a round of intensive talks Friday morning. Nelson was set up in one wing of Reid's suite of offices. Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.), one of the Senate’s most liberal members, was in another part. For 12 hours, Schumer and Reid shuttled between them.

Schumer “was extremely important,” Nelson told POLITICO just after the deal was done. “The thing about Chuck Schumer is he is very innovative, he doesn’t get ideological about something. …We may be an odd couple in a lot of respects, but we share some of the same qualities in trying to solve things.”

Schumer said the negotiations left him with deep respect for Nelson and that the hunting trip also taught a lesson.

“You can see where going hunting is a real bonding experience, kind of like golf,” he mused. “I’d like to do it again.”

“I’ve got a lot of invitations,” Schumer said.



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Sources: MSNBC, Politico, Youtube, Google Maps

White House, Schumer Concerned Paterson Will Hand NY To GOP On A Silver Platter

White House not looking for "soft landing" for Paterson

An Obama administration source denies reports that the White House has been looking for a "soft landing" for embattled New York Gov. David Paterson — but says Paterson hasn't flatly refused to remove himself from the race, though he is being coy about his plans.

Informed sources tell CNN that White House political director Patrick Gaspard met early last week with the Democratic governor to let him know about the administration's concerns he could not win the governor's race next year — a problem that could affect races down-ticket, not the least of which Senate seat now held by Kirsten Gillibrand. The White House decision to approach Paterson, says one source, "was driven by the poll numbers. There doesn't seem to be any way he can recover."

CNN has also learned that New York Sen. Chuck Schumer met with the president last month, and that the fate of the governor's race may have been one topic of conversation.

Polls show that Paterson's approval numbers are low — and dropping fast. In recent polls, just one in five voters approved of the job he'd been doing as governor. The same surveys indicated he'd lose in a matchup against former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani. State Attorney General Andrew Cuomo — who has assiduously avoided weighing in on the Paterson controversy — is clearly waiting in the wings, his approval ratings skyrocketing as he aggressively takes on Wall Street. "Every banker Cuomo indicts, the more popular he gets," says one Democratic strategist.

Even so, New York Rep. Jose Serrano told CNN, "if the White House has issues with a Democratic governor, there are ways to do that. Going public and embarrassing our governor doesn't make any sense." Particularly, Serrano adds, since the two met had to meet in New York today. It must be, he added, "the most uncomfortable situation either has faced in a long time."




NY Times Op-Ed: What Obama Said to Paterson, Maybe

President Obama walked down from Air Force One after his plane landed shortly before 11 a.m. Monday. He and Gov. David A. Paterson exchanged a brief greeting. They shook hands. Mr. Obama gave Mr. Paterson a half-embrace, then whispered into his ear for a few seconds. It was impossible for anyone nearby to hear over the roar of the engines.

— NYTimes.com, Sept. 21

The tarmac at Albany International Airport.

PRESIDENT OBAMA Governor.

GOV. DAVID A. PATERSON Why are you trying to ruin my life?

MR. OBAMA David. ...

MR. PATERSON Joking. Kind of. Do I smell cigarettes?

MR. OBAMA We don’t have a lot of time here, so I just want to make clear that the best thing for the party — and you, ultimately — is not to run.

MR. PATERSON You know what this reminds me of? Remember the end of “Lost in Translation,” when Bill Murray’s character whispers into Scarlett Johansson’s ear?

MR. OBAMA I do, yes.

MR. PATERSON No one knows what he said, right? It was a big deal at the time. But I think I know what he said.

MR. OBAMA What?

MR. PATERSON I think he said, “Scarlett, if you ever change your name to David Paterson, make sure you run for governor.”

MR. OBAMA Why are we still hugging?

MR. PATERSON It’s nice to hug sometimes. It’s nice to just stand here and sort of hold each other awkwardly. Like the end of a first date. What song’s in your head right now?

MR. OBAMA Ahhh. ... I’m not sure. Something by Journey. I forget the name.

MR. PATERSON Me, too. That’s so weird. Do you remember your dreams?

MR. OBAMA Sometimes.

MR. PATERSON Me, too! We have so much in common.

Mr. OBAMA Ahhh. ...

MR. PATERSON O.K., let’s say hypothetically that I do win the election.

MR. OBAMA You’re not going to win the election.

MR. PATERSON But hypothetically. ...

MR. OBAMA It’s not going to happen because you’re not going to run.

MR. PATERSON I’m going to start screaming.

MR. OBAMA O.K., hypothetically.

MR. PATERSON Hypothetically, what if I came to work for you?

MR. OBAMA As what?

MR. PATERSON Governor?

MR. OBAMA I don’t really have a position like that open.

MR. PATERSON Do you feel that I might be a kind of freelancer, simply sitting in on meetings, perhaps speaking to the press, traveling on your plane?

MR. OBAMA No. David, at some point you have to stop holding me.

MR. PATERSON We’re similar in so many ways, don’t you think?

MR. OBAMA Not so much.

MR. PATERSON I have the Lionel Ritchie song “Endless Love” in my head now.

MR. OBAMA That’s great. Look. David. I have to go. Announce you’re not going to run. We’ll figure something out.

MR. PATERSON Give me a sign of what you’re thinking.

MR. OBAMA Announce that you’re not going to run.

MR. PATERSON I’m hearing you say I should run.

MR. OBAMA Let me be very clear. You should not run. I will disavow you and put all the pressure of the Office of the President behind a different candidate.

MR. PATERSON Then it’s settled. I’ll run.

MR. OBAMA Oh, look! My car’s here.

MR. PATERSON What’s it like having your own plane?

MR. OBAMA Best of luck to you, David.

MR. PATERSON Do you have time for a coffee?



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Sources: CNN, NY Times, Whitehouse.gov, Google Maps

Congressional Dems May Use Reconciliation To Pass HC Reform Bill This Year...GOP Attacks Won't Hinder Progress

NY Times----



(U.S. Senator Schumer on Health Care Reform: Bi-Partisan or not, we're prepared to make it happen with just Dems. Watch)

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U.S. Senate Democrats said Sunday that they were fleshing out plans to pass health legislation, particularly the option of a new government-run insurance program, with a simple majority, instead of the 60 votes that would ordinarily be needed to overcome a filibuster.

After consulting experts in Senate rules and procedure, the Democrats said they were increasingly confident that they could legislate creation of a public plan in a way that would withstand challenges expected from Republicans.

Appearing Sunday on the NBC News program “Meet the Press,” Senator Charles E. Schumer of New York, the third-ranking Democrat in the Senate, said a public insurance plan was “essential to getting the costs down, which is our No. 1 problem.”

Proponents of a public plan say it would drive down costs because it would not have a profit motive and would have lower overhead costs and lower executive salaries than private insurance companies.

In Colorado on Aug. 15, President Obama said people had become “fixated” on the public plan option, which he described as “just one sliver” of efforts to overhaul the health care system.

Mr. Schumer said it was “looking less and less likely” that Republicans would support Democratic proposals to subsidize coverage for tens of millions of the uninsured. And Senate Democratic leaders said they had little hope that the chairman of the Finance Committee, Senator Max Baucus, Democrat of Montana, would be able to forge a bipartisan compromise.

In the last week, Democrats have begun to talk openly of using a procedure known as budget reconciliation to pass a health bill in the Senate with a simple majority, assuming no Republican support. To do that, under Senate rules, they would probably need to show that the public plan changed federal spending or revenues and that the effects were not “merely incidental” to the changes in health policy.

Democrats believe they could clear this hurdle by demonstrating that the public plan would save money or cost money.

“If a public plan is shown to have a cost to the government that affects outlays or revenues, it could be included in a health care bill using reconciliation procedures,” said Martin P. Paone, a former Senate aide who has been consulted by Senate Democrats.

Republicans object to both the idea of a new government plan and the use of expedited procedures to push it through the Senate on a simple majority vote.

Senator Orrin G. Hatch, Republican of Utah, said that using the budget reconciliation procedure to pass a health bill would be “an abuse of the process,” which was meant to focus on spending and tax policy. Moreover, Mr. Hatch said, “every Republican says that they will not be for a public option.”

Mr. Hatch said a new public insurance program could “bankrupt the country.” He said it made no sense to “throw out a system that works for 85 percent” of the population so Congress could take care of the 15 percent who were uninsured.

Senator Joseph I. Lieberman, independent of Connecticut, said Mr. Obama should take a more gradual approach. “We morally, every one of us, would like to cover every American with health insurance,” Mr. Lieberman said on “State of the Union” on CNN. But, he noted, “that’s where you spend most of the $1 trillion” in expected costs over 10 years.

“We’ve got to think about putting a lot of that off until the economy’s out of recession,” he added. “There’s no reason we have to do it all now, but we do have to get started. And I think the place to start is cost, health delivery reform and insurance market reforms.”

The administration continued on Sunday to wrestle with questions about planning for medical care at the end of life.

Senator Arlen Specter, Democrat of Pennsylvania, called for hearings to investigate a guide used by the government to counsel veterans with critical or terminal illnesses.

On “Fox News Sunday,” H. James Towey, the director of the White House Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives under President George W. Bush, said the guide seemed to encourage people to “hurry up and die.”

The booklet, “Your Life, Your Choices,” asks people to consider whether life would be worth living if, for example, they were in severe pain, relied on a feeding tube or a breathing machine, lived in a nursing home or imposed “a severe financial burden” on family members.

In addition, the booklet asks, “Have you ever heard anyone say, ‘If I’m a vegetable, pull the plug’?” It then explains that people have different ideas of what it means to be a vegetable or to “pull the plug.”

In a bulletin last month, the Department of Veterans Affairs recommended the booklet as a tool to help veterans with “advance care planning.”

Tammy Duckworth, an assistant secretary of veterans affairs, said it was being revised.

But Mr. Towey said, “The document is so fundamentally flawed that the V.A. ought to throw it out.”


Sources: NY Times, Huffington Post, MSNBC