Craig Crawford's Trail Mix

Too bad for the President that offering up to $6,200 for each new worker hired is overshadowed by the high stakes endgame of his health overhaul. Helping employers in this way is just the sort of thing that Obama mostly needs to be seen doing.

Today he signed the HIRE Act, a $17.6 billion measure that includes a payroll tax break for businesses that hire unemployed people. The White House is hopeful that this could put some 300,000 Americans back to work.

How telling it was that Obama describes the HIRE Act as "the first of what I hope will be a series of jobs packages." He could have given himself more credit by claiming that the Economic Stimulus package enacted early in his tenure was his "first" job creation initiative.

But with unemployment still rising, Obama and his aides are mindful that so many Americans think he has not been adequately focused on jobs. Hence, the effort to portray this law as the beginning of an all new attack on unemployment.

Democrats would be better off heading into the coming elections if for the past year they were seen as having done everything they could to boost employment numbers, without having to stage this public relations reboot.

The health care debate increasingly seems like my favorite TV show, "Lost." Producers of the ABC show had promised answers in this, the final season. But instead they have raised more questions, introduced more characters and provoked ever more confusion among loyal viewers.

Just when we thought that President Obama's health overhaul would get an "up or down" vote by the end of this week, it got even more complicated. Now, the buzz is about a vote as late as Sunday, when Obama's postponed trip to Asia is supposed to begin.

Capitol Hill's Democratic leaders say they are waiting for a now overdue report from the Congressional Budget Office. But you've got to wonder if they've lost their nerve and instead are paying attention to the legions of party operatives who say this plan spells disaster in November.

It was once assumed that Democrats believed that doing nothing was the worst thing for surviving congressional elections in November. But just as producers of "Lost" seem to think so far, perhaps no answer is the best policy. Keeping the country guessing about what might happen might be better than making a decision.

But who knows, the promo for next week's "Lost" promises that crucial questions will be answered. Maybe Democrats will do the same.

It might not be so clever for President Obama to postpone one of his health plan's least popular elements until well after a re-election campaign. Forcing all Americans to buy insurance or pay fines is not going to sit well. But it does not take effect until 2014.

While there might be some benefit for Obama in not forcing this issue until after a 2012 bid for a second term, he would be setting up a powerful rallying cry for political enemies who will make the mandate's repeal a plank in their "take our country back" mantra.

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Republicans and tea partiers will surely focus on it during the presidential race - and in the coming congressional elections - as a cause for liberty as they see it. The enticing prospect of undoing the mandate by electing conservatives before it takes effect would fuel that drive.

If the mandate did go away, much of Obama's overhaul would fall apart. For starters, the insurance industry would lobby for repeal of one of the President's most popular proposals: The ban on pre-existing condition exclusions, which also takes effect in 2014. Insurance companies are only accepting that reform in exchange for selling more coverage under the federal mandate.

Also, a five year delay gives the states time to come up with blocking legislation. If the courts strike such laws as a violation of the federal government's supremacy, the ensuing firestorm would further stir up conservatives and libertarians. Already, Virginia has led the way by passing a law saying that its residents would not have to obey the mandate - and 34 other states have similar measures in the works.
 
It's a bitter political pill that might be better swallowed right away, to avoid giving opponents time to spit it out.

Oh please, if not for the mess in the Senate there would be no need for "deeming" in the House.

If the Senate could have passed health legislation by a simple majority, its bill would have been closer to the more liberal House version and Speaker Nancy Pelosi would not have to be considering subterfuge to win passage.

But here we are. To gain the 60-vote super majority overcoming Republican filibuster threats, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid had to dilute his bill -- so much so that House Democratic leaders are having trouble winning support among their own.

Thus emerges the "deeming" plan, which allows a vote on fixes to the Senate bill and a rule deeming the underlying bill as passed in the House without actually conducting a roll call on it. That would give wavering members cover to say they never voted for it.

The fixer bill, called reconciliation, can then be passed by a simple majority in the Senate under its rules.

So, let's remember that all of this chicanery in the House, which will surely make Democrats look bad, might be necessary because the Senate's minority party, the GOP, used the filibuster threat to prevent a simple-majority passage of a bill that most senators would have supported.

At the end of the day, even if this convoluted process is how the health overhaul becomes law, it was still supported by a majority of the nation's elected lawmakers in Congress. And that's democracy.

A special invitation for Trail Mix readers in Washington, DC: Join me at CQ-Roll Call's "Off to the Races" election preview at the Capitol Club at Union Station next Tuesday, March 23 at 8:30-10:45 a.m. Register today!

I'll be on a panel moderated by Political Wire's Taegan Goddard, featuring Tucker Carlson, Stuart Rothenberg, and Walter Shapiro.

I hope to see you there!
-- Craig

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Rep. Dennis Kucinich's ride on Air Force One yesterday highlights how liberals are as unhappy as conservatives with President Obama's final health overhaul plan, which is why it has a good chance of becoming law. For offsetting all of the noise from the right, it is probably helpful to Obama to show independents and moderates that liberals do not think he is going far enough.

The Ohio Democrat is unhappy that the plan facing a possible vote this week does not provide any form of government-run health care. That alone ought to discount conservative complaints that the Obama plan involves a "government takeover" of the health care system. Kucinich and other House liberals might vote against the bill because it does not include a government takeover.

Still, the House vote could be close enough that Obama needs Kucinich on board -- hence, the President's attentiveness to him on Monday.

But the murky lesson in showcasing Kucinich's concerns, plus the expected tight vote and the ongoing conservative opposition is that Obama has possibly found the shaky middle ground that yields the only changes in our health care system that are politically feasible.

Delayed benefits in the Democratic health care bills have opponents claiming that there are no immediate effects. Not true.

It is true that some of the big-ticket items are gradually phased in. In general, this legislation could take a generation to be fully up and running.

Supporters of the measure point to several important benefits in the first year if it becomes law. The gist of the plan's first-year impact is mostly about insurance reform, which might be a more fitting label for this debate.

Also on Trail Mix: The '10-6' Debate

Immediate Changes

• Uninsured sick people could find cheaper insurance through increased federal funding of high-risk pools -- until the ban on pre-existing coverage exclusions takes effect in 2014.
• Insurers would no longer be allowed to rescind insurance when claims are filed.
• Group health plans would no longer be allowed to establish eligibility rules that discriminate in favor of higher wage employees.
• Young adults will be able to stay on their parents' insurance plans through age 26. Children with pre-existing conditions could not be denied coverage.
• Insurers would be forced to spend more on medical care and less on administration expenses (which means less profit).
• Lifetime limits for coverage would be eliminated and annual limits would be restricted, a major benefit for those with catastrophic illnesses.
• Early retirees get more access to insurance before Medicare eligibility.
• Uniform insurance documents would be created, making it easier to compare policies. Another aid to consumers would be the creation of an appeals process to resolve disputes with their insurer.
• Insurance companies would be forced to cover preventive care and immunizations, and exempt these benefits from deductibles.
• While elimination of the Medicare "doughnut hole" is put off until 2020, in the first year the ceiling for prescription drug coverage would be raised by $250 in the president's plan.
• Small businesses that provide insurance to workers would get tax credits of up to 35 percent of premiums in the first year, rising to 50 percent in later years. 

Health reform foes are accusing Democrats of gaming the price tag by juggling the start dates for revenue and benefits. On separate Sunday talk shows columnists George Will and David Brooks asserted that the plan's deficit reduction promise is bogus because it has 10 years of taxes and 6 years of benefits.

That's a potentially devastating statistic for Democrats. It plays to suspicions of phony math. But, as always in these budget fights, it's complicated.

The Congressional Budget Office, which "scored" the health plan last week, is limited to scrutinizing the legislation it is given. By delaying the start date for some spending until after four years of increased revenue, the bill's deficit neutrality is enhanced. But the CBO estimators say that the plan will continue to reduce the deficit after the first ten years, undercutting what Will, Brooks and others are implying, that once the full plan is up and running there will be no deficit reduction.

"CBO expects that the legislation, if enacted, would reduce federal budget deficits over the decade after 2019 relative to those projected under current law." (CBO report, 3/11)

Republicans discount that projection because it is partially based on spending cuts that they say Congress will not have the guts to impose. They're probably right. Both sides play with the future to make the present look better in these budget games. And the CBO itself acknowledged as much in a disclaimer.

"These longer-term calculations assume that the provisions are enacted and remain unchanged throughout the next two decades, which is often not the case for major legislation." (CBO report, 11/18)

Despite the CBO's long term deficit reduction prediction, the GOP has a powerful talking point at its disposal, that the short term Democratic balance sheet is based upon 10 years of revenue minus only six years of expenditures. Unfortunately for Democrats, on this score their defense, although valid, is more complicated than a sound bite.

Roundup:

CQ Today reports that Democrats are confident about passage but are "trying to resolve at least two important issues: making Medicaid funding equitable to all states and addressing Hispanic lawmakers' concerns about immigration. A third issue, abortion, has been set aside, Democrats say."

• Activists Target Undecided Democrats (Congress.org)
• Gibbs: Health Bill Will Pass (CBS)
• Boehner Determined to Kill Dem Health Care Bill (AP)

Now that we've had the food fight, what about the war debate?

It was, after all, the first full House debate on ending the Afghan war since it began in 2001. Patrick Kennedy and colleagues were debating a resolution to bring troops home this year. Reporters already knew that the measure was doomed to failure and paid little attention, provoking the Rhode Island Democrat's now infamous rant.

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The resolution was offered by Rep. Dennis Kucinich, D-Ohio. It would have required the president to withdraw U.S. forces from Afghanistan within 30 days. It was voted down, 65-356. Sixty Democrats and five Republicans backed the measure.

CQ Today reported that the March 10 vote "likely signals smooth sailing for a looming war supplemental spending bill that Congress could take up this spring."

Kucinich and a small band of like-minded colleagues stressed an important question of constitutional war powers: The 2001 joint resolution authorizing the Afghan conflict should not mean that presidents could continue the war forever.

"It's time for Congress to claim its constitutional responsibility or we'll be in Afghanistan a very, very long time," Kucinich said during Wednesday's House debate.

We are in the ninth year of this war. Two months ago, President Obama sent 30,000 more troops, bringing the total to almost 100,000, plus at least that many private contractors. If Congress passes the increased spending that Obama is now proposing, by next year the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq will cost more than $13 billion per month.

• US Reports Steady Progress in Afghanistan (Voice of America)
• White House Weighs Talks With Taliban After Afghan Successes (New York Times)
• Obama holds Sit Room meeting with Afghanistan, Pakistan (USA Today)
• Gates Hints at Possible Early Pullout (CNN)

CNN Blog: "Afghanistan Crossroads"