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WASHINGTON: President Barack Obama proposed Tuesday incorporating four Republican suggestions into historic health care reform legislation in a bid to boost support for his overhaul drive.
In a letter to Democratic and Republican leaders in the US Congress, Obama said a bipartisan health care summit held last Thursday was a worthy step because it helped "identify areas on which we agree and disagree."
The president, in urging backing for his top domestic priority, also said the meeting left him "convinced" that Republican and Democratic approaches to health care "have more in common than most people think".
Among the ideas identified in Obama's letter were proposals from Republican Senator Tom Coburn, himself a doctor, meant to combat health insurance fraud, and an idea from Senator Chuck Grassley, the top Republican on the Senate Finance Committee, to extend reimbursements to doctors working under the Medicaid system.
The other two Republican proposals suggest additional funding to address medical malpractice disputes and an expansion of health care savings accounts, which aim at helping individuals save for future medical expenses.
The inclusion of ideas from the Republican side of the aisle however failed to win positive reviews from opposition lawmakers.
"There is a certain lack of symmetry there, in other words, a suggestion that we might have a few items inadequately addressed in a 2,700-page bill," Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, who also admitted he hadn't read Obama's letter.
He maintained the bill should be scrapped and the process restarted, to address reform as an incremental process.
House Democratic Majority Leader Steny Hoyer said that because a different bill would likely emerge from melding the versions passed by the Senate and House, it was still possible that Republicans could be convinced to vote in favor.
"We are talking to everybody. Do I think there is a possibility of some people changing? Yes I do," he told reporters.
"I think if that happens then as is normally the case, bills change and members look at it somewhat differently."
Obama pledged to lawmakers that "after decades of trying, we are closer than we have ever been to making health insurance reform a reality."
At the end of Thursday's "summit" he warned Republicans he was prepared to go ahead with the overhaul with or without their support, and he is scheduled to reveal Wednesday how he plans to proceed.
The House and Senate have failed to agree on a unified piece of legislation for Obama to sign into law, and may end up employing the parliamentary tactic of reconciliation to bring legislation to Obama's desk after a straightforward majority vote in the Senate, sidestepping opposition objections.
Republican House number two Eric Cantor slammed such an approach in a statement Tuesday ahead of the speech.
"It has been reported that the White House will no longer use the term 'reconciliation' to describe the partisan process they plan to use to jam through a trillion dollar overhaul of our health care system," Cantor said.
Should Democrats "make the partisan decision to use reconciliation for transformational legislation of this size, scope, and cost, they do so against the will of the people," he warned.
And if Obama "adds a couple of Republican solutions to a trillion dollar health care package that the American people don't support, it isn't bipartisanship - it is political cover," he said.
- AFP/sc
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