House bill on health care does not address changes

The Arizona Republic, on health care reform:

There is a lot wrong with the current state of affairs in American health care. But the rapid rise in costs - including a 131 percent rise in employer-sponsored premiums in just the past 10 years - is what drives this current fight for reform.

We have concerns about whether the House bill passed by five votes accomplishes this goal.

The Congressional Budget Office projection that the House measure would lower the federal deficit by $109 billion in its first 10 years is accurate only if one accepts the data presented to the CBO. It is hard data to buy.

The most dubious figure is the expectation that Congress will trim $400 billion from Medicare through dramatically lowered payments to doctors and hospitals. A smaller but similar "savings" is to result from a $110 billion slash in reimbursements to private insurers running the popular Medicare Advantage program.

Many times over the years, Congress has attempted savings by cutting reimbursement schedules, and every time, its heart grew too faint to hold the knife. ...

There are changes that really can alter the trajectory of medical-care price rises. Medical-liability law comes to mind.

But for whatever reasons, the House of Representatives chose not to consider those changes. ...

The Star-Ledger, Newark, N.J., on the first anniversary of President Barack Obama's election:

Few presidents have come to the job bearing a bigger burden of great expectations than Barack Obama, a blessing for a candidate but often a curse for a presidency. ...

Now, a year since his historic election, the pace of the Obama agenda has the country gasping for breath. His popularity remains high; but worries have risen about the speed of the change he represents - and especially the cost. ...

His decision to remake health care his first year, on the other hand, was a political calculation. It was his signature campaign issue, a radical reordering of the U.S. economy that could make or break his presidency.

GOP opposition is no surprise. Nor are complaints by Democratic Blue Dogs, a moderately conservative bunch. Bellyaching from the cranky Democratic left is, however.

What they've found - what 10 months in the Oval Office have shown - is that Obama is not really one of them. He leans left on lunch pail economic issues, but he's no true ideologue, despite GOP cries to the contrary.

He wants to win. Like most Chicago Democrats he'd deal with the devil, left- or right-wing variety, to do it. It's a bargain he may yet have to make to redeem those expectations.