Health Care For America Now

Senator Chuck Grassley, ranking Republican member of the Senate Finance Committee, has made a lot of noise about "bipartisanship" in health care reform. The kind of "bipartisanship" that Grassley has in mind, however, will not answer America's needs and demands. Nor does it represent what the people of Iowa want.

Iowans are deeply engaged in the debate over health reform. As town halls on health care take place throughout all of Iowa's 99 counties, state residents are engaging in "spirited debate" over the shape reform should take. With Health Care for America Now airing ads in Iowa in support of the public option and the national health care debate capturing daily front page headlines, the temperature of the fight is increasing - and the public option is winning among ordinary people. In April, polling indicated that a majority of Iowans favor the inclusion of a strong public option (h/t Think Progress) - as do over 70% of Americans. With President Obama (who won Iowa 54%-45%) speaking out for the public option and people across the country engaging in the fight, I can only imagine that Iowans' support for the public option is increasing by the day.

So when Grassley says that bipartisanship means nixing the public option, who does he speak for? Grassley may cast suspicion on the results of a recent New York Times poll, but does he doubt the clear trend in multiple national polls? Does he doubt the sincerity of his constituents when they say want real reform, not watered-down compromises? Rather it seems that voters should doubt the sincerity of Grassley's "bipartisanship" when he disagrees with Democrats on nearly every principle and detail.

Grassley is, in fact, one of the most problematic voices in the health care debate. TPM's Brian Beutler reports that Grassley and Schumer, a leading advocate of the public plan, are deeply at odds when it comes to reform:

Some conservative Democrats on the committee had "concerns" about Schumer's plan, and Republicans were generally opposed, which put a crimp in Baucus' plan to reach a bipartisan consensus–for all intents and purposes, to win the votes of ranking member Chuck Grassley and Olympia Snowe. That's what ultimately created the political space for Sen. Kent Conrad's plan to build a cooperative system, which Grassley said he was open to in principle.

There were just a couple significant problems with that.

First, the co-operative plan Grassley might support is not a plan Schumer would abide by. "If the co-op option remains unchanged from what it is now he would not support it and he would urge other Democrats not to support it as well," Schumer's spokesman Brian Fallon told me.

And by the same token, a co-operative plan Schumer might support isn't a plan Grassley could support. Conrad said earlier this week that he and Schumer don't really disagree too much on the potential shape of the co-operatives–but Grassley's still not on board.

So there's a bit of an impasse, and committee leaders are struggling to reconcile a number of seemingly incompatible desires: The desire to build a bill that stands a chance of surviving in the House; the desire to move a bill out of committee with some Republican support; and the desire not to get further behind schedule than the committee already is.

Grassley, it seems, wants others to compromise but will give little ground himself. At a time when Americans want leaders who will solve problems, that attitude places Grassley out of step with his constituents not just on the issue of health care, but on his entire approach to governance. Too bad Grassley has not, like his colleague Senator Tom Harkin, signed on to Health Care for America Now's principles. And too bad that Grassley won't listen to Iowans and play a more constructive role in the most important domestic debate of the year.