‘Top Line’: Will Obama Concessions Bring Bipartisanship?

June 25, 2009 2:38 PM

ABC News’ Rick Klein reports:

Though President Obama spoke last night about the need for compromise in the health care debate, bipartisanship remains an elusive goal.

On ABCNews.com’s “Top Line” today, Rep. Roy Blunt, one of the leaders of GOP health care reform efforts, signaled how little terrain is truly in play in negotiations with Republicans. 

Including a public option -- a cornerstone of the plans Obama has enunciated to debate -- remains a non-starter for Republicans, said Blunt, R-Mo., who is running for a Senate seat in 2010.

“I believe -- and a lot of other people have looked at this, including doctors, including all kinds of healthcare providers -- that a government competitor inevitably leads to a single competitor because the government drives everybody else out of the system,” Blunt told us.

“You know, as a Republican I’d a think of a better example of this, but a competitor is like an elephant in a room full of mice. And either the mice, the mice are either eliminated by the elephant or the smart mice leave the room as quick as they can. And that’s what’s going to happen here.”

Asked whether Obama agreeing to tax a portion of health care benefits -- an idea advanced by Sen. John McCain, in a different form, during the campaign -- would bring along Republicans, Blunt said no.

“I don’t think taxing benefits are an essential part of this,” he said.

White House Deputy Press Secretary Bill Burton told us that the president still favors other funding mechanisms.

“He’s already put forward are a bunch of ways that we can rearrange some of the money that’s already paying for health care, in order to pay for a new health reform that brings down costs and gets more people covered,” Burton said.

“There’s a lot of different ways that people think that we can go about doing this. The president has laid out some of his ideas; we’re hearing ideas from both the right and the left on Capitol Hill. And what we want is the best possible bill that brings down costs as much as possible and gets every American covered.”

Click HERE to see the full interview with Rep. Roy Blunt.

And you can watch the full interview with Bill Burton HERE.

At a breakfast session with reporters today, White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel said he thinks there will be some Republican support for the health care measure – and said the bill can be labeled “bipartisan” even without significant GOP backing.

“The bill will be bipartisan,” Emanuel said. “It will have bipartisan ideas. I do believe you’ll get bipartisan votes for it. Then you’ll get into the measurements that we have. ‘Well, you didn’t get this many.’ I think that you will -- there’s a number ways of grading bipartisanship.”