ThinkFast: October 5, 2009

RNC Chairman Michael Steele was scolded by congressional GOP leaders in a private meeting last month for “meddling in policy.” Politico reports that the lawmakers “were particularly miffed that Steele had in late August unveiled a seniors’ ‘health care bill of rights’ without consulting with them.”

As the Supreme Court begins a new term full of high-profile cases, retired justice Sandra Day O’Connor says she regrets that some of her decisions “are being dismantled” by the current, more conservative-leaning, court. “If you think you’ve been helpful, and then it’s dismantled, you think, ‘Oh, dear,’” she said. “But life goes on. It’s not always positive.”

WellPoint, the largest health insurer in the United States which pays its CEO roughly $10 million, announced that it is cutting back on the health benefits it offers to its own employees. WellPoint also announced that it will eliminate some jobs at the company, while raising deductibles and premiums for some of its employee health benefits.

“Despite months of outward ambivalence about creating a government health insurance plan, the Obama White House has launched a behind-the-scenes campaign to get divided Senate Democrats to take up some version of the idea for a final vote in the coming weeks.” Administration officials have been holding private meetings “almost daily” with Democrats to discuss including a public option.

Twenty-two House liberals from the Congressional Progressive Caucus have signed onto a bill introduced last week by Rep. Barbara Lee (D-CA) that would bar any funding for an increase of troops in Afghanistan. “Open-ended military intervention in Afghanistan is not in our national security interest and will only continue to give resonance to insurgent recruiters,” Lee said.

Sen. Mark Warner (D-VA) said this weekend that it would be a “travesty” if the Senate failed to pass financial regulatory reforms this year. “If we didn’t learn the lessons of one of the worst financial meltdowns in all of our lifetimes, and didn’t put new rules of the road in place, I think it’d be a disaster, it’d be irresponsible,” he told Bloomberg Television.

In a new report, bailout inspector general Neil M. Barofksy criticizes “the Treasury Department for some misleading public statements last fall” about “the health of the nation’s biggest banks even as the government was doling out billions of dollars in aid.” Former Treasury Secretary Henry M. Paulson Jr., said that the banks were “healthy,” but “in truth, regulators were concerned about the health of several banks.”

Rep. Betty McCollum (D-MN) will introduce the ACORN — “Against Corporations Organizing to Rip-off the Nation” — Act, which would bar any companies that defraud the federal government from receiving federal funds. “Targeting one nonprofit that serves low-income people, while billionaire organizations defraud taxpayers, there’s really no justice in that,” McCollum’s Chief of Staff Bill Harper told the Hill.

Mohamed ElBaradei, the International Atomic Energy Agency’s director general, said yesterday in Tehran “that the Iranian government had agreed to allow access to a newly disclosed nuclear enrichment facility on Oct. 25, and Iran said it would enter talks earlier about temporarily exporting much of its low-enriched uranium to be converted into nuclear reactor fuel.”

And finally: House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-OH) caused a stink last week when he said that the public option is “about as unpopular as a garlic milkshake.” In response, Rep. Mike Honda (D-CA) — who represents the city of Gilroy, which hosts an annual garlic festival — “decided to personally deliver a basket” filled with garlic to him. Boehner had already left for the weekend, but one staffer “promised to make a dish for the GOP leader using it.”

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