captions paid for by nbc-universal television this sunday, it's do or die for the president's massive health care reform. >> we have finally reached a point where inaction is no longer an option, where the choice to defer reform is nothing more than a decision to defend the status quo, and i will not defend the status quo. >> reporter: but the toughest obstacle remain over taxes, coverage and overall cost. will the president's august deadline be met and what will the final bill look like? with us the administration's point person on health care, health and human services secretary kathleen sebelius. then the view from the senate's top republican, mitch mcconnell. will health care reform be bipartisan, and why is he

preparing to vote against the nomination of judge sonia sotomayor for the supreme court? plus our roundtable weighs in on the high stakes political moment for the president on health care and the economy. joining us, paul gigot, editorial page editor of the "wall street journal," john harwood of cnbc and the "new york times," richard wolffe, author of "renegade: the making of a president," and michele norris, host of npr's "all things considered." and finally n our "meet the press minute" we remember legendary newsman walter cronki cronkite. >> the emotional aspect of it hit me when i had to say "the president is dead." but first secretary of health and human services kathleen sebelius. welcome back to "meet the press." >> thank you, nice to be here. >> i thought we'd frame our discussion by going through what the president says, must be included in health care reform

if he's going to accept it. now, this is what you said on that topic back in june, on pbs. "it really has to lower costs, cover americans, drive quality and be paid for." so let's go through that, and i want to start with that first principle of lowering costs. most people may not know how expensive health care really is. $2.5 trillion per year, 16% of our economy. here was the president on that score on thursday. >> even as we rescue this economy from this crisis, i believe we have to rebuild an even better economy than we had before. that means finally controlling the health care costs that are driving this nation into debt. >> controlling those health care costs, but on that very day, just hours aftbefore the presid spoke this was from the nonpartisan director of the congressional office, kind of the umpire for the plans. he says this, "congress's chief budget scorekeeper casts a new cloud over democratic it's to erhaul the nation's health care system, telling lawmakers

thursday that the main proposals being considered would fail to contain costs, one of the primary goals and could actually worsen the problem of rapidly escalating medical spending. we do not see the sort of fundamental changes that would be necessary to reduce the trajectory of federal health spending by a significant amount. on the contrary, the legislation significantly expands the federal responsibility for health care costs." if lowering costs is the rationale the president can't support what's going through congress right now, can he? >> first of all, david, as you know this say work in progress. the good news is the house and senate are actively working and share the president's goal that overall costs have to come down for everyone so they have an initial report on one of the initial bills that says in the long-term, this doesn't bend the cost curve enough. the president has a proposal that he hopes will be incorporated, where med pac,

independent group of providers will help to lower the medicare costs long-term but he's very committed to this and i think it will be part of the package going forward. about 16 of the recommendations of already in the legislation in the house and senate and we want to include some more. >> wait, this is a huge blow it seems like on the face of it, if the priority is lowering costs, you've got the person who is in charge w a nonpartisan lens saying it's not going to contain costs. that was goal number one. it doesn't appear to be getting acheefd through this. >> i think, first of all, it's clear that this will bring costs down to a degree. it won't do enough over time but i think you have to start from grounds zero, the status quo is absolutely unsustainable. we have 16% of our gdp, every business, every family, every organization, every government is paying more and getting less. we live sick or die younger and spend more than any nation. >> but you want to spend $1

trillion to bring costs down and the cbo is saying you won't bring costs down and all you're saying in response to that no, they actually will. i don't understand the disconnect here. >> i think that more will be done. the house and senate are committed to working -- >> what has the president committed to doing in terms of the house and senate working on, this you've got to control costs but because to t seems to me this was a wake-up call, was it not? >> he's been doing that all along, very enganld and the senate and the house members want to do this. this is sort of an initial scoring, if you will. >> was it a wake-up call to the president? >> well, i think we know that more has to be done. as i say, he's got a proposal on the table that he hopesongress wi take a serious look at. what i think is somewhat disengenius though is that the last real health care reform the incorporation of medicare part d wasn't paid for at all and as part of the cost care driver we have initiatives that are under way that we know we need to reform.

there's no scoring at this point no, cost savings at all for the prevention and wellness investments that we know will pay off long-term so we'll continue to work on this, and -- >> so this isn't ready yet, in other words, this is not ready, does not meet the president's goal? >> we don't have the bill even out of the senate finance committee, the bipartisan effort that's going on, the house is still on markup. this is a work in progress and i think the house and senate leaders share the president's goal that cost also come down. >> the bottom line from president to leaders working on this in the congress you had better lower costs before this gets to me? >> it isn't that the president is scolding anyone. he's congratulating them for the work. >> it's his goal, secretary. he says it's got to lower costs and you're not contradicting the idea the cbo says it's not. >> well, we have gone, i think, a long way to, again, incorporating who the cbo director said needed to be in the bill. many of those elements, the vast majority are already in the bill, and i think we need to

take another step in terms of probably the medpac idea making sure that an independent group a step removed from congress is able to continue to watch that cost curve and help us drive quality. mean that's what we're really trying to do. >> we'll get to that in a minute. an independent group watches cost after it's passed to contain them? >> part of the changes that we need so that we go ahead and implement a number of the cost-cutting recommendations that have been made year after year but congress failed to implement them. >> let me get to the other priority, coverage of americans. 40% of americans roughly uninsured right now. is universal coverage the priority? >> it isn't the priority. it's one of the priorities. costs, quality, coverage. all three have to be part of this fundamental -- >> if there are say millions of americans who are left uninsured, it would not stop the president from signing a health care reform bill? >> well, i think that one of his

goals, again, it's not one or the other. he wants a bill that covers all americans, that offers affordable quality coverage to all americans. >> we have some experience with universal healthare now i massachusetts and they're taking a hard look at that because on the issue of cost it doesn't appear to be going so well. this is how the "wall street journal" reported it ofriday. "in 2006, massachusetts adopted a health care law that has attained near-universal health insurance coverage, but the plan has done little to control costs, which are now 33% higher than the u.s. average and projected to grow faster than the rest of the country." is that another flashing red light? >> i've had a number of conversations with the massachusetts officials, who is very involved in passing the bill. he said they made a fundamental mistake. they did this as two steps, they went for universal coverage. now they have a group back at the table revisiting the costs. what the president has said from the outset we need to do them

both together, we need to have this as a comprehensive reform that both covers all americans t also lowers costs. >> but what are you doing to anticipate the result you've already seen here, universal coverage, subsidizing more people to get insurance, drives up costs, does not bend the cost curve? >> not unless you incorporate that the at outset and that's why 16 of these proposals are going in, we're going after fraud and abuse in a different way. there are billions of dollars stolen out of the system every year. it's why the president is insisting on the public option. one of the ways to lower cost -- >> of a government plan that competes with private insurance? >> we have insurance companies right now who pick and choose not only who gets covered but basic with monopolize in parts of the country drive the costs. >> because a public plan wouldn't necessarily be less expensive? >> competition would -- >> it wou be less expensive? >> i think it will lower the

overhead costs that are often 30 cents on the dollar, gives them affordable options to small business owners and self-employed americans and help jumpstart this economy. >> so why wouldn't everybody go to a public plan if it's less expensive, why wouldn't everybody choose that? >> i think a lot of people have coverage they like what you'll see is private insurers will be competitive. they will have innovative practices, they'll compete for benefit plans that may be more attractive. that's what we want in a marketplace. >> let's talk about quality and you mentioned, if i like my insurance, i'm going to be able to hold onto it. that's what the president talked about in his wkly radio adrs. listen to this. >> under our proposal if you like your doctor you keep your doctor. if you like your current insurance, you keep that insurance, period. end of story. >> but is that truth in advertising? the ap did an analysis of this and they reported saturday "it's a pledge beyond obama's control. his plan leaves companies free

to change their health plans in ways that workers may not like or to drop insurance altogeth." if an emoyer says we can't afford what we've got, a small business owner, they can change whether the employee likes it or not. >> well, david, that is exactly what's happening in this markup place. we have 12,000 americans each and every day losing coverage. we have small business owners, over half of whom used to offer coverage who don't anymore who are being priced out of the marketplace. what the president is talking about is stabilizing employer coverage, making it easier for small employers to first of all offer coverage. a lot of them tell me we can't compete for good employees because they'll go down to the street to somebody who has health benefits when i can't offer them. we have people locked into their jobs who would like to start a small business or work for somebody else. parents terrified when their kids graduate from college, happy day but suddenly uninsured and some of them uninsurable. we have a system that absolutely doesn't work.

>> but it doesn't address the fact that if you like your insurance you may not be able to keep t like the president says. >> well, the employer market would be more stable in a new reformed health care system than it is right now and that's really what the president is talking about, where employers would have health and incentives to offer coverage to their employers. small employers would have a tax incentive and stabilize the marketplace and be far more competitive than they are right now. >> you can't have it although. the president said no free lunches and what i have not heard from the president and i wonder what you would say to americans, what is it that they have to sacrifice in order to achieve this goal of universal coverage? >> well, i think both the house and senate bills are contemplating some responsibility that both, that everyone would have a responsibility to have health insurance, that business owners would have a responsibility to provide health insurance and

that the government would do their fair share. we're also hoping that that personal responsibility extends to lifestyle, that in order to have a healthier america, more productive america, we need to make some basic changes i what we eat, how much we exercise, getting our kids up off the couch, turning off the video games, but that's a personal responsibility that all of us can act. >> but the government in this plan would say there are certain things we're not going to pay for. do americans have to accept the fact there's some limit for what gets paid for? >> there's limits right now. insurance companies pick and choose every day who gets what benefits, who gets what drugs, whether or not you get the procedure your doctor ordered, this notion that we're going to somehow rationing is going on each and every day and it's done in a private market. i think what has to happen is, we know about 30% of the tests that are done don't make us any healthier. we know that there are areas in the country where there's a

redundancy of medical procedures, people readmitted to the hospital, other areas where there's high quality, low-cost care. that's where we want every american to have access. >> the other principle it's got to be paid for, can't add to the deficit. let's talk about how you want to do that. the house plan would levy a surtax. this is also a concern among democrats. "representative jared polis, a freshman democrat from colorado said he worried that the new taxes could cost jobs in a recession, to help finance the coverage of the uninsured the house bill would impose a surtax on high income people and a payroll tax as much as eight percent of wages on employers who do not provide health insurance to, wores in a letter to the house speaker nancy pelosi mr. polis and 20 other freshman businesses said health care reform will negatively impact small businesses, the

backbone of this economy." >> what the president sports is paying for this bill. he has said that it will not add a dime to the deficit. >> does he support this? >> he knows that the house has a plan to pay for it, that's very good news. the senate has -- >> secretary, why can't the american people know what i is he'll support? this is a concrete plan moving its way through the house. >> i understand, david, but there are basically five different plans in congress right now and there are a variety of ways. what's the good news, this congress and this president are committed to paying for this over time, in the last bill, the medicare bill in 2003, billions of dollars of new drug benefits were provided for america's seniors. that's good news. they needed the drug benefit, not a dime was paid for it, not an effort to put any money on the table, so we are committed to -- >> we're talking about this plan. you won't say whether you support the surtax? >> the ideas are in play. this is a legitimate way to put

forward. the president put forward his ideas. in all of the plans more than half the money pays for this proposal is already in the system, it's money that is misdirected now to efforts that don't work very well, so a lot of the money is really coming from savings and efficiencies from fraud and abuse from other areas and being directed to high quality lower cost care. >> does the president believe f everybody benefits under health care reform, everybody should pay? >> absolutely. >> he does, then why is it he doesn't support taxing benefits for employees? >> he's always said from the outset that he's acted under the notion that you should keep your coverage if you have it, that that may dismantle the private market, that it is the incentive given to employers to provide coverage and 180 million americans have coverage through their employee workplace, and a tax on those benefits may dismantle that market and then have people lose their coverage

so he's reluctant to move in that direction. >> even though that is consistent with the idea of if everybody benefits everybody pays? >> i understand but -- >> he thinks that upper income americans should shoulder most of the burden. >> not most of the burden. half of the money of all the plans is already in the system. there are a variety prove posals to raise revenue. the house has one, a legitimate proposal. the senate is working on others. the senate finance committee hasn't come out with their proposal. he talked about a cap on item e itemized deductions. so there are a variety prove posals but it will be paid for. it will not add to the deficit and that's good news. >> on timing, will the president meet his deadline? there are democrats who say we shouldn't have a fixed deadline to do this by the august recess. we need more time. what will his bottom line be? >> well i think he's very clearly urging the house and senate to stay at the table and work. they're working very hard.

the august recess is looming. the bills are -- the good news is, you know, this week, america's doctors through the american medical association endorsed the health reform bills, the nurses have endorsed the health reform bills. hospitals and drug companies and others are at the table, and we think this can be done. the house and senate are on track and on time. >> he's urging but not demanding. >> well, he isn't a member of the house or the senate. he's saying this is an important issue. it may be the singlemost important issue to get our economy back on track and the status quo cannot work. it doesn't work. it's bankrupting this country. >> but it looks like that deadline could flip. >> well, hopefully they'll get it done before the august recess. >> before you go, on the issue of swine flu, which is still looming throughout the country and around the world, the fall is a big concern. will there be a vaccine ready if necessary and how big of a hit do you think we'll see in flu season? >> we don't know how big we're watching the southern hemisphere in flu season and h1n1 is moving.

so far it hasn't gotten more lethal but the cases continue to grow. we're on track to have a vaccine ready by mid-october. we need to make sure it's safe, and so clinical trials will begin and we need to make sure it is effective against this new novel strain, so that's what's happening in the meantime, and if the scientists say it's a go, by mid-october, we will have a vaccine available and start with the priority communities. >> we'll leave it there, secretary sebelius, thank you for being here. >> thank you. up next the other side of the health care debate and looking at the upcoming vote on supreme court judge sonia sotomayor. we'll talk with senator mitch mcconnell. plus inside analysis from our political roundtable, coming up, only on "meet the press."

the view from the other side with the senate's top republican, mitch mcconnell, after a brief commercial break.

joining us now the senate's top republican senator mitch mcconnell welcome back to "meet the press." >> thank you. >> a couple of significant points, the first on timing, is the president going to get a bill out of the house and senate by the august recess? >> well, i don't think he ought to get the particular bills that we've seen out of either the house or the senate before august because they're really not the right way to go. what's going on here, david, is perfectly clear, this is the same kind of rush and spend strategy we saw on the stimulus bill. we're going to have a deficit this year of $1.8 trillion

that's biller than the deficit of the last five years combined. they passed a budget that puts us on a path to double the national debt in five years, triple it in ten and here comes health care on top of it. as you just pointed out with secretary sebelius, cbo says it's a quarter of a trillion dollars that will not be paid for, and even if you look at the papers, you're taking it out of the backs of senior citizens and small businesses. this is a bill that shouldn't pass at any point, either before the august recess or later in the year. what we need to come up with a truly bipartisan proposal. >> will they get what they're working on now, do you think they'll get it passed? >> i certainly hope not. i don't think this particular measure ought to pass the house on the senate because it's not good for the country. >> that's the factor in terms of cost. secretary sebelius certainly recognized the fact that the cbo says increased costs over time undermines their goal. the president would really have

to drive some specific cost-cutting before signing on to these measures. >> well, if you're going to do something as comprehensive as the president wants to do and you're going to pay for it, you ought to pay for it, there are no easy choices in this, is what they're grappling with right now. let me just tell you what i think, david, if i may, is flawed about the whole approach. they don't seem to grant that we have the finest health care in the world now. we need to focus on the two problems that we have. cost and access. not sort of scrap the entire health care system of the united states, where the canadians go for quality health care. john mccain and john cornyn and i were down in houston, one of the world's famous cancer hospitals, a couple of weeks ago, having a meeting with their health care professionals. they take care of patients from 90 countries who come to houston to save their lives.

we have quality health care now. surveys indicate that americans overwhelmingly like the quality so let's focus on access and cost and not try to scrap the whole system. >> but wait a minute, you say that we have the best health care system in the world. you say it is a matter of fact but it seems to be a matter of debate. you just mentioned access. we have 47 million people who are uninsured and there are experts, including one expert who is now an obama adviser who actually writes about this idea, that it's a myth that it's the best health care in the world and this is what he wrote along with another expert last fall. saying it's a myth that america has the best health care in the world. the united states is number one only in one sense, the amount we shell out for health care. we have the most expensive system in the world per capita but we lag behind many countries on virtually every health statistic you can name, heart attack recovery, that's the best system in the world? >> that's one expert. if you look at the surveys and ask the american people who tat

they think, they don't think quality is the problem. they think cost and access is the problem. let's look at the access, the people that are uninsured as you mentioned, a better way to begin to deal with that problem is to equalize the tax treatment. if you're running a business and you provide health care for your employees it's deductible on your corporate tax return but if you're an individual, buying health care on the open market, it's not deductible to you. we ought to equalize the tax treatment. another cost item we seriously ought to address that the administration only pays lip service and some of the proposals kicking around in congress discouraged are the wellness efforts we've seen on display for example at the safeway company which through their own efforts targeted the five biggest categories of preventable disease, smoking, obesity, high cholesterol, high blood pressure and lack of exercise, and incentivize those employees and capped their cost.

they never mentioned junk lawsuits against doctors and hospitals. we're spending billions every year in junk lawsuits defending in defense of medicine, defending all these lawsuits. they don't want to do anything about that. >> and yet you say the time is now to act. you think something must be done. >> absolutely. i'm not in favor of doing nothing. we have a cost problem and access problem. we do not have a quality problem. >> during it's moral issue that 47 million americans go without health insurance? >> they don't go without health care. it's not the most efficient way to provide it. doctors and hospitals are sworn to provide health care. we all agree it is not the most efficient way to provide health care to find somebody only in the emergency room and then pass those costs on to those who are paying for insurance. so it is important, i think, to reduce the number of uninsured. the question is, what is the best way to do that? the proposals over in the house, according to cbo, not only

aren't paid for, they don't really dramatically -- decrease the number of uninsured. >> ted kennedy, a driving force behind health care legislation, senator kennedy obviously suffering from brain cancer, he's on the cover of "newsweek" magazine and in the essay he quiz this, "quality care shouldn't depend on your financial resources or the type of job you have or the medical condition you face. every american should be able to get the same treatment the u.s. senators are entitled to. this is the cause of my life. it is a key reason that i defied my illness last summer to speak at the democratic consengs in denver, to support barack obama, but also to make sure as i said that we will break the old gridlock and guarantee that every american will have decent quality health care." >> we all love ted kennedy and we wish him well and hope for his recovery. but we don't necessarily agree that his particular prescription is going to bring about quality health care for americans, for

all americans. we all like to do that. the problem is the direction in which the democratic majority seems to want to go and the president wants to go, basically put the government in charge of our health care. we have hey an experience with that already. with government-run automobile companies. ford motor company makes automobiles in my hometown, the ceo called me up recently and said we're doing reasonably well, compared to everybody else in this recession. people appreciate the fact that we haven't taken any money from the government but we've got a problem. the government now runs the finance companies of gm and chrysler and since they're running the finance companies they're undercutting us on the financing of our automobiles. sound familiar? secretary sebelius says that there will be more competition, if you have a government-run insurance company, there will be no competition. the government will, with the backstop of the taxpayers, undercut the 1,300 or so health insurance companies we have. we won't have any competition at all, pretty soon the doctors and the hospitals will all be

working for the government. and the notion that this will be cheaper, i'm reminded of what p.g. o'rourke said you think health care is expensive now, wait until it's free. >> although it's pretty expensive now. >> it is. >> private insurance companies say you can't have certain things covered t already exists. >> not like if you have h a government plan. a friend of mine just lost a friend of his in canada because the government decided he was too old for a procedure and didn't have the money or ability to get to the united states for quality health care. i don't think that's the direction the american people want us to do g, david. >> final point, political taxes, this is where "the washington post" reported saturday the main goal of republicans is to slow down the pace of legislation in congress in the hope of fomenting wider opposition f we're able to stop obama on this it will be his waterloo, senator jim demint said during a conference call.

it will break him. >> my goal is not to stop the president. my goal is to get the right kind of health care for america, and the direction in which the president and the majority in the house and senate want to take this, is the wrong direction. what we hope to do is to have enough time here for people to truly understand what's going on, as you know, david, they're having a hard time, our democratic friends are having a hard time steelling this to the own members, a very difficult time because it's a flawed allow approach and the wrong direction in which to go. >> let me move on to the economy. you said the stimulus plan is a failure. critics on the left say it's too small. paul krugman wrote had this on july 9 --

>> we've got an old saying down home that there's no education with the second kick of a mule. we've seen what happened with the first stimulus. the president said rush and spend it, pass it, we'll hold unemployment to 8%, which now pretty clear we're going to 10% n my state it's almost 11%. by any measurable index, the stimulus package has been a failure. and we are adding, as i indicated earlier, dramatic amounts of money to the deficit. we're spending, david, $100 million a day in interest on the stimulus that we passed back in january -- february, the rush and spend was what they told us, pass it, and we'll hold unemployment to 8%. by any objective standard, this has been a failure. >> you have announced that you will oppose judge sonia sotomayor for the supreme court. why? >> i think her personal story is remarkable. i, myself, am married to an

immigrant who came to this country not speaking a word of english and who ended up in the president's cabinet. i'm a big fan of her career, the way she rose from humble beginnings and went to fine schools and had a marvelous career, but the problem is, is the president himself indicated and opposing justice roberts and alito, both of them he opposed and filibustered justice alito, we're looking for judges here who are going to be as chief justice roberts said, an umpire, call the balls and strikes, and what i worry about with regard to judge sotomayor is that her personal views, which she's expressed quite frequently, lead me to believe that she's -- lacks the objectivity you would prefer to have as a member in the supreme court. there's no appeal from the supreme court. that's the last word. >> do you see anything stopping

her confirmation? >> i'm not going to predict the outcome. >> but there will be republican support? >> there were three republicans th who announced their support friday. as i said she's an outstanding individual and should be commended for her lifetime in public service. >> before you go it's been a disturbing development overnight, u.s. soldier captured by the taliban and they made a videotape showing him speaking about the hardships of the war. what's troubling as you see this, at a time of ramped up commitment of troops to afghanistan? what's troubling to you about seeing that individual joe? >> sorry, i thought you were going to show it. the president is doing the right thing in both iraq and afghanistan. it's regretful that this soldier has been captured but it illustrates again the nature of the enemy, that they would try to coerce an american soldier into saying bad things about his country or to suggest that we ought to stop the effort in afghanistan.

the president, in my view, i'm happy to say something nice about him, something supportive. i think he's done the right thing in iraq and ofafghanistan. it's regretful that the soldier has been captured. >> senator mcconnell thank you for being here this morning. >> thank you. up next, a crucial moment for the obama administration on health care and the economy. our political roundtable weighs in. paul gigot, john harwood, richard wolffe, and michele norris. plus our "meet the press minute," remembering walter cronkite. after this brief station break.

we're back with our roundtable, paul gigot and richard wolffe, michele norris and john harwood. welcome to all of you. all right, tomorrow marks six months in office for president obama. john harwood, this is do or die time, as i've been saying on health care reform, and to me,

the biggest issue, and you heard it addressed with secretary sebelius, is whether or not the number one goal of containing costs over time will be achieved. the cbo said this week, congressional budget office said not with the plans you've got in congress so far. how can the president stand behind these plans? >> well i think you'll sea adjustments in the plans. you've seen a ramped up effort to get the medpac idea, independent commission to say no, taking place in the system and i think you've got a live conversation ongoing within the administration, between the two parties on capitol hill about whether, in fact, you ultimately finance part of this package by taxing health care benefits which is one proposal that would raise revenue and could bend the cost curve. health economists agree on that. it's politically touchy. labor unions are against it. are the democrats going to go there and try to strike a deal

with republicans? we don't know yet. >> the president was campaigning for governor corzine in new jersey, also campaigning for health care. this is what he said. >> we have talked and talked and talked about fixing health care for decades, and we have finally reached a point where inaction is no longer an option, where the choice to defer reform is nothing more than a decision to defend the status quo, and i will not defend the status quo. we are going to change health care reform. >> so paul gigot, is he a president who has got the reins here or does' peer defensive? >> he's still popular but he is in a rush to get this done in august for a couple of reasons. one, because the popularity of his own agenda is falling. he's personally more popular than his agenda is, particularly in health care and the economy and they're worried that if they don't pass this by august, it's going to be more difficult in the fall, because a lot more democrats will see his approval rating fall, particularly if unemployment rises, it's now

9.5%, probably going to get to 10%. more and more democrats are going to get jittery about the 2010 elections and also worried about the house bill which has enormous tax increases and if that hangs out there in august it will be a real opportunity for a lot of people. >> you wrote about this week in the "wall street journal," highest tax rates, higher than france. >> if you combine state and federal, higher than france, three european countries, upper 50s. that's very dangerous for the economy at this time, and a lot of democrats are nerve bus it. >> because it's not just republicans. you heard senator mcconnell. it's democrats who look at this and say we're in the middle of a recession, we have to campaign next year, should we be raising taxes to this ex-tebt in. >> that's one of the things so interesting about this is the president is having a hard time selling this plan to members of his own party. i thought it was really interesting to see him just in that clip now and hear the barack obama that we heard on the campaign trail.

you know usually he sounds much more measured right now but it's a little bit if you're following this he's sort of all over the place right now. he's talking about health care but doing all kinds of other things so the message is, you know, people make the legitimate criticism that he's not putting as much into this as perhaps he could and with all of the horse trading going on at the hill right now. >> right. >> the danger is when you see this last-minute horse trading, arm-twisting going on it usually makes the situation worse instead of better, we saw that with the climate change bill. >> wolffe, the convention is he's on the ropes on health care. >> it's challenged. paul is right not about the polls but delay has always killed health care so the longer this delays the worse his authority gets but he is going to try to step this up. can he get there by being in campaign mode? no. he has to give them the tools to sell this program and has to do arm-twisting like lbj and get involved especially with his own democrats and while this is in

debate about tax and spend and budget cuts, while he's being conventional he's going to struggle. he has to go out and say this is about gimmicky politics. he's the outsider, the authentic voice and people are paying more and getting less. if he puts it on those temples he has a path. >> why doesn't he meet his own test? he put out the test that cost control is the first principle. he knows that's a more popular thing to talk about. he's also for it, but if his own bill doesn't meet his own test how does he vigorously sell it and make it work? >> the test becomes about what is affordable. in the campaign they realized that health care wasn't its own issue. it was an economic pocketbook issue so while they're talking about budgets or the uninsured, they don't talk about the uninsured anymore, they don't talk about universal coverage at all, they need to make this about what people can afford and what they're getting for health care. anything else is going to kill him. >> outside of the beltway there's an interesting data point that people involved in the process talk b the fact that some 90% of the people who voted

actually have health insurance and three quarters of them are satisfied with what they got and there are different ways of looking at that. perhaps there is not the public mandate for this that would dictate this sort of rush to legislation. that's going to make it harder to make that point. >> i agree with that but he's making the same mistake he made on the stimulus. they got it away on the stimulus because it was the first bill, the economy was in bad shape. he's governoring from the left. he subcontracted out a lot of his agenda to the committee chairman, predominantly liberals on capitol hill and driving this from the left. that's why you see the extraordinary costs and extraordinary taxes. there is a better way to govern the way bill clinton did on welfare reform, get republicans to pass tax credits to help the uninsured, get those republican votes, deal with the tax exclusion that john mccain suggested on the campaign that john just talked about but he won't do that because that will upset his political left >> let's add the economy into this and all about jobs.

this week, a remarkable figure, the deficit tops $1 trillion for the year, and look at unemployment, the idea of the long, hard slog here. the "new york times" did an analysis going inside the numbers, beyond the unemployment rate, if you factor in people part-time who want to work full time or those who are not now looking for a job look at the states where unemployment gets into the high double digits here. john, if you combine the economy and health care, this is about obama performing. if he doesn't get health care, doesn't change the dynamic on the economy, this is the blueprint for a republican opposition to him in 2010. >> this is the issue on which the timing gets very, very tough for barack obama. even if you do everything right on the economy, and the administration would not concede paul's point they made the mistake on the stimulus, even if that's working and the economy isn the process of returning to positive gdp growth, unemployment by their own estimation is going to continue to rise in top 10%. how do you get the public to accept that this is going to work in the long run, when

they're seeing these scary numbers and see in some states like michigan where unemployment 15%, and that's why senator mcconnell's argument they made with you is pretty powerful. look at the size of the deficit, over $1 trillion and here comes health care. if you look at the polls, the issue of spending and the deficit are where the administration's most vulnerable. >> doesn't that get to the point which is why do all of this right now? >> i don't think they've got a whole lot of choice here. the economy was falling off of the cliff and -- >> vice president biden didn't think it was a good idea to go for health care reform right now. >> well the question is whether health care can be pocketbook economic issue but interesting, the internal polls in michigan show the president's numbers are holding up really well. about 60% with independents who were supposed to have left him. how can that be? what is this guy doing right now? the answer for the white house, he's looking like he's doing everything and as long as he's doing that, people give him a

pass because they know the economy wasn't his doing. on the other hand, how long are they going to be patient, and the question is, as we go into 2010, unemployment according to the fed is still above 9% or thereabouts that's a tough situation. >> the uncertainty of the o bba agenda hangs over the economy. rearranging 18% gdp with health care. uncertainty of a huge cap and trade tax on energy, whether union rules, what they will be like, all of that reduces the risk-taking, the borrowing and lending that we need in this economy to get it fired again. >> are we talking about health care, talking about the economy t leads to you start think being the campaign and opposition from hillary clinton and all of the questions about the secretary of state, who is now in india, she's sort of off the injured list here and her elbow is in better shape, she was in india and a diplomatic mission over this weekend. this is what the ap wrote on wednesday will hillary clinton falling off center stage

eclipsed whieclipse ed -- the counter foipoint to that, michele, she has been quieter but a huge force on public policy. >> i think too much is made of this obama versus clinton narrative, people suggesting she's not taking center stage. she's the secretary of state. the secretary of state does not take center stage. what you see with hillary clinton in india a savvy

politician, meeting first with the business leaders, the symbolic things, staying in the hotel that was the site of the horrible situation there in mumbai, and also at the same time applying pressure in pakistan. i think what you see there is a very smart politician and i think too much is made of the fact that -- >> david, how does somebody retake center stage when they work for barack obama? as present and visible as he is around the world and so much of what has been important so far in the obama foreign policy is his atertempt to repair america relationship with the rest of the world. where hillary clinton appearance is felt with tough bargaining. >> and peggy noonan on the "wall street journal," she's waiting, knows how to wait. if there are excesses in this administration, if there are mistakes she will be there as a democratic alternative. z>> i don't think anyone thinks

the clintons have a bigger strategy but reports inside the white house i hear they respect each other' enormously. there is rancur and petiness on both sides. it is small fries when there are big things to do, terrorism, global warming. but she isn't president. >> we have a couple minutes left, i took my son to the all-star game in st. louis this week h a terrific time and i thought baseball did something really great. we have video of it, before the game they had the all-stars among us, people who engaged in community service, giving to other people, they lined up there all the president's taped message and the players descended upon them during the round of applause to shake their hand and pay tribute. as a dad in the stands this is what is wholesome about baseball and easier than having to answer my son's question about who is taking steroids and who hasn't.

>> it was a great moment for professional sports and it gives light to the fact what we sometimes think not all of the athletes are spoiled and wealthy. most of them are actually solid citizens and it's a great lesson for kids because as we know they're all role models. >> right, and again you've got these moments you think where can you take your children, an area with all of the presidents contributed, former presidents and president obama threw out the first pitch, a little shaky but nevertheless he was there. >> he was probably shaky. >> he got it there. but these do become important moments, balancing these influence force our children. >> you know, the symbolism there was, i thought, very, very striking because you know, our sons and our daughters. >> right. >> worship the people that play on the field and on the court, and when you can introduce them to real role models and people serving in the community, much was made of community service in a good way during the campaign. i think we saw a different side of it there. >> we thank you all very much.

up next our "meet the press minute," remembering walter cronkite. the legendary cbs newsman who dhid week at the age of 92.

and in our "meet the press minute" this morning, he was known as the most trusted man in america. for decades walter cronkite delivered the news to millions and told it "the way it is." he was one of the first reporters on the battlefield in world war ii, announced to the that the first man had landed on the moon, conclude the the war in vietnam with a cono not be won, broke the news that the president. >> the flash, president kennedy died at 1:00 p.m. central standard time. >> 35 years after that fateful day, cronkite appeared right here on "meet the press" to reflect on the significance of that moment, for the nation and to him, personally. >> it was a terrible, terrible

time. for me, as we reporters do, our adrenalin pumps and you're concerned with covering the story for awhile but the emotional aspect of it hit me when i had to say that the president was dead. >> walter cronkite died this week at the age of 92. his family and all his friends and colleagues and cbs news are in our thoughts and prayers.

as a reminder the rebroadcast of "meet the press" now airs on msnbc every sunday afternoon at 2:00 p.m. eastern time. 2:00 p.m. eastern, in place of our usual 5:00 p.m. re-air. that's all for today. we'll be back next week. -- captions by vitac -- www.vitac.com