gwen: six mons in. the president trul hitting a rough patch, r are the white house and coress in a andoff? we te a look tonght on "washington week." as the president's popularity begins to side, the tests naow down to the the future of health care. >> nobo is talkingabout som governmentakeover in health care. i'm tiredf hearing that. >> the only prolem with havng a ipartisan is cooperation in the senate. >> congress s in such a ruh to pss any reformrather than the right reform. the trouble is you olks are looking for news and thre n't no news. gwen: but ere has beennews, and it all about complicate

choices, whether it's out revivinghe econmy -- >> we now haveproblems. we're gog to have to tighte our elts. we can't do it in the midle of a stimulus. we can't do in the midd -- st as the economy is comng out of recession. >> he'taken a bad economy d made it worse. gwn: or tacklin racia reconciliation by photop. whater happened to the summer doldrums? coring itthis week is charlesabington of the assocted press, dan balz of the washington pos and alexis simendinger of "national journal." >> celerang 40 ears of journalistic excelence. live from ournation's capital, this is "wahington week" with gwen ill. produced in associatio with "national journal". corporat funding fo "washington week" provided by -- >> th shape our world.

create new woders and new conveniences. america's minerals. they're the sff dreams are made of. the's more information at nma.org. >> corpate funding for "washington week" is so provided by boeing. jor funding for "washington week" is rovided by the annenberg undation, the john s. and james l. knght foundation, the coporation for publ broadcasting. and b contrutions to your pbs station from ewers like you. thank you. once again, live from washington, modetor gwen ill. gwen: good evening. six months in, appears thingsn washington are mor complicatethan clear. the presdent's poll nmbers are uniformly headeddown. his health re plan is snaged in t house and senate a the succs of is conomic recovery plasubject to debate. vi president joe biden

speaking in chicago tday to the national urban league to fend it. >> housi starts are up for this month. doeshat mean we're out? no. do that mean there won' be more foeclosures? no. but we'rebeginning to movin the direction we have . th unemploymt rate sill i ucceptably high. but not growing nearly as fast. less good is not good but less good is better han worse. gwen: ok. that makes funny kin of sense. is less ood enough to get the heth care reform passed? at's the big questionacing the hite house and congre is week, stating with te whiteouse, chuck, how are they doing on this >> well, its less good. gwen: i dareyou to throw that out. >> one thing tht's perplexing is the numrs definitely are not od for obama. they' coming don across the ard. his genera approl ratings.

theelements ofthe healtcare debate. and yet if you reak out, well, how are epublicans? they're worse. theye less god. think it's perpling to the white house and their alies, really,in thatobama hiself and dan can talk bout this more when we talkabout polls, still remains relatively popular. and ople seem to like him ad want him to do well when you start loking at the spcifics of espeally his health care pan, for example, that'shen the numbers start droing down and it'sa frustratn that i think the white house trying to figure out, how can we transfer or at least -- don't know i transfer is te best word but tt popularity andexplanation and get the numbers upor health care. gwen: let's talk abt those polls nd what we mean when we say he's sliding he's not down no all the way. >> 's down but not in freefall en: ok. >> and base on historical standards, he's still reasonablyood. if you loo at the new patch of

polls thatame out this week which confm what we've been sang the last few weeksis his overall approval ratin is trenng down. and as chuck said, support or approvaof his handling o the economy or halth care have gone down more rapid. now, if yo look at where he is, in a coule of polls this week he waat 53% or 54%. that's down fom aout 6% since apri that a decent drop but it's not ityous. if youook at the handling o healthare he's down under 50 and depending on which poll he's down well below 50%, same on t economy. and we're seeing significant ncern about his handling of the defici that's ne way up. if i you ak people today f you suld spend more mone to stimulate the econy or not spenmore money because of concerns of the deficit,t's close to 60% sa we houldn't spend more money. he's gotten himsel flatened

down but still has, as chuck suggests, there's a lot goodwill out there for him, and i think the white housepeople believe that he has strong support from s suppters. in other words, his ba is very solid and thas important. gwen: s, alexis,does that mean the people who e not his supporters and en some who are his suporters but who are nervouright now, do they ok athe numbers and ay ok, i' got a way to push back the presint's priority? >> absolutely. i've beecovering the senate and paying lot of attention to the t republicans who looked at ll the dynamics dan ju talked about, very popular esident, as chuck was saing. what can do with a popuar present? well, what they' looked at is thedetails about how you can find room to bring him down on the ideathat he's not as popul on certn policies, s th're not trying tobe personal, per s except for a w senators. but they ant to attack himon policy and also ant to slow everything down. what's the ush?

and then try o talk up the things that repblicans beeve are winners fo them fr their supporters. let's worry about t debt. let's not rry about taxes or raise taxes but curb spending. a stimul plan was larely unpular until what we've seen it come. so they' trying to capitalize on the little niches tha they can find to bringthe president and the democratsto some kind of -- eve the majority whip mitted this past week to a stand still. gwen: let's talk little bit about how the battle lies are being drawbecause you don't have to listen closely to detect a strtegy emerging from some republicans ad some democrats on capitol hi. listen rst to the rpublican argument, courtesy of representative virginia fox of north carolina. >> republicans have better solution that won't pu the government in charge of people'shealth care, but make sure we ing down the cost of health re for all americans and that insures affordabl access for all amicans and is

pro-life becae it will not put senio in a positio of being putto death by their government. gwen: democrats hve found someone else to lame, house speaker ncy pelosi spoe with judy woodruff last night othe "newshour." >> there's a lotf interest in taxing insurance compies because people reall do see acss america, they kno that they havcaused the proble that we have with their anti-trust exempon thatthey have and the immoral profits. gwen: so tre you have it. the government wants to pt seniors to dath or the insurae companies are immoral. it doesn't soun like common ground to me. >> no. it's not. and there a lotof wild comments ing thrown around there. the government is not ing to be puing people to death. that comes frm a new wrinkle in t house bill if it becomes he law that would say or the first ti medicaid -medicare

would pay for - you'd hve a consuation with health pressionals about your end of life choices gw: the president found himself having t knock that down this week at tn hall meetings. >> o thing, i think that' a difficty for the administtion and its supporters is that is is a very complicated issueto begin withnd all the more complicated because 's moving rough congress slowl you have twomain bills hat are very different in the senate, an entily different bill in th house, none of which e done yet. while ty sit out therwith this confusion, it's sier for theypes of attcks that alex was talking about, t's too ch money, it's toomuch this or oo much that. ev for polling, do you support obama's ealth care plan? what is obama's ealth care plan? yoknow the general princips of it. but i think that'sone reon the proponts are doing petty well now. mae it will last. but they mit have a harer ti if this legislation does -- if we gt a more specific plan tat has someappeal, maybe that will make it esier for the supporterto defend. gwen: but i wasinterested in

what nancy pelosi had o say. she didn't say thatonce but said i several times, the comment about immrality and the evil insurce companies and the president lso changed his langge a little bit tis week to start laming insurance compans who i guess arethe only industrienot on -- but their rheoric is a little different. wh nancy pelosi and harry reid, th majoity leaderin thesenate is that th're evil and make too muc money. whathe president has been sayi is their business is o be responsble and provide the services that l of us are paying for andthat they're not providing the servicessafety net we're l paying for. he talks about the word "resnsibility." and they're sayingsomething a little diferent, which is ty're making excessive prits and that they arein effect evil companies. he doesn't go ite that far. gwen: how much is is coordinated if at ll? >> it'swell-coordined on th sides. thers a lot of work going o trying to figure outwhat's the best way t sell this, what the best way to attack i.

and think what you saw this week is that t administration and the democra decied, you know, there's one person in the whiteouse, you're either a stk or inata, and they'd rather be the stick han the pita and they were getting hit veryhard. they spent a lot o time trying to talk about thiin terms of bringi down costs, that tis would savemoney, it would sve the vernment money and in t long run good for the deficit. but as the mmittees have struggled with this ad as the sausage making as becme the focus of attention, t's been clear that they're sruggling to meet tose goals that they've set andthat the choices hat they have are inful. now with the republans going afterovernment as the boogeyman onthis, the dministration s decided, let's goack to sort ofsquare one where we'velways been. it's the insurancecompanies that are maing life difficult for all of youwho are denyi you coverage, who won't -- ou know, who will connue to raise your raes. so they've decided togo after them. anwe're going to see in

augu a big messagewarver the shape ofhis plan. gwenthe message war it sems toe to extend also t this ideaf the government as the oogeyman. and when you thinkbout the economy, this als -- we saw last nighthe news came out that the cash for clunks program might have un out of money. so immediate the message was, see tha, you can't trus the governmen with something to stimulate e auto industry, how e you going to trus them with your halth care? is that a mesage which is resonang that we can tell >> it's hard o know - in 1993-1994 when illary cae, remember, it was attackedas a governme program, attacked very successfully. there's a lot of fling things have chaged so much ver that time. and onthing, this argunt, where you n't want the government between you and our doctoryou and your health care, a lot ofpeople say i've already got an nsurance person between me and myoctor and my health care. i think there's a sense, o, if that line of atack can be come at hard engh and sustain enough, they feel thy can pick

itapart, bu it is an eas line to delive you know, the cas for delunkers, they can't ust the government but t was a gornment program that was so popar. gwen: exactly. so here's te big --the perso who loses the concept tha loseout in this which is partisanship. remeer bipartisanship s supposed to the holy grail and now we saw his weeksonia tomayor com out of -- it was a log time ago butcome out of the sene judiciary commite on a partyine vote wit only republicans spporting her, we've seen few rublicans who s on the senate floor ey're gog to vote for her. bipatisanship dead >> it's dan near deaat this int. you know, here's stilla clear effo in thesenate finan committee, theang of six, three republicans and hree demoats trying to wor together to pul offa biartisan approach, buthey are strugging. ey're not gong to met the deadline of gettina bill done by the time hey leave next

week. so i was strck by what happened in theote on sonia sotomayor in the diciary committee this weekjust because, you know,the present had said one of e things he nted to do with this nominati was to daen down the hot was we'veseen ove judicial nomineesand presumably fd somebody who could get more partisan support, and you jst have not seen that. i think he country repolarized after this elecon faster than most people xpected, certainly faster thanthe white hous expected. and they're now hang to live with that. >> and on the hil, the republicans are-- have experimend enough months now that they'r persuaded that thee's no real politic risk for the to go against the president, not on his popularity, but onhis policies and to resst, that th shore p their base, thatthey're attracting independents, in the case of sonia sotomayor, the

national rifle assoiation has some republins scared to t int that they don't fel that in their state that theyan support someone who the n.ra. went up against, sonia sotomayor, and someone whois agains gwen: john cornyn in texa -- or kay bailey hutchinson runng for governor of exas who you would think wouldwant to spport the firt hspanic nominee but whoare balacing out thepressure. >> exactly. they el the n.r.a. will be far more important to their political future thaperhaps the hispic vote. th made a calculad decision. and one tie-in on the healt care debate, if ip rams inside the congre and outside are somewhat unppy with obama and others that are leting this senate finance mmittee look for thi big compromis and they're sayg, why are you trng to pick up some republicans? look, you can' even get a handful of them to vte for sonia sotomayor, whyare we chasing this bipartisship at's a phantom, lets just go ahead and particular with -- stick with our liberal ideals

and get ts through bcause we have large majoritiesn the house and natiol. you're hearing that o the ght and the left. gwenin fact you talked t mih mcconnell, theenate nority leader wo says he's happy thangst is all on the other ide. >> he was absolutely delighted. mitch mcconnell s not the ost demotive pers but fo him was incredibly happy and happ to show s delight that the infighting among thedemocrats was certainly gift t the republicans, at least atthat point. gwen: dan bal you with yor colleague hanej johnon i'm sure a best-sellin author of the new chronicle of te campaigncalled "the attle for america 20." and as you watched this unfold, you talked just a moment ag how qukly everything repolarized and you o back to when y were alking to barack obama, joining s campaign befo he waspresident, did he see this coming, is his what he was vng into o could yu

have sn it coming? >> i don't thinkanybody could ve seen it coming th way. this was an extrordinary campaignnd the country ws galvanized an you know george w. bush was, you know, the force against whih people were reacting. and think that the psident, and alot of thepeople aroun him thought they wuld come in washington on a mndate for change, but alo because of what had happened the lat mont of the campaign, the collapse of the economy, that there would be a sense in washington of let'sroll up our sleeves and et something done together, that the ountry is in suchad shape we ought to workogether and that simy hasn't happened. you canlame everybody. th republicans can legitiately claim they've bee sht out on thingsby the democrats. the democrats ad te white house would argue the republicans have pshed -- they made a decisionearly on they're going to be th party of no. but we're bk into an environment that i thinkthe people thought wouldn't appen quite so quickly.

gwen: chuck, is part of the reason for that ecause he bit off much? it's the one thinthat seems to keep howing up as we dig deepern these polls i the uncertainty abt all the things the president's plate. >> a nber of people in th polls are saying slow down, you're taking on too mch. but in airness, brack obama d run on all these thngs. he hasn't pused anything h didn't campgn on and he has said, hat's the point of having a mandate ad winning an ection and changing the parties in th white house i you don't go fo these things? he says, now is thetime to do it, don't wait. so i thin he has been true to his campaignand the on question onhe repuican side is, is this go sow a genui winincere fort to get it right or a way o kill things? gwen: alexs? >> it is both. the party pparatus at large wants to go slow to stall o kill legislationthat they feel they can'tsupport that as the stamp of liberal left.

but tse folks in the room in the coalition of the determined, those si, there arerepublicanswho are hor-bound to try to crate sometng out of the finance committee that can get partisan support and lso thr feeling is that's the last stop for sometng that might be truly biprtisan on the helth care. gwen: then ere are the distractions. we have -- sadly, his is oly water. there were othe beverages drunk inashington this week. >> amber. gwen: at least an aber glass, trying to imaginehere are suds here. what really was hat about other than a uge distraction fromthe prsident's genda? and ofourse i'm talking abo the beer summit a thewhite house beween henry luis gates jr. and sergeant james rowley ofthe cambrge police,the president and viceresident. >> i tnk it mostly was an effort toextract president obama from a mstake. and he had wade into the middle of a verydelicate ssue and he had waded in in an impoliick way, clearly

regretted i said so. is was the last sep, i think, thaprobably at the time ty decided to do i, it seem like a good idea. i think by the timeit happened -- gwen: it took a long te for it to actually happen. but is that the way they saw it at the white house an were they happy to hve it -- is it done? do we not he them talk about it nymore? >> theysure hope it's done. ey truly are taken aback at the way this tng -- the medi went totallyoverboard, ut, yoknow, 80% ofthe american people knew about it d seemed to have some interes in it. it's oneof these weird things. it shows certainl that race is stl a very sensitiv issue and obama talks abo that. i thin dan's rigt, i think by talking a lile bit off the cuff at that wedesday night press coference, he probably didn't worit the way he wished he had. he acually cted a lttle tupidly. >> boy, you'll g in trouble for that. gwen: you're going tget letts. ere's room for conversaon, i'm not sure the convertion happened but here we e on the lip of august when eeryone -- congress is oing to leave town, the president willleave

town presumably, do august give us a chance to tke a deep breath or o people get hardened and concret >> chuck is gog to be covering a president wh is gointo be talking for a month until he oes o vacation, righ and taking, alking,talking, selling health care a everytng else. and mbers of congress are going to fan out and eep talking and spendingenormous amounts of mey on advertising and tryingto kep their busiss alive, i tnk. gwen: you seean opportunity there fo the president or fo congress? >> there's anopportunity for the president to get ack on the offensive on this. but it's a isk. i mean, that's one o the reons they did try to seta deadline is ecause they wanted at lea some things done by the time ongress broke. and you now ave lots that's still undone. you have pices of this that people can attac and so aust could be a very decisive month. and as the come back, whther there is greater spport or whether it contins to erode. >> tday deadlines ot set, middle of september

gwen:or? >> for health ca, both house and senate. gwen: we' seen these deadlines befo. >> wanted to mntion. gw: thank you all very muh. thas for wrapping it up r us. of course it's not to soon to preorder "the batte for america," dan balls got to suort our own. we are aving you few minutes earltonight so you can take advantage of he opportuny to support your localpbs stationwhich then they support us. but the conversation will continue onlne. check out "washington week" q&a weite. and keep up ith daily develments on "thenewshour with jim lehrer." we'll see you again nxt week on "washington week." good night. gwen: download our wekly podcast and take us ith you. it'sthe "wasngton week" podcast at

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