both the democrats' bills in the house and senate would reform ininsurance for people with -- to pre-existing medical conditions. it would also have competition with private insurance. >> we are closer than ever before to the reform that the american people need and we're going to get the job done. >> reporter: president obama will hold a primetime news conference tonight. watch it live here at abc2 news starting at 8:00. sherrie johnson, abc2 news. >>> the latest developments now on the three pre-teens who were handcuffed by baltimore city police and taken to jail. this stemmed from a call to police on friday night, in the medfield neighborhood off falls road. the three boys, ages 7, 8 and 11, were caught trying to steal a go cart and scooter from a neighbor's yard. so police arrested them but the kids' parents say arresting them is one thing. locking them up quite another. >> it's horrible. seeing my 7-year-old handcuffed sitting on a curb is the worst feeling i've ever had, but i think it was much too extreme for three children to be handcuffed together for that amount of time. >> no charg

banks, home builders, ininsurers they were takeken down lels in mah that were unbelievabably low andssentiaially foresting utter collapse andndhaos. which i don't t ink wi happen. >>very day, we hear it's'sot over, it's not o over. >> i is alrey happened. evevybody waiting for the ash. we had a crashsh we had a housising recsion in e last two years that't'been brutal. i don't think it's ovever. if you look at tolol and lnar and vnanian, which i own, nonot one, e exceptor tolle,s expecting to earn n y mone until 2010.. >>>>hat's long time. >> buyg back land at cheaperer prices aftfter havg taken it off of tir balance sheet. i think there's goining to b consolidion. i owned centntex befori started to writete for tstreet.com and th got taken out. i sold tt at a profit. i expectct there'soing to be that aivity in the sector as well. >> ather thing that you didi i have to tell you, , it wasery, very contrary. you took a lot o ocompans that i ink do well in a very y ow envivinment,alking about some of the drugs, , me of e slower techchs. and d said thathey have to go hehere. explaito peopl

as a private practitioner in dallas, texas, i think, you know, we need a good plan to cover the ininsuredwe need a good plan to provide quality, provide access. there's a lot of things we can do to fix the system, i don't think the solution is going to come from a completely government run government funded plan. >> right. what do you say to a critic who says, look at that doctor there, he's just worried about his own salary getting capped. >> i think more than the physician's pay, i think what the physicians really are concerned about is the ability to provide excellent medical care for their patients. in the era of managed care and insurance companies, physicians are not allowed to give the appropriate care at the appropriate point in time because somebody's always looking over their shoulder trying to do something better. what we need to do is find a plan that can align incentives between the physicians, hospitals and patients. sometimes who gets in the way are the insurance companies. insurance companies are taking a lot of money out of the system and we don't need to necessarily crea

so his main audience tonight are the 85% of the american people who already have ininsurance. >> not the poor people who work hard and don't have health insurance, but the people who find out after they get in trouble in terms of medical challenge he's nthey're not cov. >> he's been trying to scare people into the arms of the health care reform. if we don't reform the system it will go bankrupt and everyone will lose their insurance. that's what he said. the stroubl the cbo statement sort of knocked the props from under that. >> it outbid them for fear. >> we'll go bankrupt faster under your system. and the desire for change has been dulled a little bit. six months ago, seven months ago, eight months ago. get rid of the old guys. change is wonderful. now people are saying hey, what if it's expensive? what if my tacks are going to go up? what if i might lose my job? is this plan really a good idea? he's got sell those people on the fact that this change will be good for them, not just to scare them into the arms -- >> let's talk about whether it really works in these kinds of moments.

class americans would get a tax cut and we would have money left over to provide some help for the ininsuredgg, i know you have said in the past, you think health care, there is something that needs to be done. but you disagree with how the democrats are going about it right now. >> i don't disagree with what ron wants to do. senator wyden's right. he's got a good bill. what i disagree with is the idea that you would create a massive new basically federally-run program, putting the government between you and your doctor and creating an english or canadian type system where you basically end up with delays and rationing and that you don't address the cost issue in the odd years. the proposals marked up in the house and senate have added trillions, trillions of dollars to the debt of the united states and expanded the government dramatically. that's not what we need right now. right now our problem our debt. >> how big were the bills they put through committee in the senate? how was it financed? senator dodd talked specifically about financing. and the idea of financing by taxing health care b

that's not keeping what you have if you like it and it will leave millions of americans un ininsured. elections have consequences. this is a glaring example of that. we have now committed another act of generational theft. of laying an unsustainable fiscal burden on futures of americans. and the whole procession we've just been there is -- through is one of the least savory and most bizarre that i have been involved in this my years in the united states senate. >> senator hatch? >> i think my colleagues have summed this up pretty good but let me just take, with senator gregg's permission, a copy of a letter from senator gregg to mr. el men defensive, the head of our congressional budget office. i won't reeled the whole thing but i thought i'd read just a couple of -- part of one paragraph that i think kind of sums this up and backs up senator mccain 100%. it says c.b.o. has not yet had time to produce a full estimate of the cost of incorporating any specific medicaid expansion in the health committee's legislation. however, our preliminary analysis indicates that such an expansion cou

found out that because their daughter had a complicated pre-existing condition that they were ininsureable and were going to bear the full cost of care. the health care costs in this country, whether for individuals or businesses have been weighing this economy for way too long. and this health care conversation we're having today, this bill that we hope to pass that we're going to talk a little bit about over the course of the next hour is certainly about getting health care out to the people that don't have it, in the country that is the richest and most powerful in the world. there is no reason why some little kid goes to bed at night sick because his mom can't get him to a doctor. that is not right. this is beyond the moral considerations of conscience for a country that doesn't provide health care for those kids, this is about economic revite lization, realizing we will be at a competitive disadvantage so long as we have a health care system that costs twice as much as every other health care system. and what we need to talk about is yes, the cost of the bill we are proposing and the