talking to congressman steve scalise from louisiana. if you would like to call in -- there is a provision of the bill that i believe you are specifically involved in, involving an issue close to your home state on the drilling in the intercontinental shelf. can you talk about what this issue is and how it would help louisiana? guest: finally last year we were able to release the moratorium that existed, but this administration has literally block the ability to go and least some of the areas. the estimates are you got over 100 billions of barrels of oil in the shelf, 500 trillion cubic feet of natural gas. you have so much energy that could help our country that literally is being blocked off by the federal government. we want to unleash the potential. we want to open that up. what is great about it, the states would be the to participate -- states would have the option of participating. but if the state -- they can't dissipate and revenue-sharing. in a state like louisiana, we have a constitutional amendment in our book signing any mon

after that, congressman steve scalise discusses a republican energy proposal. >> later, jared bernstein on health care legislation. >> and then mary landrieu tauks talks about oil drilling in the gulf of mexico. "washington journal" begins each day with the day's news. >> president obama met with the chairman and ranking member of the committees working on health care legislation. the senators worked -- spoke with reporters after wards. this is eight minutes. >> the president wanted to meet to discuss health care rosm. the main point is, we have to act now together, which is probably one of the more important messages we wanted to make, to revamp the health care system, so that health care costs do not go up as rapidly as they have. so many person families are experiencing an uncon shunnable hike in health care costs. we have to reform the system, reform the health insurance system so people are not denied coverage based on preexisting conditions or health status. and all americans should have health insurance to make this system work, and it's just morally the right thing to do. we dis