Health Care Kabuki

Tomorrow is the day long health care summit during which both parties will meet for six hours and neither side expects to accomplish anything:

Here's one point on which Democrats and Republicans agree on health care: President Barack Obama's much-touted televised summit has virtually no chance of breaking the political logjam. That means Democrats will be forced to find a way to pass an overhaul on their own or face a huge political defeat.

Lawmakers from both parties suggested the Obama-hosted meeting Thursday will amount to little more than political theater. No cracks appeared in the GOP's overwhelming opposition to Democrats' efforts. And both parties saw the president's revised, far-reaching proposal, released Monday, as a call for Democrats to try to pass the legislation on their own under Senate rules that would bar Republican delaying tactics.

"We're happy to be there, but I'm not quite sure what the purpose is," Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said Tuesday of the daylong summit. "It seems to me the president's already made up his mind."

Underscoring his points, McConnell invited some of Obama's sharpest critics, including the 2008 GOP presidential nominee, Sen. John McCain of Arizona, to join him. None of the GOP moderates who have raised the prospect of bipartisanship on health care, such as New Hampshire Sen. Judd Gregg or Maine Sen. Olympia Snowe, were included.

Democrats were equally dismissive of GOP demands that they start from scratch.

"This idea that we have to start with a blank sheet of paper is ridiculous," said Sen. Bob Casey, D-Pa.

That's not to say Thursday's six-hour meeting will play no role in the long-running health care debate. As president, Obama is likely to dominate, but Republicans hope to use the session to criticize the Democratic plan's scope and cost, and to highlight their more modest alternatives.

Democrats are almost certain to portray the GOP alternatives as flimsy and unworkable. They hope the session will embolden rank-and-file Democratic lawmakers who face re-election this fall amid worries that public opposition to a full-scale overhaul of health care could doom them. Failing to pass a bill would be even worse, party leaders say.

I don't think it matters to the Dems at this point what's in the bill. The only thing that matter is that there IS a bill they can call health care reform, even if it doesn't do anything to reform health care. They just need to have something...anything...to point to in order to claim victory. And following the failure of the summit you'll see them go into a full-court press to pass something out of the Senate via reconciliation, the only way they can get around a GOP filibuster.

And they will do so in direct opposition to a significant majority of the voters who don't want what they're offering. It's a kamikaze moment for the Dems, but they have an almost religious fanaticism about nationalized health care and they seem willing to sacrifice just about anything, including many of their seats in Congress, to pass it.