Tales from the Trail

Former President Bill Clinton is due to visit Capitol Hill today to talk healthcare reform with Senate Democrats and their independent allies.

The meeting’s important because Democrats have yet to find the 60 votes they need to stop Senate Republicans from blocking President Barack Obama’s signature domestic issue. House Democrats got their end of the job done over the weekend by passing landmark legislation.

Clinton’s presidency was overshadowed by his own failed bid to reform the healthcare system in the 1990s. But NBC said he could help sway Democrats wavering in the current debate, including Sen. Blanche Lincoln of his home state, Arkansas. 

A big obstacle that Clinton, Obama and Senate Democrats face seems as old as human nature: people who will cooperate — if they get their own way.

This time, a small clutch of moderates want their own way on the so-called public option, a proposal to offer government supported low-cost health coverage that is anathema to Republicans and the insurance industry.

Bad things come in threes… three strikes and you’re out… the third time’s a charm…

Which one of those applies to Fox refusing for the third time to change its primetime programming  to carry a speech by President Barack Obama?

It could be three strikes, but it’s unclear who’s out.

Obama’s 8 p.m. speech to Congress on Wednesday will be carried live by the other networks — ABC, NBC and CBS.

ELKHART, Ind. – President Barack Obama and conservative commentator Sean Hannity are hardly political allies, but Obama on Monday briefly entertained the thought they could at least share a beer.

 At least, Obama seemed to like the beer part.

Hannity, a talk show host who is one of Obama’s harshest critics, offered recently to buy the president a beer after Obama said “hardcore” Hannity fans would not want to share a brew with him.

 At a town hall meeting in Indiana where Obama was selling his stimulus package, a woman who identified herself as Tara questioned why some of Obama’s cabinet appointments could not handle their own taxes.