There are always unintended consequences. And with the negotiations taking place at Blair House between the White House and members of Congress in Washington, D.C. on Feb. 25 – that’s what appears to be occurring.

On Fox News Channel’s Feb. 25 "America Live with Megyn Kelly," medical contributor Dr. Marc Siegel explained some of the myths surrounding the proposed political solutions for health care in the United States. He started with tort reform and explained the trial lawyers have their hands in how this tort reform is done.

"You know 37 states already have tort reform," Siegel said. "That’s one of these political solutions that doesn’t make any sense – the same as today’s summit. The problem with tort isn’t even the issue with caps. It’s the issue of nuisance suits. Once a doctor has been to a lawyer’s office and has their charts combed through, they feel raided. The way they practice medicine changes. They become more defensive. We got to get boards that cut down on nuisance suits. None of that is in the legislation. And if the American public is cynical it’s because they know the trial lawyers association is preventing that."

Another myth – that forcing insurance providers not to disqualify coverage for pre-existing conditions hasn’t been tried. As he has explained, in the state of New York it has sent premiums skyrocketing.

"I think it’s too much talking points," Siegel said. "The facts show it will. New York state, in 1992 a law was passed that said pre-existing conditions have to be covered and ever since then we have a $9,000 a year premium rate in New York state – highest in the nation because we’re covering pre-existing conditions."

And similarly, under Massachusetts’ state health care plan, which is often likened to the Senate proposals, premiums have also increased.

"In Massachusetts, we have universal health care – very much like the Senate bill," Siegel explained. "Premiums have risen about 20 percent since then. We’re going to get higher premiums."

The administration has floated trial balloons regarding capping insurance premiums. But history clearly shows that caps on what the markets prescribes to be a fair value leads to shortages.

"Here’s what’s worrying me Megyn," Siegel said. "You know what’s going to happen when we get higher premiums? The president’s already forecasted it this week. He’s going to try to put caps on them – national caps. You know what insurance companies are going to do? They’re going to game the system. They’re going to say let’s cut services. Let’s cut reimbursements to doctors."

Siegel also warned that the slashing of some entitlements like Medicare and Medicaid to rid the systems of fraud and waste won’t work because there will always be those that attempt to game the system and it will be the honest brokers that suffer from those cuts.

"This whole situation is a political solution to a medical problem," Siegel said. "You can’t get fraud and abuse out of the system the way the government is proposing. How come the government is coming to us, with already a problem with Medicare and Medicaid and now they’re going to take on private insurers? They said this morning, many Democrats said this morning, that somehow we’re going to get the fraud and abuse out of Medicare. If you cut $500 billion out of Medicare, I guarantee you the people that will be hurt will be real doctors like me that are practicing medicine. The ones that spend their days gaming the system – they’ll just game the new system. You can’t get the fraud and abuse just with across the board cuts."

Speculation was rampant that today’s health care summit could be a trap for Republicans. In fact, Republicans performed as well as they could have, given the hostile circumstances. The best part: the national media was compelled to cover it all.

The concern for the GOP going in was that President Obama, with his supreme oratory skills, would back the GOP into a corner and get them to agree to legislation out of sheer political necessity. The national news media would, of course, be lying in wait, cameras rolling, anticipating a slip up to fill the evening broadcasts.

But none came; at least on the Republican side. Rep. Paul Ryan, R-Wis., one of the GOP’s fastest-rising stars, laid out the free market health care argument for the nation to see. He told the president and the American people (video embedded below the fold with partial transcript),

The difference is this. We don’t think all the answers lie in Washington regulating all of this. So the problem with the approach we’re seeing that you’re offering, which I do believe, Senator, is very different from what we’re saying, is we don’t want to sit in Washington mandating all of these things.

What you’re doing is you’re defining exactly what kind of health insurance people can have, you’re mandating them to buy this kind of health insurance, and so we simply say, look if the National Restaurants Association or the National Federation of Independent Business on behalf of their members, wants to set up an association health plan, we think they’ll probably do a good job on behalf of their members. Let them decide to do that instead of restricting insurance competition.

By federalizing the regulation of insurance, and by mandating exactly how it’ll work, you make it more expensive and you reduce the competition among insurers for people’s business. We want to decentralize the system, give more power to small businesses, more power to individuals, and make insurance compete more. But if you federalize it, you standardize it and mandate it, you do not achieve that. And that’s the big difference we have.

Ryan’s brief but apt summary of the Republican position on DemCare generally was at once calm and hard-hitting.

As Ed Morrissey notes, far from being backed into a rhetorical corner during the summit, the GOP was able to draw a very effective contrast between the domineering policies proposed in the current legislation and the more federalist policies favored by Republicans.

What will resonate more strongly with Americans — the idea that the federal government should narrow our choices to a couple of key mandates, or the idea that grown-ups can make their own choices and that government should just ensure that fraud doesn’t occur? Democrats have just set themselves up to get a loud and clear answer to that question.

Of course this is not the first time Republicans have issued the charges Ryan did today. But it is the first time they have been able to do so in an organized setting with virtually every national media outlet present.

Who knows, maybe this will get the nation’s lefty pundits to stop calling Republicans do-nothing obstructionists and actually discuss some of their ideas. Well, maybe that’s getting a bit hasty.

World News anchor Diane Sawyer touted her objectivity in an interview for the February 28 Parade magazine. The ABC journalist seriously asserted, "I think no one knows my politics." Continuing to hype her journalistic integrity, she proclaimed, "I hope first of all that everyone knows that the facts are what I care about."

Sawyer also had nice things to say about far-left MSNBC host Rachel Maddow. She enthused, "And I think Rachel Maddow on MSNBC is great television. I love the expression of personality that cable invites." She did throw some praise to the Fox News channel: "I think Roger Ailes, who runs Fox News, is smart as a whip."

Sawyer may think that "no one" knows her politics, but a look at the Media Research Center’s 2009 Profile in Bias tells a different story. While at Good Morning America, the journalist recounted stories of dreaming about Bill Clinton and pizza. She also used poetry to compare Hillary Clinton to Jesus Christ and wondered if America was more racist or sexist. A sampling of some of Sawyer’s "greatest hits" can be found below. The complete Profile in Bias can be found here.

Drooling Over Dreamy Clintons

"As we know this morning, there is another ground-breaking, crossroads moment. That is for Senator Hillary Clinton, who ran her campaign on her own terms. This woman, as we said, forged into determination and purpose her whole life. As someone said, ‘No thorns, no throne; no gall, no glory; no cross, no crown.’"

— ABC’s Diane Sawyer on Good Morning America, June 4, 2008, quoting a 17th century discourse about Jesus Christ.

"After pepperoni pizza and banana milkshakes once, I dreamed about Bill Clinton."

— Sawyer talking with her Good Morning America co-host Charles Gibson about a study which claimed sleeping Republicans have three times as many nightmares as sleeping Democrats, July 10, 2001.

Are Americans More Sexist or More Racist?

"We have seen new polls this morning about you and Senator Hillary Clinton. Here’s my question: Do you think that residual resistance is greater for race or for gender? Is the nation secretly, I guess, more racist or more sexist?"

— Sawyer to Democratic Senator Barack Obama on Good Morning America, November 13, 2006.

"Ninety percent of Americans say race and gender make absolutely no difference in their vote in the polls. I asked Senator Obama yesterday if he believes it, and he thinks it’s case by case. Let me ask you, do you think that there is secret sexism, secret, secret genderism in this country?"

— Sawyer to New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd on the November 14, 2006 Good Morning America.

Chris Matthews Thursday said that if the Senate doesn’t use reconciliation — or what some are calling the "Nuclear Option" — to pass healthcare reform after it once again clears the House, it will be the end of the Democratic Party.

Speaking with Andrea Mitchell on MSNBC during the lunch recess of the President’s heathcare summit, Matthews said:

Do you have to get a bill passed before you fix it through reconciliation? Probably yes. Which means Speaker Pelosi is going to have to get 217 votes with the agreement that right after that happens and the President signs the Senate bill passed by the House there is immediately going to be reconciliation in the Senate which rectifies all the problems they have with that bill.

Mitchell replied, "You’re asking the House members to vote on something on the bet that the Senate will follow through."

"It’s more than a bet," said Matthews. "Because if the Senate doesn’t do it it’s the end of the Democratic Party" (video embedded below the fold with partial transcript, h/t Story Balloon):

ANDREA MITCHELL, HOST: The White House and the President, and we talked to Linda Douglass a little bit ago on the air saying there are areas of agreement. They want to say that the glass is half full because they’re trying to appeal to the polling that shows that people want progress. They want some sort of bipartisanship. And then if it all falls apart, they can try to ram it through with 51 votes.

CHRIS MATTHEWS: It’s not going to happen. It’s not going to be a bipartisan deal. Everyone is looking ahead to November. The Democrats know they need a win. The Republicans know they need a loss here for the Democrats. It’s all clear it’s all transparent. Today’s interesting. We’ll learn a few things. But in the end, perhaps by 5:00 tonight, we’re going to know that whatever Harry Reid says during the daylight hours, as we get to nightfall, he is going to admit he’s going for an up or down vote in the Senate.

MITCHELL: Now, after the Massachusetts Senate defeat for the Democrats, the political wisdom was that the White House had to turn to jobs, that the economy — jobs, jobs, jobs. Forget about healthcare. But, yet, this is the President, trying to say we’ve got to make one last ditch effort at it, because otherwise, the whole year has been wasted. And we paid this heavy political price. This is what Bill Clinton said to the House and Senate caucuses, Democratic caucuses. You’ve already taken the tough votes. You’ve already gotten yourself in trouble. So at least now go for it. Do something.

MATTHEWS: Well, they’ve gotten a bill passed in the House. They’ve gotten a bill passed in the Senate. And they were on the road to a conference agreement. They were going to get one. They would have to tilt to the left in the House to get around Stupak…

MITCHELL: On the abortion issue.

MATTHEWS: On the substantive issue, they’ll need at least thirteen votes or so from the more liberal side to make up for the pro-choice, pro-Life people they’re going to lose. And we know the politics. But it was doable. And I think there is going to be a lot of heavy lifting on the left. To me there’s one big message. The Democratic Party now has to deliver for the President, left, right and center. The Democratic Party is going to have pass healthcare. That’s the fact now after today. Because the Republican Party, this is not a partisan assessment. Look back for the last 50 years. With the odd exception of Richard Nixon, as he was facing the Watergate struggle, when he offered a employer mandate, a very dramatic program that required employers to give healthcare to their employees, which was dramatic — as you and I know, Richard Nixon was one of those liberal presidents in history if you look at his domestic program. Not in any other case has the Republican Party stood up and said, "No, we want healthcare for everybody." So, it’s only the Democrats who really believe in healthcare for the 30 or 40 million people uninsured right now. And that’s why it’s going to be very hard to reach agreement at the table today.

MITCHELL: You know the House and the conventional wisdom is this has to start in the House. They’ve got to…

(CROSSTALK)

MATTHEWS: It looks like that, because the parliamentarians are still meeting, they’re still trying to get a clear ruling. And here for the people watching it’s pretty simple. Do you have to get a bill passed before you fix it through reconciliation? Probably yes. Which means Speaker Pelosi is going to have to get 217 votes with the agreement that right after that happens and the President signs the Senate bill passed by the House there is immediately going to be reconciliation in the Senate which rectifies all the problems they have with that bill.

MITCHELL: You’re asking the House members to vote on something on the bet that the Senate will follow through.

MATTHEWS: It’s more than a bet. Because if the Senate doesn’t do it it’s the end of the Democratic Party. I think. They absolutely at that point are so much exposed they have to pass it in the Senate.

Strong words from Matthews.

Is he right, or just trying to be controversial?

Taking a break from ongoing coverage of today’s Blair House health care summit around 3:15 p.m. EST today, Fox News Channel’s Shep Smith scolded Sen. John Thune (R-S.D.) and congressional Republicans for impeding passage of the Democratic health care agenda (video embedded at right; audio available here):

Why do Republicans want to throw this thing out and start over, senator? Why do they want to do that? Nobody buys that!

[...]

Can’t we just say, "Look, we [sic] got to do something in this country. This is going to bankrupt us!" And you people up there who are supposed to be representing us are making it perfectly clear, you are going to sit in your corners with your own talking points and we’re going to lose! We’re going to get nothing. And it’s clear we’re not.

So when this is over, the president will be able to say, "I tried, we couldn’t get anything done, here comes reconciliation." Fifty-one votes, and away we go. Then we got a real mess on our hands, and everybody is just mad at everybody else as the country falls apart. It just doesn’t seem fair!

Thune calmly retorted, without missing a beat:

Well, if that bill becomes law, that would be true.  It would be a real mess, and that’s what we’re trying to avoid.

How do you think it’s going so far? Are both sides being effective or just one? Are you even watching at all?

"Are we on seven-second delay?"–Mark Halperin on Morning Joe, prefacing his criticism of Pres. Obama’s performance at the health-care summit.

Halperin was surely being facetious, but the point about MSNBC’s pro-Obama predilection was made.

The Time editor went on to rather comprehensively pan PBO’s petulant performance. His comments were preceded by a clip of Pres. Obama rudely reminding Sen. John McCain of just who had won the presidential election.

View video here.

JOE SCARBOROUGH: I just wonder whether that was really in the President’s best interest, whether the entire episode yesterday was in the President’s best interest?

MARK HALPERIN: Are we on the seven-second delay?

SCARBOROUGH: Ah, yes.

HALPERIN: I thought, you know, he in that scene and in a few others I thought he was a little too, maybe . . .

SCARBOROUGH: Petulant?

HALPERIN: Dismissive, petulant, some might say arrogant. You know he called most of the members by their first names, I think maybe to try to sort of be ingratiating and friendly.  But it did seem to some–me–a little condescending.

Triple kudos to Halperin: 1. rightly criticizes PBO’s condescending performance; 2. gently chides MSNBC for its pro-Obamism; and 3. ultimately offers the criticism as his own rather than relying on the technique-that-Couric-made-famous of attributing it to "some."

On Thursday’s Joy Behar Show on CNN Headline News, Behar hosted a discussion of the health care negotiations between President Obama and Republicans. Introducing the segment, she charged that "the Democrats brought a plan and the Republicans brought an attitude." At one point, after playing a clip of President Obama speaking, Behar gushed that, "He is so civilized," and, after playing another clip of Obama getting cocky with Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell, Behar exclaimed, "Oh, I love that! Don’t we need more moments like that?"

Notably, Behar mispronounced House Republican Leader John Boehner’s last name as "Boner," possibly intentionally, during the show’s opening teaser as she derided him, McConnell and Senator John McCain as "the Three Horsemen of the Apocalypse." Behar: "President Obama makes his health care pitch at a health care summit attended by Republicans John Boner, Mitch McConnell and John McCain, or, as I call them, the Three Horsemen of the Apocalpyse."

During the segment, guest Ron Reagan lamented that a single payer health care system, which he asserted "the rest of the world enjoys," has been ruled out, and charged that Republicans want the government to fail.

Below is a transcript of relevant portions of the Thursday, February 25, Joy Behar Show on CNN Headline News:

JOY BEHAR, IN OPENING TEASER: President Obama makes his health care pitch at a health care summit attended by Republicans John Boner, Mitch McConnell and John McCain, or, as I call them, the Three Horsemen of the Apocalpyse.

..

Democrats and Republicans met today for a health care summit that was billed as bipartisan –  and by that I mean the Democrats brought a plan and the Republicans brought an attitude. President Obama admitted it was bipartisanship, bickering that derailed his health care reform plan.

PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA: Unfortunately, over the course of the year, despite all the hearings that took place and all the negotiations that took place, and people on both sides of the aisle worked long and hard on this issue and, you know, this became a very ideological battle. It became a very partisan battle, and politics, I think, ended up trumping practical common sense.

He is so civilized. President Obama has tried to reach out and touch the Republicans more than AT&T, but will the President’s last-ditch effort at working with the GOP really work? With me now is Representative Maxine waters, Democrat from California. Political commentator Ron Reagan. And Liz Winstead, comedian and co-creator of the Daily Show. Okay, let me start with you, Ron. Is this just theater going on today or is there really any substance to it?

RON REAGAN: I doubt that anything that happened today will leave the Republicans to endorse any sort of health care legislation. Yes, it is theater, but it’s useful theater, I think. The American public, anybody who tunes in or tunes in to cable shows and sees some clips from this will probably get the impression, the accurate impression that the Republicans here are not involved in this summit in order to seriously negotiate. There are two fundamental points we have to get straight here. One, the most effective way to control costs and provide better health care for Americans was taken off the table from the get-go months and months ago – and that is universal single payer. That is what the rest of the world enjoys but we can’t have it here. It was taken off the table. Second, the second point is the Republicans here, not only want health care legislation to fail, not only want President Obama and his administration to fail, they want government to fail. They have made a short-term political calculation that it is in their best interest that nothing happen in government. Whether it’s health care, stimulus, job creation, anything else, their answer is no, because they want this government to fail.

BEHAR: I hear you, Ron. Maxine, I’ll call you Maxine, is that okay?

REP. MAXINE WATERS Yes, yes.

BEHAR: All right, Maxine, do you agree with Ron that they want the government to fail?

WATERS: I really do. I mean he stated it so well. I agree with him 100 percent. They didn’t come to the summit today because they wanted to be in a bipartisan effort to try and find a way to provide health care insurance for Americans and all those 30 million who are uninsured. They came today because the television cameras were going to be there, they were going to cover it and they thought they may as well get in on the act. But they came with the idea that they were going to stick to their strategy and their plan that the democrats would have to scrap this and start all over again in order to have any kind of bipartisan effort. They know that that’s not going to happen. And they came with their props. They had the old legislation with all of the 1,100 pages or so to show that they could continue to say, "See, all of this that they put into their health care plan. They just want to take over, the government wants to take over, ObamaCare," all of that.

BEHAR: There is that fear, the fear, the mongerers. Obama got a bit tough with the Republicans. Watch this.

MITCH MCCONNELL, SENATE REPUBLICAN LEADER: To this point, the Republicans have had 24 minutes, the Democrats 52 minutes. Let’s try to have as much balance as we can.

PRESIDENT OBAMA: You’re right. There was an imbalance on the opening statements because I’m the President.

BEHAR: Oh, I love that! Don’t we need more moments like that, Liz?

LIZ WINSTEAD, COMEDIAN: Yes, but there’s nothing more offensive to me than hearing men who have – and mostly men – who have graduate degrees and some doctorate degrees complaining that they have to read too much. Now, Maxine, correct me if I’m wrong, isn’t basically the tenet of your job to read things and write things? And yet they’re complaining about it.

WATERS: All the time. You’ve got to read, read, read. You know, I’m five hours between California and Washington. I read all the way there, all the way back. It’s hard to keep up, but you have to read. You have to keep up.

BEHAR: Maxine, we’re not going to get the public option in this bill.

WATERS: No

BEHAR: That’s dead, right?

WATERS: Yes, yes.

BEHAR: Is that a failure on Obama’s part? How do we construe this now?

WATERS: Well, he did not put public option in his plan. As a matter of fact, he never really got out front even when he was saying that he was for a public option. As you know, a lot of us, particularly the progressives in the house, are for a public option. We’ve been fighting for it. We want it very badly. We’re disappointed that we won’t have public option in the plan that he’s proposing. And that’s going to cause some trouble on the floor. There will be some people who won’t vote for it because it does not have public option, nor does it have national exchanges that will be regulated nationally.

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