Republicans confident abortion issue will prevent Obama from passing health care

The president will argue, as he did last week at the day-long health-care summit, that he has incorporated numerous Republican ideas into his $950 billion proposal, which has yet to be presented in legislative language.

“The president will note that his proposal includes the best ideas from both parties” and “urge Congress to move swiftly toward votes on this legislation,” the White House said Tuesday evening.

As a preface to his statement, Obama sent a letter to congressional leaders on Tuesday that outlined four Republican ideas that he said he was “exploring”: undercover investigations into fraudulent entitlement claims, $50 million toward pilot programs to reduce medical malpractice, increasing Medicaid payment amounts to doctors, and an expansion of health savings accounts.

Republicans said Obama was doing nothing more than giving himself “political cover” before Democrats in Congress move forward with reconciliation.

The White House is intent on trying to pass a bill through the House before Congress recesses for Easter break on March 26.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, Kentucky Republican, sent a letter to the president in response on Tuesday, saying that he and other Republicans had originally thought the president’s solicitation of their ideas was a sign he would work with them to “build a new bill,” calling the president’s proposal “unsalvageable.”

McConnell denounced Democrats’ plans “to jam some version of their original bill through Congress and past the American people by way of the highly partisan process known as reconciliation.”

Privately, Republican aides are warily confident that Pelosi and her lieutenants will be unable to marshal support for any comprehensive bill.

But Gibbs, speaking to reporters Tuesday, warned Republicans and critics from counting the president down or out.

“I don’t think the final chapter on how health care has played out has played out yet. So I don’t know how anybody could figure out, besides those interested in parlor games, who’s won and who’s lost,” Gibbs said.