Republicans know that when they enter the Blair House Garden Room a few minutes before 10 o’clock on Thursday morning, they will be the public relations equivalents of Lilliputians.
President Obama has said that he has invited the opposition party to talk about health care for six hours straight, on live television, in the interests of bipartisanship.
Republicans not only don’t buy that — “I see this episode as more about showmanship than really bipartisanship,” Rep. Paul Ryan, Wisconsin Republican said in an interview – they are also aware that the event is a potential image bonanza for Obama.
Republicans are coming onto the president’s home turf, the 70,000 square foot compound of four row houses across Pennsylvania Avenue from the White House, owned by the government and used as a guest house for visiting heads of state.
Each and every detail – from how the room is set up and who sits where to where the TV and still cameras are positioned – will be determined largely by White House staff. And the subtopics to be discussed and format of the session were chosen by the White House without any input from Republicans, according to GOP aides.
“There’s absolutely nothing that’s not in [Obama’s] control,” said Greg Jenkins, a former television producer who went on to stage-manage the visual and logistical components of large events for former President George W. Bush.
Obama has “a tremendous opportunity to telegraph some important messages to the American people who are really going to be paying attention this Thursday,” Jenkins said.
And the more the conversation appears to be a “pretty free-flowing” exchange of ideas, as a White House official said it will be, the more Republicans know they will be at the president’s mercy.
Obama will moderate the discussion, which will take place with 37 members of Congressional leadership (21 Democrats and 17 Republicans) around tables set up in a hollow-square in the 42-foot by 36-foot Garden Room.
“Our members, unless they’re willing to go all David Gregory, they’re probably going to only get one retort” to Obama when he makes a point they want to respond to, a senior Republican leadership aide said.
“Members aren’t able to stand there and make 4,000 different points in one give and take,” the aide said. “Decorum and deference to the president puts him at a strategic advantage.”
A White House official waved off Republican concerns.
“This is going to be an open discussion. That’s the whole point,” he said.
But aside from the fact that Obama will be able to dominate the pace and substance of the meeting, the images that come out of the event will also be highly controlled by the administration.
“It’s whatever they want to push,” Jenkins said. “If they … really want the public to get the impression that the president is reaching out and wants to have a true bipartisan process, you know, whatever the truth is is almost irrelevant.”
“If that’s the image and that’s the message you want to telegraph, you’ve got to build the message to telegraph that. Just saying it doesn’t do the trick.”
“If I were them I would some serious thought about, ‘What Republicans do we want to be seen standing next to, talking, preferably in a light moment?’” Jenkins said. “Well that’s kind of an entrance shot. So I would think about having the stills – and nobody else, so there won’t be any questions asked – at a location that can get either the president talking with [Senate Minority Leader Mitch] McConnell or whoever and smiling.”
Whether the Blair House meeting will move votes in Congress toward the president’s desire for a comprehensive health care bill is highly questionable. What is unquestionable is that the summit will be a highly scrutinized piece of theater in which Obama could come off looking very good to Americans who otherwise don’t tune in to political debates very often.
Even if it doesn’t budge the health care debate, it could have repercussions this fall in the mid-term elections, and beyond. Moments like these play some part in how Obama will be perceived by voters who cast their ballots in the 2012 presidential election.
Republicans tried to maintain some small control over the proceedings Tuesday. House Minority Leader John Boehner did not disclose four of the House Republicans that he will bring to the meeting, keeping even members such as Ryan who would be likely invitees in the dark as to whether they would be attending.