WASHINGTON —
Alarmed at Republican attacks on President Obama’s health care proposals, Senate Democrats huddled Wednesday with White House officials to formulate a response.
Democrats said they felt an urgent need to devise a “message” to answer Republicans assertions that Mr. Obama’s proposals could lead to “a Washington takeover of health care.”
Senator Evan Bayh, Democrat of Indiana, said many Democrats felt “unease that we did not have a strategy” to answer the criticism coming from Republican members of Congress and Republican consultants like Frank I. Luntz, an expert on the language of politics.
Senate Democrats met for more than an hour at the Capitol with David Axelrod, Mr. Obama’s senior adviser, and Jim Messina, a deputy White House chief of staff.
“Axelrod came to reassure us that they do have a strategy,” Mr. Bayh said.
“We won’t make the mistake of 1993-94,” when President Bill Clinton’s plan for universal health coverage collapsed under a torrent of criticism from the right, Mr. Schumer added.
He urged Republicans to argue that the Democratic plan would “deny people treatments they need and make them wait to get the treatments they are allowed to receive.”
Mr. Luntz recommended this language: “If you have to wait weeks for tests and months for treatment, that’s a health care crisis.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/14/us..._r=1&th&emc=th
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