Word: cooperations
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...Clintons, the problem with Cooper's plan is that it threatens to usurp the political turf the Administration needs to claim: the middle ground. The plan appeals to conservatives by shunning the Clinton requirement that all employers pay 80% of workers' health premiums. It appeases moderates by trimming employers' tax deductions on premiums. And it mollifies free marketeers by doing away with Clinton's proposed caps on insurance premiums. "We're the only bipartisan approach," Cooper maintains. "We're true to managed competition...
...conundrum. How do you silence someone who is presumably a star tenor in your own choir? The trick, apparently, is to publicly praise the renegade for his perfect pitch -- then start a whisper campaign that he sings off-key. Last Wednesday, White House health guru Ira Magaziner praised Cooper's plan repeatedly during a speech before the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. The next day, Clinton told TIME that his Administration's much-ballyhooed dispute with Cooper "has been thrown out of proportion. I think there can be a deal there...
This fueled the appearance of reconciliation -- not coincidentally, just a day before Clinton and Cooper were to address the DLC. But behind the scenes, some Administration officials say the First Lady and Magaziner have no intention of compromising with Cooper. Says one official: "Universal coverage is non-negotiable, and the Cooper plan does not provide for universal coverage. Period. We are not going to back away from the notion that everyone should have a package of basic benefits. Period. And the Cooper plan does not do that. Period...
Those in the no-compromise faction that surrounds the First Lady calculate that they don't need Cooper to make the Clinton plan fly. Instead they are wooing the estimated 90 members of Congress, most of them liberals, who favor , a Canadian-style, single-payer system. This official calculates prematurely -- and improbably -- that with those votes, the Clinton plan is just 30 votes shy of passing. But in trolling for those votes, the Administration does not want to continue giving free publicity to Cooper by campaigning against his plan...
...which leaves the question: Who's using whom? It's possible that Clinton has been using the Cooper plan as a stalking horse to provide jittery Republicans with a middle-of-the-road refuge while the true dealmaking with liberals gets under way. And Cooper may be tilting at White House windmills largely to increase his stature in anticipation of his campaign for the Senate next year, when a special election for Al Gore's former seat is held. One thing is likely: when Cooper runs, Clinton, who wants to hang on to the Senate's Democratic majority, will...