Word: kerrey
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...printer. Two days later, Clinton released his "National Health Insurance Reform to Cut Costs and Cover Everybody." He claimed he could provide universal coverage without new taxes and without turning the medical industry inside out. It was pie in the sky, but that hardly mattered: Nebraska Senator Bob Kerrey had a plan and had been telling audiences that Clinton did not. The Arkansas Governor declared his plan to be "uniquely American" and promised to enact it in the first year of his administration. The tactic worked: campaign pollster Stan Greenberg noted later that once Clinton put his plan...
Friday morning Kerrey met with Clinton in the family quarters for a 90- minute chat that one official described as almost entirely philosophical. Kerrey urged the President to, as he said repeatedly, "connect." Al Gore joined the meeting briefly, and Kerrey spoke separately with chief of staff Mack McLarty. Later, Finance Committee chairman Pat Moynihan went to Kerrey to say, essentially, If you don't vote our way, this whole ball game is over: the North American Free Trade Agreement, health care, national service -- everything...
...this point, colleagues were beginning to get fed up with Kerrey's coy approach. Said a Senate leadership aide: "A lot of people here really resent having to go over there to court the guy. We didn't think it was a perfect bill, but it was the best compromise that we could get." Two hours before the final vote in the Senate, Democratic Senators Thomas Daschle of South Dakota and Harry Reid of Nevada walked into Kerrey's office. Both looked grim. When they emerged half an hour later, neither was smiling. Asked if they were confident that...
Soon afterward, two of Kerrey's staff members walked into his office, carrying bags of takeout Chinese food. Not much later, Kerrey called Clinton in the Oval Office; the President took the word of Kerrey's decision calmly and thanked him for his support. At 8:30, an hour before the vote, Kerrey emerged and said he was going to the floor to give his speech. There he took the opportunity to bash Clinton's bill one more time. "The truth, Mr. President, is in fact that the price of their proposal is too low. It's too little...
...challenge Congress could bear. With Kerrey on board and Gore's tie-breaking vote, Clinton had the bare minimum he needed. As he had been doing all week, Clinton on Saturday rewarded loyal legislators by inviting them to unwind with him. He went to play golf with Pat Williams and two other Democrats who had seen the light...