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CBO Posts Health Care Reform Price Tag; President Obama Signs Jobs Bill; Democratic Leaders Comment on Health Care Bill

Aired March 18, 2010 - 12:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

TONY HARRIS, CNN ANCHOR: Top of the hour, time for your top-of-the- hour reset.

I'm Tony Harris in the CNN NEWSROOM.

It is 12:00 at the Capitol, where the Democrats' latest health care reform bill gets a price tag.

At the White House, President Obama signs a bill Democrats say will create thousands of new jobs. Some Republicans say it won't make a dent.

And it is 11:00 in Fargo, North Dakota, where three-quarters of a million sandbags stand guard over the rising Red River.

Let's do this -- let's get started.

The showdown over health care reform is gaining momentum by the hour. The official price tag, the final score from the Congressional Budget Office was just posted within the past 15 minutes or so. The cost estimate is $940 billion over 10 years. And they're crunching the numbers from Capitol Hill to the White House.

Here's some of the reaction we have heard from both sides in Congress so far.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. JAMES CLYBURN (D), SOUTH CAROLINA: We are absolutely giddy over the great news that we've gotten from the CBO about this health care reform bill indicating that our bill will reduce the deficit in the first 10 years by $130 billion, in the second 10 years by $1.2 trillion. That, to me, is great news for the American people.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HARRIS: All right. Congressional Correspondent Brianna Keilar is on Capitol Hill --

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. JOHN BOEHNER (R), MINORITY LEADER: Let's scrap this bill and start over. Common sense reform is to make our current health care system better. But no, they're going to continue to ram, ram, ram this bill through the Congress. Tried every kind of scheme known to man to try to get it through the Congress without a vote.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HARRIS: All right. Congressional Correspondent Brianna Keilar on Capitol Hill for us.

And Brianna, my last note indicated we would hear from the House Speaker this hour. Is that still on the schedule?

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes, we're actually going to be hearing from her in about 15 minutes. We're here in what's called the Rayburn Room. This is in the Capitol, really not far from Speaker Pelosi's ceremonial office.

I just saw her outside in the hallway walking by. And she's planning on coming in here and having a press conference.

We've heard from other Democratic leaders, Tony. We've not yet heard from her today.

She's going to be breaking down -- you know, Tony, what we've been waiting here for days, a couple of things. Right? That price tag from the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office and the actual bill.

Well, as it stands right now, we're at one out of two. We have the preliminary estimate on the price tag from CBO. We're still waiting for the bill, although we understand that could literally drop so that we can all see it. It will be online here in the next couple of hours.

Let's break down what the numbers show so far from this preliminary breakdown by CBO.

The price tag for this bill, according to this nonpartisan group, $940 billion. Significant, because President Obama's goal was actually $900 billion or less over the course of a decade. So this is a little higher.

But what Democrats are really emphasizing is the fact that this package would reduce the deficit. CBO says it would reduce the deficit over that 10 years by $138 billion.

You also have Democrats who are emphasizing savings beyond that, but CBO also says -- and we know this. It's just really hard to predict the savings numbers pretty far out there.

Why does this matter? Well, because you've got a lot of fiscally conservative Democrats who are reticent to sign on. They are fence- sitting right now. And so you have Democratic leaders feeling this is a good thing. We show them that this reduces the deficit, we'll be able to maybe win some of them over and get to that all important 216 votes -- Tony.

HARRIS: OK. And Brianna, look, the numbers have changed here. This new piece of legislation is a little more expensive than the Senate bill. It's a little less expensive than the original House bill. So maybe you can talk through why the numbers have changed here.

KEILAR: Well, you know, it's a little more expensive. And it's changed because the House Democrats really didn't like the Senate bill. There were a lot of things that they wanted to adjust, a couple of the things that you can understand why the price tag went higher.

One of the ways that they were paying for this package, Tony, was by taxing those high-end, expensive, so-called Cadillac health insurance plans. Well, they wanted to tax less of them because you had a lot of objections from unions. So that means less tax money coming in.

And then the other thing is they wanted to make sure that people could -- they were worried that there weren't enough subsidies so that Americans who are now required to buy health insurance would be able to afford it. So, that would be giving more money to people to buy health insurance. That costs money, and so you can see how that affects the price tag.

Also, according to CBO, this package would insure 32 million Americans. That's one million more than the Senate bill, which was cheaper. It was under $900 billion. So, all of these things you can see how they affect it to make the price tag grow.

HARRIS: OK. And Brianna, let's just drill down on it again. The clock starts -- this 72-hour clock starts not when the CBO scoring hits the CBO Web site, but when the actual legislation, the actual language is posted, correct?

KEILAR: That's right. And we are expecting that the bill is going to be online very shortly.

So what does that mean? Seventy-two hours is three days. And that would mean that we wouldn't see a vote in the House until three days later. That would take us to Sunday afternoon.

This is later than anticipated. Remember, a couple of days ago Democrats were talking about aiming for Friday or Saturday. Now it's Sunday.

Why is that an issue? Well, because President Obama was supposed to be taking off for an overseas trip on Sunday that he had already delayed so that he could be here help whipping some of these votes into shape. So we'll see how that affects everything there -- Tony.

HARRIS: And then real reconciliation takes place in the Senate after that House vote, correct?

KEILAR: Yes, there's a whole other process.

HARRIS: Yes.

KEILAR: This is setting up a bill of changes to the Senate bill. It would still need to be passed by the Senate, this overall -- basically overall health care package would need to be passed by the Senate.

Now, it's not going to require the 60 votes. It would only require a simple majority of 51, which is key. But over in the Senate, I mean, this process is not over even if House Democrats manage to pass this bill.

HARRIS: Great point.

KEILAR: Long process.

HARRIS: Great, great point.

And we're expecting to hear from the House Speaker momentarily.

Brianna, appreciate it.

And, of course, when we hear from Speaker Pelosi, we will bring those comments to you live, right here in the CNN NEWSROOM.

The CBO score, we're talking about a lot today. Crucial information in the health care reform debate. So here's a little background on the CBO.

The Congressional Budget Office is a federal agency within the legislative branch of the government. Its job is to provide Congress with -- and this is important -- objective, nonpartisan analysis of economic and budgetary matters. According to its Web site, the CBO currently employs about 250 people, mostly economists and public policy analysts.

He has made health care reform his number one domestic priority, and a lot is at stake for President Obama. He says it is the right thing to do for the country.

In an interview with the Fox News Channel, the president said he believes Congress will approve the legislation.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BRET BAIER, FOX NEWS: Do you think this is going to pass?

BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I do. I'm confident it will pass. And the reason I'm confident that it's going to pass is because it's the right thing to do.

Look, on a whole host of these measures, whether it's health care, whether it was fixing the financial system, whether it's making sure that we passed the Recovery Act, I knew these things might not be popular, but I was absolutely positive that they were the right thing to do, and that over time, we would be vindicated in having made those tough decisions. I think health care is exactly the same thing.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HARRIS: OK. Some other big stories that we're following for you.

(NEWSBREAK)

HARRIS: You saw it here on CNN, President Obama signing into law a bill designed to help put Americans back to work. It includes tax breaks for businesses that hire workers who are unemployed. The president calls it necessary, but by no means enough. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

OBAMA: They and our broader efforts to achieve a recovery aren't about politics. They're not about Democrat versus Republican. This isn't a game that we're playing here.

They're about the people in this country who are out of work and looking for a job. They're about all the Americans of every race and region and age.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HARRIS: CNN's Dan Lothian is at the White House.

And Dan, if you would, drill down on this a bit. What does the new law actually do here?

DAN LOTHIAN, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, the bottom line here from the White House's perspective is that this will potentially jolt the economy, the recovery. Clearly, the president pointing out that, as you heard there, that this is not enough, but believing that it will accelerate the recovery process.

Now, there are some components to this that I want to just sort of spell out.

You mentioned one a while ago, and that is providing a tax exemption for small businesses on payroll taxes. And this essentially would be increased.

The benefits of this would happen if you started hiring people right away. So you get more benefits to do it now, as opposed to later, hiring people who have been unemployed. This, obviously, the administration believes, will help lower the unemployment rate.

Also, extending tax breaks for capital investments such as buying any new equipment. And then, finally, money for roads and bridges.

All of this, again, the administration believing, will help to put people back to work. And again, the president and some of the critics, even, have pointed out that this is simply not enough. And there are those who are saying, listen, this is a pared-down version from what it was initially of $84 billion, $17.6 billion, what is that really going to do? It's just a start, but an important piece of the overall puzzle -- Tony.

HARRIS: All right.

Dan Lothian at the White House for us.

Dan, good to see you. Appreciate it. Thank you.

Will the sandbags be enough to hold back the floodwaters along the Red River? Once again, Chad Myers is checking on the upper plains, and we will check in with him in just a couple of minutes.

But first, though, our "Random Moment" in 90 seconds.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HARRIS: Man, Joe Biden's day. One "Random Moment" after another.

The veep got off to a lousy start. By morning, the Irish prime minister's mother, she's very much alive. Then journalists found Biden's jokes hard to swallow at their dinner.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOSEPH BIDEN, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I just got back from five days in the Middle East. I love to travel, but it's great to be back in a place where a boom in housing construction is actually a good thing.

I do have to defend our administration a little bit here, especially the Recovery Act, which I've been put in charge of. Republicans keep saying it hasn't created a single job. Well, tell that to Senator Scott Brown.

(LAUGHTER)

By the way, I know this is all supposed to be humorous, as I'm trying to be. The job does have some perks, like when Tiger Woods came to see me to give me some tips.

Hey, guys, they were golf tips.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HARRIS: Dude, all right. One blog calls Biden's routine brain- damaged, toast-master humor. For us, it's a terrific "Random Moment."

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(WEATHER REPORT)

HARRIS: Fighting for jobs on the home front. We will take you to a job fair, where I will speak with an Army reservist competing with comrades to join the workforce.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HARRIS: Veterans looking for work -- before we get to that story, let's get you back to the Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi.

REP. NANCY PELOSI (D-CA), HOUSE SPEAKER: Good afternoon.

They say a picture is worth a thousand words. Well, a number is worth a lot, too. I love numbers. And today, the number from the Congressional Budget Office about this health insurance reform legislation will save $138 billion in the first 10 years and $1.2 trillion in the second 10 years. It speaks very eloquently to the deficit reduction that is in our package that also strengthens Medicare. We'll talk more about some other provisions in the bill. And a little bit later today, it will be online.

Also speaking eloquently to the need for this legislation in terms of the health of America are the guests who are with us today. I'm very pleased that we're joined by Ed Morris, Kim Adolfsky (ph), Stella Johnson (ph) and Carolyn Como (ph). Their personal stories tell the eloquent story of why health care is needed to make America healthier, to lower the cost for America's families' budget, while we lower the cost to the federal budget.

We always said there were two reasons to do health care reform. One was about the health of the American people, to improve quality, to lower costs, to expand coverage, and to do so in a way that held the insurance companies accountable.

The second reason, of course, was to reduce the deficit. The president has said that health care reform is entitlement reform. There is no way that we could continue on the course that we are on. It is unsustainable in terms of the mountains of debt that will be heaped on to future generations unless we intervene with this legislation.

Again, let me yield to one of our guests today, Ed Morris. Ed is from North Carolina. And I want him to tell his own personal story.

Ed, thank you for joining us today.

ED MORRIS, FITNESS CENTER OWNER: Thank you so much.

My name is Dr. Ed Morris. My wife and I own a small business, Franklin Health and Fitness Center, in the little town of Franklin in western North Carolina.

As you probably know, more than half of small businesses no longer provide health insurance at all to their employees. Well, why is that? Well, our premiums for our business over the last 10 years tripled.

This is a huge cost for our business every year, to pay these health insurance premiums. So why are our premiums so high?

Well, we, as a small business, are in such a pool that we cannot spread these costs around. One of our employees had cardiac bypass surgery about eight years ago. Well, the next year, when the insurance company got these legitimate medical bills, our premiums went out the roof the next year. So, to keep offering coverage to our employees, we had to do two things.

First of all, we had to raise our deductibles from $250 to $3,000 for an individual. And secondly, we used to pay 100 percent of the premiums for our employees. But in order to continue to have coverage, we now require the employees to pay up to 40 percent of their own premiums. And many of them simply can't afford that. Well, what will this bill do to help us? First of all, we'll be in a big pool, so our costs will be much lower.

And secondly, it will prohibit insurance companies from raising our premiums if an employee gets ill and actually has to use the insurance.

And third, and probably most importantly for me as a small business owner, beginning this year I'll receive tax credits of up to 35 percent to help cover the cost of these premiums. This will help me continue to provide health insurance for my employees and possibly to hire some new employees and to grow my business.

Our congressional district has one of the highest rates of uninsured of anywhere in the country. Twenty-three percent are uninsured in our district. We have over 700 bankruptcies every year just in our congressional district. And every year, hundreds of my friends and neighbors suffer because of lack of adequate health insurance.

And these hundreds of medical --

HARRIS: OK. Here's what we're going to do. We're going to dip out of this. The personal stories are important. We will continue to monitor those personal stories.

We're going to jump out for a moment and get back for what we anticipate to be the question-and-answer portion of this news conference with Speaker Pelosi. So let's do that.

We're back in a moment.

You're in the CNN NEWSROOM.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HARRIS: Veterans looking for work often feels like an uphill battle. Edward Williams has just re-enlisted in the Army Reserves. He is at a job fair for vets in the Atlanta suburb of College Park.

And Edward, good to see you. Thanks for your time today.

EDWARD WILLIAMS, SEEKING JOB: Appreciate it, Tony. Thank you.

HARRIS: Well, let me ask you a tricky question here. You are a father of four. All of your kids are under the age of 10 -- 10 and under.

WILLIAMS: Yes.

HARRIS: How are you explaining the job situation that you find yourself in to your kids and the impact it's having on their lives and your ability to care for them the way you would like to?

WILLIAMS: Well, I try not to explain all of it to them. My oldest, my daughter, she knows. But I don't explain it to her as a sad thing. You know, she spends more time with me. I spend more time with her. My three others, my boys, they just know that daddy's not working right now, but -- excuse me.

I just -- I try to keep them happy, keep them up. And for me not to take care of them the way I want to is -- it wears me down, but I try not to show it to them. I'll put it that way.

HARRIS: No, that's smart. You've got to stay positive. You really have to find a way to stay positive.

My understanding here is that you got laid off from Comcast in 2008. What's the job picture been like for you since then? Is it sporadic? How would you describe it?

WILLIAMS: Well, when I first got -- when I first left Comcast, I had a lot of leads, a lot of interviews, things of that nature. But as the bottom fell out of the market, I've gotten more, "You're overqualified, you'll be gone in six months," thing of that nature. And some have just not even given me interviews at all. I've got a lot of promising leads here, but it's been -- really been touch and go. This is the first time in about just about four months that I've actually had something solid that I can work with when it comes to a job interview.

TONY HARRIS, CNN ANCHOR: Yes. So, Edward, how do you explain to employers -- what do you say to them to get them to believe that your military service will actually help you help them?

WILLIAMS: Well, the discipline, the attention to detail, the fact that I can work with others, leadership roles, things of that nature. I try to stress those for them. Just basically giving them the basics of the military and basically summing it up and letting them judge from there. Excuse me. But I try to just give them as much of my experience and my knowledge of the military as possible, focusing on those few traits.

HARRIS: Well, Edward, the best of luck at the job fair today. I hope you come away with something. I hope, at the very least, you do some really positive networking. And keep us posted on how you're doing, all right?

WILLIAMS: Thank you, Tony. I appreciate it.

HARRIS: Yes, yes, yes. The best to you and your family.

Today in building up America, a town that knows all about rebuilding, it's endured natural disasters. Now it is adapting to life after an economic disaster. CNN's Tom Foreman takes us to Alabama.

TOM FOREMAN, ABC CORRESPONDENT: Hey, Tony.

We're standing here in front of the USS Alabama, which saw a lot of action in World War II and is now a popular tourist attraction here. But it's also symbolic of a greater battle being waged now by this state to find economic viability in the global market. And they're doing it by reaching out far beyond their shores.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

FOREMAN: Bayou La Batre is about as far south as you can go in Alabama without getting your feet wet. But here in the Horizon Shipbuilding yard, they have discovered that the secret to building up is not stopping there, but going offshore to find new markets and new customers.

FOREMAN (voice-over): They build state-of-the-art work boats for pushing barges, servicing oil rigs, that sort of thing. And Horizon is relying much more on sales to places like Nigeria, Mexico, even Iraq. Travis Short helped start this business almost a dozen years ago.

FOREMAN (on camera): How important has international trade been to this company?

TRAVIS SHORT, SR., HORIZON SHIPBUILDING, INC.: It's been very important for us, in particular because of the downturn in the domestic markets.

RON GUNTER, HORIZON SHIPBUILDING, INC.: Small boat yards are very competitive (ph). A lot of small boat yards have closed down.

FOREMAN (voice-over): That's Ron Gunter, a vice president. And he says the days are simply gone for counting on the domestic marketplace as much as they used to, especially for $10 million marvels like these.

GUNTER: This is the best part here. Wait until you see this, Tom.

FOREMAN (on camera): Awesome. This is the pilot house.

GUNTER: This is where you drive the boat.

FOREMAN: Wow.

FOREMAN (voice-over): And he's not alone. State officials say Alabama firms have increased their exports by 36 percent in a half dozen years.

GUNTER: You've got to do what you've got to do. Whether it's here or overseas or where it is, you've got to go out there and find it.

FOREMAN (on camera): They've certainly been effected by the recession here. They've lost more than 100 jobs. But the point is they still have more than 200 jobs, and they're still in business. And in this industry, that is saying something.

FOREMAN (voice-over): It is saying the global marketplace is here to stay.

FOREMAN (on camera): Do you think that any business out there can really afford to not be thinking globally at this point?

SHORT: I think not, particularly in our type of business, in the hard manufacturing business.

FOREMAN (voice-over): Because business these days is hard. And finding success can mean searching the seven seas.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

FOREMAN: In just the past year, the state of Alabama has had 22 foreign trade missions to places like India, China, Russia, signing deals as far as they can to try to keep Alabama firms connected to the world.

Tony.

HARRIS: All right, Tom, appreciate it. I love the positive stories.

I've got to ask you something. If you think that money is tight right now, what happens to your neighborhood schools after the stimulus money runs out? Sounds like a question for the stimulus desk and that man, Josh Levs.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HARRIS: All right. CNN is, of course, your source for money news. As always, we invite you to visit the best money website on the web, cnnmoney.com, for the latest financial news and analysis.

Let's get you to the big board now. New York Stock Exchange. Well, we're off of session highs to be sure. We're on a run of seven days of positive gains for stocks. We're up three. And the Nasdaq is down two. So a mixed day so far. We're following these numbers for you throughout the day right here in the CNN NEWSROOM.

You know, every day it seems we're hearing about another public school district taking drastic steps to stay afloat in this economy. Well, guess what, it is about to get worse, if you can believe it. Josh Levs is here to show us what's happening after this stimulus money runs out.

Josh, what is this about a cliff?

JOSH LEVS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: A cliff. That's what educational officials are calling it. When the stimulus money runs out, they are calling it, all over the country, a cliff, because financially that's what happens. I'm going to show you a few examples on this map here of what happens when this stimulus billion starts to run out and the seriousness we're facing. A few examples.

We keep hearing about Michigan, right? Michigan got over a billion dollars from the stimulus, Tony. Most of that has already been spent. And now they're trying to figure out what they're going to do in the coming years.

California, source of a lot of protests there. They got, for education, from the stimulus, $6 billion. And most of that has already been distributed. I'm going to show you one more. New York here. Look at what New York is saying. They're expecting a $2 billion financial shortfall after the stimulus money runs out at the end of 2012.

So we are talking about huge problems when this borrowed stimulus money runs out.

I'm going to go for a walk here because I want you to see our CNN magic wall what's happened with the money that they've already received because, think about this, if they hadn't gotten all this money this year, how much worse it would have already been. This is what the Education Department has already gotten from the stimulus, $100 billion basically, $98.3 billion. $71 billion has been awarded so far. So, Tony, all these things we're seeing at schools. And, like you said, we're hearing about a new school problem every day. They're cutting schools, they're cutting teachers. That's after they've already gotten $71 billion, borrowed dollars, from the stimulus. And when that money goes away, it gets even worse.

HARRIS: Well, wait a minute. Well, describe worse. What happens to schools? What happens to education in this country?

LEVS: I'm going to give you some examples of that. Yes, the Associated Press have this great piece where they talked to a bunch of experts for some specifics. What happens when we hit that cliff? Because this is the whole country we're talking about.

HARRIS: Oh, yes.

LEVS: Here's what happens to schools. You get teacher layoffs. You get teachers who are having lower pay, which means they're not as happy and it's harder to attract the best teachers. You have larger classes, fewer electives, fewer extra curricular activities.

And then they look at what happens to the whole country, Tony. Check this out. You have weaker public schools, obviously. You also have higher unemployment. That's a fact of history. Any time you have more problem at schools, you have higher unemployment. And it's tougher to keep kids in school, right, to get that degree than get a job. It will seriously damage the president's education agenda from start to finish. Everything he hoped for.

And this is really serious here.

HARRIS: Thank you.

LEVS: It will widen the achievement gap.

HARRIS: Yes.

LEVS: Because, think about it, the kids out there from families whose parents can pay for private school are going to have it so, so, so much better. There's already that gap.

HARRIS: Yes. LEVS: So you're talking about it getting even worse. The more public schools suffer and private schools continue to be the place to be. These are the stakes we're talking about when we hit that cliff with the end of the stimulus money.

HARRIS: And it's not just the achievement gap between public schools and private schools. It is the achievement gap within public schools that is startling.

LEVS: Absolutely. Absolutely. And there are lots of ways to look at that gap, but absolutely even the same kids in the same schools, you see that.

HARRIS: Yes. Josh, appreciate it. Thank you, sir.

LEVS: You got it. Thanks, Tony.

HARRIS: Top stories now. Levees are shored up. Seven hundred and fifty-thousand sandbags in place. Fargo, North Dakota, says its done all it can ahead of this weekend's flooding. The Red River is forecast to crest Sunday at 38 feet. That's three feet below the record set just last year.

A new package of tax breaks in spending designed to get the private sector hiring again. President Obama signed the jobs bill about an hour ago. It is the first of several measures Democrats are promising to get Americans back to work.

The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office puts a price tag on the Democrats' revised health care reform bill. $940 billion over 10 years. Over that same period, the CBO expects the bill will cut the federal deficit by $138 billion.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HARRIS: OK. Down to the wire on health care reform. A lot of folks may be thinking, if the bill passes, they will be instantly insured. Critics say it's not that simple. Our chief medical correspondent, Dr. Sanjay Gupta, breaks down when Americans can expect to see changes.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CHIEF MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, the caveat you have to talk about is that no one knows exactly what this health care bill is going to look like, if it passes, what its final form will actually be. But it's worth talking about the various layers to this bill to some extent and how these layers will go into effect, because if you're the average consumer, you're thinking, how this might this affect me and when will that happen.

So let me talk about some of the immediate changes first. Some of the things that are going to happen sooner rather than later is that there will no longer be any annual caps. So let's say you have some sort of health care problem but the insurance company says we have a yearly limit in terms of how much we'll pay or a lifetime limit. Those sorts of caps will go away.

Also, this pre-existing condition, which we've been talking about for more than a year. People will not be able to be discriminated against based on pre-existing condition when they go to buy health care insurance. Now, the way that they're going to do that, interestingly, is they're going to create these high-risk pools around the country and subsidize those high-risk pool so they can pay for the insurance for people who have some sort of pre-existing condition.

Young adults covered through the age of 26. Again, pretty obvious there. But really those kids who may have just graduated from college, haven't gotten a job yet, that provides them health care insurance who simply don't have health care insurance. Up until age 26, they can continue to get that coverage.

And drug discounts for seniors. We can spend a lot of time talking about this. The doughnut hole. Basically what that means, imagine a doughnut. Your health care insurance sort of kicks in as you eat through the first part of the doughnut. Then you don't have any coverage as you're going through the hole. It doesn't kick in again until you start eating through the other part of the doughnut. That hole is what they want to shrink. That's what so many people are sort of talking about here.

But, you know, if you're really thinking about this, you think, well, when does the vast majority of health care reform as we've been hearing about it kick in? A lot of it really is four years from now, 2014. Lots of things happen at this point. First of all, mandated coverage. You're going to have to have health care insurance or pay a fine.

How do you get there specifically? These health insurance exchanges, which are set up around the country. Think of them as supermarkets where you can go and find a private plan that might work for you. If it's still too expensive, keep in mind, that there's going to be no discrimination there. So even if you have some sort of medical condition, they can't discriminate against you based on that.

And there will be tax credits for consumers. If the price of the health care insurance has been the issue all along, getting those tax credits will certainly help there.

And, finally, this idea of Medicaid expansion. This idea that childless adults living near poverty may also be qualifying for Medicaid and to help get them on some sort of health insurance plan as well.

But again, if you're at home and you're thinking, you know, I really need an operation within the next couple of weeks, I'm uninsured, I don't know how this is going to happen, you know, really pay attention to this. It's unclear exactly how that will affect you. But some of these plans, again, it's going to take some time before they go into effect.

Back to you.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HARRIS: All right, Sanjay, appreciate it. Thank you.

Sounding off on health care. We are listening to what you have to say.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HARRIS: Very quickly now let's get you back to Speaker Pelosi taking questions now on the latest iteration of health care reform.

REP. NANCY PELOSI (D), SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE: A rubber stamp caucus. So we have our full airing of issues. Members want to see this -- the figures. They want to see what the Senate will do. We like the dynamic in our caucus.

But it does show, also, second part, it also does show the impact of a campaign of misrepresentation of fear that is going out there. There is no limit to what the other side will do to protect the insurance companies. And that is what came out, I think, at the president's summit when he said that -- he came out and said the difference is, you're for regulating the insurance companies or you're for protecting the insurance companies. We're for regulating them.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Madame Speaker, 900 -- it's over $900 billion.

PELOSI: Right.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Can you tell us off the top of your head, how is this going to be paid for? Is this a surtax on the wealthy? A cadillac plan?

PELOSI: Well, that will up -- yes?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (INAUDIBLE)? Payroll tax? How is it going to be paid for? Just a few bullet points on that.

PELOSI: Well, what I want you to do is to go to the website in about an hour or so? Later today. The report will be complete from the CBO and our analysis of it and we will put it up on the website.

But, basically, most of the legislation, the biggest -- one biggest covering of the cost comes from cutting waste, fraud, and abuse, largely in Medicare. Over $500 billion comes from that. The remainder of the money comes from a number of things. One of the victories that we have in the House is that our numbers did not like the excise tax on insurance plans. We thought it hurt the middle class. There was a debate about that. So the higher end of that is left in the plan. I call it the platinum Rolls Royce piece of it. The rest will be covered by Medicare fee on unearned income. Medicare fee unearned income.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (INAUDIBLE)?

PELOSI: No, a Medicare fee on unearned income. Whatever category that is. The third piece of it is that there will be -- well, it's not a pay for, it's about coverage. You'll have to look there, but that's the main thrust, cut mainly from Medicare waste, fraud and abuse. No cuts in benefits. No increase in premiums. Just cut waste, fraud and abuse. This is essential in order to strengthen Medicare. And in this legislation, we will make it solvent for nine more years.

There's some other pieces to it that will be in there, but the main piece is the Medicare fee. It's health for health. You know, in our bill we had a surcharge at the high end. This is a health fee on unearned income. And some other feature in there as well. But they're the two main ones.

DANA BASH, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Madame Speaker, you've said many times that one of the things that was most important to House Democrats, removing special interests that were in the Senate bill. But -- so did you remove, aside from the Nebraska issue, did you remove the money for (INAUDIBLE) hospitals? Did you remove extra money for -- to help for medical care (ph)?

PELOSI: When do --

BASH: (INAUDIBLE) everything removed? All the (INAUDIBLE)?

PELOSI: No, what -- you will see -- OK, let me talk about what the bill is. Largely the difference between the House and the Senate bills that have been corrected are the following. We did not believe that the Senate bill had enough on affordability, so there's more affordability for the middle class in the legislation -- in the reconciliation package that will pass.

Secondly, we did not -- we did not like the state inequities. It's a category. And this bill corrects the state inequities by making the Medicare -- excuse me, Medicaid reimbursements more fair to all of the states. That also includes rewarding do-gooder states who had been out there before making -- in advance of this bill, making changes, to reward them for that.

The third in that -- in that Medicare -- Medicaid piece is funding for primary care doctors who handle Medicaid cases. So that we're not adding more people to Medicaid without adding the opportunity for more doctors to provide services.

The next piece of it was to close the doughnut hole. We talked about some of these things by way of our guests here today, but to close the doughnut hole. For those who are not seniors, as I am a senior, the doughnut hole is very important issue to us. And what it is, is an undue burden on seniors in terms of their prescription drugs. And Stella Johnson (ph) spoke eloquently to that.

Thank you, Stella.

Another feature of this is that we do not -- we did not think that the Senate bill went far enough in the insurance reforms. And that is something that we do in the bill.

So in terms of the affordability for the middle class, the reform's accountability for the insurance companies, the access to many more people that we talk about in the equity for the states, changing the excise tax, which was -- is the main feature -- a complaint among many of our members to a different pay for, those are the major changes in the bill.

BASH: But are those special deals still there?

PELOSI: Well, it's not a question of special deals. Whatever is in there can be subjected to many people competing for it. They're capped. There is a comfort level with why they are in the legislation. We thought that Nebraska was indeed a special deal.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The CBO report on the second 10 years out, CBO tends to be a little bit more cautious on that, calling it a rough outlook. Are you comfortable with saying the $1.2 trillion as a commitment in savings or is that

PELOSI: Yes. Yes. And let me say this. As you well know, the CBO is usually very conservative in its estimates. They gave us no credit for prevention, which we know will result in savings. In wellness initiatives. Initiatives of that kind, which will make people healthier. It doesn't give us really any credit for early intervention, so many more people can be attended to before their cost and, more important than that, their situation -- their health worsens. So we don't get any -- any credit for some of the upside that we know is there.

And I'm going yield to Mr. Larson, because he's going to talk about health IT and the savings that that will have as well.

HARRIS: Let's do a couple of things here. First of all, we just learned that the president will delay his trip to Indonesia and Australia, trying to get health care reform over the finish line. And, very quickly, we want to get you to the White House spokesman, Robert Gibbs.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Does he still have confidence this is going to pass?

ROBERT GIBBS, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: The president still believes we will have the votes, yes.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (INAUDIBLE) a dozen votes? What do you think?

GIBBS: I don't have a number to predict. I think the president, in the calls and the meetings that he's having with individual leaders, is making great progress. I will say, I think today's CBO score provides a significant boost to the health reform. It proves that this legislation, if you look at it compared to the previous Senate legislation, provides greater consumer protection, greater affordability, greater deficit reduction, and more coverage for the uninsured. So, again, I think the president's case is strengthened.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And what is the president going to be doing over the next 72 hours to try to push this over? And kind of walk us through a flavor of some of these conversations, if you don't mind. GIBBS: Yes. Well, I think the president has spent time, both in the Oval Office and on the telephone over the last several days. He'll continue doing so today. Met with more than two dozen -- met and called more than two dozen members of Congress. But, see, but I think the case the president has made to them is very much the case that he's made to the American people over the last couple of weeks.

We know what happens if we do nothing. We know what happens to rate increases -- with rate increases. We know -- we know we have an opportunity to provide small businesses with a tax cut that provide insurance for their employees. We know what this does for families with children that are suffering from what an insurance company considers a pre-existing condition. I think all of those are -- all of those are part of the case that he's making, as well as continuing to say that this is important to get done now.

Yes, sir?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Just more details about those conversations, understanding you can't give us the names of who he's talking with. But in terms of the content of those conversations, what is he saying that he hasn't said already, the president has been having conversations like this for over a year. There's obviously a new sense of urgency, the foreign trip has been canceled. Can you give us any kind of characterization of the specifics of those conversations? Has the president said, listen, the future of my agenda is on the line unless we get this through?

GIBBS: Well, look, I think the president would be the first to tell you that there will be -- after health care passes, there will be many big issues in which we have to tackle. We've talked about a few just over the past week. Financial reform, obviously, is something that is going to take up a great amount of the administration's time. The Citizens United case, and campaign finance, again being just two of those.

I think partly the urgency of getting this done now, and this always happens as we get closer to a vote. And I would say this, and I've said it before, undoubtedly the insurance increases that we've seen by WellPoint and Anthem over the past many weeks, and many other insurance companies, in the individual market where insurance coverage is -- where the health care costs are going up 4 or 5 percent, where rate increases are going up 40 or 60 percent.