Obama Campaigns for Sestak, Onorato

President Obama is warning Pennsylvania Democrats their party could lose Tuesday, if voters don’t amp up their energy over the coming days.
Speaking for less than ten minutes to a crowd of about 16-hundred people in Philadelphia Saturday, Mr. Obama urged Democrats to knock on doors and make phone calls between now and Election Day.

"The key right now is not just to show up here. It’s not just to listen to speeches. It’s to go out there and do the hard work that’s going to be required to bring this home over the last few days."

But interviews with attendees, Joatta Glover, Jamie Papas and George Scott, revealed a wide gap, when it comes to support for the president, compared to enthusiasm for Tuesday’s Senate, gubernatorial and Congressional elections.

"I want Joe – what’s his name? Joe Sec…sec…Sestak? Sestak. Yeah I want him to win.
I’m going to sound bad – I didn’t register. I went to the day it was due – my mom yelled at me – but I just didn’t get do.
Governor – what’s his name? Dan Onorato? I can’t pronounce it."

Top Democrats say big turnout in Philadelphia and its suburbs is key, if the party wants to win.

Toomey & Sestak Disagree Over Cap and Trade

Many environmental advocates are urging President Obama to renew his push for a cap-and-trade energy bill during tonight’s Oval Office address, which will be broadcast by 90.5 WDUQ at 8 o'clock.
But Republican Senate candidate Pat Toomey says that type of legislation would cripple Pennsylvania’s economy.
Speaking at a Dauphin County coffeehouse, Toomey warned a bill taxing energy consumption would cause utility rates to skyrocket, and would force small businesses to close up shop.

"The Democratic administration that we have today, their Public Utilities Commission has indicated from a study that they believe that if this cap-and-trade legislation were fully implemented, the bill that Joe Sestak voted for and said didn’t go far enough – it would cost Pennsylvania 66-thousand jobs over the next ten years."

A PUC spokeswoman says Toomey is referring to a letter three commissioners sent to Pennsylvania’s Congressional delegation last year, in which they urged lawmakers to vote against the measure.
The bill passed the House last June, but has stalled in the Senate. Toomey’s opponent, Congressman Joe Sestak, voted for the measure.
He says he’s confident the energy overhaul would create more Pennsylvania jobs over time.

"Job Offer" Controversy Lingers

Pennsylvania Governor Ed Rendell says he had multiple conversations with the White House about keeping Congressman Joe Sestak out of the Democratic Senate primary but that he didn’t know the administration offered Sestak an unpaid position.
Rendell says he talked “three or four times” with White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel about how to persuade Sestak to back out of challenging Arlen Specter.
Rendell says he knows Democrats would have retained Sestak’s Congressional seat if he ran for re-election, but says he’s now worried Republicans could take it over this fall.

"So I was very interested in that. And Chief of Staff Emmanuel and I discussed that. No question about it. And that’s why I know the White House didn’t offer him a full-time job. Because the White House’s main emphasis was getting him to stay in the Congress and run for reelection as a congressman. So I’m certain there was no full-time job offer."

Rendell, President Obama and Senator Robert Casey supported Senator Arlen Specter's bid for a 6th term in office.

Rendell calls the continued focus on the White House offer “much ado about nothing,” and says Republicans calling for a special investigation into the matter are just playing politics and wasting time.
President Obama says the administration did “nothing improper” in using former President Bill Clinton to offer Sestak an advisory position.

President: Roll Back Oil Company Tax Breaks

President Barack Obama says the country's dependence on fossil fuels jeopardizes national security, the economy and the environment....and must be ended. The president traveled to Pittsburgh this afternoon and spoke at Carnegie Mellon University... "An America that runs solely on fossil, fuels should not be the vision that we have for our children and grandchildren.
As the broken oil well in the Gulf Of Mexico continues to spew oil unchecked, Mr. Obama called for rolling back billions of dollars in oil company tax breaks and using the money on clean energy technologies. The president pledged to find the votes in Congress to pass a sweeping energy bill that is stuck in the Senate.
Full text of President Obama's remarks.
Listen to the President remarks here.

President at CMU

President Barack Obama will deliver his latest assessment on the nation's economic recovery when he speaks in Pittsburgh this afternoon. The White House says the president will speak to the invitation-only crowd at Carnegie Mellon University about the five pillars for a new economic foundation: new rules for Wall Street; investments in education, renewable energy and health care; and reductions in federal spending.
In his prepared remarks the president is expected to say the country cannot go back to an economy that was too dependent on bubbles and debt and financial speculation..."We must build a new stronger foundation for growth and prosperity and that's exactly what we've been doing for the last 16 months."

Health Care Summit

President Obama will try to re-launch his stalled health care overhaul today by hosting a televised summit with Congressional leaders to discuss the bill.
Mr. Obama says he wants to hear Republican ideas, but the head of Pennsylvania’s GOP says he doesn’t think the president is sincere.
The President will sit down with top Republicans and Democrats to talk about the future of his health care package, which has stalled since Democrats lost their Senate supermajority last month.
The White House says it’s serious about soliciting input from the GOP, but Pennsylvania Republican Chairman Rob Gleason says he doesn’t buy that.

"I don’t trust the White House on that. I think it is a publicity stunt. I think he’s trying to fool the people by doing this. He’s trying to embarrass the Republican Party. They call us the party of no, but we have a lot of good ideas."

Democratic state Representative Josh Shapiro, who sits on a panel of state legislators who advise the White House on health care issues, says it’s “nonsense” to suggest Mr. Obama is trying to trap Republican leaders by asking for their input on legislation.
He says he’s confident a bill will be signed into law this year, saying the country’s present health care system is too expensive and unsustainable. He also says he’s confident a measure will be signed into law this year.

"We are somewhere between second and third and goal. And it’s time to get this done, but get it done responsibly, and with Republican input. And the president has established a forum to do that tomorrow, and I’m looking forward to the discussion."

There’s some debate over whether Senate Democrats can use a maneuver called “reconciliation” in order to bypass a filibuster. Supporters of the tactic point out several landmark bills, like the Children’s Health Insurance Program and COBRA, have been passed this way. The White House claims the package will provide coverage to 30 million uninsured Americans.

PA Delegation on President's Afghanistan Plan

Members of Pennsylvania's Congressional delegation are weighing in on President Barack Obama's new war strategy for Afghanistan. Senator Arlen Specter says he opposes the president's plan to send an additional 30 thousand troops there starting in January. Specter says Al Qaeda can operate out of other countries like Yemen and Somalia, so it doesn't make sense to center the fight in Afghanistan, where no one has succeeded in the past.
Senator Bob Casey, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations subcommittee, travelled to Afghanistan in August. He issued a statement saying the country deserves a full accounting of the challenges posed in Afghanistan. Casey's committee plans to question Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Defense Secretary Robert Gates and Admiral Michael Mullen, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
Democratic Congressman Jason Altmire of Pittsburgh's North Hills says he fully supports the Administration’s decision to provide commanders in Afghanistan with additional troops. "Make no mistake, the war in Afghanistan is still the central front of the war on terror. In order to keep our country safe, we must take the actions necessary to stabilize Afghanistan and to ensure that it will never again be a safe haven for Al-Qaeda or other terrorist groups.”
Congressman Joe Sestak, who is challenging Specter in the May Democratic Primary, says
the president has presented a plan to allow the nation to complete a mission that is as indispensable today as it was 8 years ago....
"It is a difficult decision. After years of war and with economic challenges at home, the American people are justified in their concern about an increased commitment in Afghanistan. But the President has made the right call. If we leave Al Qaeda behind in a safe haven and are struck again, what can we ever say to those we swore to protect?"

Sestak added that the clear emphasis of the overall goal must remain focused on eliminating the safe haven in Pakistan. And second, we should measure our progress not by a fixed timetable, but by benchmarks of achieving America's security.

Specter, Sestak Disagree Over More Troops in Afghanistan

Pennsylvania’s two leading Democratic Senate candidates have different opinions on whether more troops are needed in Afghanistan.
Senator Arlen Specter says he opposes sending 30-thousand additional troops to Afghanistan, unless their mission is “indispensible in [the] fight against al Qaeda.”
Challenger Joe Sestak supports the increase, as long as it’s accompanied by clear goals and benchmarks, but both men agree that US forces should be focused on disrupting terror networks, rather than rebuilding the country.
Specter says American troops shouldn’t spend resources propping up Hamid Karzai’s government, which he calls unreliable.

"We don’t want to fight a war against the Taliban. That’s not in the US national interest. Al Qaeda, yes, but if al Qaeda can organize elsewhere, then I’m opposed to sending more troops to Afghanistan.

Sestak says he’s also lost faith in the Karzai government, and wants to see US officials build more partnerships with regional tribal leaders. He says he’s opposed to an Afghanistan mission focused on rebuilding the country and its government.

"It needs to be primarily and near-exclusively on al Qaeda, but with a sub-goal of leaving behind conditions that leave a probability that al Qaeda will not come back."

Specter agrees, saying he doesn’t support “a war on the Taliban,” instead of al Qaeda terrorists. Both men are calling for an increased focus on Pakistan.
President Obama will announce his new Afghanistan strategy tonight at 8. WDUQ-FM will broadcast the president's address.

Lyndon Baines Obama?

This week’s White House meeting between President Obama and a coalition including insurers, the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America, physicians, hospitals and others on health reform reminded us of how another president used his PR skills and White House platform to push a key health issue forward in the direction he wanted.

In 2009, the industry groups came to the White House with the idea of expressing their commitment to health reform and to contribute their share toward a goal that health reform would eventually save as much as $2 trillion over 10 years.

Somehow, by the time they got home, there was a widely reported perception that the associations agreed specifically to reduce their costs to the health system by $2 trillion. The president asked them to come back in June with proposals for how they will do this. Since then, there has been a bit of backpedaling, and differing reports of whether the President misspoke in describing their agreement (see the full account in the May 18 issue of “The Pink Sheet”).

Now, we’re not sure how the confusion arose or who is spinning who. But we wonder if Mr. Obama learned a few presidential wiles from Lyndon Johnson and Medicare. LBJ managed to push through legislation creating the Medicare program in July 1965, despite vociferous opposition from the American Medical Association. He knew the program would never get off the ground without physician support. Here’s how he got it, as recounted by historian Robert Dallek in Lyndon B. Johnson, Portrait of a President:

Some members of the Administration were so worried about winning the cooperation of the AMA that they urged a meeting at the White House with AMA leaders at which the President appealed to doctors to support a law favored by the people and worked out “in the most pain-staking way in accordance with the exacting rules of our democracy.”

Johnson did not think that the AMA and most physicians would find it easy to oppose Medicare without serious damage to their public standing. But he was worried enough to invite AMA leaders to the White House, where he could compel a public acknowledgement of their support. In a July 30 discussion with eleven AMA officers, Johnson asked the physicians for help in getting doctors to rotate in and out of Vietnam for a few months to serve the civilian population. Appealing to their patriotism, Johnson declared, “Your country needs your help. Your President needs your help.” The doctors responded almost in unison with promises to start a program immediately.

“Get the press in here,” Johnson told [presidential Press Secretary Bill] Moyers. When they arrived, Johnson described and praised the AMA’s readiness to help the Vietnamese. But the reporters, undoubtedly primed by Moyers, wanted to know whether the doctors would support Medicare. Johnson, with mock indignation, said: “These men are going to get doctors to go to Vietnam, where they might be killed. Medicare is the law of the land. Of course they’ll support the law of the land. Tell them," Johnson said, turning to the head of the delegation. “Of course, we will,” the AMA president responded….A few weeks later, the AMA announced its intention to support Medicare.

We just hope Obama doesn’t have any appendectomy scars to show us.

- Denise Peterson & Cathy Kelly

Obama's "Down Payment" On Health Care Reform: How Far Down?

Advocates for an aggressive, first-100-days push for universal coverage in the Obama Administration can't have enjoyed much of what they heard in the Presidential Address to Congress February 24.

For the biopharma industry--whose trade associations are among the stakeholder groups publicly urging action on health care--it is hard to gauge how disappointing that outcome will be, though the President's budget proposal (due out Thursday) could make that picture clearer.

There are at least three reasons advocates for universal coverage may be disappointed by the Presidential address.

First, it is clear that while health care reform is a priority for the Administration, it is not the priority. To no one's surprise, Obama focused initially on the response to the economic crisis, including the recently enacted stimulus legislation and the next installment of relief for the financial system. But when he turned to the next item on the agenda, he didn't single out health care, instead listing energy, health care and education as equal priorities.

Indeed, among the three key areas for investment cited by Obama--"energy, health care, and education"--health care was always listed second, and was also the second theme discussed at length in the speech. (As graduates of the IN VIVO Blog School of Rhetoric know, being second on a list of three is worse than being last: debaters are trained to use their strongest argument first, the second best last, and leave the weakest in the middle in hopes that no one listens too carefully.)

Second, Obama stopped well short of making universal coverage the goal of health care reform in the near term, describing his upcoming budget proposal as offering "a down-payment on the principle that we must have quality, affordable health care for every American."

Leaving aside the odd metaphor in a speech shaped so fundamentally by the collapse of the mortgage market, "down-payment" sure sounds like a synonym for "incremental." Indeed, Obama himself described the expansion of the Children's Health Insurance Program already signed into law as a "down payment."

Third, the discussion of health care reform was framed clearly in the context of addressing the long-term economic health of the country rather than as a response to the short-term economic crisis. Translation: reform proposals will be judged on their ability to reduce spending and shrink deficits--there will be no stimulus-style spending to expand coverage with promises to restore balance in the future.

All in all, Pharmaceutical Research & Manufacturers of America CEO Billy Tauzin and Biotechnology Industry Organization CEO Jim Greenwood did a pretty good job of predicting how the address would go. (See our post here.)

In particular, the address lends credence to Tauzin's suggestion that the departure of Tom Daschle from his expected position as the Obama Administration's health care general means incremental change driven by the the economic team rather than comprehensive, policy-first reform.

Therein lies the danger for the biopharma industry: in the context of budgetary priorities, measures to restrain pharmaceutical prices are tempting offsets with little political downside compared to say, slashing physician payments or forcing hospitals to close. We've already noted some rhetorical parallels between Obama's first remarks to Congress on health care and President Clinton's in 1993.

That reform was supposed to be budget neutral, to avoid undoing Clinton's first legislative victory, a tough fought balanced budget (remember those days?). With that mandate, Clinton's working groups quickly moved into aggressive proposals for restraining spending, especially on drugs and biologics before the whole initiative collapsed in the face of opposition from across the spectrum of health care sectors.

In 2009, there is no doubt that the budget comes first, quite literally. Obama's next "down payment" on health care reform will be unveiled Thursday; a bipartisan summit on health care reform kicks off on Monday. Just don't call it the Health Care Reform Task Force ...

Back to the Future on Health Care Reform

“All of our efforts to strengthen the economy will fail unless we take bold steps to reform our health care system.”

With those words uttered during his first address to Congress last night, President Obama officially kicked off the health care reform debate in 2009. Oh wait a second—those words were from Bill Clinton in February 1993.

What Obama said was “the cost of our health care has weighed down our economy and the conscience of our nation long enough. So let there be no doubt: health care reform cannot wait, it must not wait, and it will not wait another year.” In our next post, we'll offer our key takeaways from Obama's address.

But first, we just had to note an irony. The one thing everyone in Washington says about health care reform 2009 is that the Democrats have learned lessons from 1993. And yet there sure seemed to be a lot of similarities between Clinton's first address to Congress and Obama's when it came to the arguments for health care reform.

Here are a few of the parallels, courtesy of transcripts provided by the Washington Post for Clinton’s addresses, and the official White House text of Obama’s remarks.

Clinton (1993): “America's businesses will never be strong; America's families will never be secure; and America's government will never be solvent until we tackle our health care crisis.”

Obama (2009): “The crushing cost of health care..now causes a bankruptcy in America every thirty seconds. By the end of the year, it could cause 1.5 million Americans to lose their homes. In the last eight years, premiums have grown four times faster than wages. And in each of these years, one million more Americans have lost their health insurance. It is one of the major reasons why small businesses close their doors and corporations ship jobs overseas. And it’s one of the largest and fastest-growing parts of our budget.”

Clinton: “Later this spring, I will deliver to Congress a comprehensive plan for health care reform that will finally get costs under control.”

Obama: “In the next few days, I will submit a budget to Congress…[that] includes an historic commitment to comprehensive health care reform – a down-payment on the principle that we must have quality, affordable health care for every American.”

Clinton: “There will be no new cuts in benefits from Medicare for beneficiaries. There will be cuts in payments to providers: doctors, hospitals, and labs, as a way of controlling health care costs. These cuts are only a stop-gap until we reform the whole health care system.”

Obama: “Comprehensive health care reform is the best way to strengthen Medicare for years to come.”

Clinton: “We will root out fraud and outrageous charges, and make sure that paperwork no longer chokes you or your doctor.”

Obama: “We will root out the waste, fraud, and abuse in our Medicare program that doesn’t make our seniors any healthier.”

Of course, we all know what happened next: Clinton’s vaunted health care reform task force set to work, and the debate devolved into partisan differences and collapsed under its own weight. Obama surely won’t repeat that mistake.

Or will he? “Now, there will be many different opinions and ideas about how to achieve reform, and that is why I’m bringing together businesses and workers, doctors and health care providers, Democrats and Republicans to begin work on this issue next week” (Obama, 2009).

How Much Reform, How Fast? What to Listen For Tonight

Do we have to pay for health care reform?

That is probably the single, critical question all stakeholders in the health care system will be listening for when President Obama addresses a joint session of Congress Tuesday night.

No one expects Obama to back down from his campaign promises to push for universal coverage in his first term. Indeed, Office of Management & Budget Director Peter Orszag affirmed that health care reform will be “the next priority up for the Obama administration” during a closed door meeting with the National Governors’ Association, Michigan Democrat Jennifer Granholm said Feb. 22.

However, the economic crisis and the withdrawal of Tom Daschle from his expected role as health care reform general raise significant questions about the direction of and prospects for reform in the near term.

In the context of the presidential address and upcoming budget proposal, those questions essentially focus on how reform will be framed.

For the biopharma industry, the hope is that Obama will define health care reform as, in essence, a continuation of economic stimulus, pressing the urgency of change without insisting on offsetting cuts to pay for expanded coverage.

Pharmaceutical Research & Manufacturers of America CEO Billy Tauzin suggested that policymakers should learn a lesson for Japan’s economic struggles in the 1990s. That experience, he said during a webcast sponsored by Ernst & Young on Feb. 20, shows what happens when “stimulating the economy helps turn things around and then fiscal restraint comes in too soon and then blocks the good effect of the stimulus.”

“The budget is going to be facing some very ugly deficit numbers,” Tauzin noted. However, he predicted, “the trend is going to be let the stimulus work before we start to focus on these ugly deficits.”

Nevertheless, all indications are that the President instead will call for a specific sum of money to be reserved for health care reform—and pledge to find offsets to pay for it upon enactment.

That may not sound like a significant difference since, after all, health care reform will have to be paid for one way or the other. For biopharma companies, however, the difference could be quite significant: many of the most obvious targets for savings involve cuts to drug pricing or other measures to control spending on pharmaceuticals.

It is almost impossible, for example, to imagine a package of health care spending cuts that does not address the prices of drugs under the Medicare Part D prescription drug program. Or that excludes a follow-on biologics provision, which would presumably be scored as reducing federal spending by billions of dollars.

Both measures may be inevitable anyway, but enactment in the context of finding a fixed savings target to pay for broad expansion of health coverage means a much higher chance that cuts to Part D pricing will be deeper, and that exclusivity to innovators under FOB legislation may be shorter, than would otherwise emerge from the legislative process.

The framing of health care reform is just one of many topics industry will be eagerly listening for in Obama’s “unofficial” state-of the-union address. Here are some key themes:

Bragging Rights: “I think the first thing he will do is talk about what he has already done,” BIO CEO Jim Greenwood said during the Ernst & Young webinar, highlighting expansion of the Children’s Health Insurance Program and several elements of the stimulus bill, including funding for health care IT, comparative effectiveness research, and new spending for the National Institutes of Health.

“I think he starts off with bragging rights and then promises in more general terms that there is much more to be done,” Greenwood said.

Still, even a recap of the first month could contain important indications of policy directions, especially when it comes to the comparative research funding included in the stimulus. That relatively small ($1.1 billion) line item generated a lot of political attention, and it will be interesting to see whether Obama devotes time to it.

Universal Coverage: Obama “is very interested in moving aggressively to expand insurance coverage,” Tauzin noted. But how prominent and how persuasive will discussion of that issue be? Tauzin clearly doesn’t expect much, predicting on the Ernst & Young call that reform will move “piecemeal” rather than in a comprehensive fashion in the months ahead.

Fiscal Responsibility: The President hosted a “fiscal responsibility” summit Feb. 23 and plans to release a 2010 Budget outline on Feb. 26. During his weekly web address Feb. 21, Obama pledged to “release a budget that's sober in its assessments, honest in its accounting, and lays out in detail my strategy for investing in what we need, cutting what we don't, and restoring fiscal discipline.” That sounds like a recipe for pay-as-you-go health reform.

Wellness/Prevention: Many politicians now display “an emphasis on prevention and dealing with chronic diseases in the early stages instead of literally waiting to treat all the damage done,” Tauzin noted. “You see that theme expressed in the politics everywhere and I expect you will see it expressed somewhere” in the Presidential address.

FDA: A month ago, the peanut butter recall made FDA the subject of discussion during White House press briefings and a pledge to name a new commissioner shortly. Daschle’s departure delayed that plan. Obviously any reference to FDA will be important for industry to analyze—all the more so if it suggests an emphasis on the food side of the agency’s mission (and hence a tilt towards an expert in that field to run the agency) and/or a commitment to zealous enforcement by regulators.

Tobacco regulation: All indications are that the White House and Congress are committed to expanding FDA’s mission to include regulation of tobacco products (a theme that ties together both prevention and FDA regulation). A discussion of tobacco could signal a further layer of distraction for the agency from the product review issues central to industry—but perhaps also an enforcement agenda that spares biopharma firms from the toughest scrutiny.

Stem cell research: Overturning the Bush Administration policy on stem cell research is an important priority for BIO, but also one that may have been delayed by the wait for an HHS nominee. Biotech companies would welcome a public commitment to reverse that policy.

Personalized medicine: Obama sponsored legislation in the Senate to create regulatory systems and incentives for personalized medicine. Any discussion of science and medicine from the podium could be a call to move forward in that area.

Generic drugs: Former President Bush often highlighted the cost saving impact of generics. Will Obama do the same?

Medicare managed care: The private sector has a big role in Medicare, both via fully integrated Medicare Advantage plans and as the providers of the Part D prescription drug insurance. The biopharma industry would love to see Part D serve as the template for broader health reform—but it is so closely tied to the Bush Administration that it may be difficult for Obama to embrace the program. Tonight is the first chance.

Obama's VP: Will It Be HRC?

Did we get your attention? Good. As the VP Derby enters the final turn this week, we figured we'd throw our hat in the ring because if Obama chooses one person in particular, it could have a tremendous impact on healthcare in general on the overall agenda if the Illinois Senator wins the election.

Quite simply, we don't think former First Lady and New York Senatory Hillary Rodham Clinton is completely out of the running for VP consideration, even if she is slated to have a roll-call vote at the Democratic Convention. If HRC somehow defies the conventional wisdom and is Obama's choice, that would put serious healthcare reform at the top of the first 100-days domestic agenda after Obama is inaugurated. You can read our previous posts about healthcare and the election by clicking here and here.

We recall a very smart comment from Families USA founding executive director Ron Pollack at a National Journal policy breakfast June 25. He noted that President Bill Clinton had used a lot of political capital on issues other than healthcare reform at the beginning of his administration. By the time universal coverage rolled around on the agenda in November 1993 in the form of real legislation, a lot of that "capital" had been spent. In other words, in order for broad healthcare reform to happen in 2009, it will have to begin right out of the gate.

[A very important note: We're not saying we think Hillary Clinton is Obama's choice, but we don't think it's out of the question, and if she is VP, healthcare becomes the top domestic focus immediately in our opinion.]

Remember this from Obama's victory speech in St. Paul, Minnesota on the last primary night?

"We've certainly had our differences over the last sixteen months. But as someone who's shared a stage with her many times, I can tell you that what gets Hillary Clinton up in the morning – even in the face of tough odds – is exactly what sent her and Bill Clinton to sign up for their first campaign in Texas all those years ago; what sent her to work at the Children's Defense Fund and made her fight for health care as First Lady; what led her to the United States Senate and fueled her barrier-breaking campaign for the presidency – an unyielding desire to improve the lives of ordinary Americans, no matter how difficult the fight may be. And you can rest assured that when we finally win the battle for universal health care in this country, she will be central to that victory. When we transform our energy policy and lift our children out of poverty, it will be because she worked to help make it happen. Our party and our country are better off because of her, and I am a better candidate for having had the honor to compete with Hillary Rodham Clinton."

We're just saying.

In addition to HRC, we thought we'd provide our dark horse list of VP candidates for our faithful readers to chew on. For a conventional list of Democratic VP candidates, click here.

1) Missouri Senator Claire McCaskill: She is a two-year Senator just like Obama, a single-mother of seven years who recently got married with a blended family of nine children, and most importantly, is from the critical state of Missouri. She serves on the Senate Armed Services and Homeland Security committees. To read her full bio, click here. Remember, as Missouri goes, so goes the election. The state has voted for the eventual winner in every election since 1904 with the exception of 1956 (Eisenhower). According to the most recent Rasmussen poll, Obama is trailing Republican John McCain by 7%. But Missouri was a must-have state for Obama, stemming the tide of big states Clinton won on Super Tuesday during the primary. McCaskill, one of the earliest Obama supporters, helped deliver the state to Obama with the thinnest of margins. We know, we know, she's a woman and it would be a slap in the face to Hillary Clinton supporters. We think they would find McCaskill palpable. After all, McCaskill made history herself as the first woman ever elected to the Senate from Missouri.

2) Former Missouri Congressman Richard Gephardt: See above. Obama needs Missouri. Gephardt has been the face of Missouri politics for years, is well known nationally, ran for President before and represents the exact, union-friendly demographics Clinton so effectively won over. Obviously, he's been out of the political picture for some time consulting to DLA Piper and Goldman Sachs but we think he would be a smart choice, even if he's not on the short list.

3) New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg: It's a fight to the death for independents people! Who better to win them over than the man who was talking about starting an Independent Party to send the two-party system packing. Is there any better managerial experience than running New York? Rudy Giuliani would argue, "no." The former Republican has money, a name, and a lot of polling to back up his case as someone to be considered when he was pondering his own run for the White House.

4) Virginia Governor Tim Kaine: It's hard to call Kaine a dark horse because he has been on the short list for weeks, according to widespread reporting. But the Russia-Georgia situation and the resignation of Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf left many observers thinking Kaine was dead in the water because of his inexperience in foreign policy (he's a governor, duh) and entering his third year as a one-term governor (you only get one term in Virginia). But he was very, very good on Sunday's "Meet the Press", considered to be an audition for VP hopefuls. His attacks on McCain and counters to Karl Rove were effective. We think that performance may have revived his chances. He speaks fluent spanish and is significantly more conservative than Obama on the issue of abortion, which could help win over some conservative undecideds. Oh yeah, and Virginia is up for grabs (Rasmussen has it as a dead heat).

So who is it going to be? We'd love to hear your thoughts.