Progressive Breakfast: Short Stack Edition

Today's Breakfast will be a short one, as I am currently at the Netroots Nation conference

Obama does Montana town hall today, then Colorado tomorrow.

NY Times lays definitive smackdown on "death panel" smear: "...the rumor — which has come up at Congressional town-hall-style meetings this week in spite of an avalanche of reports laying out why it was false — was not born of anonymous e-mailers, partisan bloggers or stealthy cyberconspiracy theorists. Rather, it has a far more mainstream provenance, openly emanating months ago from many of the same pundits and conservative media outlets that were central in defeating President Bill Clinton’s health care proposals 16 years ago, including the editorial board of The Washington Times, the American Spectator magazine and Betsy McCaughey, whose 1994 health care critique made her a star of the conservative movement (and ultimately, New York’s lieutenant governor)."

Grassley claims Baucus caucus is dropping "provisions dealing with end-of-life care," reports NYT

Swampland's Amy Sullivan reminds Grassley and other conservatives they voted for end-of-life counseling under Bush.

President Clinton gives political tutoriall on health care to skittish congresspeople in Netroots Nation address. HuffPost: "I'm telling you no matter how low they drive support for this with misinformation, the minute the president signs a health care reform bill his approval will go up. Secondly, within a year, when all those bad things they say will happen don't happen, and all the good things happen, approval will explode."

NYT looks at congressional resistance to cost-cutting Medicare commission: "Mr. Obama’s proposal has been welcomed by health economists and fiscal hawks eager to reduce the federal budget deficit and slow the growth of Medicare. But the proposal has received a cool reception in Congress. Many lawmakers say Mr. Obama’s proposal would take away their power to set Medicare payment policies, which may involve, for example, steering extra payments to rural hospitals and teaching hospitals."

Four Dem Senators seek to scrap climate bill for the year: Lincoln, Conrad, Dorgan and Ben Nelson.

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