Let’s get ready to rumble! Or compromise. Whichever.

It’s on! Eric Cantor, on Fox News just now, made it official: Count Republicans in.

Cantor had written a letter with John Boehner yesterday to the White House, apparently laying down some preconditions for attending the White House’s health care summit. But on Fox, Cantor said Republicans would “absolutely” be showing up.

The obvious question is whether this is a good thing or a bad thing.  And the answer is… Who knows?

It could be a brilliant maneuver to publicly expose Republican obstructionism and unseriousness.

It could be political cover for replacing the already crappy Senate bill with an even more godawful “bipartisan compromise” bill which makes Republicans, PhRMA and insurance companies happy and everyone else sick.

It could even be a hopelessly naive and deluded attempt to find common ground with the people who have been saying “NO!” to health care reform for the past year.

Any one of those scenarios could be the reason for the health care summit, but there’s no way to tell which one actually is until the event unfolds.  Obama’s history shows us a corporate doormat at best and a facilitator at worst, and he continues to appear disengaged from health care reform.  But it also shows him talking tough about obstruction in the SOTU, and used a televised meeting with Republicans to make them look like fools (a practice run, perhaps?).  All suggestive, but not conclusive.

If I had to bet, I’d put my money on one of the bad scenarios because they’re supported by a much larger body of work.  But I don’t think it’s a slam-dunk, especially if Obama’s finally starting to realize how much political trouble he’s in.  So I’m just going to hold off on cheering, screaming, or shaking my head about this summit until I have a concrete reason to.

(photo: mathowie)

The Hill posted a draft of the jobs bill that will presumably get a vote in the Senate this week. There’s no cost estimate attached to it, but this isn’t all that much of a bill, so I’d imagine that it comes in lower than the $80 billion dollar price tag.

Reading through the draft, the big measure here is the job creation tax credit, which comes in two forms – payroll tax forgiveness for new employees, and a business credit for retaining individuals hired in 2010, essentially an incentive to hire now. In addition, there are extensions for unemployment benefits and the 65% COBRA subsidy from the stimulus, allowing laid-off workers to retain their current health insurance at a reduced rate. The third big element relates to spending on infrastructure projects, through both renewing the Highway Trust Fund and some new allocations to do with transportation.

And that’s mainly it. The usual Christmas tree ornaments of attachments to large bills are included, such as various tax extenders from last year, cuts to capital gains taxes for small business, disaster relief, extending the Medicare “doc fix” for seven more months, and low-income housing credits. Finally, adding to the mop-up of earlier bills, believe it or not, the jobs bill includes an extension of provisions for the Patriot Act. It’s on page 125:

(a) USA PATRIOT IMPROVEMENT AND REAUTHORIZATIONACTOF2005. Section 102(b)(1) of the USA PATRIOT Improvement and Reauthorization Act of 2005 (Public Law 109–177; 50 U.S.C. 1805 note, 50 U.S.C. 1861 note, and 50 U.S.C. 1862 note) is amended by striking ‘‘February 28, 2010’’ and inserting ‘‘December 31, 2010’’.

It’s a 10-month extension, stuck into an unrelated bill.

There are a variety of revenue raisers in here as well, including taxing foreign-held assets and trusts in the US, and the exclusion of “black liquor” created by paper mills from alternative fuel tax credits. The latter was a revenue item in the health care bill, so if that passes here, lawmakers would have to find a different revenue item or lose about $20 billion.

Outside of being a convenient piece of legislation to use for passing unrelated items, I’m not exactly seeing the utility of a jobs bill that has very little in the way of job creation. There’s a tax cut, some necessary extension of safety-net spending, and infrastructure investment that might create a few more construction projects. That’s not even a sliver of the jobs agenda Democrats unveiled last week.

UPDATE: Working not off a draft but Reid’s statement on the floor today, Chris Bowers sees this bill as having substantially less public spending than what passed the House; about $55 billion dollars, to be exact.

Wait, let's get the chalk... (photo: Chris Blakeley via Flickr)

For those who are fascinated by watching slow motion train wrecks, the Obama White House is giving a demonstration. The trick is to pretend the other side wants to play a nice game with fair rules and not to notice while they’re destroying you.

Lesson No. 45,783 consists of the predictable Republican Response to Obama’s invitation to have a civilized discussion of health care reform options.

As I understand Obama’s proposal, our side, ineptly represented by people who don’t really represent us or what they promised and we wanted, and their side, ably represented by unprincipled barbarians, will meet at the White House, discuss the merits of Joe Lieberman’s ideas to, uh, “save” the city and the barbarians’ ideas to ransack it. Then Congress will vote on something between what we didn’t want and what the barbarians demand, and both sides will take the result to the American people.

Sounds very democratic, and very stupid.

The Republican/barbarian response, demanding the White House unilaterally abandon the Congressional health reform plans already passed and promise not to use the Democratic majority to pass anything, is equivalent to demanding that the besieged White House lower the drawbridge, drain the moat and invite the invading hordes into the city. Now that’s audacity of hope!

The White House press secretary promptly put out a statement saying, the WH doesn’t want to give up on the idea of saving the city, but it will think about it.

For those of you who don’t understand multi- or non-dimensional chess, this is how it works.

Obama offers to sit down and play chess.

The Republicans bring a sledge hammer down on the table; there will be no rules except force, they say.

Obama again offers to sit down and play chess.

Republicans say Obama is coddling terrorists.

Obama again offers to sit down and play chess.

Republicans threaten to kill the jobs bills.

Obama offers to sit down and play checkers, he takes black, starts with only two pieces.

Republicans threaten to kill financial reform.

Obama suggests a game of hopscotch.

Republicans throw the chalk in the river, vote “no” on funding sidewalks.

Obama . . .