All Blog Posts from Political Hotsheet

Updated at 4 p.m. ET with more information.

After a private meeting with the entire Senate Democratic caucus today, President Obama said he is "cautiously optimistic" the Senate will pass its health care bill.

"If the Senate knows what's in this bill, then this is going to pass because it's what's right for America," Mr. Obama said.

All of the Senate's Democrats were called to the White House to meet with Mr. Obama today after it became clear over the weekend that their latest efforts at moving health care reform forward were once again stalled. Mr. Obama said Congress must not let differences over certain elements of the bill defeat the entire effort.

"Let's be clear. The final bill won't include everything that everybody wants," he said. "We simply cannot allow differences… to prevent us from meeting our responsibility to solve a longstanding and urgent problem for the American people."

As recently as last week, the Senate appeared on the verge of passing its health care bill, after a group of key liberal and conservative Democrats worked out a plan to break the Senate stalemate over the public option. Instead of including a government-run insurance plan (or "public option") in the bill, they proposed allowing people ages 55 to 64 to buy into Medicare.

However, Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) -- one of the Democratic caucus members the plan was intended to appease -- dropped a bombshell Sunday on CBS News' "Face the Nation," when he said he would not vote for a bill that expands Medicare.

In spite of the ongoing debate, Mr. Obama said today the bill meets the criteria for reform he laid out at the beginning of the year: It is deficit-neutral, it slows down rising health care costs and expands coverage to tens of millions of people, he said.

"These are big changes," he said. "They will save money.. and they're going to save lives....That's why this reform has to pass on our watch."

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Radio host Laura Ingraham spoke at a conservative rally today in Washington to protest Senate health care reform efforts. She closed her remarks by appropriating a poem that evokes a lack of resistance on the part of German intellectuals to the Nazis during their rise to power.

After comparing House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid to Grinches "who stole health care," Ingraham offered a spin on the poem "First They Came," attributed to German pastor Martin Niemöller.

"First they came for the rich," Ingraham said. "And I did not speak out because I was not rich. Then they came for the property owners, and I did not speak out because I did not own property. Then they came for the right to bear arms, and I did not speak out because I was not armed. Then they came for me and denied me my medical care, and there was no one left to speak for me…"

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California Republican Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger told the Financial Times that the United States should try to be the "power" behind the effort to fight climate change – and in the process took a shot at former Alaska governor Sarah Palin, who has expressed skepticism over global warming science.

"America within 10 years could get 20 per cent of its power needs from renewables," Schwarzenegger said. "We have sun, wind - you can even now get oil from algae. There is a green revolution [in California] but the whole US could be leading like that."

As for Palin's comments on climate change – she wrote in a Washington Post op-ed suggesting that Americans should be skeptical of the overwhelming scientific consensus that global warming is real and man-made – the California governor had this to say: "You have to ask: what was she trying to accomplish? Is she really interested in this subject or is she interested in her career and in winning the [Republican presidential] nomination?"

Arnold: Environment, Economy Can Coexist

In other climate change news, dozens of major corporations -- among them Microsoft, Dow and Nike – have signed onto a letter urging President Obama to lead the way toward working out an international agreement to address climate change in Copenhagen.

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Senate Democrats appear ready to capitulate to Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) and abandon a plan to allow middle-aged Americans to buy into Medicare -- and the House of Representatives could go along with that, a Democratic leader said today.

The Senate has already largely given up on including a government-run insurance plan (or "public option") in its version of health care legislation, even though a public option is in the House version. Senate Democrats had hoped to include the Medicare buy-in in its place.

According to House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.), a health care bill without a public option -- or even a compromise plan including a Medicare buy-in -- could pass the House, CBS News Capitol Hill Producer Jill Jackson reports. Liberal members of the legislative body have been reticent to pass a bill without a public option or, at minimum, a compromise like the Medicare buy-in.

"My view is the guts of this bill, on both sides of the aisle, is the adding of some 30 million‑plus people to access to affordable, quality health care," Hoyer said. "That is the central impact of this bill."

He added, however, "We'll have to figure out what the Senate can pass, and then we'll have to look at it... In a world of alternatives, you've got to focus on what you can get."

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All President Obama wants for Christmas is a Senate-passed health care bill.

He really doesn't care what's in it, because he won't be signing it. The measure will then go into a House-Senate conference committee to produce the bill the president will sign, he hopes, early in the new year.

More than anything else on his legislative agenda, Mr. Obama has staked the prestiege of his presidency on getting a health care bill enacted that expands coverage to the uninsured and lessens the growth rate in the cost of health care.

But his push for health care is a sword that cuts both ways. If he fails to enact a bill, his supporters could take it out on Democrats in next year's midterm elections. And if the bill is seen as more burdensome and expensive than promised, voters could register their dissatisfaction next year on that score as well.

To read more about the process of passing the health care bill, check out CBSNews.com's Health Care Progress Report.

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Mark Knoller is a CBS News White House correspondent. You can read more of his posts in Hotsheet here. You can also follow him on Twitter here: http://twitter.com/markknoller.

With the clock ticking on Senate Democrats' efforts to draw up a health care bill they all can agree on before the end of the year, Senate leaders on Monday said they would commit to providing seniors with better prescription drug coverage through Medicare.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) promised to close the gap in Medicare prescription drug coverage called the "doughnut hole," meeting the top priority of the powerful senior lobbyist group AARP.

"Because I am committed to saving lives, saving money and saving Medicare, I am committed to fully closing [the coverage gap], once and for all," Reid said on the Senate floor, as the Washington Post reports. "The legislation we will send to President Obama for his signature will make good on his promise and ours to forever end this indefensible injustice for America's seniors."

Currently, Medicare beneficiaries only receive coverage for $2,700 worth of prescription drugs. Once they reach that limit, they are expected to pay for their own medicine until their expenses reach $6,154, when they start receiving coverage again.

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A poll released today by the Associated Press finds that many Americans believe that taking steps to slow global warming would create jobs and boost the economy, despite some Republicans' insistence that the opposite is true.

According to the poll results, 40 percent of the American public believes that efforts to reduce global warming pollution would create jobs, and 46 percent believe that addressing climate change would boost the economy. Less than one in three said taking steps to address global warming would hurt the economy and mean fewer jobs.

In addition, three in four say they would support some kind of climate change legislation. But they are unwilling to spend their own money to make it happen: a majority, 59 percent, said they would not support a cap-and-trade bill if it meant having to pay $10 more for electricity each month.

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Advocates for legalizing and taxing marijuana in California say they have gathered enough signatures to put the issue to voters.

A message on the Web site of the Tax and Regulate Initiative says advocates have the signatures to get the question of giving local governments the authority to legalize and tax marijuana onto the 2010 ballot.

Richard Lee, the primary backer of the effort, tells the San Francisco Chronicle that more than 680,000 signatures have been gathered, far more than the necessary 433,971. It reportedly cost $1 million to gather the signatures over two months, and the drive was overseen by a professional firm.

Lee is the owner of Oakland's Oaksterdam University and Coffeeshop Blue Sky, a pair of marijuana-related businesses. His campaign is planning to submit the signatures for verification to the California Secretary of State next month, with the aim of seeing the issue on the ballot next November.

A Gallup poll in October found that 44 percent of Americans support marijuana legalization, and a CBS News poll in July put that figure at 41 percent. Among Californians, according to a recent Field Poll, support for legalization stands at 56 percent.

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House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is among the seven finalists for Time's Person of the Year, Time managing editor Rick Stengel announced Monday.

"She's the first woman Speaker of the House, in some ways she may be the strongest Speaker of the House in decades," Stengel said. "She has piloted what is probably the most important legislation in decades through the House… She's a really, really interesting and pivotal figure."

Other finalists include Apple CEO Steve Jobs, Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke, the Chinese worker, Gen. Stanley McChrystal, Jamaican Olympic gold medalist Usain Bolt and President Obama. Obama was named Time's 2008 Person of the Year, but this does not disqualify him from winning this year. Stengel noted that past presidents, such as Franklin D. Roosevelt, have been named multiple times.

In the morning, President Obama will discuss the economic impact of energy saving home retrofits with labor, manufacturing, and small business leaders during remarks and a meeting at a Northern Virginia Home Depot store.

In the afternoon, the president will have lunch with business leaders in the Private Dining Room.

Later, Mr. Obama will meet with members of the Senate Democratic Caucus in the Eisenhower Executive Office Building. Following the meeting, the president will make a statement to the press in the Diplomatic Reception Room.

The president and Vice President Joe Biden will meet with Secretary of Defense Robert Gates in the Oval Office.

Here's the Full Schedule from the White House (all times Eastern):

10:45AM: President Obama holds a meeting to discuss the economic impact of energy saving home retrofits with labor, manufacturing, and small business leaders

11:10AM: President Obama delivers remarks on the economic impact of energy saving home retrofits

12:15PM: President Obama has lunch with business leaders

1:40PM: President Obama meets with members of the Senate Democratic Caucus

3:00PM: President Obama makes a statement to the press after meeting with Democratic Senators

4:45PM: President Obama and Vice President Biden meet with Secretary of Defense Gates