RSC, Tuesday Group look for common ground
By Molly K. Hooper
Posted: 04/25/09 10:28 AM [ET]
Centrist House Republicans Mark Kirk (R-Ill.) and Charlie Dent (R-Pa.) beamed as they emerged from the Capitol Visitor Center conference room Wednesday after speaking at the weekly luncheon of their conservative colleagues.
On that particular occasion the co-chairman of the Tuesday Group, a centrist sect within the GOP conference, began what is likely to be the first of many dialogues on health care with members of the Republican Study Committee (RSC).
“It went very well in there,” Kirk said as Dent nodded in agreement.
RSC Chairman Tom Price (R-Ga.) explained that despite disagreements, most notably over hot-button social issues such as abortion, there are many areas where centrists and conservatives get along.
“The whole area of healthcare is one area that they’ve talked about and we’ve talked about and I doubt there’s any significant difference at all,” Price said.
Historically, the intra-party caucuses at both ends of the ideological spectrum have caused heartburn for their leadership on a range of issues. Lately, centrist Democrats have forced negotiation on measures mandating states to pay for children’s health care and government funding of embryonic stem cell research.
But given their smaller numbers, both GOP factions are trying to make an effort to put those differences aside in the interest of GOP unity.
The two groups have already begun working together. The more than 100 RSC members and approximately 30 members of the Tuesday Group joined forces several weeks ago, calling on President Obama to sign free trade legislation left over from the Bush administration.
RSC member Rep. Jo Bonner (R-Ala.) was optimistic about working together with his more liberal GOP colleagues.
“They were basically throwing out some introductory numbers to us that will be very useful as we get into the heart of the healthcare discussions - and that is if you talk to folks in Britain, Canada they’ll tell you that the system that we’re thinking about emulating, is not all that great,” Bonner told the Hill following the meeting.
The Tuesday Group co-chairmen said that they are in the drafting phase of legislation at the moment but they traded ideas with RSC members as both groups prepare their legislation.
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