At Today's Health Care Summit, President Barack Obama Alone Spoke for More Time (122 Minutes) than All Republicans Combined (111 Minutes) While Other Democrats Racked Up Another 135 Minutes Today, According to CNN
CNN reports that the Democrats used 70% of the overall speaking time, more than double (257 minutes) the speaking time afforded to the Republicans (111 minutes), as the GOP speakers came in at under two hours of total time while the Democrats totaled over four hours. CNN reports its findings on speaking time at the Health Care Summit:
Washington (CNN) – Thursday’s health care summit at Blair House was billed as an opportunity for members of both parties to share their proposals for reform, but one party had far more time to put forth their ideas.
A CNN analysis of the meeting shows that Democrats – including President Obama, who helmed the meeting – were granted more than twice the amount speaking time as Republicans.
Democrats spoke for a total of 135 minutes while President Obama spoke for 122 minutes, for a total of 257 minutes. Republicans, meanwhile, spoke for just 111 minutes, about 30 percent of the total speaking time.
The lack of equal time was an issue early in the health care summit when Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky) complained about the lack of balance in speaking time and Obama quipped that his speaking time “doesn’t count” towards the equal division of time “because I’m the President”. That dustup between McConnell and Obama over equal time at the summit may form part of the media narrative in the post-summit environment.
CNN’s David Gergen, a centrist who has advised four Presidents of both parties, had glowing praise for the GOP, stating that today was the “best day they’ve had in years” and explained that the various claims that the GOP had no ideas or policy knowledge were put to rest today as new blood in the GOP, such as House Rep. Paul Ryan, performed very well in the debates with Obama and the Democrats. Gergen concluded his remarks by stating that while the Democrats had done better in the afternoon, the GOP “evened the score and kept it even.” If mainstream media coverage follows the lead of centrist analysts like Gergen, the health care summit may end up being the day that Obamacare died but for the time being Democrats have set a new deadline for passing Obamacare by the end of March.
NOTE: CNN has updated their numbers on the minutes for each party, and that update was reflected in changes to this article.
