Rep. Peter Roskam (R., Ill.) was metaphor man at today’s health-care summit. As the Los Angeles Times points out, Roskam compared Obamacare to something thrown in “the microwave” or drawn on an “Etch A Sketch.” Here’s more:
Roskam, who worked with Obama in the Illinois Senate, suggested that the president had not come to Blair House to work out a compromise with the GOP. Instead, Roskam said, the president wanted to know, “What is it going to take for you Republicans to vote for my bill?”
The bill, he said, was like a microwaved dish with “a little salt, a little pepper, with some Republican bread crumbs on top.” But, he said, the bill’s unpopularity with the GOP and the public wasn’t Obama’s fault, that Obama had sold the bill the best he could.
“This is a problem with the message,” he said, “not a problem with the messenger.” His constituents, he said, had turned against the bill the more they heard about it. “They listened and they listened and they listened,” Roskam said. “In my district, they’ve become increasingly disappointed with what they’ve seen come out of this process.”