From Hero to Goat

"The commitment to addressing global warming marks a shift for the White House, which critics say has consistently tried to undermine scientific evidence of the link between air pollution and disturbing trends in the environment."

But Klein writes that Bush's resistance to economy-wide caps on carbon dioxide emissions is galling to many members of Congress, "who argue that the time for voluntary programs has passed and that only swift, dramatic actions can avert catastrophic consequences. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi bluntly warned the president on Friday that lawmakers will act on global warming, with or without his help."

And it's not only Congress. Caroline Daniel writes for the Financial Times: "Ten of the biggest US companies, including Alcoa, General Electric and Lehman Brothers, will on Monday pile pressure on President George W. Bush to take more aggressive action on climate change.

"They will urge him to embrace a system of mandatory caps on greenhouse gas emissions designed to cut them by up to 30 per cent over the next 15 years."

H. Josef Hebert writes for the Associated Press that "when it comes to weaning the country away from oil, the president's critics say his rhetoric has not been matched by action."

Bush's Health-Care Proposal

Michael A. Fletcher writes in The Washington Post: "President Bush will propose a deep tax break for Americans who purchase their own medical insurance and would finance it with an unprecedented tax on a portion of high-priced health-care plans that workers receive from their employers, according to the White House.

"'Today, the tax code unfairly penalizes people who do not get health insurance through their job,' Bush said [in his radio address]. 'It unwisely encourages workers to choose overly expensive, gold-plated plans. The result is that insurance premiums rise and many Americans cannot afford the coverage they need.'"

Sheryl Gay Stolberg and Robert Pear write in the New York Times: "The basic concept is that employer-provided health insurance, now treated as a fringe benefit exempt from taxation, would no longer be entirely tax-free. Workers could be taxed if their coverage exceeded limits set by the government. But the government would also offer a new tax deduction for people buying health insurance on their own. . . .

"The proposed plan is a startling move for a president who has repeatedly vowed not to raise taxes. And it is certain to run into opposition from business groups, labor unions and, most of all, the Democrats who now run Capitol Hill."

In a nutshell, people with very expensive health plans would be penalized and people who don't have insurance now could buy it with tax-free dollars.

The biggest savings would go to people who could buy very low-cost health insurance, but deduct the full $7,500 per person (or $15,000 for family) anyway.

Who does that help? My insta-analysis suggests the new plan would create: