A greater-than-expected US budget deficit and continuing recession woes led some US lawmakers Sunday to urge President Barack Obama to scale back his ambitious healthcare overhaul plan.
"I would advise the president that bringing up of the healthcare situation in the midst of recession... was a mistake," said Senator Richard Lugar, a Republican, on CNN's State of the Union talkshow.
"It's the economic malaise now this president has to concentrate on and he'll get support doing that," said Lugar, a senior GOP lawmaker.
"Let's clear the deck and try it again next year or in subsequent times," he said.
The suggestion that Obama trim his the sweeping healthcare reform plan -- or at least introduce it in stages -- came as the president's administration was poised to raise the 10-year US budget deficit forecast to about nine trillion dollars.
The forecast, an increase of about two trillion dollars over previous projections, was to be formally announced this week.
The rising tide of red ink has increased the pressure on the president to scale back plans to remake US healthcare -- including from political allies like Senator Joe Lieberman, an independent who generally votes with majority Democrats.
"I think it's a real mistake to try to jam through the total health insurance reform, healthcare reform plan that the public is either opposed to or of very, very passionate mixed minds about," Lieberman told CNN.
"He has got other fights to fight," Lieberman said, adding that in tackling the unwieldy health reform issue the president may have taken on one too many challenges.
"He's got climate change next domestically. He's got financial regulatory reform. He's got the war in Afghanistan," the Connecticut lawmaker said.
Lieberman told CNN that a piecemeal approach to healthcare reform would be better than one massive legislative package.
"Let's do the three-quarters and save the other quarter for a day when the economy is growing and maybe we've done something to turn down the deficit," he said.
Obama has watched his poll ratings dip sharply over recent months, in the face of stiff Republican attacks and mounting public concern over how to pay for the reform package.
A Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll last week found that 51 percent of those asked were very or fairly sure that Obama would bring real change to America -- down 10 points from February.
A Quinnipiac University poll this month suggested Obama's approval ratings had slumped to 50 percent, the lowest since his inauguration -- a reflection of growing unease about his handling of the economy.
Lieberman said a scaled-down health reform bill might still cover three-quarters of the reform items currently on the agenda.
As for the rest, "I'm afraid we've got to think about putting a lot of that off until the economy's out of recession," said Lieberman.
"There's no reason we have to do it all now," he said.
Copyright 2009 AFP American Edition
