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McConnell's words sound like more of a threat than a promise, particularly to intransigent Republicans who might fear that a bipartisan bill would be far less palatable to them and to the GOP base.

But let's imagine there is something to McConnell's idea. What if he is able and willing to mobilize a coalition of Democrats and moderate Republicans such as Senator Susan Collins to fix the Affordable Care Act through subsidies and other reforms that stabilize the health insurance markets?

It has happened before.

One of President Ronald Reagan's biggest defeats early in his administration came on his proposal to cut Social Security benefits for early retirees. When he included this measure in his budget, congressional Democrats snapped to attention. Dejected after Reagan's 1980 victory over President Jimmy Carter, Democrats criticized Reagan for trying to slash the benefits that elderly Americans depended on.

But Reagan didn't back away forever. In 1982, Social Security was back on the agenda when experts warned that Franklin Delano Roosevelt's greatest legacy faced a massive budgetary imbalance in the near term that threatened the program. The government would be spending more on benefits every month than it was raising through payroll taxes.

Reagan, still stinging from his defeat, established a bipartisan commission to offer recommendations about how to fix the program. Reagan appointed Alan Greenspan to serve as the chairman of the 15-person commission. The panel, which had more Republicans than Democrats, reviewed every possible solution. Democrats like Claude Pepper of Florida warned that the commission was stacked with conservatives and would not produce anything that his side could accept.

And other Democrats warned that the commission would have trouble making recommendations that were acceptable to their party. After all, the GOP was the party of Reagan, who had repeatedly expressed his opposition to the basic structure of Social Security, as well as Medicare.

In the 1982 midterm elections that took place while the commission met, many House Democrats -- who picked up 26 seats -- ran on the saying that, "It's not fair . . . It's Republican" in reference to the Social Security plan and other conservative domestic policies. Democrats handed out bumper stickers that read, "Save Social Security -- vote Democratic."

The commission came back with a recommendation to put the program on sound footing. The report "rejected proposals to make the Social Security program a voluntary one." But there were concerns that partisan pressures would sink the commission's recommendations.

Greenspan's panel proposed increasing Social Security revenues by taxing a larger number of employees, accelerating tax rates, taxing some Social Security benefits, delaying cost of living adjustments and more. Reagan expressed his support for their recommendations, saying, "Well, sometimes, even here in Washington, the cynics are wrong. Through compromise and cooperation, the members of the commission overcame their differences."

Dole argued that "Through a combination of relatively modest steps, including some acceleration of already scheduled taxes and some reduction in the rate of future benefit increases, the system can be saved." He added that "When it is, much of the credit, rightfully, will belong to this President and his party."

Other than a long break on January 8 to watch the Washington Redskins compete in the NFL playoffs, the negotiations were nonstop. In the end, both sides agreed that the final deal had to inflict some political pain on both parties -- that was the only way it could work. They reached a deal on January 15.

The administration found support from such congressional Democrats as Speaker Tip O'Neill who was eager to join the president in this effort to save a key part of the social safety net.

Congress eventually passed legislation that raised the payroll tax, raised the retirement age from 65 to 67, delayed the cost of living adjustment for six months and required government workers to pay for Social Security. The Social Security Amendments of 1983, a $168 billion package, remain a landmark moment in the history of the program. It made the program solvent for several more decades.

Reagan said the legislation "demonstrates for all time our nation's ironclad commitment to Social Security." He continued, "It assures the elderly that America will always keep the promises made in troubled times a half a century ago. It assures those who are still working that they, too, have a pact with the future."

In 2017, repeating this success with health care seems almost inconceivable. The polarization in Washington has become so much worse that it is hard to imagine the two parties coming together on any issue of this significance.

House Republicans who are part of the Freedom Caucus and their allies in the Senate will have little appetite to join Democrats on any initiative. Shifting to the center feels to them like the ultimate act of political betrayal. Any Republican willing to sign on to such a deal would face great political risks back home. Repealing Obamacare has been so important symbolically that compromising on this question could be politically disastrous for Republican members of Congress.

Democrats will likewise have little appetite to hand President Trump a victory of this sort. The utter failure of Republicans to deliver on repealing the ACA, with the realization that much of the program is far more popular than conservatives believed it to be, has been one of the main rallying points for the Democratic Party. Continuing to hammer away on this issue, rather than giving Republicans a victory, could be critical to success in the 2018 election, allowing them to both save the program and regain control of the House. So why compromise right now?

And both parties must grapple with the reality that millions of Americans who now have health coverage are likely facing rising costs.

Yet maybe the politics will move Washington in the most unexpected of directions. Perhaps McConnell will see that bipartisanship might in fact offer his party the best way to save itself on health care and to move on to more appetizing issues, such as cutting taxes for business and investors. This could be a legacy-making moment for him as a congressional leader, even if there are big short-term political costs.

For Trump, it could allow him to finally claim a domestic victory and give some credence to the notion that he is a maverick. Should he defy the conservative Republicans, he might come out of this with more leverage to move the party on other issues.

Democrats could break the lock that Tea Party Republicans have had on Capitol Hill since 2010 and create a precedent for other sorts of alliances, such as a deal on rebuilding infrastructure, that go against the conventional wisdom. Republicans who locked in march step with the conservative caucus would know that the possibility of bipartisanship was a real option.

Democrats face the real risk that if gridlock prevents Congress from fixing the program, the costs of premiums will continue to rise and more insurers will pull out of health care markets, leaving the party to shoulder the responsibility of these problems. Instead, through a deal, the Democrats could come out of this bruising battle with a new and improved ACA.

In entering this alliance, they could save a health care program that is central to their party's recent rule, and offer ongoing evidence -- in the midterms and the next presidential election -- of what they can accomplish when they are in power.

The President could immediately generate some good press coverage by creating a bipartisan commission to offer recommendations for fixing the ACA.

The odds of any of this happening are slim. Intense partisan polarization is not some imaginary force in national politics -- it defines our era.

Yet every now and then, as the nation saw in 1983, both parties can find a way to join hands with the opposition in ways that benefit both of their interests and help citizens achieve more security in their lives.

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How GOP could make health care deal with Democrats - CNN

WASHINGTON The congressional midterm elections are still 16 months away, but that hasnt stopped a growing number of Democratic candidates with military experience from starting their bids for office.

So many veterans are reaching out to us now, we have to start early, said Jon Soltz, chairman of the left-leaning VoteVets.org. In the past, we might get moving after the primaries. But this cycle, were setting the pace early.

At least 15 veterans have already announced their intention to run against Republican incumbents in 2018, a sizable number for the minority party this early in the election cycle.

While Democrats have boasted several high-profile veteran wins in recent years including Sen. Tammy Duckworth of Illinois and Rep. Seth Moulton of Massachusetts roughly three quarters of the 100-plus veterans in Congress are Republicans. Of the 27 Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans in Congress, 20 are Republicans.

That image of military members as conservative lawmakers is one Democrats would like to change in coming cycles, especially as issues of national security remain at the forefront of voters priorities.

We need to build up that piece of the party, Soltz said. When people talk about Democrats, they talk about labor, they talk about womens groups, they talk about environmentalists. We need them to talk about veterans that way, too.

Were looking for that respect.

Earlier this year, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee announced plans to work closely with Soltzs group to help identify and promote those left-leaning veteran candidates.

Of the 11 veterans VoteVets.org is backing for the 2018 cycle already, eight are in districts that the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee has identified as winnable swing districts. Soltz said the next step is to help those individuals gain money, recognition and experience before the new years intensifying campaign arrives.

Meanwhile, Moulton (who VoteVets.org endorsed in his 2014 and 2016 bids for Congress) drew more attention to the issue last month when he announced plans to early endorse eight veteran Democrats, saying that his party needs a genuinely new message and a new generation of leadership.

His Serve America political action committee has a stated goal of supporting veteran candidates who will put country ahead of politics and bring new perspective to gridlocked Capitol Hill.

Thats a theme that has been echoed on both sides of the aisle in recent years. In April, Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz. and arguably Congress most well-known veteran, said in a CNN interview that he believes younger veterans could help restore civility in politics, because of a common bond and respect thats lacking among many lawmakers today.

The overall number of veterans in Congress has dropped steadily for decades, with only about 19 percent of elected lawmakers having military experience today. That figure was more than 70 percent in the 1970s.

Still, only about 9 percent of the American population ever served in the ranks, making veterans overrepresented in Congress compared to the voting public.

How many of the early-entry candidates can even survive their own party primaries remains unclear.

Last month, Army veteran Randy Bryce drew headlines when he announced plans to challenge House Speaker Paul Ryan for Wisconsins 1st Congressional District. The steelworker and former military policeman has ample support among his party base but faces a long-shot bid to unseat one of the best-known and most powerful members of Congress.

Marine Corps veteran Doug Applegate narrowly missed upsetting longtime California Republican Rep. Darrell Issa in 2016, and has rolled last years campaign into one continuous run for 2018.

Soltz said hes also closely watching (and supporting) Navy veteran Mikie Sherrills bid for New Jerseys 11th district (retirement rumors have swirled around incumbent Republican Rep. Rodney Frelinghuysen) and Marine Corps veteran Dan McCreadys bid for North Carolinas 9th district (where Rep. Robert Pittenger easily won in 2016 but presidential candidate Hillary Clinton performed well).

VoteVets.org officials said to expect more names of endorsed veteran candidates in coming months.

Leo Shane III covers Congress, Veterans Affairs and the White House for Military Times. He can be reached at lshane@militarytimes.com.

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Veteran Democrats already targeting the 2018 elections - Military Times

Democrats can take advantage of the unpopularity of Donald Trump and the Republican Congress to win midterms in 2018.

First, replace Nancy Pelosi as the House Democratic leader. She has become a symbol of her party's poor showing at the polls.

Get more candidates out in "red" states and rural areas where Republicans have succeeded in recent years. Democrats have failed to connect with these voters. One exception is U.S. Rep. Cheri Bustos of Illinois, who won her district by more than 20 points when Trump beat Clinton in the same area by the same margin. She spent time with voters, and it paid off.

Next, show some courage to support liberal causes. One very important issue is single-payer health insurance. Another is national paid family leave. Rejoin the fight against global warming. Support raising taxes on the top 1 percent. With some exceptions, the super rich are money hoarders, not "job creators," as Republicans claim. They park trillions in offshore banks to avoid taxes.

Democrats have to vote in greater numbers. Their failure in the last election was a major reason Trump won. Progressives often don't vote if they don't get the exact candidate they want. This has to change. Republicans vote in greater numbers, which is why they win.

Democrats can succeed in the 2018 midterms, but they must show backbone and determination to do so.

Larry L. Brown Glen Carbon

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Democrats have opportunity to regain seats in midterm elections - STLtoday.com

President Trump has performed a service of sorts to our debate over how the United States views itself and its role in the world. He has reminded the democratic left and the democratic right note the small d that they share more common ground than they often realize about the importance of democracy, the gifts of modernity, and the value of pluralism.

Trump has done this by articulating, fitfully and inconsistently, a dark worldview rooted in nationalism, authoritarianism, discomfort with ethnic and religious differences, and a skepticism about the modern project. He did this again during a European visit that was disconcerting both for what Trump said and for the isolation of the United States within the very West whose cause the president claims to champion.

His lack of constancy makes it difficult to judge exactly what he believes. We commonly describe his contradictions as the product of administration power struggles between Stephen K. Bannon and Stephen Miller, the populist nationalists, and Jim Mattis and H.R. McMaster, the representatives of a more conventional approach to foreign policy.

On the days when Trump pledges allegiance to NATO and our allies, we see Defense Secretary Mattis and national security adviser McMaster as winning. When Trump veers off this course by dissing allies and going rhetorically apocalyptic, we declare senior White House aides Bannon and Miller triumphant.

Optimists about Trump insist that the grown-ups, as Mattis and McMaster are often somewhat obnoxiously described by old foreign policy hands, will eventually limit the damage the president can cause us. The last several days should push them toward reappraising their hopefulness.

Trumps European trip, including his meeting with Vladimir Putin, was always going to be a high-wire act, given the presidents unpredictability and his allergy to briefing books. For Trump, everything is personal, which means hes subject to being easily played. Foreign leaders know that flattering him is the way to his heart - the Chinese and Saudis seemed to have understood this well and that his deepest commitments appear to be to his business interests.

But to the extent that Trump does have a gut instinct about the world, it seems closer to Bannons. The presidents spontaneous outbursts, his Twitter revelations, and his reactions to individual foreign leaders point Bannons way.

Trump has spoken with far greater affection for Putin, Saudi princes and the right-wing nationalists now in power in Poland than for democratic pluralists such as Germanys Angela Merkel and Frances Emmanuel Macron. At the Group of 20 summit, in fact, both Merkel and Macron sounded more like post-World War II American presidents than Trump did.

And the ambiguity about what Trump said during his two-hour meeting with Putin about Russian meddling in the 2016 election (the administration denied that Trump had accepted Putins denials, as Russia claimed, but its own account of what Trump actually did tell him was hardly reassuring) only underscored the presidents reluctance to confront the Russian leader on anything. Trump gave Putin exactly what he wanted was the headline on a commentary in the New York Times by Russian writer and dissident Masha Gessen. It was hard to deny its truth.

In his speech in Poland on Thursday, Trump did commit himself to the Western alliance, but in an otherwise gloomy, backward-looking and Manichaean address.

The fundamental question of our time is whether the West has the will to survive, Trump said. Do we have the desire and the courage to preserve our civilization in the face of those who would subvert and destroy it? If we fail to defend what our ancestors passed down to us, Trump warned, it will never, ever exist again.

To which one might respond: Yikes! Trumps words were remarkably similar to Bannons pronouncements in a speech to a traditionalist Catholic group in Rome in 2014. Bannon spoke of a Judeo-Christian West that finds itself in a crisis and confronts a new barbarity that will completely eradicate everything that weve been bequeathed over the last 2,000, 2,500 years.

This dire view should remind the democratic left and the democratic right that while they have disagreed on many aspects of American foreign policy over the past two decades, they share some deep allegiances. These include a largely positive assessment of what the modern world has achieved; a hopeful vision of what could lie before us; a commitment to democratic norms as the basis of our thinking about the kind of world we seek; and a belief that ethnic pluralism and religious pluralism are to be celebrated, not feared.

They also see alliances with fellow democracies as serving us better than pacts with autocratic regimes that cynically tout their devotion to traditional values as cover for old-fashioned repression and expansionism.

Democrats have many incentives for opposing Trump. But its Republicans who have the power that comes from controlling Congress. Their willingness to stand up to a president of their own party could determine the future of democracy and pluralism. He is, alas, a man whose commitment to these values we have reason to doubt, and his European jaunt did nothing to calm those fears.

Read more from E.J. Dionnes archive, follow him on Twitter or subscribe to his updates on Facebook.

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Trump has done a big favor for small-d democrats left and right - Washington Post

Only in Washington, D.C., will you find politicians so wrapped up in themselves, their party, crazed ideology, or something that they will not come together to pass legislation for the sake and safety of the American people.

Even though the House managed to pass two common sense, safety-focused bills on June 29, it is beyond comprehension that most Democrats voted against Kate's Law and the No Sanctuary for Criminals Act. The GOP did have a handful of rogue nays, but very few in comparison.

Whatever they were thinking, it had little to do with safety and security of Americans. Leftists do their best to hoodwink normal Americans into accepting their San Francisco-style values like the absurd presumption that it is moral to break federal immigration law and shelter those who illegally cross our borders instead of following the rule of law to protect U.S. citizens.

A little background on the two bills. Lawmakers introduced Kate's Law after an illegal immigrant killed a beautiful, young San Francisco woman named Kate Steinle. Although her killer, Juan Francisco Lopez-Sanchez, had a lengthy list of felony convictions and multiple deportations, sanctuary city policies meant the San Francisco Sheriff's Department would not honor a detainer issued by U.S. Immigration and Customs. Sheriff officials said they found no active warrant for his arrest, so rather than contacting ICE to pick him up, they released him and the rest is history.

The San Francisco which Lopez-Sanchez found sanctuary in, Miss Steinle did not. Kate's Law serves to enforce immigration laws already on the books, imposing mandatory minimum prison sentences for lawbreakers like Lopez-Sanchez should they re-enter the U.S. after deportation.

The No Sanctuary for Criminals Act cuts off federal grant money to safe harbor cities and forces sanctuary city leadership to take responsibility for their actions, opening the way for victims of illegal immigrant crimes to sue.

You would never know it from the uproar by the left, but we are only talking about illegal immigration, not legal immigration, albeit Washington Democrats and their corporate media sidekicks have an astonishingly tough time differentiating between the two.

The left's obsession with protecting lawbreakers at taxpayers' expense is baffling.Taxpayers in San Francisco are set to foot the bill for a $190,000 lawsuit brought by an illegal immigrant who sued because a police officer had the audacity to obey federal immigration laws and report his whereabouts to ICE, reports CBS's KPIX-TV.

It comes as no surprise that a Harvard-Harris Poll survey taken earlier this year found that 80 percent of voters surveyed reject sanctuary cities because they believe "local authorities should have to comply with the law by reporting to federal agents the illegal immigrants they come into contact with."

Regardless of surveys or polls or public opinion, Senate Democrats will try to defeat these two bills using the lame excuse they have already raised that supporting this legislation might somehow ramp up fear in the immigrant community.

Apparently, there is nothing more petrifying than obeying the law.

Democrats' fear of ramping up fear in the immigrant community is misdirected. They should instead focus on the fact that besides the Almighty, the only thing Democrats should fear is themselves. They alone are responsible for the mess they are in and the chaos they have created.

It would be nice to believe Senate Democrats will set aside their partisanship and emotions long enough to do what's right by the American people to vote "yes" on this legislation. But, if history is a prognosticator, don't hold your breath.

So, with countenances drawn and somber defeat on their faces, Democrats will march lockstep into the 2018 midterm elections as weak on crime and weedy on principles as ever.

2017 Susan Stamper Brown Susan lives in Alaska and writes about culture, politics and current events. She is a regular contributor to Townhall, The Christian Post and Right Wing News. Susan's nationally syndicated column is published in scores of newspapers and publications across the U.S.She writes about politics, culture and media and was selected as one of America's 50 Best Conservative writers for 2015 and 2016. Contact her by Facebook or at writestamper@gmail.com.

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Susan Stamper Brown: Lefty Democrats won't vote to protect America - Tulsa World