C-SPAN Asks Dems to Keep Talks Open

C-SPAN is begging Congress to let it record and televise the last phase of the health care bill’s journey, but Democrats seem intent on negotiating behind closed doors. C-SPAN’s CEO sent a letter to Democratic leaders asking them to open “all important negotiations” to cameras, pledging to “commit the necessary resources to covering all of the sessions LIVE in their entirety.”

Democrats want to negotiate behind closed doors because they’re afraid Republicans would throw up procedural hurdles in a formal conference committee. But as a candidate, Obama promised to hold all such conferences in the open, “bringing all parties together and broadcasting those negotiations on C-SPAN.” That evidently isn’t happening; the meetings began today, Robert Gibbs told Fox News. He said he hadn’t seen C-SPAN’s letter of request.
(More C-SPAN stories.)