The Berwick Timeline

The White House and surrogates maintain that time was of the essence for Donald Berwick to start serving as Health Czar, and that left no choice but to make him a recess appointment -- no time for Congressional hearings and a vote in the Senate.

But consider this timeline:

• President Barack Obama took 495 days to nominate Berwick, and
• For the next 79 days, Democrats refused to hold a hearing for him.

So This is Donald Berwick

Instead of going the recess appointment route -- slinking into office when Congress is out of session -- perhaps Donald Berwick should have asked Queen Elizabeth for a job when she was in New York yesterday.

After all, Berwick gets misty-eyed when he contemplates the marvels of the British National Health care System.

In 2008 at the London Science Museum in Berwick said: "I fell in love with the NHS . . . . To an American observer, the NHS is such a seductress."

In 2005, Berwick said "I think the NHS is one of the great human health care endeavors on earth. It can be an example for the whole world, an example I must say the United States needs now more than most countries do.

Yeah, the NHS is such a seductress if you want to get the wrong limb amputated, or if you don't mind waiting months to see a doctor after finding a lump in your breast.

I can see know why the Obama administration sought to avoid Congressional hearings on Berwick. So many questions to ask him . . . where to begin.

And notwithstanding the administration's latest spin, Republicans never blocked his nomination. To the contrary, as Jake Tapper notes, Sen. Charles Grassley (R-Iowa) requested a confirmation hearing for Berwick to take place two weeks ago. Republicans are eager for this hearing; it is Democrats who don't want to Berwick on the evening news so close to midterm elections.

That's why they chose to slip him in as a recess appointment. So much for transparency.