Obama heads to Ohio looking for health care votes

WASHINGTON (AP) — Still seeking votes for his proposed health care overhaul, President Barack Obama appears ready to reverse his position and allow unpopular deal-sweetening measures in the hopes of finding Democratic support for legislation whose future will be decided in coming days.

Increasingly eager to finish work on his top domestic priority, Obama was set to head to northeast Ohio on Monday with a final sales pitch for health care legislation that the top Democratic vote-counter in the House said lacked support to pass. Obama's top political adviser, David Axelrod, said he was "absolutely confident" the measure would pass during a make-or-break week that already saw the president delay his trip to Indonesia, Australia and Guam.

"This is the week where we will have this important vote," White House press secretary Robert Gibbs said. "I do think this is the climactic week for health care reform."

Clinching support, though, might require Obama to back away from his insistence that senators purge the legislation of a number of lawmakers' special deals.

Taking a new position, Axelrod said the White House only objects to state-specific arrangements, such as an increase in Medicaid funding for Nebraska, ridiculed as the "Cornhusker Kickback." That's being cut, but provisions that could affect more than one state are OK, Axelrod said.

That means deals sought by senators from Montana and Connecticut would be fine — even though Gibbs last week singled them out as items Obama wanted removed. There was resistance, however, from two committee chairman, Democratic Sens. Max Baucus of Montana and Chris Dodd of Connecticut, and the White House has apparently backed down.

Axelrod said the principles the White House wants to apply include "Are these applicable to all states? Even if they do not qualify now, would they qualify under certain sets of circumstances?"