President Obama sounded a note of optimism about the economy in his speech on financial regulation today, declaring that “the storms of the past two years are beginning to break.” It appears, however, that that may not be true for the poorest Americans. For them, in fact, the worst of the storms may be yet to come.

A report issued late last week by the Brookings Institution projects that the national poverty rate will continue to climb because of the recession, peaking at 14.4 percent in 2011 or 2012 — up from 12.5 percent in 2007 — as more people are thrown out of work. That means another 8 million people could be thrown into poverty, in addition to the 37 million people who were poor in 2007.

Don’t look to Brookings for any “light at the end of the tunnel” rhetoric. “This recession will cast a long shadow on those at the bottom of the ladder — a group that was not doing well before the recession arrived and which will be disproportionately affected long after it has ended,” the report stated.

The message has been sent: President Obama is deliberately not ruling out a Democrats-only strategy to break the deadlock on health care.

At an online “strategy session” this afternoon sponsored by Organizing for America — formerly the grass-roots mobilization arm of his presidential campaign — Obama promised to move ahead on a health care overhaul “one way or another,” regardless of whether the Senate Finance Committee can reach an agreement that can win the support of three Senate Republicans.

Responding to a question about whether the bipartisan talks are doing any good, Obama said he wants “a good product that includes some Republican ideas.” But, he added, “I have no control over what the other side decides is its political strategy. My commitment to the American people is, we’re going to get this done one way or another.”

Liberal Democrats and progressive groups have been increasingly frustrated at how far the Obama administration, and particularly Senate Finance Chairman Max Baucus of Montana, have been going to win Republican support — especially if the effort means getting rid of a proposed government-run health plan to compete with private insurers. They’ve noted that even Sen. Charles E. Grassley of Iowa, one of the three Republicans Baucus has been negotiating with, has said he might not support a deal if it can’t get substantial GOP support — a remark that has convinced them the Republicans aren’t negotiating in good faith.

President Obama will host the entire Senate Democratic caucus for lunch at the White House Tuesday in what's likely to include a renewed pitch for his health care overhaul and an appeal to refinance the popular "cash for clunkers" program.

White House press secretary Robert Gibbs on Monday said the gathering was in lieu of Democrats' customary weekly Senate caucus lunch on Capitol Hill and predicted a wide-ranging discussion before the chamber breaks for its August recess.

The gathering will be "to continue to talk about the priorities that they have . . . I don't doubt health care will be discussed . . . the economy will be discussed," Gibbs said.

One front-burner issue is the cash for clunkers program, which was left in limbo after the House on Friday passed a bill (HR 3435) to transfer $2 billion to the program from renewable energy loan guarantees in the stimulus bill enacted earlier this year (PL 111-5). The money would be available until the end of fiscal 2010.

Though Republicans portray climate change legislation as a costly energy tax that would cost families thousands of dollars a year, the worsening economy and budget woes in dozens of states are increasing chances the Senate will enact a bill this year.

The White House is hoping billions of dollars worth of free emissions allowances that would be part of a cap-and-trade system will persuade undecided senators to support the bill, which is one of its top domestic priorities.

The climate change bill (HR 2454) the House passed on June 26 would distribute allowances from 2012 to 2025 to each state to protect consumers from energy price hikes, help utilities and other industries transition to clean energy and to spur conservation efforts and new technologies.

Analysts say if the allowances are incorporated into a House-Senate compromise, they could deliver between $120 billion and $330 billion worth of assistance to states, which would have substantial leeway to spend the money as they see fit. The largesse could prove to be a potent enticement at a time when national unemployment stands at 9.5 percent and many states are experiencing even higher jobless rates.

President Obama continues to enjoy strong public approval ratings in virtually every category, except when it comes to spending and the deficit.

And though White House strategists swear they don't fixate on day-to-day blips in public opinion, they surely are concerned that the administration's budget proposals are projected to swell the deficit above $1.8 trillion this fiscal year -- a record in dollar terms and also the biggest deficit as a percentage of the gross domestic product since the end of World War II.

So it was hardly coincidence that Obama on Tuesday took a high-profile vow of fiscal responsibility by calling for a return to statutory "pay-as-you-go" treatment for legislation. The deficit-control rules were first written into law in the Budget Enforcement Act of 1990 (PL 101-508), but Republicans who controlled Congress for most of the current decade allowed them to lapse at the end of fiscal 2002, preferring to require offsets for new entitlement spending but not for tax cuts.

When Senate Finance Chairman Max Baucus laughs, you know President Obama and Congress don’t have their health care plan locked down yet.

This afternoon, Obama met at the White House with Baucus and the other Senate Democrats from the chamber’s two health care panels: Finance and the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions committee. After the meeting, all pledged full speed ahead on health care, and Baucus said the goal was to have a bill on Obama’s desk by October.

But when asked if the president and Senate Democrats had talked about how to pay for it — perhaps the most difficult part of all — the Montana Democrat’s laugh told pretty much everything we need to know.

“There was some discussion of that,” he said. “It’s all on the table, and we’ll figure that out.”

Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman was the kind of Republican who genuinely made Democrats nervous — a moderate governor who might have been one of the Republicans’ strongest candidates to retake the White House in 2012. So a couple of weeks ago, President Obama found a clever solution. He sent Huntsman to China.

Today, Obama again reached across the aisle for a key administration appointment — nominating Rep. John M. McHugh of New York, the top Republican on the House Armed Services Committee, to become the new secretary of the Army. Once again, Obama will get credit for stocking his administration with more Republicans. And once again, there’s a political side benefit — a chance for the Democrats to win his seat in upstate New York.

So how’s the Guantánamo Bay debate going so far for Senate Democrats? They’ve already said they’re going to strip out the money President Obama wanted to close the detention facility. But that hasn’t protected them from having to debate the issue. Republicans are still filing amendment after amendment to the supplemental spending bill to ensure that the Democrats keep talking about what to do with the detainees.

Senate majority whip and Obama friend Richard J. Durbin, what have you got?

It was up to Durbin, Obama’s Illinois colleague during his Senate days, to figure out how to argue against the Republican amendments without having a solid post-Gitmo plan to talk about — exactly the situation Senate Democrats wanted to avoid. So in a floor speech this morning, Durbin tried a talking point most Democrats haven’t even mentioned. We already have terrorists on U.S. soil, Durbin said, and they’re not roaming around in our neighborhoods because they don’t get out of prison.