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Exciting news from Washington today: Steny Hoyer, House majority leader, announced today that Congressional Democrats are “very close” to finalizing negotiations on healthcare reform, according to a Reuters report. Democrats from both the House and the Senate have been coming together for intense talks concerning a compromise on the government healthcare package. Hoyer reported stated that lawmakers could be within a few days of striking a deal on the bill’s terms. Hoyer said that it could come even sooner, but that he was loathe to make an exact promise as to the day and time.

Before winter recess last month, both chambers of Congress passed the bill. But before a final product can make its way to the desk of President Barack Obama, a “final, unified version” of the legislation will have to be constructed. Late yesterday, President Obama called leaders from both parties and both chambers to the White House to discuss what is being called a possible deal-breaker in the ongoing healthcare negotiations: the taxation of high-value insurance plans. Obama had heretofore been criticized for being too detached from the heated negotiations taking place on Capitol Hill, but he’s definitely fully engaged at present. Obama seems to have made it his mission to cement the healthcare deal either this week or early the next week. He’s informed congressmen that not making the tough decisions is not an option, and that even the most difficult compromises must be achieved at a speedy pace.

The bipartisan House and Senate leaders were apparently speaking with President Obama from around nine last night until one-thirty this morning. A representative for the POTUS said that Obama thought “solid progress” had been made towards the compromise effort and the completion of a final package. This was after many of these same legislators had sat out an eight-hour marathon in the Cabinet Room the day before dealing with the same topic. The topic? Union workers’ insurance plans. In accordance with demands from national union leaders, all union workers’ insurance plans will apparently be shielded from “significant taxes” on their health insurance for five years. These “Cadillac” insurance plans have been a source of hot contention; many union members opposed any taxation of their benefits. Ultimately, however, unions do support the healthcare plan.

Republican lawmakers have loudly protested that these compromises violated Obama’s promise of transparency through the proceedings. But Obama passionately defended his nose-to-the-grindstone push for reform, citing polls showing that Americans were very pleased to see progress made and supported continued progress. Leaders of the House of Representatives had spent the better part of the last two days fighting back-and-forth with some of the most prominent labor lobby leaders in the nation over the benefit taxation issue. The union’s argument was that the Senate-passed excise tax of forty percent would lead to some union members’ loss of benefits or paying higher premiums. Siding with unions increases the odds that the two hundred fifty-six member Democrat caucus will accept the plan and vote for it, although nobody has formally polled lawmakers to be sure.

Also on the table to still be resolved: the hot-button issue of abortion funding, the formation of a healthcare exchange, and an exception to anti-trust laws for insurers.