THE ISSUE: The planned health-care summit between President Obama and Republicans.

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Jonah Goldberg has it right: President Obama invites a “bipartisan” get-together for health care, while Sen. Majority Leader Harry Reid is already wheeling and dealing to get the bill pushed through (“It’s a Trap: Jump In,” Post- Opinion, Feb. 13).

Bipartisanship? You’ve got to be kidding!

Sam King

Manhattan

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No matter who is president, or what party controls Congress, Washington is never going to change as long as big, special-interest money determines how we do politics, and our economic system runs on greed.

Republicans should designate Rush Limbaugh to be one of the representatives to speak for them at the health-care summit.

He is the omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent voice of the Republican Party. No one articulates what the GOP is all about better than Limbaugh.

Paul L. Whiteley Sr.

Louisville, Ky.

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The Republicans are afraid that if they don’t attend Obama’s health-care summit, they’ll be blamed. But, if they do attend, they’ll also be blamed.

There is a third way: The Republicans should go and take command. The Republican spokesman could rise and say, “Mr. President, you have demanded that we meet your utter failure half-way, but we will not compromise with failure.

“We do not believe you are treating health care as anything more than a power grab.

“We will know you are serious when you admit that the Republicans had ideas that should have been considered from the beginning, get real tort reform passed, allow insurance companies to sell across state lines and kill the government option.”

If the Republicans pussyfoot, we will lose in November.

Bill Watkins

River Edge, NJ