Fun with Health Care Policy

Had enough of the Health Care "Reform" debate? Hope not, because it would seem that it's nowhere near being resolved.

Glenn Greenwald published a pretty good piece on Sunday.

...The co-op plan which Daschle is advocating to Obama and which the White House and Senate Democrats are now leaning towards "happens to dovetail with the interests of many [Daschle's] clients, like the insurance giant UnitedHealth and the Tennessee Hospital Association." What a weird coincidence; it's like those companies won a Bingo game (can you believe our number happened to get called?!? what awesome luck we have).

That's why there's such fervent demands (sic) for a "public option" -- because it's the only thing that can keep costs low and thus prevent this bill from being nothing more than a glorified bailout of the insurance and drug industries, which is exactly what will happen if 50 million people are forced by law to buy their products with no cost-control mechanism but ample government subsidies. Yet still, the prevailing Beltway narrative continues to be that it's those loser fringe Leftists who are impeding true reform by demanding a "public option."

That's just a taste. Go ahead and read the piece. He makes good points about political language: how "Getting Things Done" can usually be equated with acting in the interests of big business.(and, unsurprisingly, the business-dominated media embraces that equation)

Try to bear in mind that opportunities lost are only worth remembering if they represent lessons learned. We can lament that the administration didn't frame this debate with a single player plan as a more loudly-stated goal, thus allowing them to accept the public option as the compromise (which it is). But the more important question is: what's next?