I wanted a real public option, but the limited public option available to the uninsured and some small business, is unlikely to make much of a difference anyway. At yesterday's town hall, it was clear Obama is signalling that the public option is expendable - the deal has probably already been struck behind closed doors. This was to give the people who wanted a publc option time to rant and rave until October when the tiny sliver gets thrown under a bus to be renamed coop. We will get modified insurance reform, where the government will pretend that insurance companies cannot discriminate and cannot rescind, we will have an individual but not an employer mandate. we will have some subsidies to make it more affordable and that's it.
Health care reform isn't coming anytime soon. Are baby steps better than none? I don't know, but probably. I did read an intriguing article in Atlantic called health care killed my father that made some really interesting points about the employer based insurance system and the idea that comprehensive, unlimited care can ever be affordable. Frankly, with the moderate changes likely to be the end result, I don't see why I should get excited trying to get my representatives to pass something that barely resembles reform. I have to remind myself that this is administration is better than the alternative but was never going to be revolutionary or truly progressive. And I also have to remind myself that the President isn't able to make these changes uniliaterally and having to work with this Congress which may be Democratic in name but in reality milk toast, moderate change is all you can probably hope for. As Donald Rumsfeld might have said, you go with the Congress you have not the Congress you want.
Read the Article at HuffingtonPost
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