Paul Krugman, who writes an op-ed column in my local newspaper of record, the New York Times, also has a Times blog with the unintentionally funny title The Conscience of a Liberal. What’s so risible about that tile is that liberals have no conscience. They gave ample proof of this over the past year by responding with a stiff and unwavering middle finger to repeated requests from the opposition party to be counted and heard. One presumes the Democrats must have supposed the Capitol Building and White House were surrounded by two-way mirrors that hid their obscene gesture from the American populace.
However their behavior might be explained, earlier this week the American populace responded with a clarifying gesture of its own. Suddenly, a Senate majority so eager to exclude Republicans for a year because they had exactly the numbers needed to pass a gigantic piece of legislation the people did not want finds itself exposed to the rude light of day. They now speak in conciliatory terms of bipartisanship and the need to work with Republicans to make this needed reform a reality.
Which brings me back to Krugman. In his column in today’s Times, which like his blog is also pretty funny, he appeals to his political base thus:
A message to House Democrats: This is your moment of truth. You can do the right thing and pass the Senate health care bill. Or you can look for an easy way out, make excuses and fail the test of history.
Wow, talk about not getting it! Here’s a guy who apparently still believes that two-way mirror exists. His message is to House Democrats? Why not just address the House janitorial staff, which has at least as much political sway right now as Nancy Pelosi and her group of partisan thugs?
To the truly deluded, like Krugman, this is still the Democrats’ battle to win or lose. All they need to do is mollify those silly Republicans on the other side of the aisle — you know, pretend to be their best friend, invite them over after school, share your baseball cards with them. Then once you get something that the president can claim as his signature landmark legislation, you drop the pretense and go back to business as usual.
What Krugman and his ilk in the mainstream media don’t seem to grasp is that the definition of business as usual has changed. “There is,” to quote the Speaker of the House, “a new sheriff in town” — and it is the American people, who can’t really stomach either party but find the Republicans at least palatable. Which gives Republicans the decided edge. They don’t just think “they’re on a roll,” as Krugman writes. They hold the cards right now. They have the power to stick it to the majority party bigtime.
And they should. Sure, the nation needs health care reform; has for a long time. But now that Obama and his Democrat cronies have squandered a year on some half-baked effort to wrest away control of an enormous chunk of the American economy — all the while ignoring rising joblessness — why should Republicans lift a finger to help them? Instead, why not let the message sink in over this coming year, so all Americans can absorb and savor it? The Democrats and their beloved president screwed all of us. And now the screw has turned.
It might be tempting for the Republican leadership to want to negotiate, to win tort reform and insurance portability for their constituents, but Democrats had their chance to negotiate and we all know how that went down. So why throw them a bone now? I say, wait until the 2010 elections. Republicans should use their new-found voice to persuade their colleagues in Congress to start genuine efforts to jump-start the economy — by, for example, cutting corporate taxes and fighting Obama’s idiotic bank tax, which will only slow down lending and growth.
For now, the issue of health care reform can be relegated to a back burner — which is where most voters, according to the polls, have placed it anyway. Once Republicans get a few more congressional wins under their belt, they can begin work toward giving the American people the real health reform they deserve.
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Comments 48
Didn’t Barry Goldwater write a book called “Conscience of a Conservative”? I consider it a kind of progress that Krugman feels obliged to engage in comparable apologetics, since at least he no longer assumes that the term “liberal conscience” is perceived as redundant.
January 22nd, 2010 at 9:38 am
horsehockey to your contention that Republicans are intent on providing health care reform.
January 22nd, 2010 at 9:45 am
@ fuster:
horsehockey and HA! to your horsehockey. The progs would rather have the issue and their client constituencies (trial lawyers, government workers and unions and especially unionized government workers, in some states the Blues) than accept market-based reforms – e.g., tort reform, national health insurance market, equal tax treatment for individuals and employers providing insurance, etc. A logical approach to reform would have attempted measures like these and others, aimed at rationalizing and improving the current system, before contemplating a total overhaul, new layers of bureaucracy, and unsustainable commitments.
The public visits the Dem clinic for a check-up, and is advised to consider amputation, a heart and lung transplant, and combined radiation and chemo, and says “no thanks – I think I’d rather be sick.”
January 22nd, 2010 at 10:07 am
@ CK MacLeod:
see ya and raise the entire hockey stick to help you get straight.
you don’t have to like the poorer ideas of this bill, but spare me the crap about Republicans intending to do anything positive.
none of that crap you list is anything other than tangential.
January 22nd, 2010 at 10:35 am
@ fuster:
We disagree about the “tangentiality” of such reforms. If they’re so trivial, then why not try them out and see what effect they have before moving to the transplants + chemo approach? Why not offer them in exchange for acceptance of something precious to progs?
January 22nd, 2010 at 10:45 am
Ah fuster, once again you drift into areas beyond your means to comprehend. Allow me the opportunity to clarify a few things. The only way to really fix the problem is this: eliminate prepaid health care paid for by 3rd parties. Thats it, quite simple. Now I have zero expectations that either political party has the fortitude to do anything like that. Too many people on the public dole – or their employer’s. That means making health care paid by your employer and provided by the government disappear. That would solve it.
Now some of what CK suggests would have some positive impact, tort reform would help, and a national insurance market which essentially eliminates all state regulation and allows a variety of levels of insurance products to be sold at appropriately underwritten price levels, and treat insurance benefits provided as real income and tax it accordingly. I would add that since the government has screwed the private insurance market up so much, I think it would only be right and proper of them to provide assistance to those whose current medical condition would make their insurance impossible to buy.
The GOP if they go around and horse trade would trade a national market for guarentee issue. Massachusetts has guarentee issue, seen what that looks like – costs are spiraling out of control. I would prefer the government work to slowly dismantle what they have wrought these last 45 years and reintroduce actual insurance to the health care market.
Ok – you can now all refuse to accept the financial realities of life if you like and believe the magic hand of government can fix this. Not even the US government can print enough money to do that, but believe what you want. Even conservative think tankers don’t get this one right very often. Work on the economy and jobs and maybe pay more attention to that nutjob middle eastern state trying to get a nuke to blow up their neighbors.
January 22nd, 2010 at 10:53 am
@ JEM:
why waste your precious arrogance upon me, benighted creature that I am? save it for your peer in the glass.
January 22nd, 2010 at 11:05 am
@ fuster:
Now why get insulting? Too many servings of spicy black beans? Take a Tums, then maybe come back and explain for once what you believe should be done. We could use a laugh.
January 22nd, 2010 at 11:10 am
Ahhh CK, I have no problem with our reptilian friend’s comment. Besides, I just thought he says that stuff all the time as the house contrarian.
Now arrogance, tsk, tsk is best reserved for our betters in the white house who are attempting even now to think they really didn’t just have their ideas squashed by the American public. I seem to remember that it ain’t bragging if you can back it up. OSlash and his minions cannot back it up. Outside of my predictions on what a politician may or may not do – which in fact are nothing more than opinions perhaps with which I attached too much hubris – my health care comments are spot on and accurate, so I will not accept the slam on that part of my comments.
And I will even accept one aspect of Mssr. fuster’s verbal barrage as accurate – although for reasons other than what he said. The GOP – at least a significant number of them – feel this is an insurance problem and will legitimately feel that addressing the insurance industry will fix this (guarentee issue, fixed level pricing, etc). This isn’t an insurance problem, so whatever they propose, though sincerely offered as insurance reform, will make things worse. This problem is a you and me and our government problem. The only insurance problem is that we have too little of it.
January 22nd, 2010 at 11:33 am
Sorry I missed all this horse hockeying. I would certainly responded to Mr. Frog as you did, CK, but ya beat me to it.
The larger point here–the one that Krudman so badly misses–is that the American people have put both parties on notice. At this point, the Dems are in deeper doo-doo for being the more flagrant offender, but don’t be surprised if a third party finally takes shape and form.
January 22nd, 2010 at 11:53 am
I agree that America is wary of both parties – the Tea Party movement was in essence a reaction to Washington, regardless of who is running it. The solution is not a third party, which will allow the progressives to run roughshod over the other two factions, but a takeover of the republican party with republican ideas. Like:
- getting our fiscal house in order
- reducing the size and the scope of the federal government
- electing officials who recognize they work for us and not for
enriching their own pockets with trinkets from the industries they
threaten to regulate.
- Having a common sense attitude towards the war on terror and
our treatment of the enemies we capture.
How about we shoot for the US government to only be worth about 25% of our GDP as a start.
January 22nd, 2010 at 12:27 pm
Although I am deeply thankful that no horses play hockey here in these parts, I’d sure love to see a video. Especially if it’s ice hockey.
Paul Krugman always defies parody, but one thing we have to keep in mind about “rolls” and being on them is that they are notoriously impermanent, and often leave you high and dry if you trust to the “roll” rather than keeping strategy and principle in mind.
The GOP leadership is just dumb enough to trust to the “roll,” so vigilance is essential. Voters have demonstrated that they want to halt the insane career of the Democrats over the progressive-collectivist “precipice,” but that’s not the same thing as wanting a particular form of positive policy being offered, in any unified way, by th Republicans.
That doesn’t mean voters won’t want specific Republican policies, but it does mean the intellectual heavy lifting still remains to be done. Progressivism is on auto-pilot in our federal government now, and it isn’t actually enough to say “Stop doing so much!” There has to be a change of concept, in the minds of voters and pols. The nature of progressive government is to metastasize; if you’re not actively affirming an alternative to it, you’re enabling it to continue its course.
CKM is quite right that Republicans in Congress have offered concrete measures to beat back the impact of government intervention on the cost of health care. I don’t despair at all of American voters shifting to the mindset that will be required to adopt those measures — to seek them as the positive program they are, rather than merely shouting “No!!!” against the collectivist agenda on the Democrats’ side.
But I think we’re still short of the tipping point. One of the pieties ruling the Brown campaign was that state-mandated health care in Massachusetts is great, and he had NO intention of trying to reverse it. Well, Massachusetts’ health care program is hemorrhaging red ink and has caused insurance premiums to skyrocket, particularly for the young and healthy. It isn’t “working,” in any sense except that politicians can point to 98% of Bay Staters being “coverered,” at least on paper. The cost of “insuring” lower-income citizens is simply being kicked down the road as debt. This is an unsustainable situation, and politicians can only claim it’s working because the reckoning of debt, job and business losses, and worker flight hasn’t been imposed by time yet.
Brown himself said during the campaign that Massachusetts had to figure out a way to get the costs of its mandated health care system under control. Free advice: don’t plan on growing old in Massachusetts. There were plenty of voters who voted for Brown, but, for a variety of reasons (mostly emotional), don’t want to see the Massachusetts health care reform undone.
So there’s some distance to go on this. I’m not pessimistic, by any means — how could I be? — but the battle’s not won yet. I predict that if the time ever comes to trample on the political corpses of defeated Democrats, it won’t even seem interesting or fun to do that any more.
January 22nd, 2010 at 12:42 pm
JE, you are correct on Massachusetts’ growing health care debacle. Cato is releasing a pretty extensive study that affirms much of what you say and also the following – the young are fleeing or avoiding the state, because of health care mandates.
That is why the tea partiers, and those who are sympathetic to their concerns need to keep it up and keep the heat on our feckless political class – how about we suggest to our masters they all take a 5% pay cut along with about a 15% force reduction. That’s what the rest of us are dealing with, time for them to get on board.
January 22nd, 2010 at 12:55 pm
January 22nd, 2010 at 12:55 pm
Does anyone happen to know what health providers typically spend on bureaucratic services related to patients’ insurance? I was wondering whether the abolition of health insurance – so long as we’re doing a thought experiment – would encourage or discourage the practice of medicine.
January 22nd, 2010 at 12:57 pm
Dang, CKM, that’s great. I note that it’s not horses playing hockey — but you can never, ever write those inventive Canucks off. They can be honorary North Americans in my parade any time.
January 22nd, 2010 at 1:00 pm
@ Seth Halpern:
Seth, it would be at least the amount required to employ a medical services office worker. In a standard full-time private practice in a medium-size city, the practice will need at least one worker dedicated solely to administering insurance claims and payments.
In much of southern California, and in areas like Houston, Phoenix, Miami, etc, a private practice will need one worker for private insurance and one worker just for Medicare claims. A larger practice may well have to employ more workers to handle insurance and/or Medicare.
Depending on the region, the total cost to the practice of each employee will run from $30K to $80K a year (salary plus employer fees, taxes, and mandated benefits contributions).
Of course, in many areas, the practice is spending more than that per year, per physician, on malpractice insurance. I’ll never forget getting my raise when I made Commander in the Navy, and finding out that my dad’s malpractice insurance premiums were more per year than my new salary — and he practiced in Oklahoma and was never sued the entire time he practiced.
January 22nd, 2010 at 1:08 pm
@ JEM:
I look forward to that Cato report, JEM. I’d heard it was on the way. My info came from an article in National Review from a few months ago, and now that I think about it, the author may have been a contributor to the Cato study.
January 22nd, 2010 at 1:12 pm
Seth – it really depends on what aspect you are talking about of insurance. If you abolish insurance, as opposed to creating an individual private market akin to auto insurance today, primary care docs would probably be the happiest. They receive the smallest amount of revenue, but probably have the most frequent interaction with insurers. But since their charges to patients are not so substantial compared to a specialist or certainly a hospital, you would see lower costs per patient and the doctor being able to see fewer patients a day to make ends meet. I would imagine a doctor’s office has per every two docs at least one and a half admins in their office that could be reduced.
January 22nd, 2010 at 1:14 pm
@ J.E. Dyer:
There was an article in the HuffPo today – illustrated with photos of a cackling McConnell and a cackling Newt – suggesting that one of the great fears of leading Dems is that passing popular, smaller reforms on a bipartisan basis would enable Republicans to take credit for them – not just share credit, but claim, believably, that they wouldn’t have been passed if O-care hadn’t been defeated. The argument underlines just how destructive the whole O-Care approach has been up to this point.
At some point, such a stance by the Dems would probably become unsustainable, but we’re still left with the question of what exactly the Rs should be pushing for and how hard and uncompromisingly. You get the feeling that whatever a large bipartisan majority will accept will be popular at first, if for no other reason than that it puts an end at least for a while to partisan conflict, but the question is whether there are smaller reforms that could create positive feedback on the way to more ambitious ones – the strategy that Ø campaigned on, but ended up rejecting while also being forced to embrace ideas (mandate, taxing benefits) he rejected in both phases of the campaign.
January 22nd, 2010 at 1:31 pm
Wow, JED, you really DO know everything. No wonder lester called you a monster. Thanks.
I guess the figures you cited would have to be set against the lower fees associated with market pricing, and again against intangibles or opportunity costs like spending the extra hours otherwise devoted to riding herd on office bookkeepers (more likely the reverse, knowing lady bookkeepers) either caring for additional patients or going fishing.
Quite possibly an acceptable bargain.
January 22nd, 2010 at 1:32 pm
@JEM: Well, you know everything too.
January 22nd, 2010 at 1:38 pm
@ CK MacLeod:
If you thought that I was insulting you, I’m sorry about that. I thought that we were just slapshotting.
the horse vid was a winner. thx for that.
January 22nd, 2010 at 1:54 pm
@ fuster:
Actually, I thought you were insulting JEM.
January 22nd, 2010 at 1:57 pm
January 22nd, 2010 at 1:58 pm
@ CK MacLeod:
now why ever would I have done something such as that?
January 22nd, 2010 at 2:03 pm
@ fuster:
I had proposed spicy beans in excess as a possible explanation, but enough of this, lest we OT Howard’s comment thread beyond recognition.
I’m still curious what you believe should – and, possibly more important, can – be done. You left the impression that you considered the last iteration of O-care generally indefensible, yet that its collapse would be more harmful than its passage.
January 22nd, 2010 at 2:15 pm
You’re right, CK. Howard’s post needs no more bad bean gas from me.
(another winner. hope you put this pic in the rotation.)
January 22nd, 2010 at 2:22 pm
@CKM: My BlackBerry doesn’t get most videos so I’ll have to use my fertile imagination. I like the primitivist winterscape, however.
January 22nd, 2010 at 3:44 pm
@ Seth Halpern:
Don’t hardly know everything. Just happen to have doctors, and a former insurance claims clerk for a big cardiology practice, in the family. When talking to people in different parts of the country, if you know how their practices work, they’ll tell you a lot that you wouldn’t necessarily hear if they had to explain everything to you.
January 22nd, 2010 at 4:49 pm
@ CK MacLeod:
A noble effort indeed, CKM. Still looking for video, but this one may end up at least decorating a T-shirt…
Back on health care policy, while I’d agree that small measures are better than none, one of my conclusions from life so far is that nothing will be sustainable if people don’t buy into the few big ideas of liberty with their whole hearts. Brutalizing collectivism can creep up on nice people, but liberty can’t. To have liberty — which includes a free market that keeps medical services affordable — you have to choose liberty when offered the deceptive alternatives the left always has lined up.
January 22nd, 2010 at 4:55 pm
@ J.E. Dyer:
The spirit of “don’t tread on me” and a suspicion of government seem to have been nicely aroused. However, since the statists and their immense clientele will fight hard to protect their rents and privileges, the cost-benefit calculation for the average, non-ideological, uncertain, conflict-averse citizen will tend more toward compromise – except when a choice is forced. At such times, of perceived crisis, one tendency will be to seek shelter in the promises of the state. The other tendency is to see the statists as competitors and thieves. In mishandling their initial success exploiting the former, the Obamaists have encouraged the latter.
On health insurance, the Republicans should, I think, continue to point to their proposals, but probably not expect any progress anytime soon unless the Democrats sort themselves out ahead of schedule. Right now, it looks like the war is likely to shift to other theaters.
If I were an Obamaist, I wouldn’t have been encouraged by the President’s flailing performance since the Massachusetts “Buzzsaw” Massacre – see especially today in Ohio (Geraghty was even more merciless than scientific socialist). I also noted reports of surprise and skepticism on the part of Dem leaders and from within the Administration itself regarding this week’s attack on Wall Street. In the wake of the collapse of Ø’s domestic program and poll numbers, and now that there’s no big congressional circus to soak up attention, he’s left to wing it, and he’s showing more of the same Carteresque tendency he’s already shown in foreign affairs, of surprising, undermining, and insulting allies with ill-considered initiatives and announcements.
January 22nd, 2010 at 7:57 pm
CK – I was surprised by the assessment of people who I think generally are pretty measured in their response to Obama. Listening to Pelosi and the WH it appears we have a very interesting – and very public – civil war going on in which Obama is showing that he is a true believer. When an amateur gets in over his head, which is where OSlash is right now, they double down in trying to show their cool, but fail to look the part. I don’t know if Axelrod can shake him back from the cliff, I mean he is the President afterall, but we are watching amateur hour unfold right before our eyes. Maybe the WH is just in shock and they will snap out of it. Noticed how quiet Reid has been.
And Seth – to be mentioned anywhere near the knowledge of JE, well, it is a red letter day for me!!
January 22nd, 2010 at 8:38 pm
I also noted reports of surprise and skepticism on the part of Dem leaders and from within the Administration itself regarding this week’s attack on Wall Street. In the wake of the collapse of Ø’s domestic program and poll numbers, and now that there’s no big congressional circus to soak up attention, he’s left to wing it, and he’s showing more of the same Carteresque tendency he’s already shown in foreign affairs, of surprising, undermining, and insulting allies with ill-considered initiatives and announcements.
In this sense,the Republicans are in a good place,and if they’re smart,they’ll stay where they are,not responsible for the recuperation of the economy. Obama’s team,headed by Geithner and Bernanke are the Foxes in charge of the henhouse,and Obama himself is clueless. However,if the repubs are too sucessful in 2010 and 2012,then the economic monkey is on their back,and the labyrinthe of Trade,Currency,FedReserve,Debt,Deficit,Inflation/Deflation issues will fall on their uncomprehending shoulders. They’re in the Catbird Seat,but I have a feeling that they think they can fix the economy. If they do, They are delusional as Krugman,and all the Liberals.
http://www.hussmanfunds.com/wmc/wmc100104.htm
January 23rd, 2010 at 1:17 pm
A key element of the attack on Wall Street is that it will make lending assets and credit less available — or, more accurately, available only at a higher price. Banks pass on the new expenses imposed arbitrarily by government to customers.
This will hurt the little guy most. Small businesses and individuals paying off debt. It will stifle economic growth.
It’s a diabolical approach, because it has the same discouraging effect it would have in the short term for the Fed to raise its rate — but without the beneficial longer-term effect of making the dollar more attractive. It’s the worst possible measure to take.
I don’t know if OSlash is clueless or not, but we do know he’s a devoté of Alinsky and is surrounded by others who can quote Alinsky at the drop of a hat. This attack on Wall Street is not being undertaken without an appreciation, inside the administration, of its potential consequences.
There’s nothing that can’t be recovered from, but the attack on Wall Street is going to make things worse economically. We can hope and pray that things won’t be as bad as they could be. Don’t count on small business generating new jobs any time soon though.
January 23rd, 2010 at 2:09 pm
but (1)the attack on Wall Street is going to make things worse economically. We can hope and pray that things won’t be as bad as they could be.(2) Don’t count on small business generating new jobs any time soon though.
(1)Yes because Wall Street’s tactics are a result,not a cause,of the underlying fiat currency disruption.
(2)include Medium and Big Business, Government,and the non-profit sectors also.
January 23rd, 2010 at 2:26 pm
Worth keeping in mind though that there are multiple levels to the attack, and not all of them being pushed by the Administration, and others will intersect or seem to intersect other policy areas. The Zero Hedgers, for instance, seem convinced that Volcker is effectively replacing Geithner-Summers as dominant influence, and they’re all for it. On the proposed financial regulations, there seems to be division among NRO-niks, and the WS’s Irwin Stelzer sees a mixed bag, and warns conservatives to “get their intellectual case in order” before unloading on the anti-TBTF measures.
And then there’s the foreign and security policy beat… There is such a mess of mixed messages and contradictory gestures to sort out right now – take a look at Plouffe’s pep talk today in the WaPo – I’m kind of glad I’m on a semi-break from serious posting. Odds are that it’s 95% disposable nonsense – but which 95%?
January 23rd, 2010 at 2:37 pm
Oh – and left out Bernanke – I guess that he’ll be re-confirmed, because anything else would add to the image of chaos at the top, but it’s just one sign of how a turn to aggressive economic populism may be a lot more difficult to execute – not just incredible, but destructive to the administration’s own standing policies and interests – than it sounds.
January 23rd, 2010 at 2:40 pm
Volcker
Not a chance CK,he’ll raise interest rates which will purge the BS from the system,which will expose the system to be 100% BS.
January 23rd, 2010 at 3:23 pm
@ Rex Caruthers:
Outside of loose speculation – not very credible, considering Volcker’s age – the idea isn’t that he’d replace Bernanke, but, as I understand it, he has re-appeared, and is considered responsible for much of the new proposed financial regulatory regime.
January 23rd, 2010 at 3:50 pm
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/01/21/banking-reform-optics-vol_n_431582.html
Check it out,see ya later
January 23rd, 2010 at 4:00 pm
@ JEM:
Dammit: amphibian!
@Republicans and Healthcare: Until this past year, the Republicans couldn’t get “healthcare reform” off the ground, even if they wanted to, for obvious political reasons. We begin with Trial Lawyers and go from there. While this past year has been a shot in the arm for Reps as far as articulating what needs to be done from a common sense “this won’t hurt a bit” approach (capping suit payouts or some other tort reform) I think it’s a mistake to think that anyone is going to even touch the subject until after Nov. because we are all sick of the focus on Obamacare, all the distraction, the big effing timewaste boondoggle payola palooza of it all. Scott Brown or no Scott Brown, it would be a huge mistake for Reps to participate in any talks about health care until after the elections when their hand will be way stronger anyway.
Does anyone think tort reform will come out of this Congress or this administration?
January 23rd, 2010 at 4:10 pm
thank you.
I feel that I’ve earned the right to be well and carefully disrespected here and your help is noted appreciatively.
January 23rd, 2010 at 4:35 pm
I think that some Rs probably should, and in any case will participate in talks if offered, but just need to make it clear that they’re starting over if not quite from zero, then from a position where their proposals are to to be taken seriously, and that BigeffingtimewasteboondogglepayolapaloozaCare is for all intents and purposes off the table as such. Even if any acknowledged talks aren’t going anywhere or very far, their mere existence could serve a number of tactical purposes for the Rs – which is probably the main reason that the Ds have remained unavailable for them.
I could imagine Sen Brown playing a role in convening such discussions – and there’s always the danger (to whom I’m not 100% sure) that they’ll take on a life of their own if his participation causes the media and public to get interested in them.
January 23rd, 2010 at 5:17 pm
Excellent summary of a sensible conservative approach to HCR, overlaps with much discussed above, tho doesn’t aim as high as JEM and JED might like.
http://www.weeklystandard.com/articles/after-obamacare
January 23rd, 2010 at 7:28 pm
There is some stuff that is worthy, though the problem with the states is that their insurance regulations throw way too many requirements on insurance products.
But those suggestions are practical and not a bad place to start. Tort reform will never pass, which is good because it allows the public to realize that the dems really don’t care about the public, just lining their ally’s pockets.
January 23rd, 2010 at 8:36 pm
@ Barbara:
Tort reform will never come out of a dem admin – hard enough for a GOP controlled admin to overcome the dem filibuster on that one.
January 23rd, 2010 at 8:38 pm
@ JEM:
Exactly. This is the pound of flesh that the Reps should exact for any “bipartisan” face saving on Health Care. But honestly, HC should be dropped entirely. Big effing timewaste that is angering voters.
January 24th, 2010 at 5:03 am