"Progressives lost sight that this would be a HUGE progressive win"

[impik]

Ezra, as always, makes all the sense in the world:


Five years ago, no one had ever heard the term "public option." But progressives had been talking about the uninsured for decades. There's probably no more constant lament in Democratic campaigns than the plight of the nation's 50 million uninsured. And this bill is, fundamentally, an effort to address that. Once it's up and running, it spends $200 billion a year to help low-income and working-class Americans afford health-care coverage. About 15 million of those people will become eligible for Medicaid, which is public insurance. Another 15 or so million will get private insurance.

But that private insurance will now be a very different beast: It will have to spend 85 percent or 80 percent (depending on the market) of every premium dollar on care. It won't be able to reject people for preexisting conditions. It will be in a regulated exchange where it has to justify premium increases and bad behavior or face exclusion. And those exchanges, regulations and subsidies will also create the core structure of a universal health-care system in this country, which should be comforting to progressives who look to the improvements in Social Security and Medicare and Medicaid and CHIP and the EITC and know that the history of American social policy is that, in general, we build on our imperfect foundations and make them stronger and fairer over time.

I don't want to suggest this bill is all progressive victories. It isn't. It isn't single-payer and there's no public option, and though I think the excise tax is a progressive tax, I grant that reasonable people disagree on this matter. But the fact of it is that this bill represents an enormous leftward shift for American social policy. It is not, in my view, a sufficient leftward shift, but it is unmatched by anything that has passed into law in recent decades. Progressives have lost some very hard battles but are on the cusp of winning an incredibly important war. For all its imperfections, health-care reform itself is deeply, deeply progressive. And if you don't believe me, just ask the conservatives who have made opposing it their top priority.

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/ezra-klein/2010/03/health-care_reform_is_progress.html


A-Men.

[depakid]

1. Already been posted and laughed at

Good luck selling that this fall- you're going to need it.

[TheWraith]

11. Thank you for your "concern."

Now since you have nothing to contribute but suggestions for the ruination of the Democratic Party, why don't you go away?

[depakid]

13. Just telling it like it is-

Like many other learned and experienced folks, I've given and passed along plenty of positive suggestions (including one today) for a way forward that would help avoid the coming massacre. Not our fault that the administration and party stalwarts ignores them, preferring instead to engage in tactics and substantive policies that are proven failures or not designed to actually solve the nation's problems.

And not our fault that lo and behold, they've once again created this sort of dynamic (even though the opposition is as dishonest and intellectually pathetic a bunch that ever walked the halls of Congress).

Dr. Westen said it best: We are supposed to be the party of science, yet we constantly practice political creationism.

An irony worthy of the best in classical tragedy.

[Clio the Leo]

2. Gotta love that Ezra Klein! NT

[Oregone]

3. Rejecting non-profit socialistic egalitarian solutions is a HUGE progressive win

In bizzaro world

[depakid]

6. It's going to be interesting to see the spin if this passes in its current form

Will the Republicans switch gears and attack the mandates AND McCain's sorry policy of taxing health care benefits?

Or will they still claim that this is some socialist government takerover.

It really is bizarro world- and the sad thing is that with the right leadership an tactics, this would actually be a bill that contained popular and effective structural changes that went beyond the obvious window dressing.

Down the line of course, the Democrats will OWN THIS- and every insurance company abuse, every double digit rate increase, every set of figures on health care bankruptciesw ill fall into their laps.

[marmar]

4. It takes Ezra Klein 20 column inches to say nothing.....

I find him pompous and obnoxious, and sometimes quite clueless.

[bluestateguy]

5. I agree with Ezra Pound

nt

[phleshdef]

7. We will get something not much different than what Dean himself campaigned on in 04.

And now my wife won't have to forever face problems because of a handful of pre-existing conditions. Anyone that has a problem with that may feel the good freedom to kiss my ass.

[RaleighNCDUer]

10. The industry will have to offer her a policy -

there's nothing that says they have to make it affordable.

Can you afford an additional 12, 18, 24K in health insurance premiums? Can you handle an eight thousand dollar deductible?

[Faryn Balyncd]

12. I know a couple in their early 60's that pays $16,700/yr for $20,000 deductible.....

.....even though they have never exceeded their deductible in over 2 decades.


(And the hospital bills them over twice what they charge Blue Cross and Aetna for the same services - - just like they gouge the uninsured.)

[girl gone mad]

8. I can't think of a single person I know in real life who is buying this.

Including the handful (out of hundreds) who do want something to be passed.

[rockymountaindem]

9. Five years ago, nobody had thought of the brutally simple (emphasis on brutal) solution

of just making it the law for everyone to buy insurance, with the corollary that if you can't afford it the federal government will just subsidize your policy with taxpayer money. I mean, by accepting the lowest common denominator of applying the power of the law to just force people to do something, I suppose that's a step in a certain direction. Let's just remember not to confuse motion with progress.

I'm also amused that this idea of having to be certified by a government watchdog to participate in the exchanges is being seen by Klein et. al. as some kind of panacea. For starters, let's not ignore all the many instances of regulatory capture that have occurred in other sectors of the economy, such as the SEC turning a blind eye to all the goings-on of the past decade. How quickly will the members of this regulatory agency be applying a hands-off policy in the hope of getting high paying jobs with the insurance companies after a few years? What will happen when the Republicans get in control of government again? We'll be lucky if the people they put on these commissions even bother to steer with their knees. Forgive me if I don't have a lot of faith in this stuff.

[Cha]

14. Thanks Ezra Klein..they're rendering

themselves irrelevant.

[ibegurpard]

15. horseshit

/nt

[GeorgeGist]

16. Ezra's too young to remember ...

shit.