The Daily Background
| Maybe *this* is what went wrong on health care reform
by Arlen Parsa
Yesterday I wrote a post called What went wrong on health reform?. Here’s one possible answer.
Years ago, when Mr and Mrs Clinton tried to achieve universal health care, they were criticized by innumerable Republicans (and a fair share of Democrats too) who felt that they had been too strong in crafting the legislation themselves, and had basically told Congress to take it or leave it, without allowing them much in the way of input.
Years from now, in reflection, it may be clear that this current bump in the road to reform happened because the Obama Administration went too far in the other direction, leaving legislators to battle it out and providing too little in the way of executive guidance. Rather predictably, Republicans have consistently referred to any and all of the wildly divergent Democratic plans as “Obamacare,” but in reality there hasn’t been a true “Obamacare” proposal put forth. At least not by Obama himself.
With his speech next Wednesday, it seems he’s realized that if anybody needs to lead the charge on Obamacare, it’s him. Media reports suggest he’ll put his foot down and advocate for a specific plan. Hopefully the great orator will be able to reset the debate and get through to some of the poorly mislead deathers.
[…] to say I told you so, but, well… This: On the morning of a major address to Congress on health care, President […]