Why Did Progressives Support A Public Option?
(See also Norman Solomon.) And when I say progressives, I do not mean Ezra Klein. Here is an example of progressive post-loss rationalization from Daily Kos:
True, we did not get a public option, but we are going to get a health insurance reform bill that covers virtually every American citizen and puts in place a patients bill of rights on steroids. It's not perfect: outside of Medicare, the middle-class will be entirely dependent on a system of for-profit medicine [. . .] But even though the bill is not perfect, for the first time in our nation's history we will have enshrined into law the notion that everybody ought to have health insurance -- and that's a major accomplishment.
When Lewison says universal health insurance coverage, he is referring to the individual mandate that requires all citizens to have insurance, but does not offer all citizens a public insurance option. That, we are to believe, is the great progressive accomplishment. I respectfully demur. There was a reasoned basis for believing a public insurance program was essential to real health reform. There was a real difference of opinion about that point in Democratic circles. Last December, Ed Kilgore articulately described this divergence of view:
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