Enemies of Reform
Things You Might Not Know About the Lewin Group and the Public Option
Published August 19, 2009 @ 11:11PM PT
You’ve seen this as many times as I have. Some big Republican – Orrin Hatch or somebody – goes on television and talks up the problems with having a public health insurance option competing against private insurance plans as a choice in the Health Exchange. They’ll normally cite a study by the Lewin Group purported to show that 83.4 million Americans would “lose their coverage” and join about 20 million other people in the public option. There are a few faulty assumptions, a dash of conflict-of-interest issues and one rather sizable problem with this analysis: they’re describing a public option that no longer exists in bill they're analyzing.
Let’s start with the biggest problem: the Lewin Group version of the public option doesn’t resemble the HR 3200 version. They base their modeling on this notion of provider payment: “The public plan would pay health care providers using the Medicare payment methodology, with an additional 5 percent for those agreeing to see both Medicare and public plan enrollees.” The Lewin Group calculates savings in the 20-25% range. That would certainly give a public option a huge price advantage. To be fair, this reimbursement scheme was part of the original draft of the bill in June… except not quite. Even there, the Medicare rates were a crutch to get the public option up and running. They would give way after three years to a plan that negotiated rates directly with providers, like any insurance plan. At that point, you’re not even getting close to 25% savings. In fact, the CBO estimates it will be closer to 10%.
Thanks to the Blue Dogs, though, the whole point is moot – after amendment, the public option negotiates rates with providers from day one. So the crux of the argument just went bye-bye.
But let’s press on with their inaccurate model for pricing. After all, the questionable assumptions don’t end there. The Lewin Group presumes private insurance won’t be able to keep up and therefore won’t try. The CBO, on the contrary, presumes that in the face of competition, private insurance will practice some cost-containment – hence only 10% difference between public and private, and a net win for the rest of us. For another, the Lewin Group runs its calculations by the classical economics model that price is the only decision point – if I’m an individual, I’ll only buy the cheaper plan; similarly, employers will discontinue their current contracts, having done that to purchase coverage in the Exchange for their employees, will only buy the public plan because it’s cheaper. Speaking as a human being who’s drinking a $1.69 bottle of Coke Zero because the store that sells it for $1.50 is an extra two blocks away, I do not share this assumption that price is all that matters in making a decision.
Furthermore, the Lewin Group presumes that “about 89.5 million people would become covered under the public plan with an employer paying a share of the premium.” That actually represents “a net increase” of nearly 2 million people in employer-based insurance (pg. 18) – interesting for a study that often gets cites as proof that having a public option will unravel the employer-based benefits system. (Btw, the CBO sees a slightly bigger increase in employer-based coverage). So it admittedly doesn't even directly support the talking point that millions would lose their employer-based coverage.
In closing, let me speak directly to those who are planning to trot out this faulty and inaccurate study in the future – please, please, for the love of God, please find someone else to crunch your numbers. The Lewin Group is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Ingenix, the database company that provides information on provider rates for most of the major insurance companies, and is itself a division of UnitedHealth, the nation’s largest insurer. This is the same UnitedHealth urging its customers to go to anti-reform tea party rallies. This is the same UnitedHealth, the subject of a congratulatory profile in Business Week showing how the insurance industry has subverted and manipulated the legislative process on health care.
Really? You can’t get someone else to come up with a study based on several odd assumptions and a misreading of the public option provider rates? You can’t cite some other study to say that the employer-based insurance system will unravel (despite the study suggesting it will actually be strengthened)? Really?
(Photo credit: live w mcs on Flickr.)
German Health Care, the NHS, and James Carville: The Best of the Weekend
Published August 16, 2009 @ 11:01PM PT
Every weekend, I select the best of the best – the three top stories or videos that best enhanced my own understanding of the policy and politics around health care. As regular readers will recall, Sundays on this blog used to serve as a “policy corner” and a chance to explore how other countries managed to solve the questions of access, affordability and quality in their health care system. We’re in luck – two journalists wrote strong articles about what we can still learn about other countries’ health care systems.
1.) Kansas City Star, “Germany shows public, private insurance can coexist”
Germany’s “sickness funds” were created in the 19th Century, making it the country with the most experience with universal health care. Most people don’t know that Germany’s system operates largely through private insurers (albeit with far more regulations than we have in the U.S.) and a private delivery system of hospitals and doctors. They probably also don’t realize how national health care has helped Germany solve so many other problems that our own proposed reforms barely address.
Nations with national health care see it as a fundamental human right. We see it, on many fronts, as a way to make money. A friend in Berlin, a well-known surgeon, lives what can most accurately be described as a middle-class life. Nothing wrong with that, but lavish homes and luxury cars aren’t part of it.
Of course, neither is medical school debt. Nations with national health care also tend to have national education. Students graduate with a bit of debt, but nothing compared with the $100,000-plus that U.S. medical school grads often carry.
And sky-high liability premiums aren’t an issue. Doctors who practice in national health systems are seen as dedicated public servants — held accountable for grievous errors but protected from the extent of liability doctors are exposed to here. As one German journalist noted, “They can be sued, but expect to spend more than you get back in damages.”
Read the whole article at KansasCity.com
2.) New York Times, “Health Care in Britain: Expat Goes for a Checkup”
The reforms we’re talking about in the U.S. now look nothing like the health care systems of Canada and the U.K., but these two English-speaking countries have become the punching bags for the anti-reform movement. This is largely enabled by the fact that most people don’t know anything about how health care is run in those countries. (And if we don’t know anything about countries that speak English, you can guess how familiar we are with the health care in Greece, Taiwan, or Switzerland).
Debates about health care are often personal. Policy is full of statistics — mortality rates, spending per capita, cost of drugs, length of hospital stays — and full of hysterical predictions of what disasters change will bring. But in discussing which system is best, patients turn to their own experiences and those of their families, friends and acquaintances. People believe in the hospital and doctors where they had good outcomes; they deplore those that have let them down.
As an American who now lives in Britain, occasionally writes about the health service, and uses public and private medicine here (as well as back home, occasionally), I have seen firsthand the arguments from all sides.
Read the full article on NYTimes.com
3.) James Carville and Mary Matalin on CNN
If reading about universal health care in other countries is like eating your vegetables, consider this your dessert. No matter where you are on the political spectrum, I think we can all agree that the husband and wife duo of Democratic uber-strategist James Carville and Republican uber-strategist Mary Matalin know more about the chess game of politics than most of the pundits on the Sunday talk shows. True to his reputation, Carville has an outrageous proposal for Democrat reformers – but as the outrage wears off, might he be on to something?
No, I think [Republican intransigence] helps congressional Democrats. Put a bill out there, make them filibuster it. Make them be what they are -- the party of no.
Look, we spend -- the truth of the matter is, we spend about $8,000 per person in the United States on health care. The second -- the country that seconds the second most is Switzerland, they spend $4,000. That means you have got $4,000 per person more that we spend on health care, that is $1.2 trillion, 4,000 times 300 million. And you know what? Run [in 2010] on it. A lot of people -- and we're not producing any kind of results that double that money provides. Let them kill it. Let them kill it with the interest group money, then run against them [in 2010]. That's what we ought to do.
Read the transcript from the show and Mary's rebuttal – not as good as the video, but it’ll do.
(Photo credit: jaime.silva on Flickr.)
Rushing Health Care Legislation
Published August 15, 2009 @ 10:53PM PT
It’s not hard to get a health care bill passed in Congress, provided you want it in the worst way.
The recipe: take a presidential candidate’s plan to address a big problem that directly affects millions of Americans, but on which the two parties irreconcilably disagree on the solution. Then adapt the overall principles from the campaign plan but largely ignore the details – start from scratch. Construct a bill hundreds of pages long largely in secret and with the heavy influence of lobbyists, particularly from Big Pharma. Also, make it as broad and expansive as possible – pile lots of other goodies that you wouldn’t suspect in there. Then get Congressional leadership to put their foot on the accelerator. Bypass the committees, and severely curtail any chance of amendment or debate. Pass it in both houses of Congress as soon as possible, using every parliamentary trick at your disposal to get it signed off on before anyone – including the public – has had a chance to read the bill, let alone discuss it.
I am, of course, describing the Medicare Prescription Drug and Modernization Act of 2003, which gave us the Medicare Part D prescription drug plan. Then-Governor George Bush had proposed a subsidy for Medicare seniors to go out and buy a private prescription drug plan, with some caps out-of-pocket expense. The whole plan was supposed to cost $158 billion over 10 years. But the bill that emerged in 2003 only partially set up the large and ultimately confusing bureaucracy to carry out President Bush’s model of subsidies for private plans. It was chock full of giveaways to the pharmaceutical companies in the form of waiving the ability for the government to negotiate for the best rates, providing a big subsidy for employers who were paying drug costs for retirees already, and creates an unexpected “donut hole” where Medicare patients would see their coverage cut off entirely at a certain dollar value and not resume again until they had paid an even larger dollar amount in out-of-pocket expenses. At least half of this bill has nothing to do with prescription drugs. It restructures and expands the deal with HMOs for Medicare Advantage plans, allowing them to market to seniors and get paid 14% more per beneficiary, all of of the taxpayers' pockets. Finally, the CBO said the final price was actually $372.5 billion over 10 years – more than double the Bush campaign proposal – and every dollar of that would add to the deficit.
But no matter what you think the merits or problems of the Medicare prescription drug plan have been, the process stunk. The bill was 600 pages long. It was submitted on the House of Representatives on a Wednesday. It bypassed any and all committees of jurisdiction and went right to floor for a maximum of 3 hours of debate. One Congressman put forward a motion to at least get it reviewed by a committee, but that motion was squashed. The bill passed at 2:30 in the morning on Friday, meaning it couldn’t have been available to members of Congress for more than 50 hours before the $372.5 billion bill passed. How many representatives do you think read all 600 pages? How many read any? Congress broke for the 4th of July. When they came back, the Senate passed the bill on the same Monday they received it from the House, with a few amendments.
Including days off for vacation, the whole process for the largest expansion of government health care obligations since the creation of Medicare and Medicaid in the 1960s had taken 13 days to pass the House and Senate.
That, my friends, is what cramming a bill down our throats looks like.
Contrast that with the reform bills moving in Congress. The Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions bill was worked on in committee for 38 days after the bill was released, and hundreds of amendments from Republican and Democratic Senators got an airing and a vote. It’s now hanging out, waiting for the Senate Finance Committee to complete its work, meaning we’re likely talking about at least a hundred days before it reaches the Senate floor. The House bill has gone through even more committees – three separate committees had public mark-ups and hearings, each with dozens of amendments from members of both parties getting a hearing and a vote. The most optimistic projection would be the bill would have been public for 87 days before a full House vote could take place. (And if the rules limit HR 3200 to a mere 3 hours of debate, I will not only be shocked but call Congress myself to complain.) Suffice to say, nothing like the town halls – where provisions of health care reform are getting a both a loud and public airing – happened for Medicare Part D.
And no matter what you think of the policies of HR 3200, the health insurance reforms and regulations, the Health Exchange, the establishment of minimum level of benefits, the creation of subsidies for low- and middle-income Americans to make coverage affordable, and the public health insurance option are all to be found in Senator Obama’s campaign health care plan.
GOP political spin-master Alex Castellanos came up with the tactic of pretending Congress is rushing reform, with the implication that they’re getting it wrong. But let’s not kid ourselves – that’s a political talking point, not a description of an actual precipitous rush to throw process out the window in order to pass a bill before dissent can be registered and the surprise details come to light.
We know what that looks like. This ain't it.
(Photo credit: amarine88 on Flickr.)
Will Today Be the Day Obama Gets Challenged on Health Care?
Published August 15, 2009 @ 08:42AM PT
Look, I would much rather have Barack Obama on my side, arguing for my cause, than I would want him to be putting the full weight of the presidency and his own robust political talents against it. But it is likely that the White House is not seeing the returns they expected from the risk of putting the president front-and-center in clearly unscripted town halls. Weirdly, the problem isn't that people are directly challenging the president. It's that they're nowhere near challenging him enough.
I don’t need to tell you that when most people think health care town halls, they think of ordinary-looking folks screaming, yelling, and booing their elected officials (not to mention, as Genocide blogger Michelle points out, using “egregiously irresponsible” Nazi analogies.) Clearly Obama message guru David Axelrod was hoping for just such a moment when the president opted to hold town halls in libertarian-leaning and fiercely independent places like New Hampshire and Montana. The headline for the LA Times story this morning on Obama’s Montana town hall reads, “Obama's seeking out skeptics of healthcare reform,” and the article seems deeply disappointed that the audience was “mostly receptive.” Similarly the Washington Post’s subheadline tells you what the media’s looking for, and not finding: “As He Hits the Road, President Finds Few Openings to Confront Critics of Plan.”
Amazingly, Obama himself seems to be looking for confrontation, and is even trying to add it himself. He seems to be actively avoiding feel-good moments. When asked by a little girl in New Hampshire why protesters were being so mean about reform, the president used his answer to confront the ludicrous “pulling the plug on grandma” lie. When a man expounded on his own deep satisfaction with the government health care program Medicare, Obama tried to pivot from that to exposing the ridiculousness of people saying “keep your government hands off my Medicare.”
Let me put this on the table – he called on the guy in the freaking NRA jacket. What does that tell you?
The “why” should be obvious. The president excels at the campaign-style contrast between himself and an opponent sharing the stage, especially when he can defy expectations and hold his own. He just spent the last two years of his life holding no-holds-barred town halls and public events. Although pundits often declared victory for his opponents in both the primary and general election debates, polls almost always showed Obama winning with viewers. Let’s face it, a big part of the reason why polls have shown the shouting protesters attracting rather than repelling sympathy is because there opponents have been, well, members of Congress looking rather feckless. No matter how badly the anti-socialists, "deathers" and screamers behaved, it was hard to watch the confrontations and conclude, “Man, Alren Specter was in complete control” or “I think John Dingell won that round.” But one of the most popular politicians in the U.S., a cultural icon, a man whose charisma exudes “I understand where you’re coming from” and also one of the best communicators of complex issues like health care? You know the White House dearly wanted that match-up.
But whether it’s the presence of the Secret Service, respect for the Commander-in-Chief trumping that of a mere legislator, or a reflection that the DNC's pushback to the Atlantic is right and the rowdy town halls are the dramatic exceptions, not the rule, Obama hasn’t gotten challenged, and the White House hasn’t gotten its moment. Unless today in Colorado is different, the president may well have just engaged in a week of town halls in which he executed just short of flawlessly, yet still fell short of changing the narrative.
(Photo credit: The Official White House Photostream on Flickr.)
Whole Foods' CEO on Health Care
Published August 13, 2009 @ 06:30PM PT
Because Whole Foods CEO John Mackey begins his Op-Ed on health care reform with a quote by Margaret Thatcher disparaging those to her left, I’ll begin mine (for balance) with a quote by FDR disparaging those to his right: “A conservative is a man with two perfectly good legs who, however, has never learned to walk forward.” That’s the overwhelming sensation I had while reading through his editorial on health care reform. It’s as though every paragraph was a new step backward.
Those unfamiliar with Mr. Mackey’s well documented free-market libertarianism and anti-labor business practices probably experienced a shock similar to the one I had when looking at Whole Foods’ prices for pomegranates. But initially, his op-ed seems similar to any other cookie-cutter U.S. Chamber of Commerce editorial on how to develop a free market health care system. Mr. Mackey lists eight reforms for how he would fix health care, billing it as “Whole Foods Alternative to Obamacare.” It should come as no surprise that six of those reforms are lifted directly from John McCain’s health care plan – from the removal of the tax exemption of health benefits, to the deregulation of the health insurance industry (famously damned during the campaign by the campaign’s assertion, “as we have done over the last decade in banking”).
But not content to have espoused a free market vision from the past – one the American people rather definitively voted against -- Mr. Mackey adds two more items to his wishlist. One is a preference for high-deductible plans where an individual would have to pay $2,500 out of pocket before the coverage kicked in. The second is an intriguing notion to make it easy for citizens to make a charitable deduction for coverage for the uninsured.
Coming from Mr. Mackey, there’s something quaint in the notion that charity will solve the problems of the uninsured. After all, Mr. Mackey’s own generosity as a CEO worth billions is well known. However, from decades of watching the trends in charitable giving, there’s a major problem – charitable giving goes up when the economy is good, and down when the economy is bad; the number of people who need help affording health care has the exact opposite trend. Even if this idea that charity would solve the problem of the uninsured (when $31 billion in uncompensated care from hospitals including charity care doesn’t scratch the surface) were remotely feasible, it’s a system designed to be lest reliable when most needed. Put another way, how did the charitable structure of the roaring Twenties stave off need during the Great Depression?
Mr. Markey’s alternative is a grand bargain – on the one hand, we should not expect government to regulate consumer protections, we should not expect support for the necessities of life (he clearly states his belief that there is no intrinsic right to health care, food, or housing), and the aid that we receive for those necessary is best delivered through a “voluntary” free market. However, he also notes that the individual has responsibilities and obligations, among them “We are all responsible for our own lives and our own health.” So the problems are ours. The obligation to find a solution is ours. And if life gets too tough, our recourse is the “voluntary” charitable contributions of the well-off. Imagine my surprise – I had though we had moved past the point of being an oligarchy, with the less well-to-do dependent on the scraps from the lord of the manor's table, decades ago.
It’s pretty revealing when the “alternative” to health care reform is a giant step backwards.
(Photo credit: Wombatunderground1 on Flickr.)
Top Five Health Care Lies -- and How to Fight Back
Published August 12, 2009 @ 10:44AM PT
[Editor's Note: This guest post from Nita Chaudhary, Campaign Director at MoveOn.org Political Action, tackles a number of the strangest fabrications about the health care reform proposals moving in Congress, as well as a bevy of primary sources so you can read and decide for yourself. It was originally posted here.]
The health care fight has turned ugly, fast. And lies about reform are spreading via anonymous email chains. Here are the real facts that you need to know:
Top Five Health Care Reform Lies—and How to Fight Back
Lie #1: President Obama wants to euthanize your grandma!!!
The truth: These accusations—of "death panels" and forced euthanasia—are, of course, flatly untrue. As an article from the Associated Press puts it: "No 'death panel' in health care bill."1 What's the real deal? Reform legislation includes a provision, supported by the AARP, to offer senior citizens access to a professional medical counselor who will provide them with information on preparing a living will and other issues facing older Americans.2
If you'd like to read the actual section of the legislation that spawned these outrageous claims (Section 1233 of H.R. 3200) for yourself, here it is. It's pretty boring stuff, which is why the accusations that it creates "death panels" is so absurd. But don't take our word for it, read it yourself.
Lie #2: Democrats are going to outlaw private insurance and force you into a government plan!!!
The truth: With reform, choices will increase, not decrease. Obama's reform plans will create a health insurance exchange, a one-stop shopping marketplace for affordable, high-quality insurance options.3 Included in the exchange is the public health insurance option—a nationwide plan with a broad network of providers—that will operate alongside private insurance companies, injecting competition into the market to drive quality up and costs down.4 If you're happy with your coverage and doctors, you can keep them.5 But the new public plan will expand choices to millions of businesses or individuals who choose to opt into it, including many who simply can't afford health care now.
Lie #3: President Obama wants to implement Soviet-style rationing!!!
The truth: Health care reform will expand access to high-quality health insurance, and give individuals, families, and businesses more choices for coverage. Right now, big corporations decide whether to give you coverage, what doctors you get to see, and whether a particular procedure or medicine is covered—that is rationed care. And a big part of reform is to stop that.
Health care reform will do away with some of the most nefarious aspects of this rationing: discrimination for pre-existing conditions, insurers that cancel coverage when you get sick, gender discrimination, and lifetime and yearly limits on coverage.6 And outside of that, as noted above, reform will increase insurance options, not force anyone into a rationed situation.
Lie #4: Obama is secretly plotting to cut senior citizens' Medicare benefits!!!
The truth: Health care reform plans will not reduce Medicare benefits.7 Reform includes savings from Medicare that are unrelated to patient care -- in fact, the savings comes from cutting billions of dollars in overpayments to insurance companies and eliminating waste, fraud, and abuse.8
Lie #5: Obama's health care plan will bankrupt America!!!
The truth: We need health care reform now in order to prevent bankruptcy—to control spiraling costs that affect individuals, families, small businesses, and the American economy. Right now, we spend more than $2 trillion dollars a year on health care.9 The average family premium is projected to rise to over $22,000 in the next decade10—and each year, nearly a million people face bankruptcy because of medical expenses.11 Reform, with an affordable, high-quality public option that can spur competition, is necessary to bring down skyrocketing costs. Also, President Obama's reform plans would be fully paid for over 10 years and not add a penny to the deficit.12
P.S. Want more? Check out this great new White House "Reality Check" website: http://www.whitehouse.gov/realitycheck/ or this excellent piece from Health Care for America Now on some of the most outrageous lies: http://www.moveon.org/r?r=51729
Sources:
1. "No 'death panel' in health care bill," Associated Press, August 10, 2009. http://www.moveon.org/r?r=51747
2. "Stop Distorting the Truth about End of Life Care," Huffington Post, July 24, 2009. http://www.moveon.org/r?r=51730
3. "Reality Check FAQs," WhiteHouse.gov, accessed August 11, 2009. http://www.whitehouse.gov/realitycheck/faq#i1
4. "Why We Need a Public Health-Care Plan," Wall Street Journal, June 24, 2009. http://www.moveon.org/r?r=51737
5. "Obama: 'If You Like Your Doctor, You Can Keep Your Doctor,'" Wall Street Journal, 15, 2009. http://www.moveon.org/r?r=51736
6. "Reality Check FAQs," WhiteHouse.gov, accessed August 10, 2009. http://www.whitehouse.gov/realitycheck/faq#r1
7. "Obama: No reduced Medicare benefits in health care reform," CNN, July 28, 2009. http://www.moveon.org/r?r=51748
8. "Reality Check FAQs," WhiteHouse.gov, accessed August 10, 2009. http://www.whitehouse.gov/realitycheck/faq#s1
9. "Reality Check FAQs," WhiteHouse.gov, accessed August 10, 2009. http://www.whitehouse.gov/realitycheck/faq#c1
10. "Premiums Run Amok," Center for American Progress, July 24, 2009. http://www.moveon.org/r?r=51667
11. "Medical bills prompt more than 60 percent of U.S. bankruptcies," CNN, June 5, 2009. http://www.moveon.org/r?r=51735
12. "Reality Check FAQs," WhiteHouse.gov, accessed August 10, 2009. http://www.whitehouse.gov/realitycheck/faq#c1
Sources for the Five Lies:
#5: "Obama's 'Public' Health Plan Will Bankrupt the Nation," The National Review, May 13, 2009. http://www.moveon.org/r?r=51744
#1: "A euthanasia mandate," The Washington Times, July 29, 2009. http://www.moveon.org/r?r=51732
#2: "It's Not An Option," Investor's Business Daily, July 15, 2009. http://www.moveon.org/r?r=51743
#3: "Rationing Health Care," The Washington Times, April 21, 2009. http://www.moveon.org/r?r=51742
#4: "60 Plus Ad Is Chock Full Of Misinformation," Media Matters for America, August 8, 2009. http://www.moveon.org/r?r=51734
(Photo credit: matthileo on Flickr. Please note, image not used in MoveOn's original post.)
Health Care’s No Win Messaging Scenario
Published August 11, 2009 @ 11:20PM PT
St. Augustine wrote, “Lord, grant me chastity and continence, but not yet.” As President Obama again took to the town hall format to reassure people that no, health care reform will not mean your care will be rationed, Grandma will be executed, or sink our federal budget into an ocean of red ink, you could almost hear in the questioners a sense of, “Grant me transformational change and fiscal responsibility, but not yet – and not if it changes my benefits at all.”
Jon Cohn points out something fascinating about the turn our national debate has taken, pointing out that reformers suddenly have the problem explaining the benefits of reform “in no small part, because conservatives have been making two separate arguments--arguments that cut in completely opposite directions.” On the one hand, you have people criticizing the health reform bills by saying they “won’t do enough to change the way we get medical care and, as a result, won’t do enough to reduce the money we’re spending on it.” On the other, you have often the same people argue “that health reform will put the government in charge of medical treatment and that, as a result, we’re on our way towards harsh rationing of care.”
Cohn is right, but he hasn’t taken his theory far enough. After all, we were told that the public option would be a government takeover and that people would flee private insurance in droves, but we were also told that government is incapable of managing anything this complex and it was foredoomed to failure. We were told a government bureaucrat getting between the decisions made between you and your doctor was a terrible thing, and then asked where the hell were these government bureaucrats to clamp down on waste, fraud and abuse. Finally, a self-professed "just say no" fellah who “turned myself in” by emailing the White House about his opposition, asked Obama why he didn’t “chastise Congress for having two systems of health care -- one for all of us, and one for them”, despite the fact that the plan Obama advocates is designed “to make sure that you are getting that same kind of option [members of Congress are.]”
(And don’t get me started on how you can possible be a socialist and a Nazi at the same time.)
Despite this mass of contradictions, ever single one of these is a concern for somebody. It's like pellets from a shotgun. All those sticking up for the status quo need to do is hit the right key and shazam, you’re feeling anxious about change. Those on the attack receive no penalty from the contradiction – only one of these items needs to be true to scare the bejeesus out of you. Those on defense, like the President and some impressive members of Congress like Sen. Claire McCaskill need to reassure everybody, simultaneously. It’s a no-win messaging scenario – to really reassure Peter on his particular issue, you run dangerously close to freaking out Paul all over again.
No wonder why our debate no longer resembles an argument and instead represents a game of whack-a-mole.
(Photo credit: The Official White House Photostream on Flickr.)
