"In the weeds" on health reform

In the restaurant business, waitresses, bartenders and line cooks sometimes get hopelessly behind. We are doing our best but we are irretrievably lost, "in the weeds". Extra effort just makes it worse and only tomorrow's coming will set things right again.

President Obama made some brief remarks in the Rose garden yesterday promoting the health care package that is currently being debated in Congress. He is trying really hard, but it is slipping away. He is 'in the weeds' and only a new day saves him.

The president said “They (opponents) would maintain a system that works for the insurance and drug companies while becoming increasingly unaffordable for families and businesses.” How is it working for them, if, as the president acknowledges, their customers are less able to afford their products?

The president later said “Let me repeat that. If you like your plan, you will be able to keep it.” It would have been more accurate to say….If your plan survives the coming reform, you will be allowed to keep it.

Mr. Obama further assured the public that “Each bill provides a public option that will keep insurance companies honest, ensuring the competition necessary to make coverage affordable.” Read that statement carefully. It is breathtaking in its arrogance. The government’s remedy, aka the public option, will prevent companies from following their dishonest predilections. This government-generated honesty will then produce the competition that evidently is lacking now

Health care or more accurately, medical care could use some attention. The White House plan gets less focused every time someone speaks about it. It is hard to make a coherent argument for it because no one knows what is in it. The president is reduced to saying that it is comprehensive, fair and urgently needed but it doesn't ring true. The public wants to know why it is necessary, why right now, what it entails and how it is going to work.

The public option is not new. The government has provided us with three public options to date, Medicaid, Medicare and VA health care. Are we confident that the strategies and bureaucratic structures that have made these three a model of service delivery and financial viability will work for the rest of the health care market?

The president is very focused on leadership. He needs to lead this to a halt and wait for tomorrow to come.