co ops

It’s happening…

Two final holdouts, Sens.

Mary Landrieu of Louisiana and Blanche Lincoln of Arkansas, announced in speeches a few hours apart on the Senate floor they would vote to clear the way for what is expected to be a bruising, full-scale health care debate after Thanksgiving.

Well, at least the opt out version.

That’s supposedly the takeaway from the prime time address to Congress, and I think it’s the right message to send.

The public option has been the sticking point for nearly everybody. On the right it was tantamount to socialism.

On the left, any modification of the plan was considered weak and worthy of scorn. So it’s time for it to get seriously scaled back or discarded altogether.

Here’s what he had to say today about the prospects for getting this bill passed…

From Lakeland Times:

“Nobody is going to bring a bill before Christmas, and maybe not even then, if this ever happens,” Feingold said.

“The divisions are so deep. I never seen anything like that.”

Feingold reiterated his appraisal a bit later.

The following editorial from Steven Pearlstein is one of the more clear headed I’ve read on health reform, the public option and why co-ops could be better.

So I’m going to excerpt a little more than I usually do.

After months of debate, the controversial government-sponsored public plan may be dropped from health care overhaul bills.

Instead, some are pressing for health co-ops — where the insurance buyers own and run the insurance company — as an alternative way to provide affordable insurance.

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The White House insists that President Obama is not backing away from health care changes that include a federal option for the sale of health insurance.

Even though some Democrats want to hold on to what's known as the public option, the plan is losing appeal.

A likely alternative to that plan is a network of nonprofit health co-ops.

Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius has signaled the Obama administration is willing to make a deal on a key part of the health care plan that the president has been pushing.

Sebelius told CNN on Sunday that the White House would be open to consumer-owned nonprofit co-ops. The co-ops would operate under a national structure with state affiliates, but independent of the government.

Yesterday, Obama positioned the public option as something that everybody was getting hung up on. Not only that Kent Conrad said he wouldn’t vote for legislation that had it in it and neither would Blue Dog Dems or moderate Repubs.

Well, now HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius is continuing the meme that the public option isn’t necessary…and if that’s the case, well, it’s dead folks.

“There’s been no final resolution, but I think there’s a good chance the cooperative plan will be adopted, at least at the committee level.

The notion of a cooperative plan is that it’s membership-controlled, membership-run — not government-run, government-controlled.”
- Kent Conrad on CNBC talking about the only workable national health care solution