Tuesday, August 18, 2009

Obama not fighting the good fight on health care

Our president seems to be slipping in the polls and he deserves to be.

The candidate I voted for was a man of principles and intelligence. The one who has taken on the fight for health care reform is neither.

It does not make any sense to keep fighting for what he cannot get. The Republicans are out to have him fail on the health care initiative. He is also losing the moderates, and liberals who he promised to protect.

In his knuckling down to the Republicans and the Mad Dog Democrats he has done a disservice to the people who voted for him. The cooperative idea has absolutely no chance of working and may be an even bigger disaster than our present system.

Here is why. The cooperative idea will cost a lot of money with no strings attached or plans to ensure it will work. Some cooperatives will have different rules than others and someone moving will have to join with different rules. In order to achieve maximum benefit, it is likely that some cooperatives will not take in people with pre-existing conditions. Some cooperatives will be taken over by the very people who are against making the health care system better. I can see the insurance companies, the pharmaceutical companies,  and those that will gain from weak rules and entry conditions doing so.

The only system that will work to reform health care is one that takes the good of Medicare and and expands on it.

So in order for our president to do what he promised, he has to fight for a public option and explain why to the American people and those who are fighting him on it. They will back him and vote out the naysayers. But to do so the president will have to regain his principles and intelligence.