I find it interesting that single payer supporters are so inflexible in their vision of what health reform should be like.
Progressive blogger Ezra Klein says that the opponents of single payer supporters actually are moderate Democrats, rather than the right. “Their enemies are on the left,” writes Mr. Klein. “Their targets tend not to be those blocking reform, but those promoting the wrong type of reform.”
Influential Senator Max Baucus was pointedly asked why single payer was not an option, and his response was blunt: “I think at this time, in this country, single payer is not going to get to first base in the Congress.”
As I have said before, PHNP and other single payer groups are advocating for a system that’s an extreme political improbability. Like it or not, health reform is going to build upon what we already have. For them to fight the Obama administration’s attempt at reform is ironic, in that doing so will only serve to preserve the dysfunctional status quo.
Until they bend a little bit, I have no doubt they are destined to be rendered irrelevant in the health reform debate going forward.
