Who's responsible for all this mass hyesteria over ObamaCare? Gee, I wonder.
Charles Krauthammer thinks he has a better idea. So do I:
http://townhall.com/columnists/CharlesKrauthammer/2009/08/07/health_care_reform_a_better_plan
The reason it doesn't have a chance for even being considered is admitted by Krauthammer:
"There is no logical reason to get health insurance through your employer. This entire system is an accident of World War II wage and price controls. It's economically senseless. It makes people stay in jobs they hate, decreasing labor mobility and therefore overall productivity. And it needlessly increases the anxiety of losing your job by raising the additional specter of going bankrupt through illness.
"The health care benefit exemption is the largest tax break in the entire U.S. budget, costing the government a quarter-trillion dollars annually. It hinders health-insurance security and portability as well as personal independence. If we additionally eliminated the prohibition on buying personal health insurance across state lines, that would inject new and powerful competition that would lower costs for everyone.
"Repealing the exemption has one fatal flaw, however. It was advocated by candidate John McCain. Obama so demagogued it last year that he cannot bring it up now without being accused of the most extreme hypocrisy and without being mercilessly attacked with his own 2008 ads.
"But that's a political problem of Obama's own making. As is the Democratic Party's indebtedness to the trial lawyers, which has taken malpractice reform totally off the table."
Ah, for the good old days in politics, when politicians like Reagan and Bradley could actually listen to each other and work together. It happened once upon a time, but now it would be more like a fairy tale coming true.
The reason it doesn't have a chance for even being considered is admitted by Krauthammer:
"There is no logical reason to get health insurance through your employer. This entire system is an accident of World War II wage and price controls. It's economically senseless. It makes people stay in jobs they hate, decreasing labor mobility and therefore overall productivity. And it needlessly increases the anxiety of losing your job by raising the additional specter of going bankrupt through illness.
"The health care benefit exemption is the largest tax break in the entire U.S. budget, costing the government a quarter-trillion dollars annually. It hinders health-insurance security and portability as well as personal independence. If we additionally eliminated the prohibition on buying personal health insurance across state lines, that would inject new and powerful competition that would lower costs for everyone.
"Repealing the exemption has one fatal flaw, however. It was advocated by candidate John McCain. Obama so demagogued it last year that he cannot bring it up now without being accused of the most extreme hypocrisy and without being mercilessly attacked with his own 2008 ads.
"But that's a political problem of Obama's own making. As is the Democratic Party's indebtedness to the trial lawyers, which has taken malpractice reform totally off the table."
Ah, for the good old days in politics, when politicians like Reagan and Bradley could actually listen to each other and work together. It happened once upon a time, but now it would be more like a fairy tale coming true.
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