Still more commentators are calling attention to the political flaws in Sen. Harry Reid's plan to jam the public option into the House health care reform bill by making it optional for states.
Today my job is easy, because David Broder's column today has pretty well nailed some of the problems, including the fact that it's far from assured of passage. A more important objection is that Reid's state-option could weaken health care reform far more than a bill that included no public option at all. It's a clever political ploy, enabling Reid to say he got the "public option" into existence; but if any state (say, all reliably Republican states with Republican governors) could bow out, that could defeat the broad, all-inclusive nature of the reform. Wasn't universality the idea of reform, and of the public option? Won't the costs of the reform package shoot up dramatically if only half or one-third of the states opt in? Even if popular pressure over time could cause more and more states to opt in, is it reasonable that large numbers of people in some states might not be covered for years to come?
As Broder also points out, it's a rather dangerous precedent -- a national law put into effect with built-in withdrawal rights for states just doesn't make sense, and would seem to violate principles of fairness and equality, if not the equal-protection provisions of the Constitution.
If there must be an option, I think the trigger -- by which the public option would automatically be put into effect after a period of time, if private companies failed to provide broad, affordable coverage -- is far better. This option would put the focus of the law where it belongs, on shaping the actions of the private sector.
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