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Former Gov. Dean calls public option indispensable
Former Gov. Dean calls public option indispensable - Yahoo! News
The former Vermont governor was asked on NBC's "Meet the Press" about President Barack Obama's statement over the weekend that the public option for insurance coverage was "just a sliver" of the overall proposal. Obama's health and human services secretary, Kathleen Sebelius, advanced that line, telling CNN Sunday that a direct government role in a system intended to provide virtually universal coverage was "not the essential element."
Dean argued that a public option is fair and said there must be such a choice in any genuine shake up of the existing system.
"You can't really do health reform without it," he said. Dean maintained that the health insurance industry has "put enormous pressure on patients and doctors" in recent years.
This fight is not between republicans and democrats. It's between left wing democrats and center-left democrats. The Republicans could not stop this bill if they wanted to.
This fight, and if it gets done or does not get done, will be on the backs of the democrats.
Its a lose lose situation here for them. on one hand, if it passes, watered down, the blame will be on some democrats, if it passes with the public option, you can be sure, that many of these center-left democrats will lose thier seats.
If the whole thing fails as the majority of Americans now wish, it will be seen as a failure of the Obama administration.
They are in a tight spot.