Krugman on the trigger

[Becky72]

It is always useful to know how Paul Krugman stands on any issue. Here he is three months ago, addressing the possibility of a "trigger" system:

At first the insurance lobby’s foot soldiers in Congress tried to shout down the public option with the old slogans: private enterprise good, government bad.

At this point, however, they’re trying to kill the public option in more subtle ways. The most recent ruse is the proposal for a “trigger” — the public option will only become available if private insurers fail to meet certain performance criteria. The idea, of course, is to choose those criteria to ensure that the trigger is never pulled.

And here’s the thing. Without an effective public option, the Obama health care reform will be simply a national version of the health care reform in Massachusetts: a system that is a lot better than nothing but has done little to address the fundamental problem of a fragmented system, and as a result has done little to control rising health care costs.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/05/opinion/05krugman.html

[SaveOurDemocracy]

1. Many here dislike Krugman because he's not

a "rubber-stamper" for the Obama Administration. They ignore that he's so often dead on.

[PM Martin]

2. Mr. Krugman is not respected around here

because he does not tow the line of Obama. He is an independent thinker and he has been right far many more times than not.
Krugman is right. This trigger business is nonsense. There should be a public/medicare option
available as soon as the law takes effect.

[LostInAnomie]

3. That's what I was thinking as soon as I heard about the "trigger" idea.

All it would amount to is creative ways of making sure the trigger never gets pulled.

[Laelth]

4. A trigger is not good enough.

No "robust" public option = no deal.

Anything less is just a bail-out of the health insurance industry.

:dem:

-Laelth