I love this new Opt-Out plan and I think it's important for everyone here to hear all sides of this argument from important voices... here's Nate Silver's Take...
Here's a link to his post directly: http://www.fivethirtyeight.com/...
I have a lot of respect for Nate Silver and hope he forgives me for posting his words here, but I think all of his points are worth reading. I especially love #4 since just the mere fact that the states can revert back to the public option will provide most of the competition of an actual public option anyway.
It's important to remember the long-game here. From a rational and logical perspective we have to understand that getting the best public-option out there will add to our overall goal of having this implemented across the board; this opt-out proposal seems to give the best chance of that. Politically, I think it also provides a gold-mine for us and allows ideas to fight each other between states. It's a win-win even for those in Red States since, hopefully it will lead to full implementation as many have already surmised.
UPDATE: After reading the comments below, I see a lot of people seem to think that the active users of DailyKos or NetRoots have something against 'red states' and that's why there is so much support for this 'Opt-Out' plan. I completely disagree. In my mind there's people with all types of backgrounds and opinions...for the sake of our argument, let's talk about two types:
Type A: Those that are pragmatic and believe we need to find a way to get a public option through the senate and this 'Opt-Out' measure provides the best hope. We realize it negatively affects those in Red States but we also hope that, as happened with Medicare in the early days, all states will eventually choose to adopt the Public Option because of enormous support and demands from their electorates. We also realize that it's more important to get some type of PO out there but that there are other benefits reform will bring. (No Pre-Existing Condition Discrimination, etc.)
Type B: Those that have strong rooted and personal (may live in a Red State) beliefs that a Public Option should be universal and across all states and that we can't settle for anything less.
There's nothing wrong with either of these viewpoints, it's just a difference of opinion and background. We should not pit each other against one another (red state vs. blue state). We all want the best universal health care we can get and if we had it our way, all of us would most likely opt for Single Payer. Let's not question each other's motives but discuss our strategies and tactics.
Here it is, from Nate Silver:
"Some of the usual suspects are out this morning with criticism of Tom Carper's compromise proposal to insert a robust public option into the Democrats' health care bill, but allow states to opt out of it by legislative or popular action. I'm not going to call these people out by name because I consider some of them friends and they're doing good, important, productive work. But this compromise is leaps and bounds better than most of the others that have been floated, such as Chuck Schumer's proposal to have a public insurance option that would be forced to negotiate at private market rates. Here's why:
- If the public option is indeed popular -- and the preponderance of public polling suggests that it is -- we should expect the solid majority of states to elect to retain it. Perhaps some Republican governors or legislatures would seek to override the popular will in their states -- but they would do so at their own peril (and at Democrats' gain).
- Behavioral economics further suggests that default preferences are extremely powerful. Making the public option the default would probably lead to much greater adaptation than requiring states to "opt in".
- If the public option indeed reduces the costs of insurance -- and most of the evidence suggests that it will -- than the states that opt out of it will have a pretty compelling reason to opt back in. Say that Kansas opts out of the public option and Missouri keeps it. If a Kansan realizes that his friend across the border is buying the same quality health insurance for $300 less per month, he's going to vote restore the public plan in a referendum or demand that his legislator does the same in Topeka.
- Even in states that do opt out of the public option, the fact that voters could presumably elect later to restore it creates an extremely credible threat to the private insurance industry that will itself help to create price competition.
There's more points! Read the rest of his Commentary and Arguments at his site:
http://www.fivethirtyeight.com/...
Again, to add my two-cents, we're talking both tactics and strategy here. Get this passed in Congress first, then let the merits of the public option idea win in the states that keep it, paving the way for all states to adopt based on pressure from those that live there, you know, like a democracy.
UPDATE: Thanks for the REC Everyone!
UPDATE 2: I'm torn whether to take out part of his quote or leave it as-is. Taking parts of his argument out and replacing it with links would change and dissect his argument for most people as they would forget or not think to click further... if this was a traditional article, I could do that but since there's specific points he's making one after the other, it would disrupt his whole argument to take half of them out...
UPDATE 3: I have taken out parts of Nate's Points and linked to his full commentary.