The Wall Street Journal has some reactions to the bill, and to be honest, they leave me feeling a little queasy and anxious:
Sen. Blanche Lincoln, (D., Ark.), a centrist who faces a tough re-election battle in 2010, was among the 10 senators who forged the compromise. She insisted Wednesday that a compromise wasn't in fact reached, but rather that there were "a lot of ideas where there was consensus that we need more information in order to move forward."
Still, Lincoln praised the proposed public plan alternative as a measure that creates a situation in which "private industry is providing the product in a way that best meets the needs of the consumer."
Joe Lieberman seems to be pretty happy as well. All the wrong people seem to love the bill, and few of the good Democrats like it. At least so far. We'll see what people say when more details are released.
The compromise hasn't helped to gain support from business, either. Not that it was expected.
The National Organization for Women may oppose the bill.
And I, for one, am not really sure how they can call the public plan part of the bill a public plan. It's a private insurance plan meant to give private insurance companies, the very people killing us, more money to do so.
Think of it this way: the plan will supposedly increase the insurance "menus" for people who can't afford to buy the "food" in the first place. We'll be able to peruse the options and gawk at the high prices. Fun.
I don't see how that will work. And keep in mind, as vague as the details are right now, we don't have any idea if the buy-in will work the way Howard Dean and others assume it will work. He even says if it doesn't it would lead to a situation that wouldn't be real reform.
It also doesn't seem like there will be any competition to drive insurance prices lower. And there will be no way, without a public option, to keep insurance companies as honest as possible - a task that is difficult enough with the added competition. Those of us who supported single-payer loved the idea of the public option because it was the one way we could put a check on private insurance companies.
Without that, what we're looking at is mandated private insurance, higher premiums for 55-65 year olds, even higher options for 27-54 year olds and people with kids are pretty much screwed.
At best.
We need better. Granted, there have been a few positive comments on the bill, but all those have caveats, while Lieberman and Lincoln are happy and insurance companies say they won.