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AP headline, within the past 10 minutes:
Sebelius: Obama OK with insurance co-ops.
"Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius says Obama still believes there should be choice and competition" in the health insurance market — but that a public option is 'not the essential element.'"
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Here at Daily Kos I've been trying to be all Paul Revere about this for the past several weeks, to get people to get out in front of these Craptacular Co-ops and deride and derail them before we got some kind of announcement like we've just had. Dammit.
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It's been almost two months since I went round-and-round with a few people on this, e.g.:
You argue, quite spuriously, that backing-down, capitulating to the Insurance Industry lobbyists, that saying, "Oh, well, I guess we'll just compromise on health care and maybe get behind Conrad's co-op 'compromise' with the GOP, blah, blah, milquetoast blah..." is, by definition, "operating within the confines of the office", whereas advocating for substantive change is not.
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I wish everyone would READ some background on the corruption and criminality Co-ops bring with them (and we're not talking about local farmers' market co-ops). How these things get "captured" by the very industries they're created to bypass or compete with.
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I also been saying and saying that Obama's been telegraphing that he's about to throw the Public Option under the bus. Many (hopefully most) saw that, but, unfortunately, too many haven't and have been in "shoot the messenger" mode.
Damn.
UPDATE I: I've removed the "Told you so" from the diary title. It probably was not aimed at you.
UPDATE II: Heh. Because I can use a laugh.
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