Naomi Klein: Neoliberalism is to blame ...

[DanTex]

107. It wasn't a "sacrifice" because the public option was already dead.

He fought for it, and he lost the fight, and then he decided to pass the bill without the public option. The other argument we are having -- whether it's better to pass ACA without public option or nothing at all -- is a valid one, but that doesn't change the fact that Obama did in fact fight for the public option up until the point where it was dead, due to Baucus and Lieberman.

The argument that it's a sacrifice assumes that passing ACA without the public option somehow precluded a future bill with a public option. I think the opposite is true. A public option without the rest of ACA wouldn't work. You'd end up with all the high-risk people who can't get private insurance signing up for the public option, which would drive the cost up, basically making it a high-risk pool. With ACA, community rating, individual mandate, and subsidies are already in place, it would be simple, if congress wanted, to tack on the public option.

It's true that Obama could have chosen to fight differently, and that different tactics might have been more effective. I would agree that, while Obama is a brilliant campaigner, he's not as skilled at political maneuvering in office. But it's pure speculation that different tactical decisions might have been more (or less) effective, and the fact is, he did fight for the public option, and he lost that fight.

For the larger question, first of all, again it's a question of strategy and not a question of policy or whether Obama is "progressive" vs "neoliberal" or whatever. The question is, is it better in the long run to pass an imperfect bill, which without doubt is a big improvement over the status quo, or to wait, possibly forever, for something better, in the meantime letting people suffer. And, yeah, I'm in favor of making imperfect improvements.