Paul Krugman echoes President Obama’s rhetorical attack on critics of government run healthcare (and that’s pretty much what happens when the Federal government determines what care you are eligible for) as an example of the brilliant side of the President.
Both Baracks were on display in the president’s press conference earlier this week. First, Mr. Obama offered a crystal-clear explanation of the case for health care reform, and especially of the case for a public option competing with private insurers. “If private insurers say that the marketplace provides the best quality health care, if they tell us that they’re offering a good deal,” he asked, “then why is it that the government, which they say can’t run anything, suddenly is going to drive them out of business? That’s not logical.”
Unfortunately for Krugman, and he should know better, is that the government trumps private insurance in this instance not because they are more efficient but because they can print money and run a system that is insolvent in perpetuity. This is precisely what the private insurance industry is rightly concerned about because if any of them ran a system in such a manner they would be hauled into court by the Department of Justice for anti-competitive activities (dumping).