Universal Coverage: Code for a Comprehensive Plan

Should Republicans create a plan and sell it as the "universal healthcare" plan that the Democrats are refusing to pass because of their bickering? No, and here's why: "universal" is another word for "comprehensive", and "comprehensive", as we learned from the immigration debate of 2007, means "a lot of things we don't like all shoved into one bill."

Tens of millions of Americans lack health insurance. Extending coverage to them has been a core goal of health reform proposals since the 1960s. President Richard Nixon offered a universal health plan in his first administration, but since then Republicans have hesitated to commit the nation to so costly an undertaking. Is it time to rethink? Should Republicans accept universal coverage as a goal?  We posed this question to NewMajority's contributors.

Part of the fun of the 2009 debate over healthcare is watching the term "universal healthcare" fade to almost nothingness in importance.  Instead of arguing over whether we should have universal healthcare, we are arguing over whether we should or should not have a "public option," whether the "public option" is a route to "single payer," whether we should have an "employee mandate," an "employer mandate," or both or neither, and on and on it goes.  The state of play seems to be that the progressives are demanding a "public option" or nothing, and the Blue Dogs are demanding no "public option" or nothing, and both sides are waiting for the other side to blink.

So... should the Republicans jump into the breach, create a plan and sell it as the "universal healthcare" plan that the Democrats are refusing to pass because of their bickering?  After some consideration, I'm going to say no, and here's why: "universal" is another word for "comprehensive", and "comprehensive", as we learned from the immigration debate of 2007, means "a lot of things we don't like all shoved into one bill".  Now isn't the time for passing, or saying we're going to pass, monster bills that will fix a bunch of (real) problems all at once.  Now is the time for principled opposition to comprehensiveness in all forms, for promising incremental, small-bore strategies, for patience, and for restraint.

To read other contributions to this symposium, click here.