What Scares Politicians?
Well, I suppose a question like this truly has unlimited responses. An unexpected recording device, an unscrupulous donor, an errant intern are concerns that instinctively come to mind. However, in Ezra Klein’s July 29th piece in The Washington Post – “A Market for Health Reform”, the larger concern for most politicians is …a scared populous.
The direction of good policy and good politics are not always the same. “Good policy proceeds from the understanding that our health-care system is a fractured, pricey, inefficient mess. Good politics, however, proceeds from the insight that a lot of people rely on this fractured, pricey, inefficient mess and don’t trust Washington to change it”, reports Klein. Herein is a dilemma leaving too many politicians asking, “How does one reform a system when they aren’t allowed to change it?”
And it is within this context that Klein explains this tricky political problem. His contention is that if the CBO estimates that “80 million Americans will transition form employer-based health…” what is heard in political-speak is “80 million Americans will lose what they have.” And the result is scared people, which scares politicians.
Klein’s ultimate premise is that the proposed health insurance exchanges are possibly the single most important element of health-care reform, “because it is the bridge between the system we have and the system we want.”
And while change is scary, it’s what our health-care system needs.
