Legal Commentary

Krugman Accuses Obama Of Going Harry and Louise On Health Care

By Big Tent Democrat

By Big Tent Democrat

Harry and Louise. The infamous fictional couple used by the Health Insurance industry to fight against health reform remain synonymous with the power of special interest money in politics. As a result, Paul Krugman's charge (see also Ezra Klein) that Barack Obama's campaign is playing the Harry and Louise game is a serious one:

Obama does Harry and Louise, again

The Obama campaign sends out an ugly mailer. Sorry, but this is just destructive — like the Obama plan, the Clinton plan offers subsidies to lower-income families. And BO himself has conceded that he might have to penalize people who don’t buy insurance until they need care. So this is just poisoning the well for health care reform. The politics of hope, indeed.

In his column today, Krugman also provided this easy to run with quote:

[I]t remains true that on the key issue of health care, the Clinton plan is more or less identical to the Edwards plan. The Obama plan, which doesn’t actually achieve universal coverage, is considerably weaker.

Will this issue have traction for Hillary? As Roland Hedley, Jr. says, time will tell.

Full post as published by TalkLeft on February 01, 2008 (boomark / email).