Academic

TOBIN HARSHAW ON OBAMACARE AT THE NYT?S ?WEEKEND OPINIONATOR:? It was a bit like planning the dre?

By Glenn Reynolds

TOBIN HARSHAW ON OBAMACARE AT THE NYT’S “WEEKEND OPINIONATOR:”

It was a bit like planning the dream wedding only to have a hurricane rip away the chapel roof as you make your way down the aisle. ABC News and the White House probably thought they had scored a coup in arranging ?Questions for the President: Prescription for America,? a prime-time opportunity (with a followup session on ?Nightline?) for Barack Obama to explain his health care proposal to the voters and for ABC to monopolize an hour-plus with the most famous man in the world. And then came Iran. And Mark Sanford. And, well, there was the fact that it was about health care reform. The result: the 10 p.m. show drew 4.7 million viewers, or nearly 3 million fewer than a competing repeat of CBS?s ?CSI: New York? and less than half what the evening?s top draw, NBC?s ?America?s Got Talent,? attracted in the previous hour. Well, could the president?s plan have got a second-day bump at at America?s water coolers? Not likely.