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This reversal of fortune got the attention of the Post's neocon-dominated editorial page which published a double-barrel attack on the public option on Monday. Both editorial-page editor Fred Hiatt and economic writer Robert Samuelson dusted off the insurance industry's arguments and repackaged them as their own assaults on the public option.
Hiatt deemed the public option "dangerous" because it supposedly would seek to save money for consumers "without controlling costs" through unpopular ideas like taxing the health benefits of Americans or tightening reimbursement rules for Medicare.
However, later in the column, Hiatt went after the public option because it may use "government power to demand lower prices from hospitals and drug companies" and thus "those providers may lower quality or seek to make up the difference from private payers," leading to a situation where "we could end up with only the public option."
Curiously, Hiatt then wrote that "single-payer national health insurance may be the best outcome, but we should get there after an honest debate, not through the back door." Of course, it's hard to recall the Washington Post editorial page doing much to lead such "an honest debate."
The internal contradictions of Hiatt's column suggest that his real goal -- as with many other neocons -- is simply to see President Barack Obama fail. Their own "back door" strategy appears to be crippling Obama over his top domestic priority and thus hobbling his ability to challenge hawkish neocon positions on Iraq, Afghanistan and the Middle East.
Similarly, Samuelson, a longtime staple of the Post's editorial page who may rank as one of the nation's dimmest-witted economic writers, reprised the arguments of private health insurers in concluding that "the promise of the public plan is a mirage."
The mainstream media's opposition to the public option -- as reflected in the reporting from CNN and other major networks as well as the Washington Post's columns -- is another reminder why honest Americans must do whatever they can to build a truly independent media that will resist pressure from the Right and other powerful vested interests.
