by Bill Kavanagh: It’s now clear that Obama isn’t considering a serious delay before pushing healthcare reform in 2009. With Tom Daschle’s appointment to head HHS, it’s full speed ahead for Ted Kennedy and Max Baucus to put together legislation in the Senate that will finally bring universal health coverage to the United States. Some speculate that the bill may not become effective until the Bush tax cuts for the rich expire in 2011, but the shape and scope of the new plan will likely become clear to everyone early in 2009. This signal is obviously setting conservatives’ hair on fire, but they won’t be the biggest obstacles to passage. The insurance industry has a huge political war chest banked and they’ll be using it to pay lobbyists and threaten legislators. Expect to see the fruits of that spending soon enough in news coverage, think tank pronouncements, PAC formations, and industry nay-sayers appearing on the talk show circuit. The health insurance companies are doubtless readying a new round of scary commercials like the “Harry and Louise” series that helped kill reform in the early 1990’s— and that will just be the most public part of the effort.
Extending health coverage to all Americans will be job two for the new administration, now that the nation has plunged into a dramatic recession and financial crisis, but it looks like Obama isn’t planning on putting off the healthcare discussion till another day. Passing a universal coverage bill quickly would be a Reaganesque move which sets the table for a powerful Presidency that is able to accomplish big things and sets its sights on major issues. Failing at healthcare reform, on the other hand, would cripple Obama right away. It’ll be a mother-of-all-battles, happening at the same time Obama must deal with an economy on the edge.
If you think the election year has been dramatic, just wait till after the Inauguration. Fasten your seat belts, folks...
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