Reid endorses healthcare co-ops as Speaker Pelosi signals flexibility

By GottaLaff

Some leaders:

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) endorsed the concept of health insurance cooperatives Thursday, siding with centrists in the House and Senate who want healthcare reform but oppose a public option.

Anyone have some blood pressure meds? I never thought I'd need them, but my head's about to explode, and I'd like to avoid a messy situation. Anyone? Stat!

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) also hinted she could accept that approach a day after President Barack Obama delivered an address to a joint session of Congress that offered encouraging words for both centrists and liberal Democrats who have demanded a public insurance option.

Did you not hear me? STAT!

Reid told reporters that healthcare cooperatives could be as effective as a government insurance plan in fostering competition and reining in costs.

I cannot fathom why it is so hard for these poor excuses for leaders to push for a public option. I cannot fathom what these jellyfish are thinking. I cannot fathom why anyone believes a public option wouldn't work. I cannot fathom any more fathoming. It's giving me a headache.

So where are my meds, guys? Look, you have a choice. Lower my skyrocketing blood pressure now, or reading blog posts by someone without a head.

If this is "breathing new life" into what they're doing, then start the CPR, because this is one big fat heaping scoop of epic FAIL.

And in a scenario that was difficult to imagine a month ago, House leaders, including Pelosi, reacted to the new momentum behind co-ops and the Baucus bill not with further disdain, but with open arms. [...]

Pelosi reiterated her preference for a public option, but indicated a new willingness to follow another direction.

“This is about a goal. It’s not about provisions,” she said. “As long as our goal of affordability and accessibility and quality, meeting the four — which you don’t want me to repeat again — goals that we have in the legislation, then we will go forward with that bill.”

But Reid’s definitive support of co-ops as a way to achieve the president’s dual goals of increased competition and lower costs paves the way for a bill containing such a proposal to shape the debate going forward. [...]

House liberals, though, remain something of a wildcard.

They walked away from Obama’s speech believing that the president had stood in defense of the public option by stating that it was his preferred choice as well. [...]

But by Thursday night, that openness seemed to be morphing back into the same concern liberals had after their leaders cut a late-July deal with conservative Blue Dog Democrats to advance a healthcare bill out of the Energy and Commerce Committee, which watered down the public option too much for their taste. [...]

After holding a public option “special hour” on the House floor on Thursday, the Progressive Caucus requested a meeting with Obama to further clarify his position on the public option.

Fine. Forget the meds. A giant box of wine will suffice.