The Atlantic - Latest Comments in Toward A Conservative Public Option

Re: Toward A Conservative Public Option

Holden — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 10:10:34 -0000

Reader advocacy and pursuing public corruption *were* your paper's bread and butter? Are those things *still* the paper's bread and butter? If so, that daily probably is still doing OK.

I worked for the AP and the Toledo Blade, and I never felt like I had the freedom to write, "Gov. Clements was wrong Wednesday when he said..." or "Mayor Finkbeiner lied yesterday when he said..."

Pursuing public corruption is sexy. It's hunting elephants. But reporters should hunt more squirrels and fewer elephants. Write more articles about the guy in the bad neighborhood who can't get the water department to return his calls, and fewer stories about large-scale corruption in the water department.

It's a matter of taste, I guess. Corruption stories, like crime stories, just don't float my boat. I simply don't care, even though I suppose I should. I care more when politicians lie, or policymakers spin to deflect their indifference to problems, than when a group of people are conspiring together in a big corruption scandal.

I realize that there's a fuzzy line between corruption and lying by a public official. We're talking about matters of degree.

I guess here's where I draw a line: If you're a reporter who's writing about public corruption, do you focus more on the ill-gotten gains, or on the ordinary people who were deprived of something? Which gives you more pleasure: Taking down the CEO or helping the little guy?

Re: Toward A Conservative Public Option

Kristo Miettinen — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 11:07:06 -0000

FOX describes it this way today: "Reid's proposal would create a national insurance plan that state legislatures can vote to opt out of if they can demonstrate an alternative."

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2009/10/27/lieberman-announces-opposition-health-care-government-plan/

Re: Toward A Conservative Public Option

russd — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 10:54:42 -0000

@brucds,

No doubt Ezra is doing a good job, and WaPo gives him the freedom to do it (which I would say is a plus for WaPo). But like our boy TNC here, who has the branding of Atlantic Monthly behind him, Ezra has the branding of that WaPo masthead to establish his readership with. That is a big difference from an independent writer publishing his own content on a website hardly anyone will read.

Truth is, most bloggers DO suck. Most of them regurgitate the same crap that the major news outlets try to force feed us. There are a few individuals out there doing it right. We found two (maybe one and a half), so I guess we're lucky. But without the Atlantic or WaPo, neither of these fine writers would have anywhere near the readership they do.

Re: Toward A Conservative Public Option

The Ninja Zombie — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 00:22:08 -0000

Taxes will go up more with a public option -- that's just basic arithmetic. The money needs to come from somewhere. Opt-out is ridiculous, simply because states can't opt out of paying for Obamacare even if they opt out of receiving it.

As for European health outcomes, do you have any evidence whatsoever that health care systems are the cause of this? Or for that matter, do you have any evidence that variations in first world health care systems have any statistically significant effect on health outcomes whatsoever?

Regarding unwanted health insurance, no one has it outside of MA. Anyone who purchased health insurance obviously did it because they wanted it. In case you weren't paying attention, Obama wants to force people to buy insurance they don't want. I'll have to replace my cheap high-deductible no frills plan with something considerably more expensive.

Regardless, this is all tangential to my main point: sherifffruitfly is wildly wrong when she claims red states are holding back the rest. That's nonsense -- any state can play any games with health care, provided they are willing to suffer the consequences (as MA is).

Re: Toward A Conservative Public Option

deva — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 23:20:55 -0000

I hate to break this to you, but taxes are going to go up regardless. Have you seen the national debt numbers? It's like a college loan -- okay a medical school loan -- and it's gonna have to get paid off (after the country gets a metaphorical job in the form of economic recovery). Shouldn't everyone get healthcare out of the deal? What do they say in economics? That's right: "Ain't no such thing as a free lunch." Taxes pay for services, they're not just levied to get on people's nerves. But then, I'm not afraid of 'turning into Europe.' I've been. It's mostly pretty nice. And their healthcare outcomes are better than ours. And vastly cheaper too.

And I'm just wondering, who has "unwanted health insurance"? MA's program is wildly popular in the state despite it's flaws (and it does have those). This besides the fact that everyone "wants" health insurance when they get sick. And even if some individuals don't that fact is, should they walk through the hospital doors, like you say, "everyone will end up paying," anyway. I mean, we do now. At least with a healthcare reform bill we get near universal coverage and, if the Dems don't royally screw it up, much needed cost control.

Re: Toward A Conservative Public Option

David — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 21:10:54 -0000

There is another huge benefit to the low cost of entry to electronic publishing: You don't have to give up your day job to give it a shot. Anyone can post a diary at Daily Kos. An individual who is passionate about something can research a topic using the vast, free resources of Teh Intertoobs pretty much any time of day or night, analyze what they find, and write it up for free timely publication. Such a person can't match the output of professionals like Ezra (at least not while keeping up the quality), but he or she can make a significant contribution to the debate. And (I'm thinking of Nate Silver here) some might show a fresh approach to a subject via 'proof of concept' blog posts that end up changing the whole conversation.

Literacy and the printing press started the process of democratizing information and ideas. In his book 46 Pages, Scott Liell describes Thomas Paine and his rival pamphleteers engaging in what amounted to slow motion blogging during the lead-up to the American Revolution. That tradition of citizen journalism and opinion seems to have faded with the growth of professional journalism and then corporate media over the next two centuries. But now it's back.

Re: Toward A Conservative Public Option

sporcupine — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 19:47:49 -0000

Holy cow! I don't quite want to take Fox's word for this, so I'll go look for more sources. Pending that, this astonishing descrption strikes me as completely the kind of thing that happens late in legislation when there are pros doing the work.

Re: Toward A Conservative Public Option

The Ninja Zombie — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 18:22:00 -0000

It wasn't conservatives "holding back the rest of the country." If a given state wants to play games with the medical insurance system, nothing is stopping them.

For example, if MA wanted to force people to buy unwanted health insurance, they could do so. And they did.

Perhaps this is a reason for a smaller federal government. As for opt-out, that's a red herring. When taxes go up, everyone will be paying.

Re: Toward A Conservative Public Option

black yank — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 17:36:19 -0000

"Print newspapers have the technical capability of allowing expert reporters to point out when people are wrong or are lying. But newspaper culture doesn't allow it. Similarly, print newspapers are technically capable of allowing reporters to take the reader's side, to watch out for the reader's interests, instead of deferring to corporations, politicians and sources. But newspaper culture doesn't allow that, either."

Holden, I'm not sure where you worked but reader advocacy and going after public corruption (i.e., telling when people are lying) were the bread and butter of the very large daily I worked at for years. I'm not sure exactly what culture you're talking about.

Re: Toward A Conservative Public Option

black yank — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 17:30:24 -0000

@Jamilah,

he suggested -- which is what I said -- that "these people" are all incompetent, which is just as absurd as someone who works at a newspaper suggesting that all "those people" who blog are incompetent. There are tons of extremely talented, highly skilled print journalists who have no need to "step up their game" as far as their reporting skills who are in a real predicament right now because the timing has them in a bind. Everyone isn't some 22-year-old who can throw caution to the wind. There are good people, dedicated journalists, who are in trouble and not because they're whiny losers.

Re: Toward A Conservative Public Option

jorgen — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 16:42:38 -0000

exactly. Everyone has to deal with new technology changing the way their job is done, and it's hard on a lot of people. But nobody was promised a job for life when they became a journalist, and nobody's stopping out of work journalists from doing something else. I'm not upset with them for complaining about it, but it does bother me when people talk about the demise of democracy because their jobs are threatened, especially since for the vast majority of Americans, the quality and variety of print news has gotten vastly better with the internet. Most cities don't have more than one or two newspapers in circulation and never did; now I have hundreds of choices about what to read, dozens of which I do choose between on a daily basis.

Re: Toward A Conservative Public Option

TW Andrews — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 15:40:20 -0000

Indeed--totally indespensible and the one reason to open the Washington Post's website. My one complaint about Ezra's reporting is that the experts he relies on are typically credentialed experts, rather than experiential experts.

For instance, when he reports on drug companies (an area where I have the knowledge to see gaps in reporting), he'll reference experts who haven't ever worked inside the industry, but have studied it. That sort of expertise is valuable, but limited when it's not paired with on-the-ground type knowledge. I get the feeling that he's hesitant to reference people from inside the industry, for fear that they aren't reliable, but in truth, a lot of folks who work in pharma know what's really broken.

Like I said, I know the pharmaceutical industry well enough to see what sort of gaps this leaves in his reporting. I don't know other areas well enough to say, but I'm assuming that it's along the same lines. I expect that as he gains confidence and experience, he'll seek out more (potentially) adversarial sources along the lines of what he's done with some of the Republican members of congress he's interviewed.

Re: Toward A Conservative Public Option

Kristo Miettinen — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 14:40:26 -0000

I don't think folks appreciate how the opt-out is supposed to work: in order to opt out, a state has to match or exceed the generosity of the federal plan.

Per FOX news (yeah, them): "The 'opt out' proposal would set up a national insurance plan with government seed money and be run by a private, not-for-profit board. Under the proposal, states would have to prove they can provide comparable coverage in order to exit out of the federal plan."

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2009/10/26/reid-offers-details-public-plan-health-care/

I suspect that it is blue states, not red ones, that may opt out - in order to pursue more robust coverage. But realistically, I doubt even they will bother. "Opt-out" will be an impractical and therefore unexercised option, like the states' option to not implement a drinking age of 21, and their option to not cap speed limits at 65mph (or, back in the day, 55mph).

Re: Toward A Conservative Public Option

anna perez — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 14:28:46 -0000

"We are the people we've been waiting for." Not just him or them (aka Congress,) WE.

Re: Toward A Conservative Public Option

anna perez — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 14:22:11 -0000

Thanks to Craigs List, my daughter just found the apartment of her dreams, at a price she can afford and she hasn't read a newspaper in years. Newspapers have lost both of my college educated adult children and I haven't had a print subscription to anything in almost two years. While still profitable (tho' margins are way down from the 30% nirvana) newspapers are bleeding circulation.

I may feel compassion for the blacksmiths, but I'm still going to buy a Model T.

Re: Toward A Conservative Public Option

deva — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 13:57:16 -0000

You're so right. Ezra's been indispensable since he was at The American Prospect, but I think his change of venue has made him even better - sharp, clear, well-researched. He's an ace reporter, no doubt.

Re: Toward A Conservative Public Option

sherifffruitfly — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 12:56:41 -0000

Yep. Until people in red states can find it within themselves to vote responsibly (as an aggregate), such compromises are likely the best we're going to be able to do.

At least they won't hold the rest of the country, who wants civilization, back any longer.

Opt-out is far from idea, but damn right I'll take it. Folks in red states may wish to take the issue up with their representation, and with their neighbors.

Irony: I thought they WANTED "states' rights"?

Re: Toward A Conservative Public Option

BreakerBaker — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 12:52:51 -0000

I don't care whether the reform is liberal or conservative. I just want one that actually works to find an honest answer to the fundamental problem of cost control.

Re: Toward A Conservative Public Option

Deborah — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 12:49:22 -0000

I agree. (And it's a feature.) If the deep red states, which already have some of the worst health outcomes around, don't want a public option they can opt out. In a few years, when it's wildly popular everywhere else, state Dems have an issue to run on. I really do believe the opt-out public option is the way to get the whole country in over the next decade.

Re: Toward A Conservative Public Option

nilpotent — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 12:48:16 -0000

I think an important point that needs to be made is that the internet is eating newspaper jobs, but the culprit is online advertising, particularly Craigslist. Metro newspapers used to have near-monopolies on classifieds and other forms of advertising streams that have disappeared, and their revenue is falling, fast. If TNC and Ezra and every other blogger stopped publishing and everyone reading them subscribed to their local newspaper, journalism jobs would keep on disappearing because you no longer have to pay the local daily whatever they ask for to place an ad for a rental apartment or used car or what-have-you. If every newspaper writer upped their game to Ezra's level, effective immediately, it might not save their jobs because revenues from content never paid the main chunk of their salary, it was all subsidized by ad money that isn't coming back.

Yes, there's a lot of great writing on the web, but the economic model isn't there to support the number of journalists who have lost and will continue to lose jobs as newspapers try to cut costs to keep up with plummeting revenues. And yes, attacks by print journalists, especially the established hacks who are clearly out-classed by online reporters and writers and who probably won't be the ones getting laid off, are infuriating. But good writers are taking pay cuts and losing their jobs, and compassion is definitely merited.

Re: Toward A Conservative Public Option

kal2020 — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 12:30:58 -0000

So TNC, does this mean that Ezra and Jon Cohn are soon to be added to your blogroll?

Re: Toward A Conservative Public Option

brucds — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 12:26:33 -0000

The thing I've been liking about the "opt-out" public option is that it puts - as Sullivan notes this morning - some very volatile politics on the ground in the states that can only hurt the GOP. Especially the ideological nutso GOP that actually exists in most states. The more one contemplates it, the more it appears like a ruthless strategy by the Dems to screw with Republicans at the state level.

Re: Toward A Conservative Public Option

PhoenixRising — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 12:24:33 -0000

This culture isn't inherent to the medium; it's just the way things have shaken out. I don't know why. But it's this difference in culture that drives readers to online publications.

(raises hand) I know why.

My wife published the computing newspaper for her large American city, back in 1985-85. They managed to hang on for 18 months using a Mac Plus for layout. Then she had to take the laser-printed layouts to the printer in the valley 2 hours away and come back 3 days later to pick up the 11x17 paper itself.

It wasn't feasible to use the printing press closer to downtown, partly because the previous owner of the paper had run out on a bill and partly because of the rates their union required for all services. (Her competitors said she was 'cheating' the system by cutting out the costs of a professional typesetter, but they just didn't have the cash flow to support that expense every month.)

The print bill alone, even at the cheaper alternative in the sticks where the workers were not union, had put the previous owner out of business. It did the same for my wife's team in a couple of years.

The costs of running a press are enormous. It is a feature, not a bug, that print journalism is accountable first to the financial interests of its advertisers, and only later to readers or the public interest.

The culture of 'write smart and you'll get page views' is in fact inherent to this medium, and it's an enormous change in how the public can be informed. The enhancement 'write smart and you'll get a conversation in which everyone becomes more informed' is a revolution as well.

Re: Toward A Conservative Public Option

brucds — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 12:18:02 -0000

I also have to add that seeing the Conventional Wisdom of the Sunday Bobbleheads and Beltway Bloviators turned on its head nearly overnight regarding the public option was very, very sweet. Even that idiot Mark Halprin was pushing the newfound "wisdom" of Dems going for the public option on the Morning Joke today. It was kind of scary how quickly he was able to spit up the old Kool Aid and concoct a new brew. While I liked what he was saying, it had an "I never knew about the camps" quality to it.

Re: Toward A Conservative Public Option

brucds — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 12:10:56 -0000

I think you're right that Ezra's reporting on the politics has tended to reflect his more establishment sources' POV - and I'm wondering if this is actually an "institutional" function of his having moved to the WaPo. I hate to think that, but I think it's probably true. The independent progressive blogosphere has been more "realistic" in assessing just how bad Baucus bill actually was, how great the dangers it held for Dems and in exposing the totally bullshit notion that Our Lady of Maine could provide meaningful "bi-partisanship." I would be all for courting Snowe if it were the only way to get a reform bill passed, but the notion that there was some Holy Grail vested in the vote of a marginal GOP eccentric from an oddball Northeastern state was laughable - and frankly was being pushed by folks with an interest in the weakest possible bill. The Dems who called the Blue Dogs' bluff on this and proved that progressives can play the same game are the real heroes of what looks to be a modest reform success. Without a public option in play from Day One, this bill was potentially disastrous - politically and fiscally.