Obama disingenuous on health care bill

Obama:  "every single criteria [sic] for reform I put forward is in this bill."

See, this is the problem. That's just not true. There are no meaningful cost controls. There is no real option in the bill for purchase of truly competitive health insurance. There is an individual mandate, but no real cost relief for ordinary middle class people. There's a tax on health plans that for some will amount to welching on the pledge of no new middle class taxes. Further, to quote Jon Walker writing on firedoglake:

"the public option was clearly part of his campaign plan. His campaign plan also promised a national exchange, drug re-importation, an employer mandate, direct Medicare drug price negotiations, to let you keep your current plan if you like it, and to bring down health care costs by $2,500 per year for a family. The Senate bill will do none of these things.¶ Obama did promise to not do two very important things with health care reform. He promised to not include an individual mandate and not tax employer-provided health insurance benefits. This Senate bill breaks both of those promises."

Obama can call a turkey an eagle all he wants, but the people see through that, and if he thinks he will gain the trust of the American people by lying to them, or however you want to characterize it, he's just wrong. The people who voted him into office aren't so easily fooled.

If he were to honestly say, "we tried, and this is not quite what we hoped for, but it's the best we could do," I would say, at least he's truthful about the at-best partial success. But instead he insists that this crappy legislation is what he wanted all along. Which is scary, because it begs the question, what if it is?