Time to Pick a Side on Health Care Reform

No more fence-sitting or holding out for a better bill. “It’s the defining moment for health care reform,” declares Paul Krugman. “Everyone has to decide which side they’re on.” By everyone he means not only politicians but people in the media and other influencers. For conservatives, it’s easy: "They don’t want Americans to have universal coverage, and they don’t want Obama to succeed." Progressives meanwhile, want both things, but have to accept that the bill, without the "robust" public option, won’t match their ideal.

The ones who need to look in the mirror the hardest are the “self-proclaimed centrists” like Joe Lieberman, who he says “have been attacking proposed legislation for doing things it doesn’t.” If these naysayers "really want to align themselves with the hard-line conservatives, if they just want to kill health reform, so be it. But they shouldn’t hide behind claims that they really, truly would support health care reform if only it were better designed." (More Paul Krugman stories.)