Yes, Mary Landrieu's Plan Is a Winner

Louisiana's Mary Landrieu

I've been steamed at how misinterpreting Barack Obama's message on keeping your healthcare policy if you liked it has been a successful political misinformation gambit for conservatives and a convenient bash-the-president message for mainstream media, which is predisposed to knock liberal concepts down (it's a knee-jerk reaction, they can't help it). So, when I first heard Mary Landrieu's proposal all I could do was, well, steam on.

But Marcos over at Daily Kos gets it right in supporting Landrieu's plan to let people keep their lousy plans if they really want to (but insurance companies can't issue new lousy ones):

Right now, the blame is being put on Obama and the Democrats. This bill would turn things around and put the pressure exactly where it belongs: on insurance companies and obstructionist Republicans.

Republicans are acting as if these insurance cancellations are the worst thing since Hitler. Well, put them on the spot: Are they really interested in mitigating the law's unintended injustices (whether real or perceived), or do they merely want to undermine its implementation for sabotage purposes?

We know the answer, of course. Landrieu's bill doesn't have a prayer of passing. Republicans will obstruct it every step of the way. But instead of having Obama taking away your insurance, we'll reverse the equation: It'll now be Republicans defending the ability of insurance companies to cancel those policies.

Heading into 2014, that may be the difference between retaining the political high ground, or facing another 2010. Landrieu's gambit is genius.

Marcos is often more intrigued by political victories than policy ones, even though they're regularly interchangeable. But here with the Landrieu plan, political victory may lead to policy victory, in that the political gambit buys time for a policy victory to come to fruition.

I say, go for it, Democratic Party.