The Republican Non-Alternative

Here's the Republican proposal. It's a non-alternative to the real efforts at healthcare reform. They call it the Patient Choice Act.

There's a lot of language in the PCA that makes it sounds progressive and forward-thinking. They throw around words like "accountability" and "prevention", "affordable" and "guaranteed". But the devil's in the details, and the details here are...well, there aren't any. Just vague posturing.

The details they do provide are complete non-starters. An example: they say that a "non-profit board would penalize insurance companies that cherry pick healthy patients." What criteria would this board use to decide if a company is cherry-picking? How would they penalize these companies? Would there be a fine? How much?

This board would be made up of political appointees, presumably. To me, this is exactly the wrong kind of government involvement in private insurance. I'd rather have an independent public health plan, and LESS regulation of private insurance. Let the two compete. Don't just have the government mess around in the private sector and call that a solution to our healthcare problems.