I just finished watching Barack Obama's press conference. Admittedly, I'm strongly biased in favor of Obama (after all, RK was "Obama Central" starting in January 2009), but I truly thought he was on his "A game" tonight, that he really knocked it out of the ballpark in terms of explaining the costs of inaction and also the benefits of action. In addition, I thought President Obama did a fantastic job of proactively addressing legitimate concerns that are out there, particularly about the deficit. As to the "urgency" of getting health care reform passed, I thought that Obama did a great job in humanizing it by talking about the letters he gets from real people, and also by emphasizing the reality of Washington, DC, which is that without a deadline, the default condition is inertia. Finally, I believe that Obama made a super strong case for having a "public option" as part of the basket of health care options being offered. All in all, great job; now let's GET THE JOB DONE!
P.S. Obama would never say this, but I will: people like Eric Cantor are ignorant, venal, heartless and irresponsible. And those are their better qualities!
UPDATE: A transcript of Obama's opening statement is now available.
UPDATE #2: Also, while we're talking healthcare, I recommend this article by Steven Pearlstein, "Imperfect Health Reform Still Beats the Status Quo."
UPDATE #3: The full transcript is here. I loved this framing of what's at stake here:
You know, just a broader point, if somebody told you that there is a plan out there that is guaranteed to double your health care costs over the next 10 years, that's guaranteed to result in more Americans losing their health care, and that is by far the biggest contributor to our federal deficit, I think most people would be opposed to that.
Well, that's status quo. That's what we have right now.
So if we don't change, we can't expect a different result. And that's why I think this is so important, not only for those families out there who are struggling, and who need some protection from abuses in the insurance industry, or need some protection from skyrocketing costs, but it's also important for our economy.
