Free Republic

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j6wv7mURuhU&feature=player_embedded] Democrats are backing away from the so-called public option in healthcare that would lead to a total government takeover of the nation's healthcare system but this is a ruse, commentator Ann Coulter said Thursday on the "Glenn Beck Program." Democrats are now touting healthcare co-ops which amount to the same thing because they would also lead to nationalization of the U.S. healthcare system, she explained. Said Coulter: As long as they have government control of medical care, you're not going to be able to buy it like you buy everything else, like you buy computers and milk and dog-walking...

On Capitol Hill, those innovations have made Group Health a prototype for a political compromise that could unclog health care negotiations in the Senate and lead to a bipartisan deal. After a month of brainstorming, including briefings from Group Health executives, the Senate Finance Committee seems poised to propose private-sector insurance cooperatives — instead of a new government health plan — as its primary mechanism for stoking competition and slowing the growth of medical costs. But state officials say Group Health's impact on holding down costs has been mixed. And its successes might have less to do with its governance...

"A network of health insurance plans run by the customers they serve, proposed in the U.S. Congress to offset opposition to a government-run system, may take a generation to pay off, even with $10 billion in seed money," Bloomberg reports. The co-ops, according to Sen. Kent Conrad, D-N.D., who first floated the idea last month could lower costs, cover more Americans, and gain bipartisan support. President Obama said in late June that he was "open" to the idea. However, based on the experience of existing co-ops, the plan could take decades to develop into an effective mechanism for achieving those...