President Barack Obama’s nationally televised address to a joint session of Congress Wednesday night, billed as an effort to explain his health care proposals to the American people, was largely devoted to reassuring the health care industry and conciliating his Republican opponents. Obama sought to repackage his proposed overhaul of health care to better conceal from the public its reactionary content, but the bulk of his speech focused on the need to slash health care costs, both those born by private companies and government outlays for Medicare and Medicaid, the government programs for the elderly and the poor. “The problem...