Obama attempts to Sell Government Health Care as Competition?

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The struggle over health care reform reached a fever pitch Wednesday as sharp partisan lines were drawn over the politically explosive question of a possible government-funded public plan competing with private insurers' plans.

President Obama says he wants Congress to send him health care legislation by fall.

President Obama, putting a chunk of his political capital on the line, will take his case for change to the airwaves while congressional negotiators tackle proposals relating to coverage and cost control.

Overhauling the health care system is Obama's domestic priority, but initial proposals to reach Congress last week received a rocky reception. House and Senate Democrats are responding by intensifying their efforts.

They scheduled four hearings Wednesday focusing, among other things, on the question of how to pay a price that may exceed $1 trillion over 10 years.

Obama spent the afternoon pushing the case for reform with a bipartisan group of governors before holding a nationally televised White House town hall-style meeting on the issue Wednesday night.

Meanwhile, congressional Republicans are jumping into the fight, unveiling an alternative proposal that pointedly prevents any government-funded public option from competing with private insurers. The GOP is adamant that such a step, which Democrats largely favor, will destroy the private insurance industry and lead to a government takeover of health care, which they oppose.

Obama argued Tuesday that having a public health insurance alternative is "an important tool to discipline insurance companies" and will help control spiraling health care costs. Watch Obama push for a public option »

The president said there should only be a "legitimate concern" about the ability of private insurers to compete with a public plan "if the public plan is simply eating [from] the taxpayer trough."

If that's the case, it would be tough for private insurers to compete, Obama said. If, on the other hand, the "public plan must collect premiums and provide [good] services" like private insurers, then private insurers should have no problem competing with a public option, he said.

Obama said he was hopeful that an efficiently run public plan ultimately would help push private insurers to make similar cost-cutting moves.

For both parties, the political stakes could not be higher.

Obama is aiming to succeed where every Democratic president since Harry Truman has failed by passing universal coverage. He has further raised the stakes by reiterating a promise in recent days to get a bill on his desk by fall. - CNN Story

I am not an expert at this by any stretch of the imagination, but!!! What kind of an idiot does Obama think that we all are?

How can you create a Public Health Care system that doesn't have to turn a profit, can actually lose money and still be funded, doesn't have to pay for loans or Interest, and has a bottomless pit of Money to draw from. Then say that Private Sector Health Insurers shouldn't be afraid to compete.

Well, I don't know, sounds like a good plan to me. It seems to have worked great with Social Security!