Jim Geraghty writes:

It’s fairly easy to persuade Americans that health care ought to be “reformed.” But the public’s thinking on health care isn’t too far from the prescriptions of “Oscar Rogers,” the faux financial expert on Saturday Night Live who, when asked what should be done in the aftermath of last fall’s economic troubles, kept yelling “Fix it!” No matter how he was asked, his recommendations never got more detailed than, “Identify the problem and FIX IT!”
This is, in fact, the path HillaryCare trod 15 years ago. Americans weren’t terribly pleased by the way they were paying for health care back in the early 1990s. Employees always think their premiums and co-pays are too high; employers always feel like they’re shouldering too much of the burden; and those without insurance always think somebody should step in and provide them with some. Everybody wants everything they need covered by their insurers, as well as some things they probably don’t need (e.g., gastric bypass surgery, chiropractors, hair prosthesis — all subjects of mandates or attempted mandates in various states).
So reform sounds great in the abstract. But then the public learns the details of the legislation — say, from an incredulous Harry and Louise sitting around a breakfast table — and it doesn’t seem like such an improvement. Town-hall meetings don’t build a majority of “aye” votes, and when there is no real effort to engage the arguments of the opposition, just the usual straw man that the alternative is to “do nothing,” one wonders whether these town-hall meetings are worth anyone’s time, much less the president’s.
If Obama really wanted worthwhile reform more than he wants a signing ceremony, he would have to do two things he has not yet indicated he’s willing to do. The first is not only to know what you want — besides “fix it!” — but to be able to rank those often-competing goals in a hierarchy. At some point, policies aiming to cover everyone and policies aimed at reducing costs crash into each other. A review board that aims to ensure that the government pays only for cost-effective treatments is at some point going to deny citizens care that they want. A president has to know exactly what’s a deal-breaker for him, what’s worth a veto threat, what provision or concept is so important that he’d rather see no bill than a bill that lacks it. At this point, it’s not clear that Obama really knows where his own red line is drawn.