I think David Brooks got it wrong in his last column. He wrote,

This brings us to the current stage: The Long Tease. Every player in this game has a favorite idea, and you are open to all of them. The liberals want a public plan, and you’re for it. The budget guys are for slashing Medicare reimbursements, and you’re for that. The doctors want relief from lawsuits, and you’re open to it. The Republicans want you to cap the tax exemption on employee health benefits. You campaigned against that, but you’re still privately for it.

There may be one or two Senate Republicans who want the Democrats to include a cap on the tax exemption for employee health benefits, but that is not what “the Republicans” as a whole want. My impression from talking to congressional Republicans and their aides over the years, and especially over the last few weeks, is that they favor modifying the tax break for health insurance so that it applies to individually-purchased policies as well as employer-provided ones. But they are not in favor of simply raising taxes on employer-provided health insurance and using the funds to create a new, even more government-heavy health-care system.