Bob Corker strikes me as a pretty interesting figure. During his run for the Republican Senate nomination in 2006, he was a moderate candidate who made a strong effort to establish his conservative credentials. As mayor of Chattanooga, he was lauded across the political spectrum for his very hands-on, pro-development management style. And as a senator, he’s staked out a distinctive profile. On a number of issues, he’s taken the tack of offering market-driven alternatives to government-driven policies. He took the lead in opposing the auto industry bailout, instead favoring an aggressive restructuring plan that would invole far less public money. He’s also called for jettisoning cap-and-trade in favor of a modified form of cap-and-dividend, not unlike a proposal offered by Reps. Jeff Flake and Bob Inglis.

According to Shailagh Murray in the Washington Post, Corker is now applying a similar logic to health reform.

As he sees it, insurers would no longer be allowed to deny coverage for preexisting conditions, Corker told the crowd, and would offer an array of plans via a new insurance exchange, unrestricted by the current boundaries of state insurance laws. To help the uninsured gain coverage, the government would provide vouchers or tax credits, and would tax the most generous employer-offered plans to pay the cost. But a public insurance option is a non-starter, Corker warned, and unless Obama pushes the idea off the table next week, meaningful GOP support will not materialize. A serious and gradual bid to control costs and expand coverage, however, could prove difficult for certain Republicans to resist, he said.

Suffice it to say, the details matter. What constitutes a serious bid to control costs? At the end of the piece, Murray cites one Corker idea that is very worthy of consideration.

One proposal that appears to be gaining traction among some Democrats and Republicans, including Corker, would limit the insurance people are required to buy to only a catastrophic coverage plan. Another idea, proposed by McCain on the 2008 campaign trail and now getting a second look from certain Democrats, would create special risk pools for people with serious illnesses. Some individuals familiar with health-care negotiations said that if Obama chooses to take a staggered approach, gradually expanding coverage over time, either of these ideas could prove promising starting points.

The great appeal of the catastrophic coverage approach is that it achieves one of the central goals that Democrats and Republicans are ostensibly working towards, namely protecting families against income shocks, while also creating a more “consumer-driven” healthcare marketplace, in which routine medical expenses are the responsibility of individuals rather than third parties. The hope is that this will encourage more responsible consumption of medical services. The danger, of course, is that we’ll see more adverse selection and that the less affluent won’t seek out much-needed preventive care. But there are ways of addressing these concerns.

As for the idea of special risk pools, there is another possibility for an interim reform, one that cut the number of uninsured roughly in half, namely federal reinsurance for the small-group and individual marketplace. More on that to come.