That’s the spin Howard Fineman applies in his latest Newsweek column to the recent congressional vote:
It’s massive, to be sure. And the way it was secretly bolted together
and jammed through Congress in the final days made a mockery of Obama’s
campaign promise of “transparency.” But the one thing that you can’t
call it is “socialism.” If this is socialism, then Warren Buffett is
Karl Marx. It is, rather, a monument to the political philosophy of
-Chicago?indeed of America?which declares that big business deserves to
make a lot of money (a lot of it from the government itself) in the
name of doing some good for the citizens.You’ll notice that, while the GOP’s tea partiers are in a frenzy, most
of the health-care industry is not. The stock market didn’t tank when
Obama signed the bill, and health-related stocks have been beating the
overall average. That is because much of the health-care industry is
going to make out big under the new law. Insurers, hospitals, doctors,
and drug companies will get 32 million new government-subsidized
-customers. Most of the new regulatory burdens they’ll have to shoulder
are ones they’ve decided they can live with, or figure out how to
neutralize sooner or later.
Wow. Regulated industries supporting regulation. What a novel concept. That’s like bootleggers supporting Baptists’ efforts to crack down on alcohol sales.
