FUN WITH EXAMPLES. As J's story demonstrates, when conservatives extol the glories of our system, they tend to focus on the care received by the rich and lucky. When liberals outline its failings, they focus on the experiences of the poor and unfortunate. Both are true. Our system can be very good if you're rich and admitted to Sloan-Kettering, and very bad if you're poor and turned away from King Drew. Given the trend lines in all of this, were I a conservative and intent on preserving the top end of the system and not redistributing those resources downwards, I'd follow the example of the Medicare Prescription Drug Act and advocate the passage of some sort of mild universal health care system that broadly extended bare-bones coverage to the poor and uninsured but contained absolutely no structural reform. Achieve the broadly popular goal (universal coverage) while blocking the associated fundamental change. That Republicans keep fighting such basic expansions as health care for children only guarantees that when reform does come, it'll come in a significantly more wrenching guise. --Ezra Klein
