Why Obama, why?

Paul Krugman blogs about the one sided debate in the media when it comes to the stimulus plan; that is to say, the media systematically excludes a specific view point (this being that the stimulus was too small) and overwhelms with people from the other side (it was too big). They did this with the Iraq War too

This can also be applied to advocates of a single payer health care plan (which most Americans support). According to FAIR “the views of advocates of single payer have only been aired five times in the hundreds of major newspaper, broadcasts and cable stories about healthcare reform over the past week. No single-payer advocate has appeared on a major TV broadcast or cable network to talk about the policy during that period.”

Also Max Baucus said with health care reform “all options are on the table” EXCEPT for single payer, taking the unusual step of specifically ruling that out. Lastly at the President’s health care summit, Obama refused to invite Rep John Conyers and Physicians for a National Health Program; both of whom advocate single payer, until they threatened to stage a protest outside the White House and finally received invitations at the last minute. The insurance companies had no such problems getting in.