It isn’t universal health care. It’s largely insurance reform, and even then, everyone admits there is much room for improvement. Many parts of the plan won’t be implemented for years to come. And yes, it still has to move through the Senate, that hive of scum and villainy. Yet despite its imperfections, the mere fact that America arrived at health care reform feels momentous, a clear victory after a rancorous, year-long battle in a war that has raged for decades. President Barack Obama has delivered a portion of the change he promised after many motion sickness-inducing starts and stops. He certainly is a gifted closer.
There will be ample time for zealous pronunciations of Obama’s greatness or lamentation and gnashing of teeth, depending on your political preference. Tonight, it is enough to feel, in the marrow of your bones, a tectonic shift, a ethical realignment of what the federal government is willing to let for-profit health insurance companies do to American citizens. Per Jonathan Chait,
Let me offer a ludicrously premature opinion: Barack Obama has sealed his reputation as a president of great historical import. We don’t know what will follow in his presidency, and it’s quite possible that some future event–a war, a scandal–will define his presidency. But we do know that he has put his imprint on the structure of American government in a way that no Democratic president since Lyndon Johnson has. … The template of a powerful, historically consequential Democratic president is unfamiliar to many of us. Certainly the Republicans have no real idea how to deal with it.
On that last point: It will be interesting to see what the president and his Democratic allies in Congress will achieve in other areas of his legislative agenda in the wake of what has occurred. They’ve broken, a least for a moment, the perception of paralysis in the the face of obstinate foes and profoundly monied interests. I hope they seize the moment.
