Dominant Hillary Scares Enemies

Hillary Clinton’s skillful introduction of her new health care plan demonstrated why she is the most formidable Democrat running for president. It also suggested that if victorious, she will not be defeated so easily by the insurance and pharmaceutical industries as she and her husband were the last time they tried to reform the dysfunctional American medical system.

While her major rivals in both the Democratic and Republican presidential fields felt compelled to attack even before she finished speaking, their glancing blows proved only that she is now dominating the campaign.

In broad outline, what Mrs. Clinton is proposing closely resembles the ideas previously presented by John Edwards and Barack Obama. While Mr. Edwards wants a stronger role for government-backed care and Mr. Obama rejects the federal mandate for individual and family insurance, none of these plans differs enough to mobilize primary voters for or against any of the leading candidates. All of the plans would impose stringent regulation on the insurance companies; all would subsidize insurance for working-class and middle-income people; and all would finance the costs of universal coverage by repealing tax cuts for the highest brackets.

Rather than emphasize differences in detail that fascinate specialists but bore voters, both Mr. Edwards and Mr. Obama tried to claim that they are more likely to achieve success than Mrs. Clinton, who has admittedly failed once in this quest. She anticipated that rather obvious line of criticism by acknowledging how much she has learned in the past decade or so, displaying at least a bit of the suppleness that was always among Bill Clinton’s greatest assets.

This refreshing approach contrasted sharply with the old stereotypes of secrecy and arrogance that haunted her previous effort, and, perhaps more importantly, girded her against the inevitable assaults from the right.

After all, she has adopted an important proposal from the Heritage Foundation as a central part of her own plan.

That’s right: One of the pillars of the new Clinton plan is actually a scheme that was originally fashioned by a prominent policy analyst at Washington’s largest conservative think tank. Back during the debate over health care in the Clinton administration, Heritage’s vice president, Stuart Butler, suggested that Americans be permitted to purchase insurance through the Federal Employees Health Benefits Program—the cafeteria plan that covers millions of government employees, from janitors to senators.

Essentially, this was an early version of “compassionate conservatism,” with the hard-line Heritage Foundation surprisingly seeking cooperation between right and left to achieve the “shared goal” of universal coverage.

Later events showed that Mr. Butler was one of very few conservatives who truly shared that goal. But aside from his idea’s beguiling simplicity, it could be formulated as a question that has only one plausible answer.

Shouldn’t every American enjoy the same quality and choice in health insurance that our taxes now provide for our elected representatives and all the other people who work for government?