Paul Krugman: Bernie Sanders is wrong and Hillary Clinton is right

[Rose Siding]

9. I'm just glad some real vetting is happening

Here's some more

Jonathon Cohn-

...Whether other independent analyses come to the same conclusion remains to be seen. But the challenge of single-payer has never been whether, on paper, such a plan could deliver comprehensive benefits to all Americans at a low price. It’s whether such a plan could survive the political process -- and how its implementation would play with the public. For example, Sanders envisions huge savings from lower drug prices, but efforts to extract far more modest savings from the industry have failed repeatedly in the past. And while programs like the Veterans Affairs health system get steep drug discounts, they also operate strict formularies limiting access to drugs -- something that many Americans would probably find objectionable.

“One can certainly design a single-payer plan on paper that saves money for the middle class by reducing payments to doctors and hospitals significantly and shifting the financing of health care from premiums to a very progressive tax structure,” Larry Levitt, senior vice president at the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation, said on Sunday evening. “Whether such a plan could ever pass and be signed into law in that form is a very different question.”

That political difficulty, along with the daunting challenge of blowing up the current system and creating something new in its place, is a big reason Clinton has not endorsed anything as ambitious as Sanders -- and has been critical of him lately.

“After weeks of denying the legitimacy of the questions Hillary Clinton raised about flaws in the health care legislation he’s introduced 9 times over 20 years, he proposed a new plan two hours before the debate," Clinton spokesperson Brian Fallon said in a statement Sunday evening. "When you’re running for President and you’re serious about getting results for the American people, details matter -- and Senator Sanders is making them up as he goes along.”

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/bernie-sanders-health-plan_569c3ddde4b0b4eb759ecf51

Michael Cohen at The Globe

...How someone who’s been in Washington as long as Sanders can believe that all that stands between doing “what the American people want [Congress] to do” is something as simple as reforming campaign finance is stunning. Sanders, who brags the NRA gives him a D- rating, is the same politician who supported legislation giving gun manufacturers immunity from civil lawsuits and voted against the Brady Bill. Why? Perhaps it is because Sanders comes from a state that has few gun control laws and lots of gun owners. Yes red-state senators who oppose gun control receive contributions from the NRA. They also have constituents who oppose gun control measures and vote on the issue — like Bernie Sanders. It’s as if in Sanders’ mind, parochialism, ideology, or politics plays no role . . . in politics.

This is frankly what’s become so frustrating about Sanders campaign. I give the man credit for raising issues all too rarely heard in presidential debates, and as a protest candidate, Sanders is playing a vital role in the political process. But now that Sanders’ campaign has gathered steam — and he is ludicrously claiming that he’s more electable than Hillary Clinton — Sanders needs to do more than just sound the same tiresome platitudes and one-dimensional arguments about the evils of Wall Street. He needs to take the job of running for president seriously. If Sunday night was any indication, that’s still not happening.

The simple fact is that there were three candidates on the debate stage Sunday night — and only one of them is qualified to be president. It’s not Martin O’Malley, and it’s not Bernie Sanders.

https://www.bostonglobe.com/opinion/2016/01/18/bernie-sanders-doesn-get-how-politics-works/GYDR7MTl0Vu3TSAHRMWipJ/story.html