If you are among those who want to "kill the bill," as Howard Dean has proposed, Nate Silver has some questions for you. Here are the first five:
1. Over the medium term, how many other opportunities will exist to provide in excess of $100 billion per year in public subsidies to poor and sick people?
2. Would a bill that contained $50 billion in additional subsidies for people making less than 250% of poverty be acceptable?
3. Where is the evidence that the plan, as constructed, would substantially increase insurance industry profit margins, particularly when it is funded in part via a tax on insurers?
4. Why are some of the same people who are criticizing the bill's lack of cost control also criticizing the inclusion of the excise tax, which is one of the few cost control mechanisms to have survived the process?
5. Why are some of the same people who are criticizing the bill's lack of cost control also criticizing the inclusion of the individual mandate, which is key to controlling premiums in the individual market?
He has fifteen other questions, all worth asking yourself.
If you read this blog, you know how I would answer them.