Krugman Sells ObamaCare

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/19/opinion/19krugman.html
Krugman's point, that current 'reality' demands a plan like the ones approved in the House and Senate, cannot be refuted if you accept his entering argument. To wit, that there's a vibrant, competitive market for private insurance in California.
However, he conveniently ignores in his assessment of 'reality' that most of the insurance market in California, like in all states, is for insurance which employers buy for their employees in lieu of giving the employees a larger paycheck. Generally, employees like the arrangement since it confers a tax benefit - it amounts to getting income without having to pay payroll or income taxes. The downside is the insurers compete to win the employers business, not the consumer's business. The downside is this insurance is not portable - they can't take it with them when they 'go' (to another employer or to unemployment or to retirement). They cannot auction their skills to a higher bidder so easily, since they don't know if they can get the same deal on insurance with the next employer.
This is why any reform must deal with the tax inequity which we've built our health care system on since World War II. It's a fantastically regressive tax which rewards the rich for lavish health plans (termed 'cadillac' plans in the mass media), and punishes the unproductive (those who's effort do not generate enough productive work to need or benefit from a tax break). This system also encentivises the sales of health care insurance which is most expensive. These plans are not like insurance, so much as a pre-paid service plan. Very few people buy prepaid service plans for their automobiles, because these plans are very expensive. But most of us buy health 'insurance' which spends as much money to pre-pay for small, predictable costs (costs which are expensive to insure) as it does for uncommon, catastrophically high cost events. These plans incentivise high consumption of health care by reducing the cost to the health care consumer whilst increasing the cost to the 'health care system.'
In other words, to create a market for private insurance, the government must undo this tax oriented market intervention which has resulted in consumers paying more for health care 'insurance' in order to avoid paying taxes for health care 'insurance'. AND allow compeition for health care insurance across state lines. AND use the government's dwindling resources to fund high risk pools to pay for the uninsurable. AND allow insurace companies to charge more for those with behavioral risk (high alcohol/tobacco use, excess body fat, and other behavior driven risk indicators). AND allow vouchers/credits to all low income Americans to be able to pay for catastrophic coverage plans. AND by so doing the market would re-orient to low cost, catastrophic insurance plans which are - unlike the pre-paid service plans that are the norm today - insurance.