The threat to Medicare is very real and pressing. Last night the President suggested he still wants to change Medicare in a way “some in his party” won’t like. We are seeing a convergence of deficit hysteria, a Democratic president who wants to have a “Nixon goes to China moment” with Medicare and powerful corporate lobbyists in pursuit of bigger profits.

During the 2009 push for health care reform, in scenes that conspiracy theorists usually have to imagine, the hospital industry sat down with White House officials and agreed to support the administration’s effort in exchange for Obama promising to protect their profits, which included a commitment to kill the public option. Yet, like any good [...]