MATLOCK!!!

I guess I can understand David Broder not being cognizant of using "the Google", though basic history awareness would be nice, but how about his editors engaging in some fact checking?

But then maybe ol' Davey, George Will and Krauthammer share the same editors? That's a lot of error for one person to catch.

Today "the Dean" says this:

Consider the precedent that would be set if a major piece of social legislation were to be passed with a states' rights provision. Imagine, for example, if Franklin Roosevelt had signed the first Social Security law with the proviso that any states with Republican governors and legislatures could exempt themselves from its coverage...

That issue was settled in the realm of economic policy during FDR's second term, after enough new Supreme Court justices were seated to uphold the New Deal measures an earlier conservative majority had struck down. In the area of civil rights, Lyndon Johnson and a Democratic Congress put an end to the doctrine of states' rights.

That must be why when Medicare/Medicaid was passed during LBJ's Administration it included an "Opt-Out" provision, because the issue was all "settled".

Forget whatever short-comings there are of an "opt-out" and the Senate's bill, and there are many, to boldly assert it is bad because it is uses an invalid, unworkable, untried, concept for health care policy is either the product of result-driven stupidity or a plain-old lie. Broder, you don't like Harry Reid, laughably for all the wrong reasons, it does not excuse sloppy falsehoods.

[cross-posted at Firedoglake]