Just in case, let's repo the Big Dig

Just gotta love America, a country that “lets” a crucial policy issue for 300 million people -- healthcare reform -- come down to one person: a hunky state senator/nude model or a wonky attorney general who doesn’t know baseball.

It’s a false narrative of course.

We were -- and are -- never going to get anything resembling the healthcare coverage enjoyed by the citizens of other advanced nations. We’re just not that kind of country.

When not totally bamboozled, which is rare, we citizens are too indoctrinated: the invisible hand… free markets… laissez faire… corporations uber alles… I got mine, screw you!

Plus, to shift that much federal money around, the government would have to tweak the defense budget, which will happen in nobody’s lifetime. We are always at "war" somewhere, with someone or against something. We virtually besieged citizens won't be happy until we each possess our very own predator drone, complete with two Hellfire missiles, all safely stored in our garages, attics, and crawl spaces.

And while corporations always will graciously accept government bailouts, tax breaks, and other subsidies, they will never will agree to givebacks. Go cut someone else’s market share.

It’s unfair to Scott Brown and Martha Coakley to make them seem so critical to the very future of healthcare reform. But the media only does horse races, so a horse race it is. Should passage of healthcare insurance reform come down to “the vote” of either Brown or Coakley -- oh, how exciting, just like American Idol -- millions of people will be aggrieved and will personalize their aggrievement by blaming both the winner and the loser of the special election for Ted Kennedy‘s senate seat.

Not a great way to end up as historical marginalia.