Blue Cross Blue Shield of North Carolina has become one of the main movers in the anti-health care reform “movement” (if something that is corporately financed and staged can be called a movement). Yesterday, Barbara Morales Burke, Blue Cross vice president for health policy, told WRAL-TV in Raleigh that the company is strongly opposed to “a government insurance option,” claiming that more than two dozen health care insurers already “serve” North Carolina, so, "I'm not sure what one more choice would do."

Well, let me explain, Ms. Burke. The public option, the “one more choice” you’re referring to, would be the choice made by most of the 2 million uninsured people in North Carolina. You remember them, right, Ms. Burke? They’re the people who were told by your lovely industry that they couldn’t have health insurance — or not at a price that’s affordable by anyone poorer than Rockefeller — because of “pre-existing conditions.” Or maybe they’re the folks whose policies your beneficent, public-minded industry canceled because you had to spend too much money on their pesky illnesses.

Opposition to real health care reform has come down to fighting against the “public option,” and it’s no wonder. Those who are leading the opposition are insurers who don’t want to see a government-run plan attract the suckers right out of the companies’ grasp. Here’s the news, though: this big national debate isn’t about health insurance companies’ profits; it’s about the American people’s health and their access to reasonably priced health care. If the health insurance companies’ profits suffer because people are attracted to a better deal in the form of a robust public option, all I’ll say is that these sources of morally repugnant policies and practices had it coming.