http://voices.washingtonpost.com/ezra-klein/2010/03/the_state-based_single_payer_s.html"Quite frankly," Sen. Bernie Sanders said today, "we don't have the votes for single payer." That's not much of a surprise, but Sanders did outline another strategy for single payer that some liberals might want to think about. "Right now," he explained, "we have language in the bill that says that states that want to go forward with single payer can do that." He's talking about the Waiver for State Innovation, which allows states to go their own way if they have a plan that will achieve the goals of the bill at a lower cost. You could imagine a state -- say, California, where the legislature has passed single-payer bills before only to see them vetoed by the governor -- using that provision to implement a single-payer system.
More at the link. Very interesting. Would the federal government try to say that a single-payer system wouldn't achieve the bill's goals, or could one stand?