The selling of "Clinton Lite." (newspaper coverage of Jim Cooper's health care reform package)

In early October Representative Jim Cooper of Tennessee, the conservative Democrats' guru on health care reform, called a press conference to announce he was throwing his version of reform into the congressional mix. That event should not have been particularly newsworthy since the year before

But this time Cooper was a more clever marketer, and he positioned his plan as a middle-of-the-road approach with bipartisan appeal. At the press conference, he distributed a chart that showed his bill -- a laissez faire version of managed competition -- smack in the middle of all the proposals on the table. Cooper's bill does not require employers to purchase insurance for their workers; it doesn't require individuals to buy insurance; nor does it establish a mechanism (aside from market competition) for cost control.

"The administration started with managed competition and went to the left. The Republicans took managed competition and went to the right. Our bill is squarely in the middle and is the only one with significant bipartisan support," Cooper told reporters. "It is the first health reform approach since Harry Truman to get major Democrat and Republican support," an exaggeration that went unchallenged. In 1973, Republicans supported federal legislation that propelled health maintenance organizations into national prominence; and in 1983, Reagan Republicans were the driving force behind major changes in the way Medicare pays hospitals, a significant health reform that has since been copied by other countries.

Reporters also received a statement from The Bipartisan Group on Health Reform which asserted that "with over forty co-sponsors ... this bipartisan effort stands to be a major force in developing legislation that can be passed and signed into law during the 103rd Congress." Even with a handful of Republicans on board (19 of the 176 House members), Cooper's proposal had far fewer co-sponsors (48 when it was introduced) than other bills, including the president's with 99, the plan pushed by House Republicans with 138, and the one supported by advocates of a Canadian-type system with 91. The number of co-sponsors, however, is not necessarily indicative of support, since many co-sponsors of Cooper's bill, as well as those who have endorsed rival proposals, have attached their names to more than one plan.