A Question About Obama's Health Care Speech: Where's the beef?

Last week we were led to believe President Obama would lay out his plan for health care reform in his speech to a joint session of Congress.

Multiple sources told CNN earlier in the day the thinking among administration officials was that the president will lay out a path to reform in his speech next week that the White House hopes can bridge the various differences in the competing proposals. Sources expect the president to emphasize the message: If Congress passes something now, it will serve as a foundation to pass further reform in the future.

Instead, we got a bunch of rehashed ideas and deference to lawmakers on the details. Obama failed to address the most difficult of those details. He did not demand the public option be in the bill , nor did he drop the idea. Obama said it won't increase the deficit, but he failed to say who we would tax to pay for it. Instead, he told stories that are partly untrue. He did take a position in favor of mandatory health insurance. This was a flip-flop from his campaign days when he ridiculed Hillary Clinton for that idea. There were few specifics in his speech and no game changers.

President Barack Obama’s address to Congress on healthcare reform was short on specifics and long on ideas he and his advisers had already floated this year.

The historic speech left some liberals wanting more details and conservatives emboldened to torpedo the president’s top domestic priority.

The big question of the night was how Obama was going to address the public health insurance option, but he largely repeated what he has said for weeks: He supports it, but will sign a bill that does not have it.