Today Barack Obama is on the road stumping for health care reform, so you know what that means: Karl Rove's up on the Wall Street Journal op-ed page explaining that if Obama's health care plans go through our policies will be written in French…

If Democrats enact a public-option health-insurance program, America is on the way to becoming a European-style welfare state.

And from there it's a short slide to wooden shoes, burly men in Speedos and David Hasselhoff fan clubs.

Advocates say a government-run insurance program is needed to provide competition for private health insurance. But 1,300 companies sell health insurance plans. That's competition enough.

Now, if there were only 1,298 companies selling health insurance plans that would be a completely different story. Sure, consumers can't shop for policies across state lines, but so what? The point is, there are 1,300 different companies at our disposal, theoretically, which means there's no need for any more.

Defeating the public option should be a top priority for the GOP this year. Otherwise, our nation will be changed in damaging ways almost impossible to reverse.

Yes, well.

He is the expert on that last bit.