March 5, 2009 9:07PM

A Ditch, Not a Summit

By Michael F. Cannon

When President Obama opened today's summit on health care  reform at the White House, he said:

In this effort, every voice has to be heard. Every idea must be considered.

Of course, he spoke those words to a room that contained not a single advocate of free-market health care reform.

  • No one from the American Enterprise Institute (ranked the #5 think tank in the world for health policy)
  • No one from the Cato Institute (ranked #7)
  • No one from the National Center for Policy Analysis (ranked #10)
  • No one from the Manhattan Institute
  • No one from the Pacific Research Institute
  • No one from the Galen Institute
  • No one from the Heritage Foundation
  • The list goes on...

Obama did, however, invite people from left-wing think tanks, including avowed advocates of socialized medicine.  That makes Obama's pledge of openness a farce, and today's event a charade.

Or as my colleague Wayne Crews puts it: it's a ditch, not a summit.