Gibbs on Dean: Nobody 'Rational' Would Kill the Bill

White House press secretary Robert Gibbs fired back at Howard Dean today for encouraging progressives to kill the health care reform bill. Dean thinks the bill, without a public option, is now too compromised to deserve further support. "I would ask Dr. Dean, how better do you address those who don't have insurance: passing a bill that will cover 30 million who don't currently have it or killing the bill?"

"I don't think any rational person would say killing the bill makes a whole lot of sense at this point," Gibbs continued, notes the Huffington Post. Dean called the bill's latest incarnation a gift to the insurance industry. Gibbs contested that assessment: "If this is an insurance company's dream, I think the insurance companies have yet to get the memo." (More Robert Gibbs stories.)