Barack Obama was elected President, by a significant majority of Americans, on a platform that called for heath care reform with a public option.  In current opinion polls, a significant majority of Americans still favor heath care reform with a public option.  An overwhelming majority of the U. S. House of Representatives favors heath care reform with a public option.  A smaller but still solid majority of the U. S. Senate favors health care reform with a public option.  But we can't have heath care reform with a public option because a minority of the Senate opposes it — a minority made up of Senators who have taken millions of dollars in contributions from the health care industry and are standing with the health care industry to the bitter end, even though many of them represent states in which a significant majority of their own constituents favor health care reform with a public option.

What's going on here?

Plutocracy.  The vast financial resources of the health care industry have subverted the clear will of the people and their government.  That's what plutocracy means — rule by the wealthy — and that's what America has become . . . a plutocracy.