David Broder (?!?!): Rising Hope For Fixing Health Care

[babylonsister]

Rising Hope For Fixing Health Care
By David Broder


WASHINGTON -- Things are looking up for substantive reform of America's troubled health care system.

No one who knows the history of such efforts, from Harry Truman's administration through Bill Clinton's, needs to be reminded of the difficulties that inevitably confront any plan to overhaul one-seventh of the U.S. economy and bring quality medicine to millions of the uninsured.

But developments at both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue last week -- and across the country -- pointed up both the urgency of the problem and the prospects for seeing significant action.

When Barack Obama's transition team let out word that former Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle would be his choice to run the Department of Health and Human Services and quarterback his work on health reform, it signaled that Obama is serious about his campaign promise to make that issue a first-term priority.

Daschle would not leave a lucrative job at a law firm in order to twiddle his thumbs. Only with a clear understanding that the new president will put his own political capital at risk in this cause would the South Dakotan sign up for the job.

Daschle can be of great help to Obama in achieving the goal. He has made his own in-depth study of health care issues and brings a genuine passion to the subject. And he knows the Senate, where past efforts have foundered.

But there are positive signs within the Senate as well. Max Baucus of Montana, the chairman of the Finance Committee, one of the two main centers of Senate action, moved first by releasing a detailed outline of his preferred piece of legislation. Sen. Edward M. Kennedy of Massachusetts, the chairman of the other committee of jurisdiction -- Health, Education, Labor and Pensions -- quickly asserted his right to be at the center of action. He organized three task forces within his committee and reached out to Baucus to suggest that their staffs start exchanging ideas as well.

more...:fistbump:

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2008/11/a_promising_prognosis_for_heal.html

[John Q. Citizen]

1. Even Broder points out that there is a real opportunity to move health care.

We, the citizens, need to also organize and push so that the changes that occur are agreeable to us. We need a system that severely limits the systematic rip off of huge amounts of money from the system, so that health care is affordable.

We need to make sure that everyone has access to quality comprehensive care.

And we need to make sure we get to choose our care providers.