All Life Is Problem Solving

It’s important to sharply distinguish strategy from tactics in health care reform. I think strategy is about your goal and overall orientation toward getting health care reform, while tactics are about the low-level things you do to get from point-to-point in getting the strategy implemented. Tactics are influenced by strategy in the sense that tactics […]

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Absent a substantial change in direction by Congressional Leadership and the President, I think it’s time to do whatever progressives can to kill the health care reform legislation currently moving through Congress, and then to immediately reset to Medicare for All, single payer. As HR 3962 bill sits now, it’s worse than no bill at […]

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I think “groupthink” is a general pattern in this Administration. Not the simple groupthink that considers only one alternative and never discusses anything else, but a more complex sort of groupthink about frames. Obama looks at alternatives in deciding on policy, alright. And he appears to be rational in his consideration of them. So far, […]

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How many times do they have to prove it? These health insurance companies are just no good. You can’t negotiate with them. They have to get everything they want, or they’ll take their marbles and go home. After all, they’re the princes of the earth. They’re entitled! Today, the health insurance companies, through AHIP, released […]

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Over the past few days, there’s been a great deal of moral protest, outrage, and even fury expressed at Firedog Lake and The Seminal about the “opt-out” compromise. The basis of the outrage is the idea that we all ought to stand together in health care reform, and insist on the idea of “everybody in, […]

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The Mad As Hell Doctors arrived in DC Wednesday and held a program in Lafayette Park, just across the way from the White House, calling for the passage of a single-payer, Medicare for All plan by the Congress. The event started off auspiciously, when my wife, Bonnie, and I “met up” with follow Firedog Lake/Seminal […]

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In the last couple of days, my thoughts have turned to the question of how much Medicare for All legislation could save compared to the present non-system of health insurance. One estimate of the savings we often see in articles on Medicare for All is $350-400 billion annually. This a substantial amount and over 10 […]

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On September 19, Katherine Q. Seelye, a New York Times “reporter” provided one of the most biased “hit pieces” I’ve seen yet on Medicare for All. The piece is called “Medicare for All? ‘Crazy,’ ‘Socialized’ and Unlikely,” implying that Seelye thinks it’s all three. But what does she say to support her implied characterization. Well, […]

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On September 19, Ezra Klein favored us with an analysis on health care reform in the WaPo. Coming off the results of the Kaiser Family Foundation’s 2009 Employer Benefits Survey, Ezra makes the following points: ”The truth is we all pay, and much more than we recognize, for health care. . . .” ” . […]

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There’s a Medicare for All sub-community at Firedog Lake. I’m not sure how many bloggers and commenters are in it, but I think it includes at least:

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