Health Care Debate

The town halls make for good television, but they're a side-show to the main event. The real story should be about the back room deals reportedly being negotiated with the Obama administration.

Obama needs needs us to put our organizing shoes back on and hit the streets. He needs us to tell our local officials that we expect Congress to pass health care reform. Pressure is what's needed.

Should we just give those who are derailing the attempt to redress America's ills what they want, actually let them secede, let them govern it the way they want, and then watch from a safe distance?

Is there still time to recover and restore American Democracy to its bare essentials -- a government "of the people, by the people and for the people"? I don't know. Today we are on the brink.

I don't recognize the raucous and rowdy town meetings in other parts of the country. The shouters talk about "freedom," but what they are doing is the absolute opposite of what freedom of discussion is about.

For loved ones, end of life planning makes one of the most difficult times that much easier to deal with. Instead of helping families plan for this, we are getting fear mongering and stupidity.

Reviewing what the Nazis actually did -- and why -- shows that recent inapt "Nazi" comparisons reveal more about the attackers than the president's or Congress's current proposals.

The election of the first U.S. president of African descent has challenged a lot of people's self-identity. The loud, vicious, unruly behavior is a collective expression of white trepidation.

Even if the public option weren't part of the Obama reform plan, the Right would still be screaming about a "government take-over" as loudly as it is now.

The boy's mom was able to focus on her son and his well-being. She never got approached to sign insurance forms, never worried about how much the hospital bill was going to be.

What is striking about right wing talking points on health care is that every horror alleged as a feature of Obamacare is actually a mainstay of American health care as it currently stands.

Tuesday's meeting held by Sen. Arlen Specter in Lebanon, PA is a perfect example of the vitriol the poor legislators must endure (yeah, I said "poor" legislators) from the health-scare mobs.

The insurgency of angry anti-government groups is misplaced patriotism on steroids, and with all the attendant side effects. This is mass 'roid rage, ugly and insane.

This week, thousands of L.A.'s unemployed and medically uninsured will have their eyes examined, their teeth cared for, their lab work and radiology work done -- free.

The latest wacky component in the insurance industry's disinformation campaign comes from a former movie kickboxer bellowing about home visitation provisions. The health care crisis is not a B-movie script.

Willfully ignorant and incurious people prefer what they're used to and don't handle change easily. The progressive message has a long way to go before these people pay attention.

I've lived in Europe for 20 years; my son has had juvenile diabetes for seven of those. The cost of all that health care over seven years: zero. I've seen the European system up close -- it works.

For some, the system works best when elites make the most fundamental decisions for our society, unencumbered by the trappings of "democracy", and when the population is depoliticized, misinformed, or both.

Progressives who insist upon a government option would do well to remember the quality of government we endured over the past eight years.

Rep. Mike Ross on Thursday boasted about how his Blue Dog coalition "held the [health care] bill hostage in committee for 10 days" and prevented a sin...