Reform Redux

The rise and wimpering demise of Clinton's health care reform attempt seem as events from a lost epoch.  But then, my memory isn't what it used to be.  Perhaps it would be better, now, if some progress had actually been made, and I could afford a brain scan once in a while without risking my DirectTV budget.

The events of this morning are much easier to remember.  President Obama courageously stood before a bunch of AMA doctors (and presumably lobbyists and lawyers) and told them some details about his plan for reforming the health care system.  Response to Mr. Obama's plan was for the most part polite, and in some places even enthusiastic. By and large, though, it's plain to see that the President is in for a rough and long haul.  By the time he's through he'll probably feel like having gone through a few dozen colonoscopies - maybe a few hundred.  Think Afghanistan is a bitter pill to swallow, Mr. President?  The health insurance companies will be glad to provide you with a special enema.  Enjoy.

Not that what the President said didn't make perfect sense.  It did - even to most of the assembled AMA members.  It's just that change is scary.  The medical world as it exists in America will need to alter in ways that mystify most, and thus frighten them.  Mr. Obama tried to explain, but there's really no way to encapsulate all that must be done in a single speech - even a very long one. 

Everyone knows that the best change - or at least the easiest to accept, is change which comes about gradually, like melting glaciers.  Unfortunately, as the President so clearly conveyed, the upward zoom of medical costs is likely to kill off our economy more surely than any other among the multitude of crises facing us - even global warming. And do it so quickly few people will be able to afford those newly - minted beachfront properties in, say, Fresno, when the glacial meltwater comes.  

Back in the early days of the Clinton administration, the goal was no less than a single payor system, and let's have that right now, thank you very much.  That was just too much change and planned to come too quickly for most at the time to accept.  Today, Mr. Obama wasn't talking single payor, but he was preaching speed.  Then, the country was on the verge of a lifting economic wave that benefited a swath of society wide enough to make the increased cost of health care seem less a crisis.  Now, the picture is entirely different.  Many American's simply can't afford health care, and many that can are on the brink of affordability.  Relief must come quickly.

So can he do it?  Can our President lead the scared and squabbling masses into a brave, new, medical universe where everyone is covered, costs are kept reasonable, and the care is of the best quality?  Maybe, but those colonoscopies and that enema are going to hurt, Sir.