This is from Campaign for America's Future.  Looks really great!

Building the Mandate in 2008 for Change in 2009

As Democrats convene in Denver, the Campaign for America’s Future is sponsoring a forum Tuesday, August 26, about how to Take Back America with a mandate to make big change happen after the election.
 

If you are in Denver on that day, be sure to attend. If you are not, bookmark this page; we'll stream the session live and post the video for later viewing. Also, join our online discussion on "Creating the Progressive Moment," designed to prepare progressives for the fight ahead.

At this conference, you will gain new insights and strategies for:

This is where progressives will talk about how we can work together on the issue campaigns that will mobilize people this year — AND win real change in 2009.

My title is a bit misleading.

The attitude of not caring about getting Health Care Insurance when it's available and affordable, is what can kill us. Other than that, I think our generation is pretty much perfect. (ahem). But seriously, as Younger Americans , there seems to be a care free attitude and lack of urgency when it comes down to getting Heath Insurance , even when it's affordable and it could actually make us sick. I cannot tell you how many times , I have refused to sign up for affordable Health Care Benefits , because I felt it was a waste of money. All the pharmaceutical ads I was seeing on T.V. were clearly for older people , or men who could no longer function sexually, but really , really  wanted to again.

So, subconsciously, I internalized that to mean getting Health Care Insurance was something that I didn't need to worry about until I got old and that all I had to do in the meantime, was eat right , exercise and take some supplements to reduce my chances of actually having the drugs I see on these commercials, in my Medicine cabinet. Well, it doesn't work that way and that was foolish thinking on my part and many of my peers.

If You Want To Live .....Read On.

SOURCE: Huffington Post

SNIP:

Elizabeth Edwards appeared on this morning's Good Morning America to discuss the Democratic Party's approach to universal health care. While Edwards had previously stated a preference for the health care proposal created by New York Senator Hillary Clinton over that of Senator Barack Obama, she told GMA host (and fellow cancer battler) Robin Roberts that she plans to "partner" with Obama on health care, and is "already working with this team with respect to health care."

Sen. John McCain, R-Arizona, told CNN Wednesday he agrees with President Bush's veto of legislation expanding a children's health insurance program, saying the bill provided a "phony smoke and mirrors way of paying for it."

from the oregonian.  talk about what goes around, comes around.

http://www.oregonlive.com/politics/oregonian/index.ssf?/base/news/1210301732200300.xml&coll=7

 No doubt some Hillary fans will say that this is Bill not Hillary.  To those people, I say: No.  The Bill Clinton 8 years are the bulk of what Hillary claims as her experience.  Either she has this "experience" or she has no experience.  Which is it?

I hope that Americans remember how well Bill Clinton kept his campaign promises while Hillary is throwing everything but the kitchen sink at Obama and at the same time promising everything but the kitchen sink to the American people

BILL CLINTON was elected in 1992 on a platform of "putting people first." His campaign promised health care reform, gay rights legislation and an end to Republican threats to abortion rights.

HEALTH CARE REFORM  --  Health care reform was forefront on his promises. When he took office, 37 million Americans were without any form of health insurance.   Like today, the crisis of the health care "was front-page. Seven of 10 Americans supported a system that would guarantee health care for every person.  The Clinton reform plan died before it even came to vote.

Summary: Market failures affect health care services in America. The health care industry is acting under logical and rational economic market rules when it underinsures America. A major overhaul is required to increase the health value of society at large. The economic incentives need to be changed for society to be healthier at a reasonable cost, not less healthy at a higher price.

Economists have a clear way of calling it: market failures. Within free markets, the microeconomic theory of supply and demand works well for commodity products and services. In perfect markets, with perfect information and universal access, products and services are priced at their true economic value, and providers are rewarded according to the true value of the service and product, making zero extraordinary profits over this market value. The key words here are “perfect markets”. Businesses are rewarded above the market value of their products and services when they can find market imperfections and take advantage of them, creating various types of monopolies. Information and location monopolies are typical ways in which market imperfections are exploited, and that is the way our economy works. Information may get protected with copyrights or patents in order to stimulate innovation, and location may be protected by zoning or licensing in order to ensure that services are provided by stimulating entrepreneurial risk.

Supply monopolies are a different matter, and that is where market failures come into play. If a supplier can control supply, extraordinary profits over market value can be attained. In order to avoid unfair monopoly advantages from this source, antitrust laws are in place, competition is encouraged and consumer oversight occurs. Most products and services fall within this market structure, providing true economic value for the consumer through direct supply/demand corrections created by competition and oversight. But certain services fall under the “natural monopoly” category that requires extra oversight and regulation, such as phone, electricity and general infrastructure, and some services fall totally outside market categories of supply and demand, generating market failures.

Go to "read more" to focus on the health care market failures

How would it be if Congress and not the Federal Reserve set interest rates? I think most economists agree that such a practice would relegate America to a backward nation effectively with no coherant money policy. Kind of like out situation with health or energy policy where interested parties lobby for a hodge podge of conflicting legislation that has no coherance or coordination, and only serve the short term interests of various stakeholders.

Tom Daschle and David Mechanic in their books on Health care reform suggest employing the model of the Federal Reserve in order to give a regulating authority the independence it needs to provide a vital public service.  The notion is appealing that health care or energy policy decisions that are frequently politicized by interested parties also should be delegated to an ultra independent agency.

I was working on a proposal for Hawaii's energy independence and saw many news articles about how small interest groups had derailed some good legislation.  I went back to what Tom was advocating and got to thinking- what is it that is the distinct notion about the Federal Reserve that we find appealing?  After all, there are many other independent agencies like the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, FCC and EPA- but those aren't so appealing because we have seen during the Bush administration how those agencies have been politicized. 

Daschle proposes 10 year terms for his Health board members, in order to insulate from politicization, and the revolving door problem with private industry.  I think the Fed has 14 year terms.  So is the main problem that the EPA didn't have the necessary insulation?  What if it did?  Just picture though the consequences if the EPA was loaded with Bush appointees.  We'd be unable to do anything with the environment for a decade. 

On the other hand, if the EPA did have independence, perhaps it could have successfully challenged Cheney's activities and declared CO2 a pollutant subject to EPA regulation.  That would have raised a huge political firestorm, and it would have been difficult for the republican congress to defund EPA since the democrats could have filibustered such cuts in the senate.  Further, if the terms of the some sort of board of EPA commissioners were staggered and long (10-14 years), then Bush may have gotten only one or two hardcore supporters in, and if we had a procedure for impeachment of commissioners, then perhaps the evil empire scenario would have an answer. 

I think Daschle is on to something.  If we are to have a stable and coherant approach for Health care and National energy strategy, then we have to go with a more fortified notion of an independent governmental agency along the lines of the Federal Reserve. 

Here's what David Freeman, head of California's Power Authority said about the California energy crisis:

"There is one fundamental lesson we must learn from this experience: ... we cannot do without [electricity], which makes opportunities to take advantage of a deregulated market endless. It is a public good that must be protected from private abuse. If Murphy’s Law were written for a market approach to electricity, then the law would state “any system that can be gamed, will be gamed, and at the worst possible time.” And a market approach for electricity is inherently gameable. Never again can we allow private interests to create artificial or even real shortages and to be in control."

There are several market imbalances with the common thread of attitudes about deregulation.  The (1) financial markets were gamed by folks like Bear Stearns, (2) The energy markets were gamed by Enron and local utilities, (3) the health care markets have been gamed by the insurance and pharmecuticals industries, and (4) communications policy has been gamed by the TelCos and cable companies.  So where were the agencies charged with supervision: respectively, (1) The Fed and SEC, (2) the  Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, (3) the United States Department of Health and (4) the FCC enforcing the 1996 Telcom act? 

The problem is that these agencies have been run by managers who believed that regulation was inherently bad economic theory.  The failure of that theory is demonstrated by the fiascos in each of those major policy areas.  George Soros suggests that the ideology of market fundamentalism has overtaken regulators, who despite the crushing evidence to the contrary, cling to the belief that economic systems tend towards equilibrium.  The recent debacle proves once again how obvious the misconception is, because time and again it is show that it is the intervention of the authorities that prevented financial markets from breaking down, not the markets themselves.

I am not arguing for some sort of revisionism of planned economies or the failed socialistic hybrids.  I am a big fan of competition, and discretionary flexibility needed for innovation.  The surprizing thing I learned from my business days was that corporations don't necessarily dislike rules.  They certainly prefer the fewest number of rules to play by, but so long as their competitors also have the same compliance costs, it has a net zero effect on their competitiveness.  Cost of compliance is like any other cost of manufacture- like the cost of a nut or bolt- the cost gets passed along to the consumer.  Your competitor has to pay the same cost, so it doesn't matter.  Like any game, rules are viewed as necessary.  Note this though.  In the absence of rules, the social contract for businesses is that your job is to increase profitability.  If the rules allow you to grab huge amount of cash and lock out competitors, that is what you do.  Now- if there is some rule that constrains your ability to lock out competitors, I would have thought from my hippy days that the higher levels of management would find that awful.  But that was more the exception.  The idea was kind of like football- there are rules against certain moves that can cause serious injury to players.  Those are good for the game.  Sure players are prevented from taking decisive action against an opponent.  But they don't begrudge the rule that prevents them from doing it.  

At it's core, American business accepts this attitude towards rules needed for fair play.  What regulatory agencies need to do is employ the notion of "Mechanism Design" advanced by nobel prize winner Leonid Hurwicz to design systems of rules that promote desired outcomes, rather than use overt schemes of direct management of the minutiae of the targeted industries.