Charles
Krauthammer reflects on the health care overhaul legislation. Excerpts:
The United States has the best health care
in the world — but because of its inefficiencies, also the most expensive. The
fundamental problem with the 2,074-page Senate health-care bill (as with its
2,014-page House counterpart) is that it wildly compounds the complexity by
adding hundreds of new provisions, regulations, mandates, committees, and other
arbitrary bureaucratic inventions.
Worse, they are packed into a monstrous
package without any regard to each other. The only thing linking these changes
— such as the 118 new boards, commissions, and programs — is political
expediency. Each must be able to garner just enough votes to pass. There is not
even a pretense of a unifying vision or conceptual harmony.
. . .
The bill is irredeemable. It should not
only be defeated. It should be immolated, its ashes scattered over the Senate
swimming pool.
Then do health care the right way — one
reform at a time, each simple and simplifying, aimed at reducing complexity,
arbitrariness, and inefficiency.