The health care summit accomplished very little, nor did many expect it to. The ruling party has made the tragic mistake of breaking the trust of the electorate.  The Louisiana purchase, the Nelson Nebraska bribe, the failure to keep the promise of openness and transparency has destroyed the trust of the voters.

In business one can easily recover from a mistake, but it is far more difficult to recover from a betrayal of trust.

This betrayal is compounded by the arrogance that flows from the ruling party.  When the opposition is treated as devoid of intelligent thought or is treated as having questionable motives there is little room for coming together at any summit.

If the president seems to kill this disastrous health care bill a little more every time he has addressed it in the past why would he think that addressing it in a summit with the cameras rolling will now help it; especially if he has not changed his message or his style.  A note on leadership and power: If you have to state that you are the president you are stating that you have the power and control. If you have to state this, if it is not apparent and obvious from those around you, then you do not have the power nor the respect of the people in the room.

But this summit did succeed is highlighting two significant differences between the two parties. For one party health care is a right, and for the other it is a responsibility.  There is a distinct difference between a right such as free speech which requires no transfer of wealth to bestow and a right to an expensive service which must be paid for by another party.  The former is made available equally to all citizens; the latter requires the force of government to rob one citizen to give to another. The former empowers all citizens; the latter fosters dependency.

The second highlighted difference is the emphasis on the emotional verses the rational.  Trillion dollar policy should not hinge on emotionally laden anecdotes. “I’ve seen grown men cry,” noted Pelosi.  We have to have a clear understanding of the issue supported by accurate numbers.  Numbers are thrown around so loosely nobody believes them. The 46 million uninsured has now been dropped to 30 million and some estimates have at a much lower number.  And uninsured is not synonymous with  being without coverage.  Ask any doctor.

The numbers may not paint a complete picture but they cannot be ignored.  It is better to have an imperfect system that is sustainable that a better system that is not.

Finally there is the comprehensive trap; the belief that a big problem can only be approached with a big solution.  Big systemic solutions are fraught with unpredictable consequences, hidden costs, uncontrolled bureaucracies and endless expensive patchworks adjustments.  Most less complicated and ambitious reforms have far outstripped their cost estimates.

There are real health care problems and real health care solutions, but the big systemic solutions that focus on the fundamental philosophical differences between the two parties was doomed to fail from the beginning . No summit could change that.

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