If Barack Obama were truly interested in improving “Health Care” for Americans, he has a very simple way to prove it to all of us non-believers.  I mentioned it to Mrs. Flagstaff (who is already registered to be in Atlanta next year) the other day, and since then I’ve heard the same general idea mentioned by such estimable people as Rep. Michelle Bachmann, among others.  The simple procedure?

He simply has to lead the way in solving the problems of Medicare.  We all know what they are–not enough money, too many obligations, no way to rein it in.  It even goes broke before Social Security does.

Since he is proposing to put everyone within the boundaries of America on the equivalent of Medicare, he should first prove that he can make his plan work for the smaller subset of the population who are already (often against their will) dependent upon government health insurance, if not government health care.  While he’s at it, he should bring the VA system up to snuff, because it truly is government health care, and it treats the most important of our citizens.

Don’t say that it isn’t fair to make those demands because the elderly are much more expensive to cover than are the younger citizenry.  That may be true, but everybody who is working, young and old alike, are already paying Medicare taxes.  He is presently essentially proposing to add many millions more people into that same system, or one just like it.  It is eminently fair to suggest that he solve the VA’s and Medicare’s problems first, before he compounds them by adding the rest of us into the coverage pool.

If he can do that without resorting to borrowing to cover expenses, without eliminating the Medicare Advantage plans which provide many of us with catastrophic care coverage, without resorting to other taxes to cover the new expenses, without resorting to accounting sleight-of-hand which postpones benefits while it moves revenues forward, then, and only then, will I believe that he can create a national, government-run health plan that will work and be self-sufficient.