In one of the Democratic debates earlier this year, a reporter asked Barack Obama if he would accept public financing of his presidential campaign.  His response was “Yes, but first I would sit down with McCain so that we would jointly agree on what that meant and agreed on the same terms,” – Or something very close to that. 

On April 3rd, the Boston Globe ran a story on McCain’s desire to “cover all our citizens,” but that he does not yet have a plan in place.  While the Democrats have plans in place, they will not pass as they are presently constituted since they would not have the support of the Independents, which are essential to the successful passage of any health care reform proposal.

Right now the candidates of both parties are stuck with proposals that would not be supported by the majority of Americans.  What would be refreshing—instead of fighting each other over whose health plan is best—is to make the same pledge on health care reform that was alluded to in the aforementioned public financing of the campaign.

What we should be asking the candidates to do is make a vow to find a solution to health care that will work for the American public. The reality is to achieve health care reform it must have bi-partisan support.  

We could get to that bipartisan support if we could get the candidates to vow to work with the American public to find solutions they will support.

We think the first step in that direction, is asking the people what they would support.  Many groups have general guiding principles:  we can start by focusing on those and identify common ground and build consensus.  Much consensus already exists.

Cheers and more later,  Kathleen