The lead editorial in the Sunday...

...New York Times is usually the most important thing to read in a given week. If you can get to nothing else (and I realize that some people actually have lives), it's the one piece I would recommend as a rule. Yesterday's concerned the number and description of the uninsured in America. The number 47 million is usually bandied about as the sum of the uninsured, and I have to confess I have no idea how many people are or are not covered in America. But I doubt if anyone else does, either. I certainly wouldn't trust the editors of The Wall Street Journal, who are shameless at cherry-picking information to support their agenda. They would maintain that the number is much lower than commonly thought, to which I would reply, "Fine. Then cover everybody; what's the big deal?" I'll leave it to others to opine on why the Journal is so resistant to the idea of covering the uninsured. I'll assume the best: that their reluctance stems from their inability to reexamine their assumptions of how the world works. That's okay; it's a lot to ask of anyone. But just don't use it as an excuse not to do the right thing. The link is below and I'll admit it's a little dry. So I included the final paragraph, which is the most important part of it anyway.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/23/opinion/23sun1.html?_r=1&ref=opinion

If nothing is done to slow current trends, the number of people in this country without insurance or with inadequate coverage will continue to spiral upward. That would be a personal tragedy for many and a moral disgrace for the nation. It is also by no means cost-free. Any nation as rich as ours ought to guarantee health coverage for all of its residents.