David Brooks takes aim at Obamacare...

...in his column this morning, "Health Chaos Ahead":

It was always going to be difficult to implement Obamacare, but even fervent supporters of the law admit that things are going worse than expected. 

Implementation got off to a bad start because the Obama administration didn’t want to release unpopular rules before the election. Regulators have been working hard but are clearly overwhelmed, trying to write rules that influence the entire health care sector — an economic unit roughly the size of France. Republicans in Congress have made things much more difficult by refusing to provide enough money for implementation.

By now, everybody involved seems to be in a state of anxiety. Insurance companies are trying to put out new products, but they don’t know what federal parameters they have to meet. Small businesses are angry because the provisions that benefited them have been put on the back burner. Health care systems are highly frustrated. They can’t plan without a road map. Senator Max Baucus, one of the authors of the law, says he sees a “huge train wreck” coming. 

I'll let you read the rest of it. (I have a feeling you'll be seeing a lot of articles like this in the near future.)

Oh, well. What did you expect from Mr. Brooks? He hated the ACA from the get-go (without offering his own solution to the health care mess in America.)  

My response to Brooks can be summed up in three words:  

Medicare for all. 

It would be the cheapest and most efficient health care system of all. Not convinced? Here's a great Web site: Physicians for a National Health Program. It's a good place to start.

Don't want to read all that? I don't blame you. How about a recent blog post from David Frum, "Somebody Has to Drive Down Healthcare Costs"? (It's an easy read.) Money quote:

...what American healthcare needs is a merciless Sam Walton figure who will brutally tell hospitals, "That $1200 toenail clipping and test? It's now $87. Take it or leave it. And if you don't take it, I'll find somebody else to take it."
 
I'd prefer that this hypothetical healthcare Sam Walton be a private company operating in a competitive marketplace. But it's going to have to be SOMEBODY, and if it's not "Mr. Sam," it's going to be Uncle Sam.