Health care is an area of policy that is of almost outsized importance to me, even though I don't write about it all that much these days. So, naturally, I found this interesting-- it summarizes a McKinsey article about how to fix the US health care system (or perhaps more accurately, what to focus on in attempting to fix it). I was pleased to see that much of what is detailed here corresponds to things I've been saying for quite awhile, and even a lot of what I was saying last year in my capacity as RNC spokeswoman, advocating for John McCain:

Back in December, 2008, the folks at McKinsey - one of the world’s most well known consulting firms - wrote an interesting article on health care reform in the U.S. What’s striking about it now as we all watch the debate unfold in Washington, DC is how different McKinsey’s approach is to the one being taken in our nation’s capital. McKinsey focused on three things - personal behavior, cost and quality transparency, and administrative simplification.

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Check out this, from Politico's front page:

Note the caption: "Democratic leaders warn supporters that they won't be able to accomplish everything they set out to do this year."

As Politico correctly notes, if Franken is seated as a Senator, Harry and his friends will have a bulletproof, 60 vote majority.

That means the GOP won't be able to filibuster.

But even with that major obstacle to Democrats passing bills eliminated, it seems Harry & Co still won't be able to get it together to pass items that evidently constitute noteworthy parts of their agenda.

I don't spend a lot of time touting Republican leadership in the Senate, but I will say this: I'm pretty sure that with 60 votes, our guys could get stuff that matters as much to our base as things like closing  the "gun-show loophole" do to the Democratic party base passed into law.

Separately, you've got to wonder just how unpopular core Democratic agenda items like individual gun control efforts or, say, card check (i.e., the Employee "Free" Choice Act) are among the population at large if Senate Democrats, with their 60 votes, can't seem to get enough of their own members onside to progress them.  60 votes or no, this smacks of the Democratic party continuing to be the philosophical home of some pretty unapalatable policy prescriptions.

Democratic leadership FAIL. [intro]

That is essentially the message sent by Chris Van Hollen, Chair of the DCCC and assistant to Nancy Pelosi, and House Majority Whip Jim Clyburn, to Democratic House members earlier this week:...