Lexington: Hillary, you won the war

摘要

Here we go again. In 1994, the Democrats lost control of the Senate thanks to Hillary Clinton's disastrous attempt to reform American health care. Now they are back in control of the Senate by a whisker—and they've put health care right at the top of their agenda. Are they mad? Or have they discovered a formula for turning a sow's ear into a silk purse?rnMad is hardly the first word that comes to mind when you look at Tom Daschle, the Senate's cunning new majority leader. It was easy enough to demonise Hillarycare as a dangerous scheme to turn America into a gigantic version of Sweden. Mrs Clinton can't help but give the impression that she thinks that they do this sort of thing better in Stockholm. But a "patients' bill of rights", which lays down standards of service and, in the last resort, allows patients to sue managed-care organisations, is a different matter. The bill has three big things going for it.