As a former lifelong Republican I voted for Obama because he promised to take power from lobbyists and restore it to the American public, especially in areas of health care, energy and education reform. These areas need drastic changes, and thus far his personal efforts to promote such change has been pathetic.

Obama has been trying unsuccessfully to herd a bunch of cats (congressmen) like Max Baucus who get huge contributions from special interests that profit greatly from the status quo. No matter how he tries to "spin" it, Baucus is protecting the constituents he cares about (his biggest contributors) through his so-called health care reform efforts. In doing so, he helps preserve the huge profits, executive salaries, and inefficiencies of health insurers and pharmaceutical companies.

There are several reasons why Baucus has refused to put single-payer health care "on the table" for consideration: 1) Overhead of private health insurers in the U.S eats up nearly 30 percent of health care premiums; Medicare costs 3 percent and in Canada that figure is 1 percent, and; 2) Health insurers in the U.S have 22 administrative personnel per 10,000 insured; in Canada that number is 1.5. The health insurance lobby that supports Baucus spends $1.4 million per day on scare ads about

government-funded health; this lobby does not want these, and other equally embarrassing facts aired publicly in open congressional hearings.

As recently as 2003, President Obama strongly promoted single-payer health care. So instead of trying to placate congressmen who do the bidding of lobbyists, he needs to spend his political capital on things he really believes in, like HR 676, an expanded and improved system of Medicare-for-all.

Bob Balhiser

735 Corral Road