Excerpt: [O]riginal Medicare stands as a shining example of a needs-based program that has consistently served the public interest. Despite being weakened by privatizing, it gives us a solid foundation for real health care reform, when access to necessary health care is even more difficult than in the 1960s. It is time to expand Medicare as a social insurance program for all Americans through a single risk pool of all 300 million of us. This is the most efficient, fair and sustainable way to insure us all against the costs of illness and injury, coupled with the strengths of our private delivery system.  MORE >>