A Question, Mr. President...

Mr. President, last night in your health care speech to Congress you said two things that struck me:

"The only thing this plan would eliminate is the hundreds of billions of dollars in waste and fraud...."

and

"Reducing the waste and inefficiency in Medicare and Medicaid will pay for most of this plan."

OK, fair enough. But Medicare and Medicaid are programs run by, well, the government; the government you currently administer. So why, Mr. President, do we need a nationalized health care plan in place before you eliminate all those billions in waste, inefficiency and fraud? I don't see how the latter is incumbent upon the former. Why can't eliminating all that waste, inefficiency and fraud be done as a first priority, before you involve the government in our health care decisions? What's the rush?

There is a compromise out there that suggests a "trigger" on your government option if there aren't enough savings forthcoming from the private sector. If you are so certain of your position, are you willing to support a "safety" on that trigger, one that would block your government option until your hundreds of billions of savings in Medicare and Medicaid have been achieved? And I mean without cutting services or quality, or raising taxes, as you promised.

Show us, Mr. President, that the Federal Government can run an efficient, affordable and high-quality health care program, and opposition to your schemes will vanish. Actions, sir; not words.