step in the right direction

A breath of fresh air wafting, finally, through the bullshit-ladden halls. Followed, apparently, by a sucker-punch. :D You go, Anthony Weiner.

MADDOW: When you where deciding about what to do with this amendment, deciding what your role was going to be in health care, what you could do in this committee, did the Medicare idea come to you because you knew it would be an embarrassment? Did you think that any Republicans would actually vote against Medicare?

WEINER: Well, I did. And you should make note that this is the 44th anniversary to the day of the creation of Medicare. But it does lead us to the next logical step where I need colleagues on both sides of the aisle to start to come to. And that is not why have a public option, but why have a private option at all.

If we know, for example, the one experiment we have is very successful, the publicly funded health care through Medicare, why do we even need insurance companies? What constructive role are they playing? We know they're taking tens of billions of dollars each year and putting it into profits that should be going into health care.

So, tomorrow, I'm going to be taking the next step in offering a true single-payer health care plan, and I want people today to start to think about, "Hey, maybe that's the way we do it. It's simpler and we know that it's works."