Yesterday I rose early to kayak, expecting the rains would come hard later in the day. The skies were leaden and the air cool and crisp.

It would cover every American, give them a choice of plans and fill in the holes in the current state and federal and private insurance plans. It's a coherent vision for the future evolution of our health system. The Center for American Progress calls it Medicare Extra.

There are already many different models for single payer in this country – Medicare, Medicaid, the VA, public hospitals and Kaiser Permanente. If you prefer model of single payer which one do you want? What features do you prefer?

Last year, the Assembly Speaker held up the single payer bill, SB 562 (Lara) to assess whether and how the measure could be financed. Its major proponents, the California Nurses Association were furious.

There will be continuing efforts to undermine and repeal the Affordable Care Act, and we need to defend its important progress. Now is the time to discuss and begin to decide on the next steps to  improve it. California has done a remarkable job in its implememtation, but we can do even better. Here are some preliminary thoughts.

Russia intervened in our elections to see that its favored candidate won. Much to everyone’s surprise their favored candidate, President Trump, did so. Whether there was or was not collusion with the Trump campaign, we’ll know at some point.

Essentially, there are five issues for decision in the Senate immigration debate (when and if it ever happens): status for the dreamers, impact on their parents, funding for the wall, restrictions on legal immigration and sanctuary cities. There are a lot of moving parts. 

The President in his most recent budget proposes the following:

In the US, we are a nation of immigrants; our prosperity was and is built on immigration, and historically we welcome immigrants and refugees; we admit about one million annually. Yet in times of economic decline and turmoil that welcome has turned to hostility and far worse.

Impeachment of the President is once again on people’s lips for the third time in my lifetime. Impeachment is an extraordinarily serious undertaking requiring a strong bi-partisan consensus to be successful. It requires a majority vote in the House and a 2/3rds vote in the Senate.

The early Pilgrims came to escape religious persecution in England. They came to practice their religion. They had no permission from the Native Americans to settle here and ultimately destroy their tribes, their communities and their way of life. They did not even have the permission of the British Government to leave England.

The GOP is in charge of the House, the Senate, the Presidency and the Supreme Court. It has control of the governorships and the state legislatures in over 30 states. What is it doing with all this awesome power to make our nation a better place to live, work and raise a family? What is it doing to make the world a better place for all who live on this planet? 

President Trump has succeeded in many of the ways his supporters wanted. He has withdrawn from trade and climate pacts, cut corporate tax rates and regulations, nominated and elevated conservative judges and made life very hard for immigrants and people of color in this country and far better for the patrons of his golf courses and luxury hotels. He has finished his first year with a government shutdown, which he has been extolling as a necessity since last fall.

In the United States public and private financing of the nation’s health care are split 50/50. In California in 2015, a total of $292 billion was spent on personal health care services. Of that total, $104 billion was spent on private insurance), $62 billion on Medicaid, $64 billion on Medicare and $61 billion comprised all other health spending (including a range of expenditures from the Veterans Administration, Prisons, personal out of pocket, Workers Compensation and Auto insurance).

As Martin Luther King reminds us “Let us celebrate the contents of our characters, not the colors of our skins”.

So really treason is trying to overthrow the government, aiding and abetting its enemies, or trying to kill the nation’s leaders on behalf of another power and losing. This is not a term to be casually thrown about.

The Governor’s Proposed Budget for the coming year (2018-19) will spend $190 billion from state General Funds ($135 billion) and state Special Funds ($56 billion). General Funds may be spent on any state or local programs; whereas Special Funds (e.g. the Highway Fund financed by gas taxes) must be spent on their designated purposes.

Are we still a functioning democracy? Are we heading towards a kleptocracy? A kakocracy?