I'd never have guessed that, six years after Medicare introduced a drug benefit, it would still be forbidden to negotiate prices with pharmaceutical companies. Health reform might fix that, but it probably won't.

This is what happens when you privatize Medicare. The Medicare prescription drug benefit is a massive giveaway to pharmaceutical companies, creating disastrous health effects for the nation's poor and elderly citizens.

Democrats believe we must have comprehensive health care reform that includes giving the federal government authority to negotiate lower prices with drug companies.

Why does Medicare have such difficulty accommodating a cut - no, wait, a trim to its annual spending increase - of two measly percentage points? Two words: baby boom.

It never fails to astonish me how cheaply a politician can be bought.

Stock prices relative to company assets are no better at signaling the likelihood of future earnings growth than they were the day the Titanic sank, and risk management is a good deal worse.