Health-care debate enhanced

Akron Beacon Journal: Harry Reid faces a gargantuan task orchestrating the passage of legislation designed to improve the country’s costly and inefficient health-care system. Yet the Senate majority leader wasn’t going to get anywhere without a bill that from the outset carried credibility, in terms of policy and politics. That’s what he delivered last week ...

Let’s agree at the start: The proposal is far from perfect, not even close, actually. ...

Sen. Reid moved smartly to keep a provision that would apply a new tax on the highest-cost insurance policies. Organized labor does not like the idea, thus, the absence from the House bill. Yet the tax is essential to easing the punishing expense of health care.

With that goal in mind, Reid made room for another critical element missing in the House bill: an independent Medicare advisory commission, its medical experts with the clout to push best practices, their actions driven by the reality that less care often is better than more care. ...

In other ways, the House takes the preferred course. It covers more of the uninsured. ...

Now the jawing can continue, and good thing: Harry Reid has enhanced the discussion, joining the House in making a genuine attempt at improving the overall quality and slowing the punitive cost of health care.