Nearly twenty years before Bill and Hillary Clinton entered the fray, there was a

major debate over national health insurance. Three proposals were on the table, and the "bones of contention," as WFB phrases it, "seem to be (1) how much, if anything, should be deductible, (2) is there a role for the private insurance companies, and (3) how best to disguise from the people the fact that they are paying the bills." To Mr. Fine, "We need ... the principle of health care as a right." To Dr. Roth, "actually more people are receiving more and better medical care in more and better-equipped facilities from more and better-trained physicians than ever before in history, and that really doesn't sound like crisis. The only crisis is in the cost area ..." A sometimes heated, always informative discussion.