Hot Topic...

We ran an op-ed from Bill Vernon, state director of the National Federation of Independent Business, in our Aug. 4 issue of the Worcester Business Journal and boy have we heard a response.

In the piece, Vernon criticizes a plan floated by Gov. Deval Patrick to impose "higher fees on employers to pay for a possible funding shortfall." Not surprisingly, this topic has caught fire on the Internet.

Health Care For All, a Boston-based advocacy group in support of... well, you know, is planning to submit a rebuttal to Vernon's piece for our Aug. 18 issue. Meanwhile, I'm getting e-mails from people across the U.S., including some guy from Wisconsin and a represenative from AARP, plugging their health care reform web site (http://www.dividedwefail.org/).

Here are two of the e-mail comments I received in the last day and a half (these are unedited):

"The Mass. mess is yet another example of what happens when you get a bunch of power hungry Gov't employees involved, all trying to justify their existence so they can mooch off the taxpayers. The concept of providing healthcare sounds good but as usual NO plans were put in to effect to reduce the cost so more businesses go under, more unemployed at taxpayer expense. meanwhile they subsidize the likes of Walmart! Go figure. "

"He hit the problem right on the head...the problem with health care in America is not access, it is delivery. Until we take the profiteers out of the system, we will never have a true national health care program as opposed to our current Health Care Services Industry. The simple fact is that America has depended upon American businesses for the provision of health care since WWII when, in fact, it should have been a federally funded program from the start. Quite simply, it is the worst program ever devised to deliver health services. I think our founding fathers would be rolling over in their grave if they saw how the lawyers have been running the country for the last 30 years."

Got your own opinion on health care reform in Massachusetts? Submit a comment below, or e-mail cdavis@wbjournal.com.