California became the most recent state to abandon government-run, mandated healthcare this week in the face of unmanageable costs and strong opposition to mandated coverage.  Rather than turning to private, market-based solutions for health care, California was attempting to require most residents to acquire insurance or face a financial penalty for failing to do so - all while wracking up massive tax-funded expenses for the $14 billion dollar plan. 

California's proposal, borrowing elements from a similar plan that passed in Massachusetts in 2006, would have required most residents to obtain private health insurance and would have called for new charges on businesses, hospitals and cigarettes to help fund it.

It drew opposition from Republicans who saw it as too onerous on business and from Democrats, including advocates of a single-payer system, who said it would impose a financial burden on working people and yet bring too little benefit. But the crowning blow came from the gaping $14 billion hole in California's budget, which made many supporters and opponents doubtful that the state could afford the program's $14 billion cost.

Despite seeing these mandated, taxpayer-funded programs fail time and time again, liberals continue to try to take control of American's health care.  What has been proven effective in states like North Carolina is to offer a mix of government support that relies on private, free market solutions to increase access to health care while decreasing the cost.

Roll Call is reporting that liberals in Congress, led by Lynn Woolsey (D-CA), are once again going to push for premature troop reductions in Iraq. 

Rep. Lynn Woolsey (D-Calif.), who co-chairs the Congressional Progressive Caucus, said late Tuesday she is preparing to reintroduce legislation calling for a troop withdrawal from Iraq and will urge leadership to move the measure in the wake of the economic stimulus package that has been the center of attention for several weeks.
 
The California lawmaker described the measure as “daughter of 508,” referring to H.R. 508, a bill backed by liberal Democrats in the first half of the 110th Congress.
 
In addition to curtailing new funding for the Iraq mission, the measure would require U.S. troops to withdraw from Iraq by the end of this year. Unlike the previous version, however, the new bill would implement a quarterly schedule, returning 25 percent of current troops by deadlines in March, June, September and December.

This new call for withdrawal and defeat comes as the Washington Post is reporting that military commanders on the ground in Iraq are calling for a freeze in troop reductions.  Generals Petraeus and Odierno have requested that when troop levels reach their pre-surge levels, they be given a chance to assess whether they will be able to maintain lower levels of violence with fewer troops in Iraq.  It would be a tragedy to erase the gains made over the last year by prematurely withdrawing our military from the field, as has been suggested by liberals like Woolsey in Congress.

"So far, so good," Lt. Gen. Raymond T. Odierno, the operational commander of U.S. forces in Iraq, said in an interview here earlier this week. "I feel very comfortable with where we are and our plans to reduce to 15 brigades by July."

But after that, Odierno added, "I believe there should be a period of assessment." He said such a pause will be necessary because the impact of the current U.S. troop reductions on Iraqi army and police forces, on the Iraqi government and on the overall security environment won't be immediately apparent.

At the peak of the U.S. counterinsurgency effort that began last year, commonly called "the surge," there were 20 U.S. combat brigades in Iraq, each with about 3,500 troops. Adding in other forces, about 170,000 U.S. troops were in the country.

Another officer said he advocated a freeze because there has frequently been a lag between events in Iraq and their impact on security. He noted, for example, that it took several months in 2006 to see the full effect of the February bombing of the Golden Mosque in Samarra, which by that summer had helped push the country into a small-scale civil war.