Just as nearly every candidate to federal office vows to save billions of tax dollars by making the government more efficient and by rooting out waste (yet once in office most Members spend their time looking for ways to increase spending), candidates are now proposing to finance their multi-billion dollar government-run universal health care plans by, "making health-care delivery more efficient."

That is how New Mexico Governor and Presidential candidate Bill Richardson says he will help pay for the $110 billion annual cost of his health plan. Reminds me of the Popeye character who would gladly pay you next week for a hamburger today. If something sounds too good to be true it usually is. I don't see how a health program administered by the federal government could achieve that degree of savings without some sort of rationing.

He says he will also save money by allowing Medicare to negotiate prescription drug costs. This is odd though, because the Congressional Budget Office has already reported that the ideas bandied about in Congress to implement this would have a negligible impact on federal spending.

He also says that his plan won't require new taxes because of the two recycled ideas above, plus a requirement that "businesses that do not provide health insurance to contribute toward helping the uninsured buy coverage." Maybe I am old fashioned, but when the government mandates that you have to pay something, that sounds a lot like a TAX.