Steven Pearlstein's Op-Ed in the Washington Post

Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist Steven Pearlstein wrote an op-ed in today's Washington Post about passage of health insurance reform. Amidst everything being said about this issue, Rep. Eshoo felt this article stood out and wanted to share it with her constituents.

Here are a few excerpts from the column :

Sometimes, those of us who live here and participate in political life can get a bit cynical. We tend to focus on the process or the gamesmanship or the unsavory compromises. Which is why it is important at moments such as this to get your head out of the weeds, look at the Capitol dome in the distance and remember how lucky you are to have a front-row seat to one of the world's longest-running historical dramas.

What strikes me about the lead-up to this weekend's health-care vote in the House is how quiet things actually are.

One of the silliest Republican talking points is that Democrats are "ramming health-care reform down the throats of the American people." In fact, we've been talking about it, on and off, for decades, ultimately winding up with a solution that is not only remarkably centrist but also not all that different from the compromise nearly reached between Ted Kennedy and the Nixon White House in the early 1970s.

Passing a health-care reform bill would restore not only a measure of trust and confidence in our political process but also, more significantly, trust and confidence in ourselves.