"There's not a politician in America who hasn't promised prescription drug benefits under Medicare to senior citizens for years and years." Those were the words of Joe Lieberman regarding the stampede to get a healthcare bill in action prior to the political season. "I want to take a few days. I'm not going to give a knee-jerk reflex reaction and say no way.” It may sound strange for me to be agreeing with someone from the left of the aisle but I agree with Lieberman.

While it is true that the United States needs an effective and affordable healthcare plan and a definite overhaul of the system in place, the absolute wrong thing to do would be to play politics with it. Hillary Clinton tried that and it handed her the biggest failure of her public life. What needs to happen, and this is for the good of the American people in total, is for there to be a consortium of healthcare professionals, not politicians, who sit down and brainstorm about how best to go about the task of creating affordable healthcare in America.

Asking politicians who can’t even spend within their means to tackle this subject is laughable. It is no wonder we are mired in the mess we are regarding healthcare in this country. When we leave the intricate details to those who thought it was okay to spend $600 on a hammer or a toilet seat of course we are in trouble. Further, although there are some in the legislative branch of our government who do know what they are talking about (Bill Frist is a heart surgeon after all) I am sure that if given a chance to drop the political facade the politicos would admit they shouldn’t be the ones to come up with the plan. It is akin to bringing a car to a veterinarian for a tune-up. They are asking the wrong people to conceive the plan.

President Bush should call on Congress to mandate a consortium on healthcare, a consortium that would assemble those at the top of their professional game to commit themselves to creating a model for healthcare in this country. The consortium should have representatives from the medical, pharmaceutical, insurance and aftercare communities, among others, and should be mediated by parliamentarians of the highest order. It should be non-partisan and go to great pains to be so. Profiteering would be grounds for dismissal from the consortium and would cost that person or persons the right to have their interests considered. The consortium would end when there was a good, efficient and effective model for a new healthcare system in this country, one that everyone could agree on. It can happen. It has happened with regard to other inter-corporation entities in the past. Then it would be up to our legislators and government administrators to keep their hands off of it and establish it as the new code of healthcare in this country.

This rush to appease voters because of promises that were made during political campaigns is reckless at best. This is not something that we should rush to complete just so one can say that they kept a promise. That’s a great way to employ an inferior product. What we need is for good old American ingenuity to come to the forefront so that we can set a standard for the entire world and not just create another political talking point for those who which to annoy us with rhetoric.

So, to the politicos I say, please stop patronizing the American public with the healthcare issue. Get responsible and get the professionals to set-up a program that will work for everyone. This shouldn’t be a political feather in the cap. Our lives depend on it.

Frank Salvato is a political media consultant and the managing editor for The New Media Journal.us. He is a contributing writer for The Washington Dispatch, GOPUSA, OpinionEditorials, Men’s News Daily, Canada Free Press & AmericanDaily. His pieces are regularly featured in Townhall.com. He has appeared as a guest on The O’Reilly Factor, The Kevin Matthews Radio Show (Chicago) and The Brad Messer Radio Show (San Antonio). His pieces have been recognized by the Japan Center for Conflict Prevention and are occasionally featured in The Washington Times and The London Morning Paper as well as other national and international publications.