AT A STARBUCKS, I was shocked at what my insurance agent Vicki showed me. She had spent three weeks researching the newest healthcare plans being offered for small business.

The best deal was a $700 monthly premium with a $3,000 deductible—for two healthy people.

That's nothing, Vicki tells me. Another client saw his rates climb 109%. That was a record for her clients. She recalled a 105% jump in the 1970s.

Surely, something catastrophic happened with that client. Not really. Vicky tells me the oldest employee, in his 50s, had shoulder surgery. The others are healthy; one in his forties and three in their 30s.

After seeing all the options, Vicki advised me not to waste time. Premiums go up about one percent a month, she warned.

Before she left, I asked her opinion on the future of healthcare. She's not optimistic. Costs will continue to rise. Socialized medicine, she says, will only lead to higher taxes and fewer doctors.

Driving home, I recalled a conversation I had twenty years ago. My friend Jim, a former journalist in the healthcare field, was educating me on the healthcare crisis that has arrived. What he said then holds true today. "It's your money or your life."

If you have a medical condition, your first concern is not the cost. You concentrate on living and living well. You focus on being with family and friends. I'd do anything to have more time with the people I love or the life I live.

You know who else knows that—and uses it? The winners in the healthcare financial sweepstakes: insurance companies; trial lawyers; doctors; and pharmaceuticals. What else do they have in common? They have all contributed large amounts to the campaigns of elected officials in Washington, D.C.

But ask yourself this: do you know of a political action committee raising money for patients' rights or small business owners saddled with these premiums? No, that's the job of the elected officials we put into office. By the way, they're failing miserably.

Here's the reason.

All roads of government failure today lead to excessive campaign donations. Special interests control our government, because they either dictate who wins office or discourage others who might run for office.

The result is evident in healthcare. Our elected officials are persuaded to look at healthcare as merely an economic issue. Cancer surgery is no different than buying a car.

In fairness, the behavior of many Americans—as patients—make it easy for our elected officials to ignore the looming problems. Too many of us abuse the healthcare system. We get a sniffle and we want antibiotics. We scrape a knee and we head to the emergency room. Yet, when we have an obvious growth or dark spot on our skin, we refuse to have a doctor check for cancer—until it's too late. Plus, we don't leave proper instructions about avoiding Terri Schiavo-type situations.

However, this behavior and lack of knowledge are partially caused by our elected officials' refusal to inform and educate us. They'll ignore us so they don't piss off the people who paid to put them in office.

I'm not saying the government needs to automatically increase spending on healthcare. I'm also not saying we need socialized medicine. We need to look at both, though, since small business is the biggest provider of jobs in America. I don't want to discourage the work and discoveries of pharmaceuticals or doctors, either. However, the patient—the American people—needs to be sitting at that table with everyone else. Right now the patient is confused and uninformed.

David Walker, the U.S. Controller General, says we are in far more danger from out-of-control healthcare costs than we are from terrorist in a cave somewhere. He is a hero since he is doing the job that the White House and Congress should be doing: warning us about the looming financial disaster. As baby boomers retire in masses, our entitlement programs will be drained. That will leave the younger generation to pay much higher taxes and endure a lower standard of living.

I asked a friend who has two daughters in their early 20s if they know what they face? He said, "I have never heard either of them say anything about it." Instead, their attention is on MySpace, where I predict you will see in coming years and decades messages like, "Let's kill the old people. They're draining us."

I have some solutions. But I need your input and ideas, too.

First, let's look at the healthcare crisis like it's another 9/11. Al Qaeda and other extremists are diseases. Like cancer or heart disease, they kill indiscriminately. Yet, we spend billions to stop these extremists. Those military costs only make sense when we see it as your money or your life. We cherish the life we know here in America that is apparently being threatened. In that regard, the fight against Islamic extremists is worth it, for many of us, at any cost. As the war rages unsuccessfully, we wonder if the cost is too high. We question our goals. We even start re-examining the precise causes—terrorists funded by enemy countries like Iran and Syria and even our allies Saudi Arabia. Healthcare needs the same reassessment.

We formed a 9/11 Commission. So, let's form a Healthcare Commission. Right now, we're waiting for the politicians running for the presidency. You know what the result will be. We'll merely get recommendations by healthcare's special interest groups that backed the winning candidate. Once the situation hits crisis mode, when the majority of businesses drop healthcare for employees or when no one can be covered, the new president will then gather the nation's best minds to find a compromise solution. So instead, let's be proactive and form the commission now.

Next, Political Action Committees (PACs) can only collect $10,000 per election cycle. That is enough money to run a good website and allow its supporters to offer their opinions on the issue they are pushing. Raising millions to air 30-second commercials that enrage and not enlighten is something we should fight.

Yes, this will get the broadcasters upset. After all, the public needs those 30-second spots that can shed as much heat and no light on the issue.

Then, we should demand that every candidate for every office refrain from voting on any issue that pertains to any industry that has donated to his or her campaign. That also includes issues where donors from both sides—or all sides—donated.

As we see in the healthcare debate, three sides are cared for in Washington—except for the patient.

It's a start to stop the narrow-thinking elected officials we have endured over the past few decades. It could have a ripple effect on other issues.

Maybe we'll stop hearing Vice President Cheney accuse political opponents of "undermining the troops" when military spending cuts are threatened. I would believe this White House's concern for the troops if there were no connections to Halliburton and big oil and the recent scandal at Walter Reed. To my knowledge, wounded troops haven't formed a political action committee.

The most recent glaring example is the nation's chief law enforcement officer. Attorney General Gonzales has just been caught with his hand in the political cookie jar. Apparently the firings of eight U.S. Attorneys came from the political wing of the Bush White House—in an attempt, it seems, to quell investigations against GOP friends or a failure to whip up quicker prosecutions of Democratic rivals before the 2006 elections.

And it's not just the Republicans. Take Democratic Senator Kent Conrad. He appeared on 60 Minutes two weeks ago. It was the story about David Walker, the Controller General of the United States, I mentioned earlier. Conrad actually agrees with Walker's approach and message. But when 60 Minutes correspondent Steve Kroft asked Conrad why Congress isn't doing anything to correct the financial disaster looming, Conrad shrugged his shoulders and said, "Because it's always easier not to. 'Cause it's always easier to defer, to kick the can down the road to avoid making choices. You know, you get in trouble in politics when you make choices."

What he means is: you get in trouble when you work for the good of the people—not your benefactors, the legal bribers who put you in office.

In the 60 Minutes piece, Conrad seemed like the brilliant lawmaker who saw what was really going on. But in truth, he was a symbol of the smugness of most lawmakers in D.C. today. Sure, he was stating a fact of life in Washington. But he didn't rage. He just shrugged his shoulders as if to say, "Oh well." What I heard from Senator Conrad was similar to what you hear from many Iraqis interviewed on TV. "What the hell, we should just shoot each other and blame the Americans. It's much easier."

Conrad and others are actually directing attention away from the only honest and correct message about the future well-being of our nation. Conrad should be sounding a clarion welcome every place Walker speaks. But no, it's easier to shrug.

By the way, there is no PAC formed by your grandchildren that will give money to candidates who will work to protect their futures.

Take Democrat Chris Dodd. His chances of winning the Democratic nomination are one in a million. Yet, his campaign war chest is getting big. The main donors are banking corporations. Why? Dodd is the chairman of the Senate Banking Committee. That means he is taking money from the people who go in front of his committee to influence laws. Do you really think these bank execs believe Dodd will be the next President? No, they're merely gaining favor from him on future issues before his committee.

Public service is no longer public service. It is a business. And it is big business on a personal and corporate level. Why do you think so many federally elected or appointed officials make so much money once out of office? It's not a coincidence that major corporations hire elected officials to top positions. To steal a phrase from a famous bank robber; the federal government is where the easy money is.

As a result, there is no longer an even playing field. Big money wins too much. I'm all for cutting taxes to spur business growth for all businesses, but I loathe subsidies and tax breaks to businesses that make massive profits and have more access to lawmakers. I'm in favor of shareholders getting equity for their investment. But it seems as if Washington is now under the siege of a class of investors and CEO's who control not just one but a horde of Manchurian Candidates running our country.

For the majority of Americans, the ultimate result is a lower standard of living, higher taxes, and a struggling economy. It's no oddity that the richer have gotten richer and the poorer are poorer over the past six years. Sure, there are folks out there who think we can "grow" our way out of this looming fiscal crisis. But we're living in different times now and in the next decades.

Campaign donations breed corrupt government. It's a form of legal bribery condoned by the people who benefit from it. Eventually, we'll see more signs of the cracks it is forming in the foundation of our standard of living. The cracks will be even more evident for the standard of living our children will face. Are we like the Roman Empire ready to collapse? I don't think so. But I understand why some folks tell me that.

The solutions won't be easy. Our elected officials make too many laws that favor themselves. Why do you think there is unlimited money going from PAC to candidates? The supposed guardians of justice—the Supreme Court—have ruled that campaign donations—no matter how obscene or harmful to democracy—are a freedom of speech.

So, it's up to us. Unfortunately, our only reliable recourses are available every two, four, or six years. And for many of us, we're too busy trying to figure out how to pay for our health insurance.