Just when you thought that the health care system in America can't get any more convoluted or maddening, a new wrinkle emerges.

Seventy-seven percent of Americans think that the price of prescription drugs is unreasonable, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation, and that same percentage of Americans think that pharmaceutical profits are a major factor contributing to drug prices.

“Yes” or “No”?

Should it be the patient's right (by law) to have their surgery recorded by audio and video?

https://youtu.be/xkFy8VJWP4I

Do doctors found guilty of medical malpractice need to be held criminally responsible if someone is injured or killed in their care? Do hospitals and doctors need to be held more accountable for medical malpractice?

Longtime Democratic FEC Commissioner Ellen L. Weintraub is the force behind new rules aimed at making online political advertising more transparent.

After Russian state agents used social media platforms to blast out misinformation from bot farms meant to foment domestic discord during the 2016 presidential election, it changed what we thought to expect from online communities.

Twitter, Facebook, and Google seemed caught off guard as well and received a sound spanking by congressional committees for lax oversight.

For over a year a group of passionate, committed people have been working to build the infrastructure, grassroots support, and fundraising network to support serious, credible independent candidates for statewide office. We knew there were big barriers for independent candidates but we believed the time was right for America and the numbers were telling that story more and more every day.

Here's one aspect of the independent ethos that guides how I think about politics, and what I think about:

Whatever I'm not allowed to talk about, that's what I want to talk about. Whatever topic is off limits, that's the topic I want to discuss. Whatever I'm not allowed to say, I'm not necessarily going to spit it, but I am going to chew on it long and hard and think about why I'm not allowed to say it.

President Trump and the GOP love to position themselves as champions of the common man. They frequently appeal to rural Americans, framing this demographic as a critical part of the Republican base.

It’s true that many rural Americans harken to conservative philosophies, but with campaign season over, much of what they were promised hasn’t arrived. Case-in-point: health care.

There are few demographics with so much to gain from a single-payer system than those living in the countryside, but party-line politics are keeping them from subscribing.

"The path to a bloc of independents in the Senate  

Tuesday in Maryland."

That’s how POLITICO’s Isaac Dovere’s reported on businessman Neal Simon’s official announcement to run for U.S. Senate as an independent candidate yesterday.

As Neal told the Baltimore Sun, “I do not believe that having another party-line Republican or party-line Democrat go to Capitol Hill is going to change anything.”