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When reading about all the commotion regarding health care reform, I am reminded of an old rock song titled, "We Won't Get Fooled Again." In particular, the line, "meet the new boss, same as the old boss," comes to mind. Let me paraphrase: Meet the new health care plan, same as the old health care plan.

Now I am really showing my age. For our younger readers who don't remember the '60s, it was a very radical time. It occurred during my adolescent years, so I am technically a flower child. Indeed, I grew my hair long, wore bell bottoms and had a very wide belt with a big buckle.

In retrospect, the cultural revolution was one thing. The political revolution was another. Many young people were all for long hair and hedonism, but the left-wing politics was something that didn't quite take.

Right in the middle of the cultural maelstrom, several big-time rock bands - The Who, the Beatles and the Grateful Dead among others - came out with distinctly anti-left anthems that separated themselves from any big government, command-and-control platform.

I have often wondered how the political left has managed to capture the hearts of the free spirits. In fact, Republicans are more apt to talk about liberty and freedom. The Communists have always been the biggest prudes in the world. Politics makes strange bedfellows. But I digress.

As Peter Townsend of The Who sang long ago:

There's nothing in the street

Looks any different to me

And the slogans are replaced, by-the-bye

And the parting on the left

Is now the parting on the right

And the beards have all grown longer overnight

I'll tip my hat to the new constitution

Take a bow for the new revolution

Smile and grin at the change all around me.

Pick up my guitar and play.

Just like yesterday

Then I'll get on my knees and pray

We don't get fooled again.

The political failure of the left wing to superimpose a political revolution on top of the '60s cultural revolution left many radicals embittered. This bitterness still manifests itself today.

I was at Harvard during some of its most radical years. A naive Mississippi boy, I was one of 50 students selected for Harvard's elite honors major, Social Studies, in which I was assigned to read every word Karl Marx ever wrote. (And believe me, he wrote a lot.)

As an editor of the Harvard Crimson, we communally carved out our editorial positions in the Sanctum - the top floor of the Crimson building which boasted a huge poster of Mao Zedong.

Many of my colleagues - including Caroline Kennedy - went on to become big names in the media elite. I see their bylines all the time in the Washington Post, New York Times, etc. Most have stayed basically true to the left-wing attitudes dominant on campus at the time.

Not sure what happened to me. Perhaps you can take the boy out of the country but you can't take the country out of the boy. In the end, all the left wing goo slid off me like water off a duck. Mississippians are very traditional and hard to change. Maybe I lacked the mental prowess to grasp it all.

And here I am today, unable to see how having a bunch of federal bureaucrats micro-manage medical care in Mississippi is going to make the world a better place.

Mississippi, like all states, already has a risk pool offering insurance for people with pre-existing conditions. A third of Mississippians get free coverage under Medicaid. Everyone over 65 is covered by Medicare. Anyone who is seriously ill - by federal law - can walk into any emergency room and demand treatment.

Perhaps the new laws will expand coverage, perhaps not. The Democrats say the new laws will reduce overall medical expenditures. That doesn't sound like expansion to me. How can you expand coverage and reduce expenditures at the same time? That's like taking money out of one pocket and putting into the other.

In the end, it's just politics. A bunch of sound and fury signifying nothing. It's a staged show. When the dust settles, we can meet the new boss. Same as the old boss.