Where Is the Popular Mandate?

Current policies of the federal government include substantial cuts in government health expenditures and dismantling government regulations in the health and medical-care sectors. These policies are being pursued under an assumed popular mandate. The existence of such a mandate is also assumed among large sectors of the political, medical, and academic establishments in this country. There is, indeed, a belief among many leaders of medical academic and healthcare institutions that there is a popular mandate to cut government health expenditures, with particular emphasis on those that affect the poor and the elderly; and an anti-government mood in the country, with.