or Leave’s membership peaked at 100,000, and that some reporters “deliberately misunderstood” the group’s structure. But the 1 million-members claim appeared in their book.

In truth, the failure of Lead … or Leave was a case of too much, too soon. Cowan and Nelson launched an ambitious series of projects, including a deficit-consciousness curriculum for high school students and a youth voter registration campaign, but had too few staffers to handle the workload. When the two leaders went on a national tour to promote their book, the problems became acute. Worse, the voter registration drive reportedly alienated some of their older, more conservative donors, who ceased supporting the group. The Rock the Deficit concert was never held. Ross Perot pulled his funding, according to one source, when Lead …Healthcare and physician leadership.
At a recent social policy conference - Recovering Together? Fiscal Pressures, Federalism and Social Policy, hosted by Queen's International Institute on Social Policy - there was much discussion of "healthcare's crowding out" of others of the determinants of health, education and income security being the predominant examples. I was struck by the loose language, four words/phrases in particular, used to describe reality - healthcare, system, single-payer and publicly funded. Physicians are increasingly moving beyond their already-demanding clinical roles to become chief executive officers (CEOs), chiefs of staff, clinical leaders, board members, deans and directors. Is this a good thing, and should physician leadership be encouraged? Or as Ron Liepert (2009, August), minister of Alberta Health and Wellness, asserts, are physicians better at diagnosing and treating