Join the Discussion: Former Sen. Daschle responds on health care

More than 3,500 reader comments later, we’re excited to report on the success of our recent community discussion on health care, the first open conversation of its kind on Change.gov.

Members of our Health care Transition team, including former Senator Tom Daschle, were eager to dig in to the comments and find out more about the issues and concerns that drove the community conversation online.

Here's a look at what they had to say:

Like Sen. Daschle points out in the video, the whole Change.gov team is focused on providing a clear and transparent look at the Transition operation.

The wealth of information that came out of the health care discussion is a valuable resource -- not just for our team, but for anyone interested in learning more about some of the most pressing issues we face.

We thought it might be interesting to step back and look at the most common words from this bustling conversation. Here's what we found:

This "word cloud" shows the 100 most commonly used words in the healthcare discussion, arranged by size according to their frequency (using Wordle). It's just one way to summarize the information you provided.

As we continue to cultivate an open conversation with our online community, we'll be taking steps to facilitate these discussions in new and innovative ways.

We want to hear your voice. Use the discussion tool below to let us know what you liked about the health care discussion, and suggest ways to keep the conversation going in the future.

One reminder: Focus your comments on the topic at-hand – it makes the discussion much more engaging for everyone. There will be more opportunities to discuss other important issues in the future. If you have questions about your content, check out our official comment policy here.

Update: Comments for this question will close at 5:00 p.m. EST on 12/10/08.