Steven Kagen, M.D., of Appleton spent his youth surrounded by the giants of Wisconsin’s Democratic Party. Though it wasn’t obvious for years, that experience shaped him in fundamental ways.
“I grew up with [two-term governor and U.S. Senator] Gaylord Nelson, [longtime Senator] William Proxmire and [former Governor] Patrick Lucey sitting in [my family’s] living room,” Kagen said in a recent interview with The Chronicle.
His father Marvin Kagen, 88, also a physician, was active in building up the state’s Democratic party, Kagen explained, and ran unsuccessfully for northeast Wisconsin’s 8th Congressional District in 1966.
So when Steve Kagen won the same congressional seat, on Nov. 7, that his father had bid for 40 years earlier, Representative-elect Kagen said his campaign victory is “symbolic of many things” and “a tremendous honor.”
It also ties him to one of the lessons he learned at home: “I learned at a very early age that it is politics that promotes change.”
And during the 25 years that Kagen has practiced medicine as an allergist, he has seen many aspects of the American scene that he believes need changing.
Driven to reform
When questioned about what motivated him to take on this challenge after such a long and successful career in medicine, Kagen spoke of two patients who needed a kind of help that he was unable to give.
“I have a patient who is poor, but not poor enough to qualify for assistance and who is old, but not old enough for Medicare. This patient has been dropped by two insurance companies and she can’t get the medications she needs,” he said.
The other patient Kagen described is a single mother with two small children suffering from asthma. She too cannot afford the medicines she needs for her children, he said.
These and other predicaments facing the patients he treats on a daily basis drove Kagen to run for office so that he could work to solve the American healthcare crisis.
In his role as a representative, he plans to focus on five essential elements of healthcare outlined on his Web site: requiring open disclosure of all healthcare related prices; “unitary” pricing that allows all people to pay the same amount for the same product or service; a single insurance risk pool to leverage down insurance prices for all citizens; deductible rates set at 3 percent of a household’s taxable federal income; and a renewed commitment to cover all uninsured children and working parents.
Kagen believes that his plans for healthcare reform are the central issue that helped him win the congressional seat. Accordingly, one of the first things he hopes to accomplish in Congress will be to submit or endorse a bill that will forgive the late penalties that senior citizens incur from their insurance companies because of the seniors’ confusion about Medicare Part D.
And, he added, “I want to be the doctor in the House that writes the federal standard for health insurance policy. The insurance companies win now because they write their own policies.”
Other areas of special concern to Kagen include getting U.S. troops out of Iraq, public education, energy independence, and integrity in government.
Jewish values
Quoting Rabbi Hillel, Kagen said that being Jewish “goes to the very core of who I am and who my family is: ‘if not now when; if not me, who?’”
He also referred to Jewish values as part of his vision, specifically the Jewish value of education and asking questions.
“We train our children to ask questions. But not enough people are asking questions and we have an absence in the balance of power,” he said.
Asking questions is what sets Kagen apart, according to friend and advisor Michael Maistelman, a Milwaukee attorney who specializes in campaign finance and election law.
“Kagen is not your typical politician in that he will ask the tough questions that others may not feel are OK to ask. He won’t back down from a fight,” Maistelman said.
An Appleton native, Kagen grew up as a member of Appleton’s Conservative Moses Montefiore Synagogue. His wife, Gayle, and their four children, continued their membership until their youngest son celebrated becoming a bar mitzvah.
Board certified in three distinct specialties, he operates four allergy clinics in northeastern Wisconsin. He hopes to continue seeing patients during his term as representative, but he’s awaiting the advice of the Congressional Ethics Committee, he said.
MORE STORIES
Loading ...