...All three Democrats [meaning presidential candidates Edwards, Obama and Clinton] have turned to the same informal network of health-care experts for ongoing counsel--people like Gruber and Hacker and the New America Foundation's Len Nichols. And all three candidates have smart people working exclusively for them. But it was Clinton who inherited the senior staff from her husband's White House, including Chris Jennings and Gene Sperling, who spent years figuring out how to navigate legislation through a hostile Congress. (Whether that experience is helpful today depends, admittedly, on just how good you feel about the old Clinton era.)

Of course, the degree to which Hillary relies on these and other advisers is open to question. "A lot of people ask me, who is Senator Clinton's closest health adviser," says Nichols, who was first called to brief her about two years ago. "The truth is, Senator Clinton does not really need a lot of health advising. ... She has what we health policy wonks do for a living down cold."

Len Nichols is the Director of the Health Policy Program at New America. For more information on this article (October 8, 2007 issue), please visit The New Republic web site. This article can also be found on CBSnews.com.