THE president and Hillary Rodham Clinton are selling the outlines of their health-care program to the nation. We have been told to expect many good things from it. Universal access, coverage of pre-existing conditions and expanded basic care would benefit many people. But it is likely that fully implementing a nationalized health-care plan will cost between $50 and $100 billion per year.

THE RECENT forest conference in Portland was, as expected, both well-attended and highly publicized. The scene, however, was more impressive than was the substance. Virtually nothing was resolved.

Unfortunately, this is a predictable consequence of political decision-making. And the conference's politicking and posturing overshadowed that week's true environmental milestone: the inaugural sale of pollution rights by the Chicago Board of Trade.

Economists had long awaited this event. It initiated an efficient strategy to reduce pollution from powerplants and factories.

WHEN considering the proposed "Ancient Forest Summit" or "Timber Summit" (word choice is significant), we should carefully segregate our hopes from our expectations. Yet I'm hopeful that the summit will increase understanding and improve policy. Here's why.

Twenty years ago my colleagues and I at Montana State University advocated market incentives and property rights as environmental tools. Few considered this a viable option. Environmentalists and journalists considered us "the wild bunch of Montana." We were the academic analogs of gunslingers and cowboys.

AS only Nixon could go to China, perhaps only a Democratic administration can join a fight against one of the worst health laws on the books, the Delaney Clause. This provision of the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act was passed in 1958. It bans any additive in any detectable levels in processed food if the additive has been shown to cause cancer in humans or laboratory animals.

IN every language the term "bureaucracy" bears a crust of derision.

This is no accident, for bureaucratic incentives invariably produce problems. Bureaucracies tend to replace the goals that justified their creation with actions that protect their budgets. The good news is that we can harness this fatal propensity in a way that will improve government and reduce its costs. While our plan won't do it all, here is a beginning.

THE Shoshone National Forest near Dubois, Wyo., is an important part of the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem. But the forest has maintained a money-losing logging program. In any rational system, the ecological, recreation, watershed and wildlife values would easily trump logging in the Shoshone.

THERE is much talk today about "reinventing government." The goal is to both improve outcomes and save dollars. The Forest Service is an excellent candidate for such reforms.

The Forest Service's creators are credited with high ideals, but America's sylvan socialism has suffered the liabilities of socialism elsewhere. The Forest Service was created because of an expectation of timber famine. Since then, the Forest Service has predicted five timber famines (which have yet to materialize) and used these threats to expand its prominence, power and funding.

MANY recreationalists bristle at the prospect of recreation fees on our national forests. Why should we pay to hike on "our" land? They are outraged, however, when they encounter clear-cuts near timberline on these same lands. But if they could choose between recreation fees and timber cutting, might fees then be accepted as the lesser of two evils?

Second in a series of articles on the Forest Service and the economics of the timber industry.

BROCK Evans, vice president and chief lobbyist for the National Audubon Society, recently spoke at a University of Washington Environmental Management Seminar. In response to a question about reforming the Forest Service, he cataloged many destructive, wasteful and insensitive practices. Below-cost timber sales were high on his list of government boondoggles. We agree on these failings.

First of a series of articles on the Forest Service and the economics of the timber industry.

IN the fifth grade I started a conservation club for my school. To me, the U.S. Forest Service epitomized conservation and stewardship. Rangers maintained trails, practiced ecology, and found lost hikers while Smokey the Bear admonished us to put out our campfires and appreciate the outdoors.