#deepspace: "Republicans are morally incapable of comprehending the virtues of a true single-payer healthcare system because of a ment tic that compels them to evaluate healthcare within the biased framework provided by the private insurance industry...."

I couldn't agree with you more, deepspace. In fact, I agree with your whole thesis. The only thing I would add would be, "Republicans, and Right leaning people calling themselves Democrats and Progressives, ...."

Thanks for sharing.

OU812 slipped. She is a he.

WE should have had Medicare for all a long time ago. Starting with the Powell Memo in 1971 the war on the working class has delayed that from happening. If Obama wasn't such a backstabber and a coeard and cut a deal with the Healthcare companys and than had a big health care meeting in2009 that was for all intents and purposes run by the Healthcare companys . A meeting wthat Singlepayer advocates couldn't even attend untill John Conyers forced his way in. I think that single payer advocates should advocate for a Socialized Medicine plan similar to Wales than the rightwingers will panic and settle for Medicare for all as a compromise which is what it is. As I have said before you don't reson or work with right-wingers you crush them and if they raise their head one inch offof the ground you crush them again.

Ou812 has no idea what she pays for health insurance. She has previously written that single payer works in Taiwan because they only have a population of 25 million and would not work in the US because of our 329 million. Of course she has not fact or reference for that nonsense. Just insults. LOL.

#Ou812: In the first place, it is rude of you to come here and call us "washed up lefties". You mean you can't make your point without an ad hominem attack? Maybe I need to return the favor by calling you an ego-entric nut job. How does that feel?

In the second place, (Case #1) I was in Ontario and I got very sick. My friend took me to a doctor who was not only and M.D. but a surgeon; a specialist. I was seen immediately and there were no lines anywhere. Not only did he see me, he prescribed. The only cost to me was the cost of the medication because I wasn't a Canadian citizen, otherwise it would have been free. What would have cost me a fortune in the US only cost $3.69CAN. (Case #2) When I was living in NY state, there were two Canadians there that I got to know. One was from Ontario and the other from Ottowa. Even though they were on work visas and could see any local doctor they wanted, whenever they got sick they made the long trek back into Canada saying that Canadian medicine was the better deal. Considering all of the things I have seen going on in Amerian medicine-for-profit, I agree.

We have bloated pricing and laws that prohibit the US from negotiating with other countries like France for better pricing all so we can be held captive while they fleece the daylights out of us. The quality of health care professionals today is atrocious as we have a dumbed down educative system.

Several decades ago, Sen. Bill Frist, Sr., was instrumental in dismantling the hospital nursing schools. Back then, for 360 days a year for three solid years, nursing students were either (1) on the floor being supervised in their graduated, hands on, patient care, (2) in class learning about what they would be exposed to in clinic next, (3) or in their dorms studying or sleeping. Frist closed all of the teaching hospital nursing schools (BIG MISTAKE) and shifted nursing education to the colleges where there were two programs: the BSRN (Bachelor of Science) RN program for those going into hospital and facility admin, and the ADRN (Community College) RN program for ward nursing. Instead of *1080 DAYS* of concentrated and supervised hands on training, now we had clinic three times a week for four hours, or roughly *72 HOURS* of hands on training over a two year period, supplemented with classroom TrainX films that showed you what you were SUPPOSED to do when faced with certain health anomalies, and comic book formatted explanations of how to give an injection. (And if you were out sick and missed that TrainX film on a certain day, there was no make up available because the A/V equipment was on a schedule being used in other classrooms.)

In the state of Florida, our illustrious Governor, Rick Scott, closed all of the Community Colleges. So, many nurses now are turning to becoming Nursing Assistants and then getting their LPN (Licensed Practical Nurse), though I'm not sure from where, and then getting their RN licenses through >>correspondence courses<<. It's a true race to the bottom.

As for implementing health care on a state-by-state level, I'm totally against this. The day they announced "State's Rights" in this country, I knew we were heading for trouble. This is a Right-wing strategy to divide and conquer. While individual states should retain their individual flavor, we are the UNITED STATES of America. Where else do we become united except at the federal level? And I will tell you that before the NeoCons and the New World Order crowd got a hold of the government, I adored the fact that we had federal oversight. Whever I couldn't get something done at the state level, I could contact the federal government and the problem got solved tout de suite! Having state's rights is like having Right To Work; a real scam for We, the People.

As for giving up your plan for Single Payer, the fact that you are so dead set against it only tells me that you have been brainwashed. Who prefers to pay ever increasing premiums? Who advocates for bean counter middle men being sandwiched in between the doctors and the patients? Who in their right mind thinks that some bean counter with NO medical training should be deciding what procedures a patient should or should not have based on the cost instead of the need? Who in their right mind advocates for a system where the doctors are pulled away from being healers and are, instead, trained to be salesmen for the pharmaceutical companies and the testing labs? Who in their right mind thinks it is better for doctors to treat only symptoms instead of the root cause of any health care problem just to keep the profits rolling in for their corporate owners? Are you aware that the doctors are being TOLD what to prescribe according to what drugs the traveling pharmaceutical reps are pushing? Who in their right mind opts for a profit motivated health care system as opposed to an actual health care system? Who in their right mind wants decisions about health being made by businessmen who neither know or care anything about it? And who in their right mind wants doctors to have their first allegiance to be to the corporations instead of their patients' best interests?

The Single Payer system, will if nothing else get the profit motive out of medicine, and unless you, Ou812, are a shill for one of these medical corporations, then you will see the light of day. ***

PS I am a license health care professional with licensure in two states.

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TAX BRACKET = TAX RACKET {1.60 limericks}

If you’re in a Big-money racket,

you’re in a Small-money bracket

regarding your tax, -

- so You can relax

with the way our economy they stack it.

But all else is hurt

while You hit pay dirt.

This regime should wear a straitjacket.

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Resist with every breath!

Republicans are morally incapable of comprehending the virtues of a true single-payer healthcare system because of a mental tic that compels them to evaluate healthcare within the biased framework provided by the private insurance industry, bloated leeches who suck blood out of the system without providing any medical service, not even aspirin (which is sorely needed when trying to decipher the small-print legalese in their thick "explanation of benefits" packets, "denial of claim" notices, and runaround appeal processes -- the primary subject matter in the bulk of their bad-news correspondence, which can quickly fill a file cabinet even for a minor illness).

Supplementals for this or that, plans A through Z, co-pays, deductibles, preconditions, high-risk pools, premiums, lifetime limits, yada, yada, yada -- the double-speak jargon of scams designed to maximize profits by denying coverage to as many sick people as possible -- all disappear under a highly efficient, government-run, not-for-profit, universal, single-payer system.

Because of blind allegiance to the right-wing economic ideologies that have given rise to concentrated wealth and monopoly corporatism, Americans per capita pay a lot more for a lot less compared to all other developed democracies with their differing but still much loved versions of single-payer. Despite these instructive, real-life successes, the true believers of unregulated, runaway capitalism in our upside down economy evidently would rather pay twice as much in expensive premiums to private monopolies than in much cheaper rates to the big bad "guvmunt."

Ignorance has a high price.

In a true democracy we would have had both the electric car and single-payer decades ago. Instead we have a system of democracy where the highest bidder gets his way, which has brought us unregulated monopoly capitalism...also known as Fascism.

The question remains: Will our corpse media inform the citizens of the Teapublican lawmaker's exemption hypocrisy? I doubt it seeing how the news media never mentions single-payer as the obvious solution the vast majority has both requested and desires..... so don't hold your breath?

Bachmann: I hope the hell the blue states do start to implement single-payer....I'd love to see how all those millions of red state Trump voters react to paying twice as much for their huge, great, smart, best ever, terrific plans.

deepspace: I agree, control of the message is everything. For decades that message has been a purposeful lie intended only to concentrate the wealth and power of the few at the expense of the many.

John Locke and our founders would agree we have justification for revolt. The contract has been broken.

Single payer? I'm for it! ...An enormous amount of money is spent on the idiotic amount of paperwork for each patient in a hospital or doctors office. It all goes away with single payer... Expand Medicare for all. They are at least 98% efficient and the system structure is already there... Get rid of the $118,500 cap. If you make money, you pay into Medicare... Put a tax on stock trading - a penny a trade. We would be flooded with money!

Then you are one of the very lucky ones to have a health insurance plan that you believe will meet your needs when you need it the most (if a serious medical condition arises you will find out it doesn't). I am a 100% service connected ,totally and permanently disabled veteran who has been disabled for over thirty three years. I lived in utter poverty for 24 years until at last the VA deemed me to be totally disabled because of my time in Vietnam. I went from having a very inadequate private insurance program that could not begin to cover the complicated medical issues incurred by me while in the military to losing my coverage and being dependent upon welfare to take care of my medical needs and that of my young child. I would have to struggle for another 25 years until the VA fulfilled its obligation to me. I was a small business owner when my time in Vietnam caught up with me. Believe me you are deluding yourself if you think that you are "successful because of [you], not because of what some politician might do for [you]". I have owned several businesses and was successful when Vietnam took me out of the game and destroyed me financially. As someone who still struggles daily with my health I can tell you unequivocally that until, if, when and as it happens to you personally you do not have any real idea of what it is like for your health to disappear and leave you a shell of your former self unable to work and have any semblance of control over your own life. One can even be a caregiver to a loved one but until it is you who is severely compromised you have no rational basis to believe that life will allow you to "take care of yourself and be successful" beyond the next second or two. I hope you never have to experience any life altering issues with your health such as I and countless others have. If you already have then let me ask you this: When it comes to the basic human right of health care why are you being such a Horse's Petunia? Answer: Basic Me First Greed!