IMO, it has a lot to do with the distribution of wealth. You will not find a lot of very wealthy people that want a national health plan. They have great insurance plans already, and just figure "everyone should get one." Someone already said the word "disconnect" but it really applies here too. I see a lot of people around me that are incredibly selfish and short minded. Here I am, paying 25% of my money to taxes, and struggling to make it. This particular position offers health care to my whole family (I pay a premium for the family to be added, but it is not nearly as much as it would be if we were to obtain the policies on our own.) Most of my employment over the last 10 years has offered a plan only for me. And since I am often the breadwinner for the family, there is no fallback plan. I would love to see a national health plan. And then again, there are the arguments over how to manage it, etc. And the wealthy would not want to see the same doctors as the working poor.....
(End Rant...)
Could be...but I doubt we will ever know. I would love to see what they could do, but it would be stuck forever in red-tape anyway.
I am very lucky in this part, earthmonkey, as I live in a major city with public transportation, and I use it every day to get back and forth to work, run errands, etc. In fact, with the parking (or lackthereof), public transportation is often the only realistic choice for us here in the city. That said, it takes me well over 1-2 hours to get home - ACROSS TOWN! The same trip takes me 15 minutes by car. So I totally agree with you, they need to refine the system and get it perfected.
But when I say selfish and short minded, I think of the fact that many people who are wealthy enough not to notice how difficult it is to self-insure would, exactly that, never notice. And never care.
And as far as being short-minded, I think that in the end, it kind of bites you in the bottom because those people that cannot obtain the correct health care are possibly not able to work, have huge medical bills that they have no chance of ever paying, and end up taking significantly more of the taxpayers money, when if they had the care they needed, it would not have been this way.
I left a job I loved, rather recently, as we are looking at having another child, which means for my family, that my husband stays at home and we go down to one income. My previous employer, a small company, was unable to provide family care for the whole office and so I was looking at a gigantic medical insurance bill monthly. About $1600 a month to insure my family. And that was with my employer paying my share. I had to change jobs to make sure I had better insurance (I am glad I did, but that is another rant entirely.)
You are preaching to the choir sister! 
I just wish there was something better, I really do...
SUCCESS??
You're a delusional IDIOT if you think communism has succeeded. Yeah, such GREAT SUCCESS in the USSR! Such GREAT SUCCESS in Yugoslavia. Such GREAT SUCCESS in NORTH KOREA! Such GREAT SUCCESS in China--which practices state-run capitalism. Yeah, communism is SOOOOOOOOOOO VERY SUCCESSFUL.
Soo serious, soo passionate... DOgbrain! So ironic, Did you Note on the atypical post that those are some words pulled out of a speech given by Martin luther King Jr. (they were attributed to him properly in the post) must have been in the early 60's - back during when "Communism" was still the government of USSR.
the last line of the post still applies: to the point of the US's failure: *** "...failure of democracy to live up to the noble ideals and principles inherent in its system.**** - MLK Jr.
The administrative costs of universal healthcare is less than the US's current one. Basically we have a huge private bureaucracy of insurance companies, HMO's, hospitals and what not.
People seem not to realize that there are different models of universal healthcare. There's the NHS model, governement funded and provided. The single payer model, government funded privately provided care. The social health insurance model, compulsory insurance for some basic plan with subsidies for the poor.
The last model generally does the best. It has the universal aspects without the long waiting lines for elective procedures the other models suffer from.
*****************
"the last line of the post still applies: to the point of the US's failure: *** "...failure of democracy to live up to the noble ideals and principles inherent in its system.**** - MLK Jr.
Sorry to be confusing - to translate - I wish that the noble ideals and principles of democracy were bing lived up to (in the current US) ...and the earlier portion of MLK's speech, especially as it pertains to discrimination and poor being taken advacntage of by the rich :"
the weakness is that we have never touched it. Isn’t it true that we have often taken necessities from the masses to give luxuries to the classes? Isn’t it true that we have often in our democracy trampled over individuals and races with the iron feet of oppression? Isn’t it true that through our Western powers we have perpetuated colonialism and imperialism? .....................the failure of democracy to live up to the noble ideals and principles inherent in its system.**** - MLK Jr.
and I was having a bit of fun answering your post about Labor camps and confiscating all kinds of stuff with replies from Big brother 1984. Are we having fun yet? >it's me atypical<
wrong thread =X
I for one wish you would refrain from a macro war on this thread as its detracting from the issues the topic has brought up.
I'll never understand individuals who come to a forum and complain about how it doesn't fit in with their world view and expect everyone else to accomodate them. Maybe I should start going to a BNP forum and complaining about the dynamic of the group.
Oh wait!!! I forgot myself there, we're all having guns held to the heads of our loved ones and being told we have to post on certain fora, right?
Did logicalconclusion die and reincarnate as a Brit? By Allah, that was fast..............
http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/108399.php
Signed unto law.
now...we need to use it.