Some government regulation can be good, and some can be bad. Your argument is a complete straw-man. Just because the government prevents some people from getting treatment with moralistic bans on stem-cell research (largely motivated by an uneducated and religious population), doesn’t mean that a public health insurance option is a bad idea.

Furthermore, a public health insurance option doesn’t necessarily mean that we have to have a case-by-case cost-benefit analysis that denies treatment to some citizens, similar to the system in Britain. Furthermore, EVEN IF WE DID, we could still set it up such that you could pay out of your own pocket for treatment if you didn’t feel like the public health care system was treating you well enough or fast enough.

Face it, public health insurance is a good idea.

Some government regulation can be good, and some can be bad. Your argument is a complete straw-man. Just because the government prevents some people from getting treatment with moralistic bans on stem-cell research (largely motivated by an uneducated and religious population), doesn’t mean that a public health insurance option is a bad idea.

Furthermore, a public health insurance option doesn’t necessarily mean that we have to have a case-by-case cost-benefit analysis that denies treatment to some citizens, similar to the system in Britain. Furthermore, EVEN IF WE DID, we could still set it up such that you could pay out of your own pocket for treatment if you didn’t feel like the public health care system was treating you well enough or fast enough.

Face it, public health insurance is a good idea.

You’re parroting economic hypotheses about the efficiency of the free market and the profit motive that are over 150 years old, and assuming that they apply to every situation imaginable, without any analysis whatsoever? And you are telling US to get educated? You’re the one spouting unsupported rhetoric, and you’re obviously NOT a student of Economics (so stop acting like one)! There has been widespread support for Keynesian economic theory for over 60 YEARS amongst economists, and Keynesian economics does NOT support blind faith in the free market system … it supports a mixed economy with free markets, some market regulation, and programs like social welfare! Do you want to send us back to the days of the great depression with your ignorance?

Doctors should be able to make lots of money with their skills. A public health insurance option and even socialized medicine will not prevent this. It will prevent huge corporations like Pfizer from gouging the public with ludicrously high prices, however. Furthermore, competition does not always bring down prices … a gov’t monopoly on health insurance would allow greater returns to the individual through a greater economy of scale and a not-for-profit business model.

Get it out of your mind that non-profit enterprises don’t pay their employees … THEY DO … and they pay them well. What they DON’T do is generate huge excesses of profit and wealth for the company owners or stockholders. You can bet that most of the money made by the medical industry does NOT end up in the hands of your average family doctor.