Scott, you're not going to believe this (and neither am I!), but I totally agree with your health care solution for America.

Having said that - I agree and disagree with your point - I don't think the Government favors the troops - I come from a family of troops and none of them felt particularly well taken care of in terms of pay or benefits (well, school benefits excepted), but that's an aside - you are correct, OUR government would not run VA healthcare or private healthcare or any healthcare.  That's correct - that's my point - when someone asks about "Government sponsored health care", you can't compare it to what the US is doing, because we don't want to do it.

The debate isn't about if we can - we clearly can - many other countries do - it's should we?

So, you're right on that point, but I think being right on that point isn't quite addressing the problem.  (Point of fact, you did address the problem yourself in another post, so this isn't aimed at you) - It's like - if you have a leaky pipe, and someone says "it shouldn't leak" and someone else says "Yes, but it leaks".  It's true, but it's not answering the problem.

Having said all this, I'm part of the "health care industry" - which has given me insight to a lot of things:

• Respatory Therapists?  Whiny punks.  Sorry Kevin.  That's how it is.
• Medicaid and Medicare aren't bad.  Real problem?  That there's not enough info out there.  When I was a starving sick guy, I had no idea I could have been seen by a doctor.  Now that I'm suffering the long term effects of going without a doctor?  Well... at least I work in the Health Care industry now...
• Kaiser has a system that is a model for what could pass for "universal health care" - basically, no outside insurance - it's all internal.  You're part of the "system" - you buy in at various levels and you pay for "venture" services like cosmetic derm and surgury, etc, but... it eliminates the outside insurance agencies, which, I think most of us agree, is the real problem behind the national nightmare that is the current American Health Industry.

(Ironic, I think, that Kaiser's invention of "HMO", convinced Nixon to screw up American Health Industry, and now Kaiser's version of in-house could save it.  Go figure!)

No, John, that doesn't work. 

The comparison to countries with a government funded health care is entirely apt, because we do not support that system here.  It would be entirely inncorrect to debate the merrits of it here, and use our meagre examples of it, when our system is not designed to support it.  You have to consider a working system, even if it's somewhere else.

If you have a rotton piece of fruit, you do not make decisions and judgements about that piece of fruit based on the rotton piece you have.  If you have a stale mushy banana, and someone is trying to convince you that banana cream pie is good, you do not answer by saying "no it's not, this banana is rotton".  That just doesn't make sense.

"If I'm not mistaken, wasn't the 85 billion dollar bailout to AIG yesterday a loan?  A low interest loan but still a loan.  That means the government would be getting the money back over time after things stabilize.  It's not like your example of what happened in Norway.  Did that company have to pay the funds back to the government?" (emphasis mine)

No, as I wrote, the shareholder capital was depleted. All that was left in the bank was customer deposits and loan credits. The bank argued that with hefty banking charges and "wise investment" of the money left in the bank they could restore shareholder capital, but they'd already squandered the shareholder capital with their "wise investments",  and operating below a certain level of shareholder capital is illegal, and in the end the national bank was guaranteeing the the safety of the deposits anyway.

So the owners or shareholders did not get anything from the bank and the government made their money back. And more. And most important of all, the customers didn't suffer (with the exception of finding their bank shares to be worthless).

The shareholders always have the option of kicking back in the amount of money needed to restore shareholder capital. Some couldn't afford to do it, and some chose not to do it. Either way, they lost their money on a serious of financial gambles that put all the bank's customers  customers at risk. No reason the bank itself should fold and take lots more people with it.

"The debate isn't about if we can - we clearly can - many other countries do - it's should we?"

Dammit O'Brien, you have me agreeing with you!  : )

My Kaiser story...
In California, Kaiser may be doing a good job.  However when they were here in NC, they totally screwed over the state employees.  When they came in, they built clinics, hired some really good doctors and everyone that used them, including me, liked the experience.  Yes, it was more expensive than some of the other insurance plans offered, but the system soon began to break down.  More people switched over to Kaiser and it began to be harder and harder to get an appointment in a reasonable time.  I came down with bronchitis and they told me it would be 2 weeks before I could get in and see a doctor.  Not 2 weeks before I could see my doctor, but ANY doctor.  Fortunately I was able to go to my brother's doctor (not at Kaiser) and pay out of pocket to get the perscriptions I needed before the bronchitis became worse.  I'm sure that I got charged the "insurance pay" rate, but it was better than having to wait 2 weeks and possibly end up in the hospital.

Eventually, service at Kaiser became worse and worse.  Doctors were leaving the system and it was even harder to get in to see anyone.  Finally, Kaiser just closed up and left NC.  It was costing them too much to try to run the clinics with the amount of patients they had waiting for services.  This left a bunch of people, including about half of all state employees, scrambling to find new doctors.