"Health is not a free market commodity, like a car. People will spend everything they have and whatever they can borrow for health."

I am as capitalist as it gets. Capitalism is the best economic system because it takes into account and harnesses (to some extent) human nature. But even the most ardent fan of capitalism like myself, must be aware that it isn't perfect. The free market is great for commodities, health however is not one.

At some point, it comes down to this, do you, or don't you respect the idea that some things SHOULDN'T be used to turn a buck off of? In a civilized country like ours, illness should be one of those. (Prison's should be another but that's another subject entirely).

I personally detest socialism as the worst embodiment of government and dread big government, so honestly, in the case of health, I wish we could create some third entity. Not private business, not government, but something in between, held responsible to the citizens, but I suppose I'm just not genius enough to dream that third entity up.

Bottom line is… it's not a political theory, but common god damn sense that doctors shouldn't be working on commission, which they are now.

And one last point to those utterly terrified of government involvement in health. If you live in the USA, the substances you eat and drink are insured to be safe by the oversight of two WHOLLY government run institutions, the FDA and the USDA. We let the government, not private industry, insure that what we feed our families is safe, and yet I don't hear people ENRAGED at the government domination of food safety inspection and demanding we hand that over to the government… maybe because they remember private industry said tobacco was harmless and didn't want any type of warning about health effects on the package until they were forced to in 1965… by……. dah dahdadah.,.. the big evil government that can't look out for the health of its citizens.

When I buy my food at an American grocery store, I have a strong sense of confidence that it won't be contaminated or harm me. If you feel the same, maybe you should rethink how you feel about the government being involved in your health.

Oh, and one last thing – Beyond a BA at Yale and PhD at Stanford the man wrote one of the definitive histories of abortion. "This history has figured prominently in several US Supreme Court decisions, and Professor Mohr has twice testified to the US Senate as an expert historical witness on reproductive rights issues." – Translation, the guy has been studying medical history and getting published (from books to articles in the JAMA) in the field for over 30 years. – so – have whatever opinion you want, but the man knows his shit.

What about Medicare and Medicaid?

The AMA initially fought the proposals, calling them a government takeover. But this time—in the progressive 1960s—they lost. Ironically, they realized, "Wow, were we ever wrong! Now we have this government spigot of money pouring into the largely unregulated world we created in the 19th century." That's where the real acceleration of medical costs started.

ANDTHAT FOLKS, SAYS IT ALL. ONCE GOVERNMENT GOT INVOLVED IT BECAME POSSIBLE TO GRAB PREVIOUSLY UNIMAGINED AMOUNTS OF MONEY. MY FAMILY, AND MANY OTHER FAMILIES, HAD MANY CHILDREN. AFTER WWII VERY FEW HAD "HEALTH CARE." WE RAISED SEVEN CHILDREN IN GOOD MIDDLE CLASS PROVIDENCE WITHOUT HEALTH CARE. THEY WERE BORN BETWEEN 1949 AND 1962. UNFORTUNATELY, GOVERNMENT "PROMISES" AND PROGRAMS CREATED UNPRECEDENTED AND TAXPAYER FUNDED WEALTH FOR DOCTORS AND MEDICAL CORPORATIONS. THE FREE MARKET CAN INDEED PLAY A FORCE IN HEALTH CARE, BUT ONLY IF THE GOVERNMENT GETS OUT.

Funny how the folks who don't want the federal government to be in charge of anything use its services everyday and rarely complain about most of them. They have no problem with the military or the interstate system, but for some reason the government can't be trusted to run health care…no one ever elaborates on why. No one ever provides ANY empirical evidence that health care is terrible in nations with a government run health system.

Don't forget, being shrill is not necessarily being factual or having a sound argument.

Why would anyone think that the Government is capable of running anything as important as our health care? The Government, at all levels, are supposed to be limited to doing those things that we as individuals CAN NOT do for ourselves(police, fire, national defense, etc), they are not supposed to be taking our taxes and wasting them on spending projects that make politicians money or increase their ability to be reelected.

Furthermore, how can anyone trust anything that Obama says? He does nothing but lie continuously, especially about his health care spending. "My health care bill won't raise the national deficit as much as one dime" is what he and Pelosi and Reid keep telling the media. Unfortunately, the media is either in bed with Obama(likely) or just too stupid(more likely) to realize that the federal budget DEFICIT is the yearly amount by which spending exceeds revenue and the accumulation of the yearly DEFICITS – the few examples of yearly surpluses + interest on the debt = the national DEBT.

Politicians crow about how they have lowered the DEFICIT, but that is just political talk to fool the uninformed, they are just adding a smaller amount to the national debt, not actually lowering it.

Obama "claiming" that he won't add a dime to the deficit in the year 2020 is nothing but sophistry as the 2020 budget has not, and will not, be written until 2019 at the earliest. It is all a BIG LIE! One quick and easy way that they could ELIMINATE the budget deficit entirely, is by simply passing items off-budget and not counting them as part of the yearly budget, as the Congress recently did with Dr's medicare payouts.

whale