>The problem I have the MA plan is that it requires everyone to purchase health insurance and provides subsidiaries for low-income folks, it does NOT provide health care for all. I think the law and the bill are misleading.

Seems to me that if and when socialized health care gets introduced here, it will be done wrong, just as a negative proof of concept. Since the for-profit insurance is so powerful, they'll manage to have the tax money go through their hands. With their overhead costing about $400 billion a year, and their profits hovering in the neighborhood of 30%, we are in danger of making the whole thing even more expensive, complicated, laden with unnecessary paperwork, and a golden egg laying goose for the same industry which has caused the current crisis.

Of course, the single-payer system would require the elimination of health insurance companies, but I fear it will not happen. They are too powerful - they got too much money, and since lobbying is legal in this country, anyone can do the math.