In a reasoned debate, single payer will come out on top
By Laura S. Boylan, MD and Joanne Landy, MPH

One can only feel sorrow and dismay at the bullying and hate-mongering that is taking place at health care forums around the country.
Massive job losses, the devaluation and foreclosures of people’s homes, and precipitous declines in [...]

As the leading proposal out of the gate for health care reform in this session of Congress, the House bill (H.R. 3200, America’s Affordable Health Choices Act) during this August recess stage is considered the most robust of the various proposals so far coming out of congressional committees. This act has an overall goal to [...]

By Kip Sullivan, JD
When the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee passed a bill on July 15 creating an anemic “public option” program, Health Care for America Now (HCAN) and other “public option” proponents were ecstatic. They welcomed the “public option” in the HELP committee bill, proclaiming it “strong” or “robust.”  But the actual provisions in the HELP [...]

Summary:
Panelists from Staten Island Community Groups and PNHP encountered angry jeers from “anti-government” mob in Staten Island Church Healthcare Forum Wed Aug. 12th.  Differences between single payer and current house bill were felt to be irrelevant by the vocal audience members.
Details
This meeting was organized by Staten Island Family Health Care Coalition.  Katie Robbins (Healthcare Now) [...]

Based on comments at a July 1st Federalist Society debate on health reform
Single payer:  freedom, choice and quality

Healthcare is a human right.  It is fundamental and instrumental to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.
We are paying for a first rate system but getting a mediocre one, getting phenomenally low value on the dollar.  [...]

Prevention and wellness programs frequently can be very beneficial for our physical health and our sense of well being, and when they are, they may well be worth the investment of our time and money.

by Kip Sullivan, JD
Conservatives never base their opposition to single-payer on the ground that it is “politically infeasible.” They oppose single-payer on policy grounds and they say so. The “political feasibility” argument is used exclusively by proponents of universal health insurance who profess to admire single-payer systems but who refuse to support single-payer legislation [...]

A recent post on the National Center for Policy Analysis’s (NCPA) web site by Dr. Scott Atlas of the Hoover Institute and Stanford University expounded on 10 “surprising facts” about our health care system.  After an opening statement that U. S. health care has been denigrated compared to other developed countries around the world, Atlas [...]

Once again. The stated goals of health care reform are 1) to cover everyone, and 2) to slow the growth in health care costs so that health care is affordable. So what is Congress doing?

(Video links below)
Last night as the House Energy and Commerce Committee completed its markup of HR 3200, the House health reform bill, Chairman Henry Waxman interrupted Representative Anthony Weiner of New York to say that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi had promised that single payer legislation, HR 676, The United States National Health Care Act would [...]