By a substantial 51 to 30 percent margin, Americans oppose a federally-run single payer health care system, i.e., socialized medicine. Given the many years of hysteria and misinformation about health care in America, it is rather remarkable that most Americans retain this healthy skepticism toward socializing this critical industry.
Poll results like these explain why Barack Obama proposes a plan that is intended to lead to socialized medicine, but gradually, by making it illegal for private health insurance carriers to compete against the “national plan” by offering cheaper coverage, and driving private insurance gradually out of the market. Then, too, ongoing efforts to force “children” into a national health care system will approach the “problem” of private medicine from another direction.
Obama is no doubt mindful that it was Bill (and Hillary) Clinton’s determination to nationalize health care that enabled the Republican takeover of Congress in 1994 and permanently deflected the Clinton administration from its intended liberal path. So no doubt he will proceed with caution. But the rocks are waiting for him, too, not far below the surface, and it will not be easy for Obama to balance his own electoral needs against the Left’s longstanding yearning for socialized medicine, now seemingly within reach.
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