Believe me, it's been suggested- and not always in jest.

I also think the Swiss model would work in the US. The Swiss were like the US till about 10-20 years ago when they brought in universal healthcare. For them the way it works is everyone has access to the basic healthcare but individuals and companies can offer better plans. The better mediplans are sometimes used as recruitment tools for jobs. Taxes didn't have to rise that much.

New England would stay its own thing. We've got pride just as big as any Southerner (we're just quieter about it), and we're damned stubborn. I could see New York / New Jersey coming to join the United States of New England; however in my USNE, New York would have to kick the Yankees to the curb.

The South doesn't hate the rest of us any more than anyone else does. The South just wants to do its own thing. Sure there are people smarting over the civil war, but a lot of people gave up on that general idea many decades ago. If anyone were to split, it would probably split along the lines of the CAS in SR, with Florida splitting itself up between possibly Cuba and the CAS.

I could see Utah going its own way. There is a strong Mormon contingent out there who'd love to not have to deal with the American government.

California - meh. They'd go independant and fuck everything up for themselves.

The only reason this guy is being listened to is a) he's a Russian shill working in a state approved think tank and b) he's fsking hilarious. Guess which opinion the rest of the world is thinking? (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

Healthcare isn't a federal responsibility. International diplomacy, interstate commerce, waging wars, those are federal responsibilites. Anything that doesn't cross state lines is a state responsibility, and so the federal government has no business telling any citizen which doctor they will report to, what treatments they are "entitled" to, or how much they're going to pay those treatments.

Now if a state, like say Massachutes, wants to go all socialist and mandate 'free' (read: taxpayer funded) healthcare inside their borders, then they can trash their own state's economy without any constitutional problems. But the feds have no business interferring with what is constitutionally not their responsibility.

It is exactly this kind of federal overreach that drives independence movements across America.

A entirely more plausable set of borders for a divided America can be seen in Weisman's Crimson Skies, though I think the border between the Western Disputed Territories and Pacifica would lie along the Cascade mountain range rather than at the eastern borders of Oregon and Washington.

You want to put your money where nonsuch is?

i was under the impression that usa had a system like that in place already...

The most recent counts had 26 states with resolutions (with varying degrees of punishment) on the table to censure the government for over-reaching and trampling states' rights.

New Hampshire... even put in language that if the Fed failed to cease and desist, it would secede from the Union. The reason? Breach of contract. The United States exist as a federation of States that have a contract for certain services from the Federal Government.

And yes, there are movements in various places to break away from the United States.

And such movements have existed in various forms and guises for a long time...

Just to clarify, in the Sixth World, the CAS seceded from the USA due to differing economic policies rather than some perceived notion of post-Civil War animosity. After the first Crash, the South's dot-com economy was devastated (whereas the industrialized North was a little better off) and the Federal government was too busy courting the remains of Canada to join the Union to pay attention to it. Rather than continuing to beg for assistance that wouldn't come the southern states split to take matters into their own hands and the North was cool with it. The CAS and UCAS co-exist on amicable terms and both consider themselves to be "American."

Unfortunately, no. Availability to health care is a major problem in the United States. We have a lot of working poor who are too poor to afford health insurance but not poor enough to qualify for government assistance such as our Medicaid program. Whenever Universal Healthcare was brought to the table in the 70s and 80s the, then, conservative majority would scream about the socialist bogeyman and it would be crushed. The strange thing is, if one were to actually crunch the numbers, UH would actually save corporations that provide healthcare benefits and the federal government money in the long term... which is something any fiscally conservative proponent would jump at. The Big Three US automakers are drowning in their benefits-related debts. Anti-UH is a post-Cold War kneejerk reactionary response; if a nation practices communism/socialism it simply must be doing something wrong even if the people are cared for. And in too many minds socialized healthcare equals the Red Menace (which never existed in the first place but that's another conversation).

Keep in mind, many of these, perhaps even the majority, are in response to unfunded mandates. The Feds say "you must build X number of schools and get them up to Y level of competence. Here's $0 to meet that." This would give the states the power to say 'no'. It's a good move, no question, but not as extreme (in most cases - NH may be the exception) as people think.

One look at New Hamshire.gov should make people realize how much these "resolutions" are so much political smoke.

About as long as federal overreach.

Obviously you've never been exposed to the proponents of freedom.

I already have. I'm a gun owner.

LOL. So am I. So am I.

I'm saving up for my underbarrel keytar. I just hope I don't need a tax stamp for all of the unleashed 80s awesome that accompanies it.

I think it's funny that 'socialist' schemes are so often held up as examples of wrong-headed, disaster-doomed, money-wasting lunacy. I have seen Canada portrayed in that light. I wish some critics would look at the evidence, instead of running their affairs according to economic myths.

We spend way less per capita on health care than the US does. yet anyone and everyone gets broken bones fixed, cancer treatment... whatever. Our centrist Liberal party balanced our budget and brought in consistent annual surpluses on the order of $10 billion (remember our economy is about one-tenth the size of yours, so think of you guys having $100 billion per year to pay off your debts). We were paying down our national debt, rebuilding our armed forces, finally settling some of the long-standing grievances of our native peoples and being presented as one of the financial success stories of the Western World.

Then along came our latest government, the Conservative party, buying votes with promises of tax cuts, less government, selling off national institutions... you've heard all these. Now our budget is in deficit again, our national debt is growing again, and we have no buffer to pay for pulling us through the world financial crisis caused by just such people as these.

It's frustrating to see a borrowed, broken ideology bankrupting and marginalizing an incredibly wealthy country like mine. I am so glad the Liberal party has an intelligent, charismatic, credible leader again. In the next election I so want to fry those politicos who have beggared us in the name of 'sound fiscal policy'.

The population of the US is somewhere around 300 million (#4 in the world). Switzerland is about 7 million (#96). We have roughly 7-10 times more uninsured than Switzerland has people. Our Veteran's Affairs Administration alone covers the population of Switzerland, plus we have Medicare, Medicaid, SCHIP and the Bureau of Indian Affairs, all of which provide universal coverage to select populations. The US is 238 times the size of Switzerland in area. The US ranks #1 in healthcare spending. Guess who's #2? Does that sound like an efficient solution to our problems? No thanks.

Heres another little fun fact: Taxation as percentage of GDP. You'll note most of the countries with UH in the top 50 or so. You'll find the US way down there at #112. Sure UH is cost effective, if you think the government's main job should be looking after peoples health. I happen to think that is state/local/individual issue, and want my federal government doing other, arguably more important things WITH MY MONEY.

And as another aside, we can talk about monetary *cost* of health care all day long, but that doesn't mean anything until you start talking about *value*. Everyone in Canada, France, the UK, etc can get life saving treatments for a variety of illnesses, but there is a reason why the people who can afford it come to the US. Here even an illegal immigrant can get the same level of care that a wealthy tax payer in those other countries gets. In countries with UH everyone gets the same mediocre level of care and those with money still get better care by other means.

I'll make you a deal northern neighbor of mine:

You take all our socialists from Washington and I'll take all your conservatives from Ottawa and we'll both be tickled pink.

The infant mortality rate in France is 43% less than the US.

Well, absolutely, every nation should choose it's own way. But arguments that someone else is wasting money by doing things differently often suffer from lack of evidence.



Sure, a system designed to serve those with money and ignore those with none can accommodate people from elsewhere who have money. Everyone in line makes the line go more slowly. So someone who can afford it can get faster treatment in a system geared to them. I agree with that.

'Mediocre level of care' has often been a fall-back argument after the cost issue is cleared up. But other than rich folk getting their x-rays faster, what other superiority can be demonstrated? Better drugs? Better doctors? Better hospitals? I would like to see any independent study that confirms any of these.

And even if such a study did exist, it would come around to 'different strokes for different folks'. We as a people have made a commitment to our community: nobody is too poor for our hospitals. This is a parallel to our commitment to the people of Afghanistan: we are willing to send our youth to die for you. Not everybody agrees with the commitment, but as a people we commit. Sometimes the minority in a democracy doesn't feel all that well served by it.

From what I understand, having listened to foreign posters on various other boards, universal healthcare is anything but mediocre and ranging from good to great. The reason more people come over here? More money to be made off of people who can afford to spend huge amounts of money for treatments, so technology is much more advanced. There's also a lot more opportunities for doctors, so you'll get more experimental treatments and a wider range of specialists.

I work as a medical credentialer for an insurance company. My job is to ensure that the doctor that claims to be an internal med doc is actually qualified to be an internal med doc and hasn't had a history of doing very bad things to their patients.

Companies don't just pick their doctors out at random. Docs have to go through very strict guidelines to be qualified for private plans and from what I've heard, the government stuff is stricter. The reason you'll only see say, one internal med doc in some areas is because that doctor is the only qualified doctor in that area to practice.

A universal plan for everyone is not a bad thing. I agree with the above; it should be a general plan for everyone and private plans that you can get on if you're willing to spend the extra dough for it. There is no reason, to use an example out of my own life, a friend should have to run from an ambulance after getting a concussion (he didn't get too far) because he doesn't have insurance.

Also the ass-backward plan we have here in Massachusetts should go the way of the dodo. Either go for the absolutely abysmal state offered plans (which are hard to qualify for), pay and get on a private plan, or be taxed for not having insurance at all. Great idea. It was a small blessing that I got hired by my company right before the deadline went by.

"Oo, well I shouldn't pay for it with my taxes!" Why is it a bad thing for everyone to be taken care of? Why is it a bad thing that people would be healthier, more educated, and able to make more of a contribution to the country? Right now, your tax money is being used to bail out idiots who gamed the system and towards an unpopular war that we got shoved to in a grand show of bullheaded "pride".

Right now my state government is thinking of not only upping our gas tax to nineteen cents on the gallon, but also increasing the tolls in and out of Boston up by a up to two or three dollars "to pay for state highways and roads". You know what it's really going towards? Paying off pensions and fixing the giant red faced mess that is the Big Dig. Numbers have been crunched and it's been shown that what's really only needed is a three cent increase, but hey, why not go for broke, right? I'd rather see that extra money be put towards education and healthcare reform before I see it go any further into the Big Black Hole and some government cronie's pocket.

Neo-conservative malarkey. Irving Kristol and Paul Wolfowitz were disillusioned liberals who felt that LBJ's Great Society reforms were a flop. Failed civil rights initiatives in the early 1960s were tearing the country apart. Their conclusion was that "individual liberty" was undoing the plan. So they decided to reunite the country by creating a mythical enemy. The Neo-Cons who came to power under Regan (though through no act of Regan himself as he was a moderate) worked together to unite the US in fear of the Soviet Union. The Neo-Cons alleged the Soviet Union was not holding to its terms of disarmament and utilized a CIA group called Team B to put together a proposal for Regan's eyes that supported this opinion. Regan wanted to open conversations with Premier Chernenko but his advisers told him not to. It wasn't until Gorby came along that things began to defuse.

The Team B report was, years later, declassified and when studied it was wrong on every single point when it come to the USSR. Yeah, the Soviets had nukes. But the idea that they were going to march across Western Europe with columns of tanks was based on misreports (or perhaps even lies). Proponents of Anti-Red rhetoric completely ignored or were unaware of the fact that the Soviet Union was a failed experiment. It was apolitically corrupt from the inside, their economy was in the crapper and it was going to fall on its own anyway.

We can build F-22 jets we don't need, bridges to nowhere and rainforests in Iowa with tax-payer money but we can't get around to Universal Healthcare? We can protect the people from invasion form foreign powers but we can't keep them healthy? Those are some jacked up priorities. All of our closest allies have UH and yet we can't? That makes no sense.


The US is 42 times larger in population than Switzerland. America has a total GDP of $13,840,000,000,000. Switzerland has a GDP of $303,000,000,000. Do the math and the GDPs are roughly proportionate to population size.

Do some reading about IMR stats. There's a good primer here.

Cancer Survival Rates [edit- won't allow a direct link. See the MedScape article second from top]

I didn't claim they were wasting money. Its about different priorities.


The belief that people without money don't get health care in the US is a myth. Quality is debaitable but everyone can go to a hospital and get treated. I treat people with no money every day. I've seen people with no money get treatments that tax payers in other countries couldn't hope for.