I've been thinking the same thing for a while now, but I hesitated to say so aloud. Not because I was afraid of what people would say, but really just because I didn't want it to be true and I was hoping that something would happen to make things look better for a single-payer program.

But, I do think this says the honest truth, despite being unpleasant to hear. Or, rather, in this case, read. It isn't going to happen, no matter how many petitions we send along. President Obama has already made up his mind, and apparently so have the people who are in a position to refuse to pass a bill for whatever heavily-diluted health care plan he finally decides to settle upon.

I can't help still hoping that something will happen to prove this line of thinking wrong, but at the same time...I feel confident in saying that I'm sure there won't be anything to give any real hope of a single-payer health care system being implemented.

Do you think President Obama is aware of what he is likely doing to his own reputation by going back on such an important issue? But, even as I ask that, I have to also ask...how could he not?

It's almost a bad joke that all American Presidents, no matter what their campaign promises, will fall in line with the profit promises of American capitalist leaders and their corporate shareholders. If it wasn't for race and class issues, which include war mongering as idealistic posturing to cover war profiteering, there wouldn't be any real politics in America. So now we have the predictable 'War on Single Payer Health Care.' What do you expect from a government that gets the best health care for free? Do we voters deserve what they get? After all, we elected them to look at us as pains in the ass, getting in the way of their success. Let's not embarrass them in front of the esteemed peers. Single payer=unAmerican. It's 9/11 on corporate health insurance. We hate their freedom to make huge profits on our bodies. What kind of Americans are we? Home grown? Canada lovers? Or just plain fed up with lobbyists?  

For me health care is a personal choice from the start. Begins with a good diet and learning about nutrition. I do what I can to avoid America's fast food plagues. You know--obesity, diabetes, overpaying for terrible food. This country is unhealthy in mind as well as body because of fast food advertising. No place in America goes processed food deprived. Pull into an interstate highwayrest stop. It's like going to a crack house, crazed drivers needing their fix. Food banks give the packaged stuff away daily. Cultural Obesity is a status symbol for both rappers and bikers. Why don't we give away fresh fruit and veggies? What! Ask Americans to eat broccoli? That's more unAmerican than asking Congress to give us single payer health programs. Right now from where I sit, American politics is like a fast food burger... the cheapest cuts of meat gone through the grinder, some fat added so it has that greasy trashy taste, between mushy white bread slices, with a hint of veggies if you dare ask. All the meat is processed... doesn't matter where it came from. White flour is like eating talcum powder. American are, if anything commendable, consistent...our fast food tastes the same in Iowa, Prague and China.

And you want health care? Silly frustrated progressive. Forget it. I wouldn't be surprised if the fast food industry doesn't secretly own all American hospitals. Fast food fatalism is our American contribution to philosophy... you can't live forever so you might as well indulge in the Inevitable American Suicide Diet. At a fast food joint everywhere. Just remember 'You're gonna be hungry sooner or later. We'll be there for you and your body.'

My advice... health care starts in your stomach, not in the doctor's office.

...but it won't mean anything if you are injured or become the victim of an unpreventable disease. You can't avoid the human condition. Even if you do everything right there will eventually come a time when the odds just don't break in your favor. That's where a decent and humane health care system comes in. The problem is, we don't have one, and it looks like we are not likely to get one anytime soon.

The sad truth about our current situation is that not enough of our "leaders" actually give a damn about us. We are expendable. We are useful only in as far as we can produce profit and political support for them. After that they just want us to go away. So the question is: how do we make them care? I'm open to suggestions. Frankly, with all the money flying around Washington these days, I find it difficult to believe that there is much, short of a general strike, that we can do to get their attention.

Larry Litt does offer some good, common sense advice, and you're also correct: accidents happen, as does disease.

Dr. Michael Parkinson, president of the American College of Preventive Medicine, said physicians would not need to see 50 percent to 75 percent of their patients if people adopted healthier lifestyles.

“We got to get the prevention message right if we want to make a difference,” Parkinson said.

He said there are six unhealthy truths:

• Chronic disease is the No. 1 cause of deaths � seven out of 10 deaths.

• Chronic disease accounts for 75 percent of the national health-care spending.

• Two-thirds of the increase in health-care spending is due to poor lifestyle behaviors.

• Obesity has doubled from 1987 and accounts for 30 percent of the rise in health care spending.

• An 80 percent drop in health care spending can be realized with change in unhealthy behaviors and aggressive treatment of chronic diseases.

• The vast majority of chronic diseases can be prevented.

The point remains that it is only the single-payer option that effectively will reduce health care costs by reducing administrative costs. Competition and choice will remain as patients will be free to select their health care providers.

The "public option" - that is, requiring everyone to purchase private health insurance - is a boon to the private health insurance industry, and does nothing to reduce administrative costs.

The health care industry lobbyists who are spending $1.4 million dollars a day to influence Congress know that the "public option" is good business, but not good health care for all Americans.

They know that 60% of bankruptcies are due to hospital bills, and that 80% of those people are insured.

One way the private insurance industry makes its profits is by denying payments after insuring people.

Former CIGNA executive Wendell Potter's was particularly illuminating when he talked with Bill Moyers in a PBS interview about insurance company profitability and something called the "medical loss ratio."

And by medical loss ratio, I mean that it's a measure that tells investors or anyone else how much of a premium dollar is used by the insurance company to actually pay medical claims. And that has been shrinking, over the years, since the industry's been dominated by, or become dominated by for-profit insurance companies. Back in the early '90s, or back during the time that the Clinton plan was being debated, 95 cents out of every dollar was sent, you know, on average was used by the insurance companies to pay claims. Last year, it was down to just slightly above 80 percent.

Wendell Potter continued, explaining why the health insurance industry lobbying so hard for private insurance under the misnomer "public option."

It is an important thing that everyone be enrolled in some kind of a benefit plan. They don't want a public plan. They want all the uninsured to have to be enrolled in a private insurance plan. They want -- they see those 50 million people as potentially 50 million new customers. So they're in favor of that. They see this as a way to essentially lock them into the system, and ensure their profitability in the future. The strategy is as it was in 1993 and '94, to conduct this charm offensive on the surface. But behind the scenes, to use front groups and third-party advocates and ideological allies. And those on Capitol Hill who are aligned with them, philosophically, to do the dirty work. To demean and scare people about a government-run plan, try to make people not even remember that Medicare, their Medicare program, is a government-run plan that has operated a lot more efficiently. And also, the people who are enrolled in our Medicare plan like it better. The satisfaction ratings are higher in our Medicare program, a government-run program, than in private insurance.