Socialized medicine

We've already got it, folks. Here's the nut graph from a post this morning over at Hullabaloo:

Indiana's alarming health statistics

• 561,000: Hoosiers without health insurance on any given day.

• $953: additional amount each family with health insurance paid in premiums in 2005 to cover the uninsured.

The entire post is worth the read, including the background on health care economics in the Hoosier state since WWII.

The thing is, though, while Indiana's situation is bad, it's not that much different from what we face in Oregon or anywhere else in the US, except as a matter of degree.

It cracks me up that free-market worshipers mock the idea of "socialized medicine" as if that's not what we have in America right now: We ration access by income level and employment situation, and socialize the costs by having the people who can afford coverage pick up the tab for those who can't. The only thing we've successfully privatized is the corporate profits.

Check out Stand Tall for America, Sen. Ron Wyden's website for the Healthy Americans Act.