Posted: 04/11/2012 11:27 am

What happens if the Supreme Court strikes down the "individual mandate" in the health care reform law?

Commentators ranging from former Labor Secretary Robert Reich to Forbes Magazine columnist Rick Ungar agree: Such a decision could open the door to single-payer health care -- perhaps even make it inevitable.

By Kurt Bateman, SPAN Ohio, March 30, 2012

The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) has, this week, been considering various aspects of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA). While political pundits and court watchers have been holding forth on what this all means, the ability to discern anything from the oral arguments is nearly impossible.

50 Million Uninsured in the U.S. Equals 50,000+ Avoidable Deaths a Year

Public Citizen - January 2012

Sidney M. Wolfe, M.D.

The latest data from the U.S. Census Bureau has shown that, as of 2010, there were 50 million people in this country lacking health insurance. A 2009 study by Harvard researchers found that there was an excess mortality of 40 percent in uninsured people — compared to people with health insurance — because they don’t have health insurance. Combining this with the lower number of people then uninsured, the researchers estimated that almost 45,000 people died each year from causes attributable to their uninsured status.

By Ralph Nader, CounterPunch

03 February 12

Looking at millions of individual bills that makeup the 2.7 trillion dollars of annual health care costs opens a gigantic window on the massive waste, redundancy, profiteering, fraud and sometimes criminal over-billing.

January 31, 2012

Dear Friends,

Most of you have likely heard the disappointing news that our bill, SB 810, the California Universal Health Care Act, failed to move off the Senate Floor by January 31st, meaning it cannot advance further in the legislative process this year. Despite our unwavering advocacy, too few members were willing to cast votes in favor of SB 810 this year, including several members who had voted for the legislation before.  Unfortunately this means that Californians will continue to have a broken health care system in dire need of change, but that is not for lack of effort.

Posted 1/23/12 

The journey I embarked on when I made the decision to leave a successful career in the health insurance business was a spiritual one. I can trace the decision to a true epiphany, to the very moment I saw hundreds of people standing, soaking wet, in long, slow-moving lines, waiting to get medical care that was being provided in animal stalls at a fairground in Wise County, Virginia.