Pueblo Chieftain Against Single-Payer

The August 10, 2008 Pueblo Chieftain published the following good editorial against single-payer health care:

Love story
BY EDITORIAL; PUEBLO CHIEFTAIN

The recent 40th anniversary of Medicare was observed in Pueblo by several doctors calling for a single-payer health insurance program for all U.S. residents.

Single-payer is a euphemism for government-controlled health care. If you are enamored of the Postal Service, you will simply love health care directed by bureaucrats in Washington, D.C.

The fact that Medicare already limits the payment for much of America's health care should tell the medicos something. It's that, when a finite number of tax dollars are going to pay for health care, there will be rationing.

One only needs to look north of the border, where health care is a government-run enterprise. People with serious ailments often must wait for months to get the treatment they need, and some die waiting. Canadians who can afford it often travel south to the United States to get the care they need when they need it.

The same can be said of government-run health care in Great Britain. The English may wait for care while keeping a stiff upper lip, but this ain't the United Kingdom. Ironically, less than a week after American "Medicare for all" was being touted, the Government Accountability Office reported that about 10 per cent of Medicare dollars for medical equipment such as wheelchairs are going to fictitious sellers. The government has been aware of these shenanigans for at least three years, but the bureaucracy has been slow to shore things up.

People say they want health care that's the highest quality, available to all and inexpensive. It's axiomatic that you can have any combination of two, but not all three.

Which one do the single-payer advocates want to do away with?