Top Ten Anit-Healthcare Reform Hit List

1. American Association of Retired Persons (AARP). AARP, one of DC’s most powerful lobbying groups, has worked inside the beltway for years to defeat single payer.

2. America’s Health Insurance Plans (AHIP). The private health insurance industry. Public enemy number one. The health insurance corporations must die so that the American people can live.

3. American Medical Association. With a shrinking base of doctors (only 25 percent of doctors nationwide belong) – the AMA is the most conservative of the doctors’ organizations.

4. Barack Obama. He was for it when he was a state Senator in Illinois. To get off the list, Obama needs to put single payer back on the table (It's our table - not Wall Street or inside the beltway).

5. Business Roundtable: “In private, they support single payer, but they’re also thinking – if you can take away someone else’s business – the insurance companies’ business – you can take away mine. Also, if workers go on strike, I want them to lose their health insurance. And it’s also a cultural thing – we don’t do that kind of thing in this country.”

6. Families USA. A major inside the beltway liberal foundation and long-time foe of single payer. It’s chief executive, Ron Pollack, was once an advocate for single payer. But no more.

7. Health Care for America Now. The largest coalition of liberal groups promoting a choice between a public plan and private insurance companies.

8. Kaiser Family Foundation. One of the most prestigious liberal inside the beltway think tanks on health reform policy.

9. The Lewin Group. The go-to consulting firm for health reform studies and a wholly owned subsidiary of Ingenix, which is in turn owned by United Health Group, the nation’s largest FOR-PROFIT health insurance corporation.

10. Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers Association of America (PHRMA). PHRMA chief executive Billy Tauzin says that under single payer, the government would become a “price fixer.” By which he means, the government, as a single payer, will have the power to negotiate drug prices downward, thus costing the drug corporations millions in excess profits.
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Single payer is one of the best ways to go. But I'd like to point out that the term "single payer" refers to the finance aspect of universal healthcare. I believe the term has been overused to repel thoe who would otherwise support universal healthcare for all. In France, the number one country for healthcare, everyone is covered and the government plays a strong role in regulating the industry. For one, they set the amounts that doctors will charge for any given procedure and this is placed on the wall of the doctors' offices. They have many payers involved. But they are all non-profit. In fact every other industrialized nation does not have any for-profit insurance involved in any way.

The problem with the U.S. is that the profit driven system is adverse to provide affordable and equal health care for all. It translates to a "loss" in the for-profit industry when they have to pay out claims. But this is not the case in non-profits, especially if they are government funded. So while single payer, meaning only the government insures everyone, is a good plan, we should not discount the possibility of allowing non-profits in, but there has to be tough government regulation and control to go along with that.

So I think we should all consider using the term "universal health care for all", instead of "single payer". After all, it is more accurately our goal to provide health care for all, whether there is one or more payers involved is not really the point of contention, is it?