What's even more bizarre is that we have a single-payer system that's wildly popular among the 48 million people it serves and has demonstrated an excellent abi

What's even more bizarre is that we have a single-payer system that's wildly popular among the 48 million people it serves and has demonstrated an excellent ability to control costs. It's called Medicare. It's currently restricted to those over 65 and certain people with disabilities, but expanding it to cover everyone would be a relatively easy task, it seems to me, compared to the gyrations we're going through trying to fix the private insurance system. It's not just that many Americans have been persuaded that a single-payer system works for the old and disabled, but for some reason isn't right for everyone else. Rather, many Americans have been brainwashed into simultaneously supporting Medicare and opposing a generalized single-payer system, with equal fervor, without noticing the contradiction. (Yes, really. I saw a photo a year or two ago of a protester at a rally carrying a sign that said "NO SOCIALIZED MEDICINE / DON'T TOUCH OUR MEDICARE", or similar language.)