Reply #2: Good point.

[JDPriestly]

But again, my point is that someone needs to mention that, with or without government involvement in health care, Congress seems to be looking at the cost of health care in our country for the first time.

Regardless of whether the government gets involved, it is evident that, as you point out, we cannot afford to take care of ourselves and still maintain the kind of huge military that we have.

The debate in Congress is about whether to acknowledge the cost of health care in our federal budget or whether to leave it unacknowledged as a cost to taxpayers that they pay out of their own pockets after taxes. Which choice we make is less important than the sticker shock of the cost of health care for Americans.

If we want to get a health care bill, we need to really bring home to Americans what cost of health care for the nation is and what that cost for each individual American is -- Medicare and Medicaid included. Then we need to talk about how much of the money -- two figures -- one for America as a whole -- the other for the individual American -- goes to the health insurance industry when it is for profit. And how much would go for administration if the entire amount were single payer and government run.

The numbers would be approximate, but that is the discussion we should have.

I am not an economist. And I do not have the mathematical skills to figure this out. The CBO has the numbers. If someone knows how to figure this, I would appreciate it.

1) What has been calculated as the cost of covering every American with private for-profit health care insurance including deductibles, co-pays, premiums and costs that are lost to bankruptcy?

2) Dividing that cost by the number of Americans, how much does health care cost if every American gets private for-profit health care insurance?

3) If you subtracted the health care insurance companies' administrative costs and replaced them with the costs of Medicare and Medicaid and the VA -- the public systems, how much would the figure for covering all Americans be?

4) If you subtracted the health care insurance companies' administrative costs as in 3), what would the cost be per American?

That is where we need to bring the debate.

Congress is horrified at the cost of any program. That is the cost we are or should already be paying. It is horrifying. We need to talk about how to lower it so that everyone can afford health care one way or the other. For-profit insurance for health care is objectionable only because it raises the cost of health care to the point that Americans cannot afford health care.