Now is the time for Single-Payer Healthcare

The disaster that is the Bush prescription plan provides Progressives with their best opportunity in a generation to push for single-payer healthcare. The Bush plan touts "competition" that will drive down prices and offer choices. How is that going?

Two weeks into the new Medicare prescription drug program, many of the nation's sickest and poorest elderly and disabled people are being turned away or overcharged at pharmacies, prompting more than a dozen states to declare health emergencies and pay for their life-saving medicines.

Computer glitches, overloaded telephone lines and poorly trained pharmacists are being blamed for mix-ups that have resulted in the worst of unintended consequences: As many as 6.4 million low-income seniors, who until Dec. 31 received their medications free, suddenly find themselves navigating an insurance maze of large deductibles, co-payments and outright denial of coverage.

Seniors vote, seniors hate the change and the maze that has been forced on them by the Bush plan. They would probably vote now for a plan that would be single-payer run, that would cover all drugs, and that would allow government bidding for prescriptions.

hat tip to MyDD.