Advocates of nationalizing the healthcare system have a wonderful ability to ignore the poor results produced by government run healthcare programs.

This includes the ability to studiously ignore the poor results produced when the US government runs healthcare programs.

As you studiously ignore the failings of the American system and studiously ignore the strengths of nationalized systems.

Because life expectancy isn't affected solely by access to doctors. The US has a high rate of obesity, smoking/drinking/drug use, and in general we are more sedentary.

So your argument boils down to, Americans have the least healthy lifestyles in the entire Industrialized world and that is why our health care costs are more than half again any other nations. We get worse outcomes for far more money because we are fat, lazy druggies?
Do you really think that Americans drink more than Europeans or do more recreational drugs? Europeans smoke far more than Americans. We are among the fattest nations but Europe is getting fatter. Germany has a high rate of obesity and Germans like their beer and cigarettes, yet get better health outcomes for much less.
European governments are able to deliver better health care to their citizens for far less money than our private system. Do you really think our government is less competent than every European government? Now who is being anti-American?

BTW the last several times I have gone to the DMV I have been in and out within an hour. (3 different states: AL, CA, and HI) In each case I received friendly and competent service with a moderate wait. A tip for all of you who typically have negative experiences with the DMV, try being nice to them.

BTW; Just this week I was mugged by the present system, but I wouldn't take a sledge hammer to an engine with an occasional miss.

Gosh, you mean that the French system might be $80 billion in the red in 15 years?

Actually I think the relevant portion of that article was

without fundamental reforms France's national health service....will collapse within the next 15 years.

The idea of emulating a collapsing healthcare system does not make sense to me. Apparently advocates for government run healthcare in the US feel differently.

Andy also says

Every problem that France has, ours are far, far worse.

To which I say Got Cite?

This includes the ability to studiously ignore the poor results produced when the US government runs healthcare programs.

US government failure in these small programs indicates a high likelihood of failure if they take over all aspects of the healthcare system.

DEM EYES BREAST TEST 'WAIT' WOE

Mammography centers in New York City are closing at an "alarming" rate, causing a 171 percent increase in wait times for the cancer-detecting procedure, according to a study by Rep. Anthony Weiner.

Since 1999, 67 mammography sites, more than a quarter of the city's supply, have closed, the Brooklyn Democrat found.

The problem? Price fixing at a lower level than cost:

The problem is that Medicare pays only $83 for a procedure that costs $125 to provide, said Weiner, who will introduce legislation to increase payments.

Every problem that France has, ours are far, far worse.

For your argument to have any legitimacy, you have to show that America's system isn't also on the same track to massive cost increase. You can't, of course. Facts are so often inconvenient.

Hard to see how following the French system would improve US healthcare.

French health service on verge of collapse, says commission

A government commission has warned that without fundamental reforms France's national health service, rated the best in the world by the World Health Organisation, will collapse within the next 15 years.

Nationalized healthcare consistently provides longer wait times and worse outcomes then the US health care system does.

This is simply false.

Nationalized health care consistently provides longer wait times than American health care does for the well insured. Americans without healthcare or who are underinsured may never get treatment.

As for health outcomes, socialized medicine delivers far more cost effective results. America spend 50% more per person, does not manage to cover some 45 million people, and does not produce better results even for our insured. Poor British people have better health measures than even rich Americans.

I don't want to see a mandatory purely universal system without any alternatives. A French-style hybrid system, with catastrophic, rationed, and preventative coverage for all, plus the option of private insurance for the better off, would solve almost all of the issues. We could do this by expanding Medicare, which has much lower overhead costs than HMO-style insurance.

Nationalized healthcare consistently provides longer wait times and worse outcomes then the US health care system does.

Doctors admit: NHS treatments must be rationed

British doctors will take the historic step of admitting for the first time that many health treatments will be rationed in the future because the NHS cannot cope with spiralling demand from patients.

James Johnson, the BMA chairman, will warn that patients face a bleak future because they will increasingly be denied treatments. He will urge the NHS to be much more explicit about what it can realistically afford to do and ask political leaders to engage in an open, honest debate about rationing.

Because life expectancy isn't affected solely by access to doctors. The US has a high rate of obesity, smoking/drinking/drug use, and in general we are more sedentary.

Floyyd:
Of course, what is lacking is the fact that once you have waited six months for your appointment with a GP, any referral to a specialist will take even longer.

Thats why people die while waiting to get a MRI.

You're being plainly ridiculous now. If socialized systems are so horrible and people die so frequently, why do basically all of the countries with universal coverage have long life expectancies and better health outcomes than the U.S.?

The numbers just aren't on your side. You have to resort to making up anecdotes about delays, which is particularly absurd because there are equally problematic delays in the American system.

Go to the DMV sometime. Sit there and imagine that the arbitrary bureaucracy you are wading through is not just 2 hours to get a plate sticker,but 6 months in pain waiting for third class medical care, from indifferent medical bureaucrats.
This is socialize medicine!

You're basically just wrong. You're making ridiculous partisan points out of some absurd fear of socialism. Did you get mugged by socialism? Did it tease you when you were a child?

Because this is basically also the American system. Except that ours costs 50% more for lesser results. There is rationing in any healthcare system, and the American system is particularly inefficient at distributing care.

davod: I have no idea what you're going on about.