“If you think health care is expensive now, wait until you see what it costs when it's free.”

A good quote is like a good dress - long enough to cover the subject, but short enough to hold your interest.

Yes anything of government's 'free' proclamation has new fetters implied in small print.!

However pithy, this quote is so far off the mark it becomes meaningless, if not openly harmful. One only needs to compare U.S. per-capita medical expenditures and the quality of care available here, to what's found in any modern, single-payer country. That simple act renders O'Rourke's conclusion into one of obvious absurdity.

Mann, sorry that you don't understand this quote, but I always try to cut libs some slack. P.J. is right and we will soon find out just how much "free" medical care costs if Obama care isn't scrapped.

Five stars for accuracy; a thumbs down for what is happening to this country. The sole reason medical costs are so high are the influence of insurance companies and the support they get from their partnes, government. When government takes over completely, quantity and quality will go down and costs will go up.

It is because of insurance companies that health care costs are so high to begin with; or rather, that doctors and medical centers can charge so much. Socialized medicine in Canada for example is much cheaper than the US, and each province handles their own health insurance program -- people may buy additional coverage and it is usually a benefit some companies offer their employees -- not because they must do so by law but in order to attract good workers. What is being proposed by the Obamanites is the federal take-over of private industry. And condoms and birth-control pills are not covered in basic Canadian 'health care.' Obamacare is an attempt to compel all Americans to accept and protect monopolies in pharmaceuticals and insurance. Their promoters could care less about the health of the people. If anything, the plan is to reduce populations worldwide by controlling who can get care and who can't. Obamacare will keep prices high so that anyone who dares to NOT buy insurance will be unable to afford treatment. As well, anything outside the scope of accepted Obamacare will be made illegal -- especially any protocols to prevent cancer, diabetes, heart disease, etc.. Obamacare is a death trap -- and according to the Supreme Court just another tax.

One more thing: a Cuban friend of mine told me how health care works in Cuba. For example, when a woman becomes pregnant she must apply at the national human resources department to get permission to have her baby. If she is not given permission, the baby is aborted. This is socialized medicine after a few decades, and the Cuban citizens know of nothing else and submit without complaint.