My daughter's tragedy: U.S. health care in a nutshell.

Like millions of Americans, my daughter's boyfriend lost his job this year. His unemployment was a direct result of the banksters' rape of the economy, which is a whole 'nuther story. And of course, with his job went his health insurance. He was offered temporary COBRA coverage, for a thousand dollars a month. For a healthy 30 year old with zero income and a mortgage to pay, that's a sick joke. So, like millions of Americans—but unlike anyone in Canada, England, France, Germany, Japan...—he was forced to go without health insurance. Affluent wingnuts and corporate conservatives like to claim that people like my prospective son in law are making a "choice", that they're refusing to carry health insurance so they can buy a big screen TV. That's bull@!$%#. The working poor fail to carry health insurance because they simply cannot afford it. Period.