But from here, it's hard to see how mandating more customers and revenue for the big insurance corporations is progress.

"Isn't single payer also "mandated"??"

Yes, single payer is mandated, and all taxpayers would have to  have to pay for it as part of their tax burden. All the same arguments apply as to the mandate in question.

Of course, if we had a national single payer system in place, and no more employer based health insurance as it takes it's place, then as soon as the political pendulum swings and  tax cutting Republicans take over again, they immediately start playing "starve the beast" as with all entitlements, they will cut the coverage down to the bare bones and then some, and the only alternative will be ghastly expensive private health insurance for people to try to buy on their own, or go without health care. People see the wide swings in government services, and do not trust the same people who brought us Katrina bringing us our open heart surgery.

At least with the Massachusetts mandate they do exempt people who cannot afford to buy insurance plans.  When was the last time you tried to tell your employer or the IRS that you "couldn't afford" to pay your taxes?

Of course, Nurse Schrum, you are brutally misrepresenting the Clinton health care mandates, which would cap costs at 6-10% of family income, and subsidize the rest, so people would not be "forced to buy plans they could not afford".  And you misrepresent the Clinton plan also by saying that people would be forced to buy private insurance - Clinton strategically included a public program modeled on Medicare that people could buy into as an alternative to private or employer based insurance. That program was the seed of a single payer national health insurance program, but had you the eyes to see it.

Hillary was the last candidate standing  who cared enough about giving single payer a chance to offer that option, even though it opened her to new political attack on the "no new bureaucracies" front. She also vowed to fight the insurance and drug companies to regulate them on their high priced snake oil and usurious rates, and swiss cheese coverage, so we could have mandates that made sure everyone was in the system and covered, with the health insurance industry heavily regulated much like it is in Europe, where the insurance and "sickness funds" are technically private entities, but function essentially as public services. Little functional difference between that and true single payer, as they are "private" insurance in name only.

Did progressives and single payer advocates support Clinton for her progressive health care plan? No. You are still stuck in the denial that American voters want a single payer system and it is only the big bad money interests that are preventing it from being passed. Wrong. Far too many Americans have lived under nationalized governments and do not want that here. I somewhat disagree with them, but I assure you it is the VOTERS who do not support single payer that remain the obstacle to it, not industry. Kucinich supported single payer, and got 2% support from voters.

Hillary Clinton listened to her constituents and devised a plan that they asked her for, not business. She was never "bought out" by the insurance or drug companies, there is no quid pro quo with her, she does what she believes in and honors what her constituents ask for.

You have to win over the hearts and minds of the American public to win single payer. And Hillary knew the people would need to see PROOF, to see it working well for them, so she included the Medicare for All option in her plan so the American public could see it working with their own eyes, and be convinced it is a good thing. They might have flocked to it in droves, making it the new "Medicare for All" program we have needed for generations already.

Now Clinton's candidacy is destroyed, and all hope of that is gone. Instead of cynically attacking and destroying your best candidate, you progressives should have been behind her all the way.

Now how happy will you all be with the "bipartisan" Obama/Biden/Bennett "Healthy Americans" Act? The free market will be unleashed to solve all our health care woes [not]. You have only your blindness to thank.

We might get 60 if we're incredibly fortunate, but not 67.

So in order to unify the party we must discount the facts and pretend that clinton received more votes then Obama?

There are at least four scenarios for who won the popular vote. Hillary gets 2 and Obama gets 2. As far as I'm concerned it was a tie. But I'll never sit back and let the myth that Hillary was robbed go unchallenged with facts.

Ha, ha!

We have similar political views, but opposing basketball views. That's okay. Just like politicians, we can be vicious opponents with deep-seated hatred in June, but we'll still set aside our differences and come together in November. (But unlike politicians, we don't have to be gracious about winning or losing in June.)

OK, masslib, I have stood shoulder to shoulder with you for a full year now, but we finally have to part our ways.

Go Lakers!!!!!

Believe me, I know what nurses do. They run the darn hospitals! Doctors are lost without them.

I understand the belief that insurance companies hold back health care reform, but if there's a way to reform with them, it's something we all should be looking at, including your organization of nurses. Because as you well know, getting care for everyone is of utmost importance and we shouldn't overlook any options just because they involve mandates.

Since you're well aware that single-payer also creates a mandate, you really shouldn't be demonizing the idea of mandates. You're poisoning the well for your own issue by making people believe that any system that they're forced to participate in is bad. We need to convince everyone that contributing to a universal health care system -- whether it's through a payroll deduction, higher taxes, or writing a check every month -- is an excellent investment for them as individuals, for their fellow Americans, and for the economic future of our country.

"the end of her campaign signals the end of proposals to mandate the purchase of products from for-profit insurance corporations."

Clinton's proposal never mandated the purchase of products from for profit health insurance. That idea is still alive, in the bipartisan "Healthy Americans" Act, poised to pass the Senate and really mandate the purchase of insurance from private industry.without the option Clinton included of a Medicare for All program.

So much more  died with the destruction of Clinton's candidacy, it was really the end of the hope for single payer.