Reuters just posted a story on satellite imagery of Baghdad neighborhoods before the surge. 

The surge worked beyond our wildest dreams!  The mere rumour of the surge caused the Sunni and Shi'ia to kill each other in sufficient numbers to clear neighborhoods before the surge happened!  No, I wouldn't call that ethnic cleansing.  But it's JUST like how oil prices dropped with the rumour of domestic drilling.  Exactly like that.  And that's what John Sidney McCain III will do to fix the economy.  And solve our energy crisis.  So... yeah..  Let's drill!  John Sidney McCain III will win the War of Terror, and win the War on Energy, and he will lead Amerika to VICTORY!!!  VICTORY!!!  YOO ES AY!!!  YOO ES AY!!!  YOO ES AY!!!  YOO ES AY!!!

Ok, it seems to me that the nature of the for-profit system of insurance currently employed screws just about everyone.  Insurance companies want to maximize profit, so they exclude the sickest people, cover less, charge more, and squeeze doctors.  Am I wrong?  The concept of insurance itself is a "socialist" notion of spreading risk through out a large subset of population.  Competition in theory should reduce costs, but in the end it doesn't because competition is not measured by the health of the consumers, but by the profit these companies generate.  Health insurance companies themselves play no role in medical innovation.  Wouldn't a single payer system necessarily be the most efficient iteration of insurance?  Of course choice must be offered, so why not allow competition of a government run system on the open marketplace? 

One more thing.  Please please please repeal direct to consumer advertisements.  Those "ask your doctor if this drug is right for you" commercials take a big chunk of pharma dollars, which should be going toward curing cancer, or diseases, or something.  Not this lifestyle drug crap.  Sure having ED is a tough lot, but so is having cancer.  I think I'd take ED anyday.

With all the economic anxiety in the past year (and especially after today), Obama should attack John Sidney McCain III's healthcare policy. 

Bob Herbert's Op-Ed