It's not just current health care expenditures, it's their growth rate that's sinking the country. This isn't a partisan statement. Obama's made the same argument.

Yes Iraq and Afghanistan were expensive as hell, but the idea that that's what's sinking the country is new to me. I did a little googling:

Quote:

Administration’s request for 2008 is funded in full, appropriations for military operations and other war-related activities in Iraq, Afghanistan, and elsewhere in the war on terrorism will rise to $188 billion this year and to a cumulative total of $752 billion since 2001.



Source: Click

Less than a $100B/year average in a multi-trillion dollar budget isn't what's sinking the country. And eventually, those wars will, some day, end. Health care costs are just spiraling upward.

Well, spiraling upwards unless you believe the politicized numbers Obama threw out there in defense of his health care reform bill. Here's an article with a link to the latest CMS Actuary report on the finances behind that bill: Click. I've been trying to get time to read that report over the last couple of weeks, but it's dense, hard to read, not enough time. Just skimming the NYT article will give you an idea though.

Also, here's a pie chart as to Obama's 2011 budget. Note how much we're spending on Medicare and Medicaid. And, that budget probably includes all the politicized numbers Obama ran around with trying to get that health care bill passed: Click

Note that I'm not against universal coverage. It's just that there are plans that got quite a bit of support in Congress for achieving that while lowering how much we spend on health care. And, real universal coverage, not this "near-universal" nonsense Obama's bragging about. What are the projected numbers? 10% of citizens are still uninsured in 2019? The USA spends ridiculous amounts on health care. It's way too expensive here.

You're probably right about Canada being the largest trading partner.

And yeah, part of the solution is raising taxes. It's just after watching how backward assed they did the whole health care reform, I can't imagine them touching it.