Americans believe that the private sector is always more efficient and cheaper than big government, and particularly when you go among Republicans, even after five beers, they still believe it. But I always say, "If it's really true, why would they need that 12 percent extra on a traditional government program? Explain to me why something that costs more saves me money as a taxpayer.".

The rich are becoming richer, and the gap between the rich and the poor is getting bigger.

We are the only nation where paper is still the mainstay in the private insurance industry.

The good things at the U.S. health care system are that we have a well-trained labor force, particularly physicians; I don't think any nation trains doctors better. We have the latest technology, simply because we throw so much money at it. We are really technology-hungry in this country. That's a good thing. Our system more treats patients like customers, which is a good thing; that it's very customer-friendly. And it's very innovative, both in the products we use, in the techniques we use and the organizational structures we use. Those are all very good things, highly competitive.

The ACA is an ugly patch on an ugly system - and I don't think it's worth mentioning in the context of price or quality transparency.

If you want to look at a purely socialized health care, you would have to go to the United States, where we have it. In particular, that's the system we reserve for our veterans. So if I hear politicians run down socialized medicine - and I have done that before the Congress - I say: Do you hate your veterans? Why do you reserve purely socialized medicine - there's only the U.S. and Cuba that have that - for the veterans? So getting the terms right would be very, very helpful in our national conversation on health reform.

Everybody should have health care, on the one hand. But on the other hand, if you ask Americans, "Are you willing to pay for it?," they say no. So I've never been able to understand this contradiction.