I think that anything that we cannot live without should be provided by the government, or at least price-regulated so we're not completely screwed if for whatever reason, we cannot provide it for ourselves. This will provide the most stable society. Those include: Housing, food, healthcare, education, and gas to get to work. When I say housing, I mean that no one should ever worry that they will be homeless. Even if they lose their job, they should never live on the street. Some may say that if you don't have anything to fear, you will become lazy and a mooch off the government. But if you look at more socialist leaning countries like Canada, the crime rates are down, health problems are fewer, and poverty rates are lower. We all pay for the misfortunes of the people around us. It omnly makes sense then, even if only for selfish reasons, to prevent the fall of individuals within our society.
The devil's in the details though. We definitely don't want the problems that typical socialized medicine has seen: turning pregnant women away from the ER when they are in labor for instance, people dying while on waiting lists, etc. There needs to be a strong push to encourage more people becoming doctors, such as subsidizing the cost of medical college for instance.

It amazes me that most conservatives seem to think that the free market will somehow magically sort itself out perfectly if you just leave it alone and let it settle itself. What about unprofitable groups of people? Single parents with chronic diseases for instance? These people are important for our society, they are raising the children of this country's future, but the free market leaves them out in the cold.

If you look at the UK, they offer free healthcare to all, housing and benefits, unemployment benefits etc, and all this has done is create two generations of people who9 have never been to work.

The system is set out so that some people are actually financially better off sitting at home instead of going out to work. The health services is overstreched, NHS dentists are now more increasingly difficult to find and the public purse has already been damaged by this financial crisis.

A term of president Obama that measure his capability to out way what was happening right now,living simply with basic needs can help. I agree with good system in UK, with the crisis we have at this moment so hard to find free services and having benefits.

Obama is no magician and probably he's come into power in worst condition ever. So don't expect much from him just like I do. Work hard and harder.

Well he certainly needs to work a little harder if he wants to lead the Americans out of this totally.