I wonder what would happen if millions of people

[Robb]

14. The poor underinsured are being oppressed. People who burned draft cards

...were protesting a war. There is a difference.

People who can afford to pay their own bills in an emergency, or relatively healthy and low-risk people, or people who do not have chronic illness or such people under their care -- in other words, the people most likely to consider dropping their insurance to stick it to the corporations -- are not the oppressed people here. They are also such a tiny fraction of the pie that any direct action such as you suggest would not be cataclysmic, but rather easily absorbed by the system, with the predictable results of increased cost for those remaining and decreased quality of care.

Thousands of people burning their draft cards on television sent a message to politicians to change policy or fear the repercussions of easily shifted public sentiment. Insurance companies cannot be voted out of office, they respond to the bottom line alone.

And that bottom line cannot be substantially affected by the actions of a minority of their customers, nor can it be expected to be affected by the majority who will face hardship and death if the onus is put on the oppressed to "free themselves."

A market-driven system that holds lives hostage must be starved gradually to ensure the safety of those lives caught within. The answer is increasingly onerous regulation, not direct action.