If you took all of the money currently paid in health insurance, and cut out duplication of services [having ambulances compete], commercial functions [marketing department, a lot of admin work], profit margins, use of a lot of non-generic drugs, cosmetic operations [e.g. braces aren't medically necessary in the vast majority of cases], and the money lost through treating people who have no insurance, you would have more than enough money to cover state-run health care provision for everyone in the US, without paying a penny more if you were rich or poor.
Obama's not being radical enough. He's keeping the existing, money-consuming commercial infrastructure. He should nationalise health insurers and providers too. Then he could achieve universal healthcare at no cost to the taxpayer.
If you need to save any more money you could ditch drug patents altogether. That would save hundreds of billions, and the argument that drug companies wouldn't innovate [Personally I doubt that would happen] could be resolved by using public money to research unprofitable drugs that are nevertheless in the public interest. The drug market gives incentive for drug companies to put you on expensive treatments for life, rather than one-shot cures, but I think we all know which is more popular.
