Guaranteed healthcare. For everyone. For life.

Not that long ago, a headline like this one couldn't have been written about a campaign in the UK. Thanks to the National Health Service, people in Britain knew that they had guaranteed healthcare, for everyone, for life, paid for by general taxation and free at the point of need. Now, of course, thanks to him, him, her and her, that's not the case any more - the NHS is under attack, and we desperately need to organise a fight just to hold on to what remains.

But despite all of that, workers in many parts of the world still look to the NHS as a beacon of humanity in comparison to their own health care provision. It's not about money - there are plenty of very rich countries that simply don't make a political priority out of keeping people alive and healthy. Any society irresponsible enough to let market economics dictate health provision must know that the rich will get healthcare while the poor will get sick and die.

In California, , the California Nurses Association has launched a campaign for Guaranteed Healthcare, and sponsored a Senate Bill to deliver a single-payer system instead of the current market in healthcare operated by insurance companies.

On Tuesday, 2,000 nurses, school employees, community activists, and patients rallied at the California state Capitol for genuine healthcare reform, and to demand Arnold Schwarzenegger end the state's healthcare crisis by signing Senator Sheila Kuehl's bill, SB 840, which would guarantee healthcare for all Californians with a single-payer model similar to Medicare for All. This historic rally is believed to be the largest for a specific healthcare plan in American history, and underscores the fact that single-payer style plans are the only one with a built-in, active constituency dedicated to their passage.

The rally was sponsored by the California Nurses Association/National Nurses Organizing Committee, with broad participation by the California School Employees Association and a wide variety of labor, religious, and community groups.

Such a system would be a less than half a step towards a taxation-funded NHS, but in America, even such demands can be revolutionary.