Nearly 1 in 5 Americans has no health insurance

[I]n the first quarter of 2010, an estimated 59.1 million people had no health insurance for at least part of the year[.]

(MSNBC.) In other words, nearly 1 in 5 Americans has no health insurance. And it's not just the sorely impoverished; about half of the uninsured live well above the federal poverty level.

Nearly 1 in 5 Americans has no health insurance.

And it's not just the healthy, either; more than 40% of the uninsured have a chronic disease such as asthma, hypertension, or diabetes.

Nearly 1 in 5 Americans has no health insurance.

The Republican response? Kill health insurance reform by chipping away at it, piece by piece. Block funding for programs, close low-income clinics, and roll back consumer protection progress until they've achieved what Representative Eric Cantor (R-Va.) calls "full repeal."

What does Rep. Cantor consider "full repeal"? Nearly 2 in 5 Americans with no health insurance? Half of all Americans? I don't mean to be disingenuous; I know he means that he wants everyone to pull themselves up by their own bootstraps and fund their own personal medical savings accounts (whether ordinary savings accounts or money-market accounts or accounts with funds invested in the stock market). That kind of account is a great idea if you have (1) seed money to begin with; and (2) generally good health, so that you can earn money by working and you don't need a lot of expensive healthcare anyway.

It's all very rich coming from someone with a gold-plated federal employee health plan. Has Rep. Cantor opted out of his federal benefits program? Has he put his money where his mouth is?

Nearly 1 in 5 Americans has no health insurance.

Let's see those ranks swell with elected Republicans who campaigned on destroying health insurance reform.