>That seems a bit surreal. I sometimes read free-marketers who speculate that certain people are intentionally making the US Private healthcare system worse in an attempt to get socialized medicine. That's the first time I've read a suggestion that socialized healthcare was intentionally being made worse to push a private option.

In the US they are literally doing this right now with the post office. In the UK they did it with the rail network.

It's a standard part of the privatization playbook.