The United States woefully trails other industrialized nations whose inhabitants enjoy universal health care as a right.  This country doesn't and doesn't even come close.

Now, the US has another dubious, shameful distinction: the biggest disparity between the richest and poorest of any Western industrialized nation.

Just in case you may have missed the following: "The income gap between the richest and poorest Americans grew last year to its widest amount on record as young adults and children in particular struggled to stay afloat in the recession.

"The top-earning 20 percent of Americans - those making more than $100,000 each year - received 49.4 percent of all income generated in the U.S., compared with the 3.4 percent earned by those below the poverty line, according to newly released census figures. That ratio of 14.5-to-1 was an increase from 13.6 in 2008 and nearly double a low of 7.69 in 1968.

"A different measure, the international Gini index, found U.S. income inequality at its highest level since the Census Bureau began tracking household income in 1967. The U.S. also has the greatest disparity among Western industrialized nations.

"At the top, the wealthiest 5 percent of Americans, who earn more than $180,000, added slightly to their annual incomes last year, census data show. Families at the $50,000 median level slipped lower.

" 'Income inequality is rising, and if we took into account tax data, it would be even more,' said Timothy Smeeding, a University of Wisconsin-Madison professor who specializes in poverty. 'More than other countries, we have a very unequal income distribution where compensation goes to the top in a winner-takes-all economy.' "

And the GOP want to extend Bush's tax cuts for the wealthy.   Banana republic here we come.