Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders spent much of the last week battling over the Vermont senator’s proposal to create a nationwide single-payer health care system. In one of the most important exchanges of Sunday night’s debate, they finally hashed it out face to face.
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What neither of them would say outright—perhaps because it’s not an especially inspiring message for Democrats to hear—is that the question of how best to expand health care access is, at least for the time being, moot. Republicans have a huge majority in the House and will almost certainly continue to control the House in January 2017. But their argument exposed core differences between the two candidates on what the nation’s health care system should look like, and how it should be paid for. And it doesn’t look like a debate either candidate is about to abandon any time soon.