Yet another offering from my "Hi!-I'm-A-Shit-Disturber!!" files.
I just LOVED it when Helldiver and Stream-O have trotted out their ol' fear-based argument about there being "limited research-and-development in medicine" in countries with ---*gasp*---SOCIALIZED health care:
(*stretches out in his hammock, and sips his pina colada, whilst two native beach girls--who are clones of his wife---gently fan him with huge palm-tree leaves that are shaped like maple leaves, and a squadron of Canada geese do a slow fly-over, and a Gordon Lightfood tune plays softly in the background*)
http://www.theadvocates.org/freeman/8903lemi.html "If we define justice in terms of liberty, then justice forbids coercing some (taxpayers, doctors, and nurses) into providing health services to others. Providing voluntarily for your neighbor in need may be morally good. Forcing your neighbor to help you is morally wrong. "
"Several lessons can be drawn from the Canadian experience with socialized medicine. First of all, socialized medicine, although of poor quality, is very expensive. "
http://www.mackinac.org/article.aspx?ID=5863 "When the government supplies you with "free" health care, you are not a powerful customer who must be satisfied. They are doing you a favor, and you owe the state gratitude and servility in return for this awesome generosity. They can give you the worst service in the world, but because it%u2019s free, you are totally disempowered. "
British socialized health care appears to function about as well as US socialized schools.
STILL got a tough time living up to what you said, huh? My comments were a retort (again) to your "Lousy R-and-D in a socialized health care system. It was a ludicrous claim. As for your comments above......I never said what we had was perfect-----just better than a for-profit system. I can honestly tell you that the quality of the service I've had here all my life is just fine...wait times suck sometimes....but the quality? Nahh....I'm happy where I'm at. But what do I know?
Its all a matter of perspective. I would bet that most Americans that have no health care because they are unwilling unemployed, have a entirely different view on the subject.
The "downers" on the single payer system focus on long waits and rationed care. A long wait "sucks" only if one is not in great pain, or facing imminent life threatening issues..."sucks" means it's an inconvenience.....dying while waiting is a distinctly different order of concern, one might suppose.
The "downers" on the US health system focus on the number of uninsured people and their lack of access to healthcare. Yet every hospital with an emergency room is obligated to provide care for whomever arrives irrespective of means or ability to pay...and these have become the "doctor's office" for the indigent, idle, willingly unemployed, as well as those UNwillingly unemployed...24/7/365.
US hospitals wail about "unreimbursed care" (read: "uninsured"), and while there have been a number of mergers and downsizings, most all hospitals continue to survive and provide excellent care despite having to care for the very segment of society that is used to argue for a socialized healthcare system.
Let me raise a question (at the clear risk of being cast as a cold hearted person): is it really a social obligation to elevate the station of the homeless, the indigent, the itinerant, the idle, the unfortunate, so as to be equal to that of the worker, producer, doer, innovater, and such?
When I was quite young I heard from my elders that the obligation of society was to assure subsistance to all....and even then it was intended only to be temporary, until the "unfortunate" got on their feet.
"Subsistance" as it was then viewed, would not include HD TVs, cell phones, daily McDonald's trips, nor was Adidas, Nautica, Hilfiger, Abercrombie and Fitch included amongst the "bare necessities". Yet, there they are....widely evident in this needy community we seek to protect today.
What used to be a parachute for the unfortunate has evolved into a balloon for the unproductive, I fear.
Please...I totally understand that there is a genuinely needy community across our country.....what my issue is......is that our government has lost whatever ability they might ever have had to identify the truly needy, and manage a program for their benefit. Instead we have a "welfare" society, or which is worse, a "welfare mentality", the latter infecting those who actually manage the programs...and the former composed of the truly (and temporarily) unfortunate, mixed with those who are addicted to the welfare system, and those who play it for all it's worth, these last two being the problem.
How can I expect efficient management of a single payer healthcare system, nationwide, from a government that has mismanaged Social Security to the point of bankruptcy, brought the welfare system to the level of ludicrous entitlements to the intentionally idle, and largely disemboweled the concept of subsistence, as it applies to the temporarily unfortunate.
We are at risk, I fear, of removing a major incentive for personal progress if, in the end, the conscientious are expected to provide conditions equal to their own for those not contributing to the general welfare of society.
Okedokey......if anyone reviews older posts, I guess I might expect to be scolded for this treatise. But.........well, let's just see..........
I guess my only answer response to that, is a question:
Is basic human health care a 'right'.....or a 'priviledge'?
Also, speaking from personal experience, while you're correct that wait times can suck in non-life-threatening situations.....I've had a family member die of diabetes-related complications slowly over the course of a year, and the care he recieved over that time, up and including the hours before he died, was excellent. So that's my own PERSONAL experience with that.
Is the U.S. ready for such a system? Don't know. I guess that'd be up to its people, and its government.
"Give us your tired, your poor and your hungry....... ", etc.
Interesting article, C..........did you read the comments also? I think they (the comments) reflect my own skepticism on "nationalizing" any important service. Basically, few trust our leadership to truly operate in the best interests of the people, despite their rhetoric and posturings. I think they are now seen as either incompetent or corrupt...or worse, both.
Obama is seen as the great hope these days....implicitly he is being trusted to inflict conscientiousness on his administration, and that is a colossal enterprise, and not one I expect can be totally effective.
I also think that there's been wayy too-high-a-bar set for this man (at least I THINK that's what you're saying), and it seems almost impossible for him to reach.
Surely it would be a shame if we let common cynicism rule the day, yes? (in spite of how easy it can be).
But in the end, I guess Time will eventually tell, one way or another.
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