Teresa

I scanned the items in Eric's link. Once you get up into the 100s, the items are pretty weak - OR - can be attributed to many many administrations, Democratic and Republican alike. But these, in particular, struck me:

"23. Global warming: denial of manmade origin, followed by minimization of the effects of the manmade contribution, continued reliance on fossil and carbon based fuels, little movement on CAFE standards and conservation, and political interference in scientific reports."
- Way too much to said about this one. There is scant little we can do about GW - and scant little we did or are doing to cause it. Aside from that, if you think $4.00 gasoline is high, just wait until some adminstration takes it as seriously as some would like - $10.00 gasoline, $15.00 milk anyone?

29. Healthcare (in general)
- "in general" - as if our gov't could do a better job...

31. 2000 Presidential election; voter suppression and cooked felons list, Secretary of State Katherine Harris, Governor Jeb Bush, Bush consigliere Jim Baker oversaw the recount, Theodore Olson argued Bush v. Gore: SCOTUS decided 7-2 to stop recounts because of inconsistent procedures and 5-4 insufficient time to begin new recount, giving Bush the election
- It was a close election, to be sure. Both sides were in a street fight for the White House. Bush won - please get over it. Yeah, he sucks, we know that - so did Clinton (not an excuse - "just sayin").

45. Rampant cronyism
- Ummm, yeah. Ok, that's a winner! Probably should be number one on the list.

57. Attempts to privatize Social Security dating all the way back to a stacked commission report of December 11, 2001;
- LOL. He ran on this in is bid for the White House! You want him not to try? It's practically the only thing he said he would do that he's actually trying to do!

78. Accusation that Clintons trashed the White House before leaving, including stealing the Ws from keyboards
- Sorry Clinton fanbois. This is fact, not fiction.


As to the Obama presidency - Yes, he is definitely the next president. Will he do worse than Bush? Good God I hope not. Will he get us out of Iraq? Not a chance. We're stuck there and no one will be getting us out anytime soon. I hope he tries, though.

Just who are the "smarter, more rational people" to which this guy is referring? It's certainly not any one in either of the two major parties. Not from what I can see...

Mark,

Yeah...but you have to admit...there are some really good ones in there...

and the last thing I heard was that the White House was not in any worse shape than any other time the place was vacated, and that it is normal for the outgoing group to play jokes (like removing "W's" from keyboards"

As for human causes of global warming, the science on that goes back past the '50's...so your claim there's nothing we can do is debatable.

Actually, removing the Ws was awesome! That's funny as hell.

On GW, yeah sure the science goes back to the '50s. So what? In the '70s we were told that there was Global Cooling! So which is it?

If you really want the scientific fact of it, we're in the middle of an Ice Age.

From http://www.answers.com/topic/ice-age?cat=technology
Ice Age: A length of time during which ice sheets are found on the continents. Thus, an ice age is occurring at the present day, as a part of the Pleistocene glaciation, which began about 2 million years ago. Within an ice age there may be interglacial periods of milder climate.

So we're in one of those "interglacial" periods - OR - at the end phase of the current Ice Age.

Question: What caused the earth to warm so drastically all those millions of years ago?

I reiterate - there is scant little we did to cause this - and scant little we can do about it. To attribute half a degree to man-made causes is ludicrous. And - even if there's a possibility that it's true - it's half a degree. I wonder how many degrees it takes to put palm trees in Antartica? Because fossil evidence proves they've grown there.

So a handful of media darling scientists in the '70's made a hairbrained claim, so the case that began in the earlier part of this century, and eventually became the scientific consensus can't be right? What a strange position.

Nobody denies that there is a natural warming/cooling cycle to the earth's history. What is causing concern is the rate at which the warming is happening, and the extent to which it can go. People have a lot to do with that. The climate change scientists take both natural forcers and anthropagneic forcers into account, and the anthropagenic forcers seem to have a lot of weight. We CAN do something about those. So, why wouldn't we?

The rest of the claims will take a little time to put together...I have a lot of scattered arguments flying around in my head, but I have to have some time to put them down in order.

I will check out the link you provide.

Mark,

Followed the URL you provided, but got bored as the first several messages are all about people snarking about how they aren't going to be able to talk about the subject without getting political. :-)

I'll take another run at it when I am surrounded by fewer distractions and can skim more efficiently. :-)

As for me, I'll be a happy man when this election is over. Good grief, these campaigns last way too long. Oh well...

David,

You said it. If it was just about ideas it would be one thing...

"In the '70s we were told that there was Global Cooling!"

No. We weren't. There was an article in Newsweek that quoted somebody's semi-idle speculation about seeing a cooling cycle in our lifetimes and another guy who thought it might be a problem, but there was never any real evidence for, or expectation of, a major cooling cycle. But this one comment got picked up by the denialists, claimed as vastly more than it was, and repeated over and over in true Goebbels style until many people nowadays believe it.

"29. Healthcare (in general)
- "in general" - as if our gov't could do a better job... "

Sure it could. You just need competent people in charge who care about doing a good job. As an example, look at Walter Reed Hospital, which did a fantastic job... until the Bushneviks ran it into the ground.

"78. Accusation that Clintons trashed the White House before leaving, including stealing the Ws from keyboards
- Sorry Clinton fanbois. This is fact, not fiction."

No Clinton fanbois here, Mark. And the accusation of "trashing" is a flat-out lie. When Ari Fleischer made that accusation, the outrage launched a full investigation by ranking Rethuglicans who found... nothing. No evidence whatsoever. Fleischer just made it up (except for the part about removing the W's from the keyboards, which was cute).

Privatizing Social Security? Yep, Bush ran on that promise. But it was a criminally bad idea from the beginning, and so needs to be held against him.

As to the blatantly stolen election and the illegal and unconstitutional stopping of the recount - No. Many of us will never "get over it", and, at the risk of getting confrontational, the reason we won't is because we're not America-hating traitors. We believe that free and fair elections kind of, y'know, matter. How could anyone possibly expect or ask otherwise?

Rick

On Global Cooling: "repeated over and over in true Goebbels style..." Sounds much like the Global Warming chatter today.

On Healthcare: In your defense of it you, quite prominently, made my point! You can't possibly believe that a government political body will keep "competent people in charge" for any length of time. Does our system need attention? Certainly! Sould we trust Uncle Sam to be competent in this unconstitutional endeavor? Hell no!

I hope you are already retired and receiving your Social Security, Rick. Because the system will be bankrupt by the time I'm ready to retire.

"at the risk of getting confrontational" ?? LMAO. Even though I'm not a Republican, when your reply is littered with phrases like "Bushneviks," "Rethuglicans," and "blatantly stolen election," you are well past being confrontational.

You're not America-hating traitors? Really? Let's see, you want to unconstitutionally take over a Health Care system that is - frankly - providing the fastest and best care the world has to offer. You want to unconstitutionally take over "big oil" because, as you see it, they are just making too much damned money! What's next? Pharmaceutical companies? You want to tax the hell out of certain foods I might want to eat just because they're "unhealthy" for me. You want to unconstitutionally take money from me and give it to someone else just because you believe they need it more than I do (I guess because I'm just making too much damned money, too!).

Whatever happened to individualism and being responsible for your own actions? Because it's simply not allowed in your world view. There are plenty of collectivist governments out there, Rick. Instead of trying to rip the consitution to shreds (which has been done enough by the way - by Democrats and Republicans alike), why don't you just head north to Canada and renounce your citizenship to the U.S.? umm - you *are* a citizen, right?

But you're right. You're not an America-hating traitor - as long as America bends to your will!

Mark,

I think your making the mistake of attributing the wrong motivations.

What makes the oil companies profits too high? Not the big numbers...but the collective effect that it has on the economy and the health of the nation.

Theres a point where individualism and personal responsibility cross over the line to selfishness, antisocial behavior and a craven excuse to abandon responsibility for moral behavior.

Taxing you to give aid to people selected by the institutions of our society to be poor may seem communist and America-hating to you but in fact, many people have, for the entire history of this country, seen t as the unique strength of America...Indeed, as Jesus said, 'the poor will always be with us"...because it simply is the case that some will have and some will have not as any system (even a communist one) is competative.

Paine observed that outside of society, nature would decide who thrived, and who failed so there is no moral content to that reality...but IN society, it is the rules and institutions that will decide who is poor and who is not, and it becomes a moral imparative for that society to care for those who it selects to be the losers. Paine thought that simply giving a one-time payment sufficient to begin a business or to get training in a marketable skill would be sufficient...but we won't even give that to veterans because apparently it would be to "communist".

Darwin also observed (contrary to many attempts to blame so-called "social Darwinism' on his observations) that if there is poverty caused by our institutions rather than nature, we are morally culpable for the misfortune suffered by others.

This drives the difference, in my mind, between "charity" and "social justice". "Social Justice" should be handeled by the government at the expense of the people that society favors, and "charity" should be individual contributions made by choice to those who merely suffer misfortune.

WRT Social Security, I laugh everytime I hear it referred to as a "failed" program. Anything created for a specific function in a specific environment needs to be modified in order to continue to be useful. So an economic tool that was created in a specific situation should be re-tooled for a new situation when one arises.

It constantly amuses me that conservatives complain that there is no point in changing social security to function in a new reality, because it is "broken". It worked just fine until the operating conditions changed...so why should we think wew can't adjust it to work now?

Its like complaining that you car is "broken" because it won't drive underwater.

As for health care...the health care we have is fantastic for a rapidly shrinking slice of the American population. In actualty, it is much much worse for a growing segment of the population, and compares worse to other systems around the world more and more all the time.

(case in point, my sister, who had to wait three days to be treated for a broken arm, and even then it was only because she drove 2.5 hours to a bigger hospital in a bigger town. Then there's my grandfather, who was shipped across the state to get a pac-maker put in, and only then did they discover that his irregular heartbeat was due to a hemoglobin count of 4 because of blood loss due to a tumor in his colon. Many Americans are stuck with crappy care at any price. It's not enough to make a pofit...you have to make a HUMONGOUS profit...so rural areas and poor areas have to make due with scraps 'cause they just can't provide the hunger for spectacular profits.)

Maybe there are a lot of people who don't care as long as they got theirs, and their portfolios continue to expand...but that's hardly a valid claim to being a "REAL AMERICAN".

And anyway, a person could argue that anyone who wants to arm all of the masses so that the populace can enforce laws and civility is a Trotskyite...so just about any position could appear communist...from a certain point of view.

:-)

"On Global Cooling: "repeated over and over in true Goebbels style..." Sounds much like the Global Warming chatter today."

Lie.

"On Healthcare: In your defense of it you, quite prominently, made my point! You can't possibly believe that a government political body will keep "competent people in charge" for any length of time. Does our system need attention? Certainly! Sould we trust Uncle Sam to be competent in this unconstitutional endeavor? Hell no!"

The private sector, given every opportunity to take over these matters from the public sector, has run them into the ground. Appointees from Reagan and both Bushes were put in charge of organizations to whose missions they were hostile and they wrecked them. And then they danced around and crowed "Look! I told this government outfit doesn't work!", ignoring the fact that it did until they were given the chance to enact a self-fulfilling prophecy. This is not the fault of government, it is the inevitable and predictable result of cronyism, corruption, and fascism.

"I hope you are already retired and receiving your Social Security, Rick. Because the system will be bankrupt by the time I'm ready to retire."

Social Security was, despite the claims of the right wing, completely solvent until Bush the Second starting looting it. Even now, it could probably be fixed without resorting to handing it all over to Wall Street in an orgy of privatization.

""at the risk of getting confrontational" ?? LMAO. Even though I'm not a Republican, when your reply is littered with phrases like "Bushneviks," "Rethuglicans," and "blatantly stolen election," you are well past being confrontational."

I didn't realize that your sensibilities were so delicate. I, along with a great many other patriotic American citizens, have for years been called a traitor and a terrorist-lover and far worse, and told that my free speech rights only permit me to shut up... for no other reason than that I value truth and integrity and the rule of law and insist that our leaders are required to as well. People like Bill O'Reilly, Sean Hannity, Ann Coulter, Michelle Malkin, Glenn Beck and their ilk utter far more incendiary - and less truthful - comments that what you quote above when they belch after a meal; by that measure I have a very very long way to go to truly be confrontational.

And for "not a Republican" you sure get irate when somebody says something unflattering about them...

"Let's see, you want to unconstitutionally take over a Health Care system that is - frankly - providing the fastest and best care the world has to offer."

Except for all the countries that do it better and for less money.

"You want to unconstitutionally take over "big oil" because, as you see it, they are just making too much damned money!"

I want the oil companies to be no longer able to write legislation - passed on to our legislative bodies by their wholly-owned sycophants in our Congress - that favors them at everyone else's expense.

"What's next? Pharmaceutical companies?"

You mean the ones that wrote the prescription drug bill that was pitched to the public with a price tag that they knew in advance was vastly less than the real cost (also known as "lying")? I want those companies to have their legislative influence cut off as well.

"You want to tax the hell out of certain foods I might want to eat just because they're "unhealthy" for me."

I do? What foods are those? And why would taxing them be bad?

"You want to unconstitutionally take money from me and give it to someone else just because you believe they need it more than I do (I guess because I'm just making too much damned money, too!)."

Shrug. I have no idea how much money you make. But I sure as hell want tax breaks for the wealthy rolled back, if that's what you are alluding to; historically, they have always been a crisis-maker rather than a panacea. And I sure as hell want a government that adjusts its spending according to its available taxation (which is the financial investment that we make in civilization), and conversely adjusts taxation according to its spending needs - and for all of that to handled in a transparent and accountable manner. In other words, I want the opposite of what we have had under the current administration and its ideological ancestors, which has been reckless spending without available taxes to cover it, corporate welfare that dwarfs social welfare by several orders of magnitude, public money siphoned off wholesale into the pockets of the administration's favorite golfing buddies, billions of dollars in cash literally left on the side of the road on foreign soil, paranoid secrecy in place of accounting and naked hostility when accounting is asked for.

"Whatever happened to individualism"

The modern meaning of the word "individualism" seems to be, as judged by the various talking heads who incant it, "I got mine; fuck everybody else". I don't know for a fact that you mean it that way; I'm sure you could set me straight on that.

"and being responsible for your own actions?"

Alive in well in my life, not so much in modern conservatism.

"Because it's simply not allowed in your world view."

Lie. Yawn.

"There are plenty of collectivist governments out there, Rick."

And they would be of interest to me... why?

Really, I've never understood the false dichotomy of Wild West/Ayn Rand libertarianism versus "collectivism". I've always been an individual, always known who I am, always done my best to live my life on my own terms, and tried to proceed with due regard for the rights and needs of other people. I guess I've always been a "No man is an island" (though some of us are pretty good peninsulas) kind of guy. I've never had a reason to fear that any action I take in concert with another human being or group of human beings is going to inherently rob me of my individualism.

If I was truly interested in "collectivism" I would join a church or Amway and bask in the group-think.

"Instead of trying to rip the consitution to shreds"

False accusation. Do you even know what's in the Constitution? I've have carried a copy of it with me every day since my days as a Scout leader, and I made sure that my son had a copy of it with him when he went off to basic training for the Marines. It's not a holy book or anything like that, it's merely the basis for all United States law, and I wish more people understood the importance of that.

"(which has been done enough by the way - by Democrats and Republicans alike)"

False equivalence. The politicking of the Democrats in my lifetime is but a pale shadow of the chainsaw that the Republicans have wielded against the Constitution in the same period. Failure to recognize that makes it obvious that you have been educated beyond your intelligence.

"why don't you just head north to Canada and renounce your citizenship to the U.S.? umm - you *are* a citizen, right?"

I actually did live in Canada for a couple of years in the early seventies; nice enough place. They have a lot of guns and the beer isn't bad. But I think, schoolyard-level taunts notwithstanding, that I would rather stay in my own country and, along with my family and friends, stand against the corrupt, lying, self-serving hate-mongers who've raped Lady Liberty.

"You're not an America-hating traitor - as long as America bends to your will!"

By the way, have you stopped beating your wife?

Teresa

I am well aware of your stance on issues - and I appreciate the educational tone in your delivery.

Your Social Security comments are well taken. However, they provide a sharp contrast to Rick's. Rick seems to believe that certain ideas are "criminal" when someone tries to overhaul a broken system. I don't hear much in the way of ideas concerning the "fix" to Social Security from anyone else.

When it comes to government, this is the bottom line: The government taketh - then they taketh more.

At the rate they are taking, it won't be long before we are all (the public) on the "level playing field" so many liberal thinkers believe we should be. Then what? The people that want more for free will still want more. There are many of them out there. I'm sure most people that apply for medicare, medicaid, welfare, food stamps, section 8 housing, etc. actually need the help. But there are enough scammers out there to really put a hurtin on us. And the more you give, the more they "need." Surely someone of your obvious education/experience knows this.

It is one thing for me to give to a charity. It's another entirely when it is decided for me who should or should not be the benificiary of my hard work. If I'm going to be forced to provide to charity, I'd at least like the opportunity to decide who receives it. I'd rather stroke a check myself and submit it with my tax return as proof that I'm doing my part than to just let Uncle Sam take it. Because Uncle Sam is a greedy bastard - he takes more than he needs, employs seedy people, and doesn't provide much proof of where the money goes.

With health care - I'll never understand your position. It is mainly (already) the government's fault the system is broken. Yet you and people like you want even more of their involvment. In the words of Larry the Cable Guy, "It's like wiping before you poop! It don't make no sense!"

"Social Security was, despite the claims of the right wing, completely solvent until Bush the Second starting looting it."

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHHAHAAAHHDHDHQWEIRQET

LOL! Geeeeezzzus! Are you for real?

"Except for all the countries that do it better and for less money."

Who? Define "better."

"...you have been educated beyond your intelligence."

Hey! He stole my line!

hehe! Rick. Anyone using that line can't be all bad.

"If I was truly interested in "collectivism" I would join a church or Amway and bask in the group-think."
Oh - you're in a group-think, Rick. That is obvious. You're a left leaning liberal all the way.

It is unfortunate that you think I watch/listen to Bill O'Reilly, Sean Hannity, Ann Coulter, Michelle Malkin, Glenn Beck and their ilk. I can't stand any of them, especially Sean Hannity!

Don't confuse my rants as defending Bush II. I'm not. His is definitely a failed presidency in nearly every measurable way. But you knew that.

"I want the oil companies to be no longer able to write legislation - passed on to our legislative bodies by their wholly-owned sycophants in our Congress - that favors them at everyone else's expense." Amen! I couldn't agree more. One of my favorite mantras is getting money out of government (i.e. no lobbyists). Serving in Washington should not make you rich! You're supposed to be a public SERVANT!

Yes, I have a Constitution. It's hanging in my living room. Teresa will tell you that governing by that document is all I want. We just have a few differing viewpoints. But I'm sure we could come to an amicable agreement...

"HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHHAHAAAHHDHDHQWEIRQET"

While Bush gibbered in his first term about a "looming crisis in Social Security", it was projected to be completely solvent through at least the early 2040's. Certainly it would need to be adjusted by then to continue to serve, but the cry of "OMG!! We must hand it all over to Wall Street NOW unless you hate America!" was and is completely fucking ridiculous.

"Who? Define "better.""

Off the top of my head - Sweden. Norway. Finland. England. Canada. "Better" meaning quality care for a greater number of people more quickly at less overall expense per capita.

"Oh - you're in a group-think, Rick. That is obvious. You're a left leaning liberal all the way."

That's funny; I've always stood out in any group I've been in, sometimes to my great surprise. The term "left-leaning liberal" only means that someone isn't quite as far right as Hitler or Stalin or Attila the Hun, and so doesn't provide any useful data as to who or what I am.

"Amen! I couldn't agree more. One of my favorite mantras is getting money out of government (i.e. no lobbyists). Serving in Washington should not make you rich! You're supposed to be a public SERVANT!"

And to that, I will raise my glass in salute.

"But I'm sure we could come to an amicable agreement..."

Only if you bend to my will!!!!!!

:-D

Teresa, where did you find this guy?

How do you figure Hitler or Stalin as being right wing? Where does this analogy come from? Are you a MoveOn.org viewer?

Hand it all over to Wall Street? umm - Rick - it was 2%. Yes, 2%. That's .02 just in case you're having problems putting that together.

Swedish Health Care: (http://www.nationalcenter.org/NPA555_Sweden_Health_Care.html)
"Görann Persson had to wait eight months during 2003 and 2004 for a hip replacement operation. Persson was not considered to be a very pleasant person to begin with, and he became even grumpier due to the pain he endured while waiting for his operation. As a result, Persson walked with a limp, reportedly used strong pain medication and had to reduce his workload.
What made Persson unique was not his wait for hip surgery. Despite the government promise that no one should have to wait more than three months for surgery, 60 percent of hip replacement patients waited longer than three months in 2003..."

More than three months for a hip replacement. Persson, by the way, was the Prime Minister of Sweden! So you know he got some priority. More than half had to wait longer than three months.

Sweden rations their health care. Do we really want that?

"While rationing may permit the government to save on costs and thereby restrain health care budgets, putting patients on waiting lists is not cost-free. One study that examined over 1,400 Swedes on a waiting list for cataract surgery found that 5.2 million kronas were spent on hospital stays and home health care for patients waiting for surgery. That was the equivalent of what it would have cost to give 800 patients cataract surgery."

Norway Health Care: (http://caliban.sourceoecd.org/vl=645295/cl=15/nw=1/rpsv/workingpapers/18151973/wp_5lgsjhvj85g3.htm)
"The Norwegian health care system has succeeded in securing universal coverage and high quality service while, at around 8 per cent of GDP, absorbing resources around the international average (Figure 1). Nevertheless, the system faces several
challenges, most prominently: acute capacity shortages suggested by long waiting lists for hospital admission and the lack of physicians and other medical staff"

Ok, this doesn't sound like much of a hit and, it seems, Norway has had some success. However, acute capacity shortages and long waiting lists seems to be a recurring theme with National Health Care programs.


Canada Health Care: (http://mjperry.blogspot.com/2007/10/surgery-wait-times-in-canada-hit-record.html)
"Canadians waited longer than ever before (18.3 weeks) for non-emergency surgery in 2007, despite a multi-billion-dollar effort by government to speed up medical care, according to a report released yesterday by Canada's Fraser Institute. Highlights of the report include:

1. A typical Canadian seeking surgery had to wait 18.3 weeks in 2007 between referral from a general practitioner and treatment (averaged across all 12 specialties and 10 provinces surveyed), reaching an all-time record high, up from 17.8 weeks in 2006."

My oh my. 17 weeks. 18 weeks. What's the difference? There both too darned long. Actually I'm surprise you even mentioned Canada. They're wait times are legendary.


England Health Care: (http://www.commonwealthfund.org/publications/publications_show.htm?doc_id=509943)
"Numbers of long-waiting patients have declined:
Inpatient treatment: number waiting more than 6 months for treatment fell from about 265,000 in March 2000 to about 12,000 in November 2005
Outpatient treatment: Number waiting more than 13 weeks fell from about 390,000 in March 2000 to about 40,000 in September 2005"

Once again, the wait time measurements are in months, not weeks. 13 weeks is over three months! Sure, these numbers show improvement. But I have to wonder what the wait times are if you change the time from from 6 months to 5 months - or 13 weeks to 11 weeks. You get the picture. If I need surgery, I don't want to be told I have to wait 3 months or more to get it.


Finland Health Care: (http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/24/36/5163944.pdf)
This is probably the best example you could've found. All the sources I find state that the quality of health care is top shelf. However, surgery wait times are still very long, measured in months - ok days. But when the count gets to 60 all the way to 200, I call that months.

United States Health Care: (http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/24/32/5162353.pdf)
We all know that the quality of care in the USA is excellent. Teresa, I can't imagine waiting to have a broken arm repaired. Just how removed from "civilization" are you? With respect to wait times for surgery, the United States is by far superior to other countries.

"Table 2. Percentage of patients waiting for elective surgery more than 4 months
Base: Those with elective surgery in the past 2 years (%)
--1998--
Australia: 17
Canada: 12
New Zealand: 22
United Kingdom: 33
United States: 1

--2001--
Australia: 23
Canada: 27
New Zealand: 26
United Kingdom: 38
United States: 5"

Conclusion:
Rationed health care, very long wait times for "elective" surgery. Just how "elective" is knee replacement, anyway?

How are Stalin and Hitler right-wing?

Both Hitler and Stalin were totolitarian, which is an anti-liberal approach to government. Both were anti-intellectual...also an anti-liberal position. Stalin preferred the spiritual heirarchy world view (scala Naturae)and mystical bent of Lysincoism to Darwins theory...also an anti-liberal position.

Hitler was fascist, which is clearly a right-wing ideology, being isolationist, anti-multiculturalism, anti-birthcontrol, anti-feminism, anti-abortion, anti-harm-reduction (it damages morality), facism relies on cultural conformity and tight manipluation of the "worldview" of the masses with a religious and irrational bent, directly opposed to science and intellectualism. Hitler also preferred the view of the Scala Naturae to the observations of Darwin.

Hitler and stalin were both anti-democratic (a right-wing position)...

...oh...and I "found" Rick in college when he came running around a corner with an armload full of books, and collided with me and my armload of books. we both skipped class and spent a number of hours comapring piles of books. They were a similar mis of science fiction, American history, and philosophy.

...that's it for now, I'm a little tired.

Oh, and one more thing, I've got a friend whose husband has waited TWO DECADES in America for a hip replacement. Now that he can pay for it, his bones have degenerated to the point where they cannot support a mechanical hip.

That's right here in the good old USof A.

In Canada, he would have had his hip a long time ago.

About Hitler and Stalin again, I didn't really include the reliance on mob action and "irregulars" to enforce cultural and social norms considered to be helpful to the state in the name of "individual freedom"...
...also a right-wing thing. You know, it's not the GOVERNMENT doing it...it's just patriots who are fed up with the situation protecting Folk Family and Faith, as free men have a right to do.

the government didn't smash those Jewish stroe fronts or raize that Jewish neighborhood...it was "REAL GERMANS" or "REAL RUSSINS" rooting out the traitors and foreigners in our midst.

Just a comment on the wait-time for stuff abroad. As usual, when comparing stats between the USA and other countries, it's important to keep in mind that the stats are not necessarily counting the same things.

In a country with socialized medicine, everyone who could use a surgery is on the surgery wait list.

In America, it's only the people who can afford the surgery in the first place, either by being rich or having decent health insurance, who are on the list, and not the many poor or under-insured (e.g. Teresa's friend's husband). Of course the list is going to be shorter and have lower wait-time in the United States.

Karen,

Exactly, because many people will not get the surgery at all. Or another way to say it is that under our system some "wait times are infinate. :-) Especially if it is considered "elective". (many surgeries are "elective" until they become "necessary". Even heart transplant patients get on a waiting list before the transplant becomes "necessary".)

That said, many of the dire warnings of the right are POSSIBILITIES...if we just willy-nilly implement a national health care system.

But it seems to me, that the country who put people on the moon, could put together a system that would work better than any other system out there.

After all, we've studied the systems of other countries...we have extensive documentation of their failings, both real and imagined...

...seems to me we could get a group together and come up with a system where a family doesn't have to sit down and decide whose going to get medical treatment THiS year.

The other thing is to set it up with the mind-set that it will need adjusting.

I think the big fear that people on the right have, but they can't say it because it will make them sound like heartless dicks...is that we have an aging population, and if ALL of them got proper medical care, they could live a really, really long time and have a high quality of life while they are here.

As long as they can be pidgeon-holed in the medicare system, that system can be starved, and the elderly held to a minimum standard of care...as they are a powerful demographic, but not powerful enough to get the funding that would make the system work for everyone.

You get EVERYONE on board to defend a national health care system...and you might have to give up spending trillions of dollars on developing big-honkin'space guns, you might have to give up a multi-trillion dollar war to prove Bush's manhood. Hell, you might have to even roll back tax breaks given to the oil industry when they were in trouble to let them get back on their feet...but continue to be in effect even though they are making record profits.

Plus, old people would live longer and burn through more of the inherited wealth in this country...and that would be terrible...'cause obviously, inherited wealth is what this country was all about from the beginning. all that stuff the founders wrote about it condemning it was just a red herring.

You know how I feel about Bush and his war. So I won't even try to defend it. I can't defend tax breaks for oil companies either.

Research and Development on those "big-honkin' space guns" does pay off for us, however. Both in terms of advanced technologies that make our lives better and defense of the country.

That's all I have...

My arguments aren't looking too hot, huh? Except that I have a serious mistrust of people in government (the high and mighty, I mean) and their true intentions when it comes to NHC.

Mark,

Not having the time/energy to mount a good argument doesn't make you wrong...but it won't convince me either... :-)

The point about "big honkin' space guns" paying off in terms of new technologies and defense might fly...if there were ANY new ideas and approaches to the problems that scuttled the LAST StarWars project...and if there was even a theoretical hope that we could develop the technology to have the project work as promised...or even come close to working as promised.

And even if that were the case, I have to admit to being a little amused at the people who think that giving the government the power to grant a poor child a liver transplant is a scary prospect - yet they are OK with letting it spend much more money to develop a technology that will let it annihilate any target anywhere on the planet or in the atmosphere.

:-)

Mark, I grew up with government-run medical care - United States Armed Services Medical. You don't get any more government run than that. At all. And since then I've dealt with corporate medical care out in the world, and still have friends and relatives who fall under the military umbrella, so I'm in an excellent position to judge the relative merits of each... and NOBODY does medical care better than the US government.

Granted, this is changing - due to the increasing privatization of the military. The medical coverage for my son and my daughter-in-law is not nearly as good as what I grew up with; it is slower, more wasteful, provides less, and requires an order of magnitude greater red tape - all because military medical care is now being parted out to HMO's with the promise of greater efficiency and better care despite MOUNTAINS of evidence to the contrary (Walter Reed comes to mind)...

...but the HMO's in question are raking in mountains of cash in the process.

Privatization Uber Alles. No matter the cost, no matter the damages. It's the patriotic thing to do. We're told.