648 replies to this topic

[Puppeteer]

Still. Power corrupts.

I disagree with this statement (and therefore with Matias), even if most people accept it to be true. It depends on the capacity for corruption in the individual, which is the sum of the factors: their intentions, their desires, their greed, their intelligence and they empathy. Not all people are corrupted by power. I can't see Obama with a rotten core. Besides, he's hardly crowning himself with dictatorial powers.

No new system or invention is initially perfect. Give the man a fucking chance before you crucify him.

I completely agree, it's not as if the status quo is even remotely perfect.

[Ash]

Exactly. I'm not even saying that the NHS is perfect. Far fucking from it. But it does serve to provide analogues for these reforms Obama is proposing. These reforms are hardly communism in any sense of the world. I grant they're more interventionist than American policy usually mandates, but that's not always worse than l'aissez-faire. In any case, it's certainly ridiculously alarmist and knee-jerk reactionary to claim that Obama is anything other than a centrist. From his standpoint, he'd probably have been the Labour or Liberal Democrat leader had he been British-born. He would have surely done a better job than any of the current party leaders have/will.

[Pasidon]

First bad President after Jimmy Carter and other countries actually like him? The global media is weird...

From his standpoint, he'd probably have been the Labour or Liberal Democrat leader had he been British-born.

British Obama? We'll... stick with our Muslim boy.

[Ash]

I don't need to ridicule you for that post. I don't even need to retort. I think it does it for me quite handily.

[Mathijs]

First bad President after Jimmy Carter and other countries actually like him? The global media is weird...

From his standpoint, he'd probably have been the Labour or Liberal Democrat leader had he been British-born.

British Obama? We'll... stick with our Muslim boy.

So you're really saying you feel Bush did a good job?

[Vortigern]

First bad President after Jimmy Carter and other countries actually like him? The global media is weird...

From his standpoint, he'd probably have been the Labour or Liberal Democrat leader had he been British-born.

British Obama? We'll... stick with our Muslim boy.

And that he's Muslim? I thought that whole thing got rejected because it's clearly a lie? Just because he's not white, protestant and old doesn't mean he's a bad person, or a bad President. America is weird as hell. If you tried to suggest anything other than complete government health coverage over here you'd get utterly crucified.

[Elvenlord]

Americans are stupid. I know several people who honestly believe Obama is going to force abortions and kill off the old people. Including my parents.

[Puppeteer]

If you tried to suggest anything other than complete government health coverage over here you'd get utterly crucified.

Indeed, even our most right-wing parties like the NHS too much to do away with it!

[Vortigern]

In fact, I reckon that if this goes through, 10 years down the line every single American will wonder how they ever got along without it.

[Ash]

Americans are stupid. I know several people who honestly believe Obama is going to force abortions and kill off the old people. Including my parents.

I would like to hope you are kidding.

If you tried to suggest anything other than complete government health coverage over here you'd get utterly crucified.

Indeed, even our most right-wing parties like the NHS too much to do away with it!

There's a reason for that - it works. It may not be perfect by any measure of the word, and it may have privatised or begun to charge for more stuff (e.g., eye tests, dentists), but by and large the NHS is probably this country's greatest modern institution. Our education system needs far more reform than our healthcare, though I would like to see the charges for getting a checkup be removed. Still by-and-large cheaper than going private, and shorter waiting lists, and less emphasis on targets, but that's just a fault of modern democracy and bureaucracy, not a fault of the health system itself.

In fact, I reckon that if this goes through, 10 years down the line every single American will wonder how they ever got along without it.

I believe much the same. When they swallow their pride and admit, for a change, that they were wrong. Let's be honest, a number of americans have been crying out for sweeping healthcare reform for decades. Now a guy comes along wanting to do just that, everyone resists and hates it. Nobody's saying it's going to be 100% perfect, just as I'm first to point out that the NHS is greatly flawed, but given the choice between getting injured in Britain and in America, I know which side of the water I'd rather be on when I did.
I actually dread to think what would've happened had I been hit by a car in the States. Here, I didn't have to pay a penny and I got full surgery and discharge, no bother. Over there, I would've probably not even got an ambulance. I would certainly have been in ridiculous debt before I got out of the hospital.

I have still yet to here one single half-decent argument for what's wrong with these reforms.

[Puppeteer]

Down the line, the American healthcare would be called a 'common-sense policy', rather than a 'socialist policy'. They might swallow their pride and accept reform, but they won't go as far as to admit that's it's a left-wing idea. In fact, they might even begin to call it an 'American policy'.
Of course, that relies on them actually implementing this idea. I hope they do, even though it won't affect me!

[Ring o' Fate]

Americans are stupid. But hell, wasn't EVERY OTHER country like that when the country came to be? If you think in terms of history, America wasn't around that long. Give us a good thousand years and as I said, we will be all smart like Europeans.

[Allathar]

Good job ruining a discussion there bro'.

[Ring o' Fate]

Your welcome, it's what I do best.

[Elvenlord]

Americans are stupid. I know several people who honestly believe Obama is going to force abortions and kill off the old people. Including my parents.

I would like to hope you are kidding.


I actually dread to think what would've happened had I been hit by a car in the States. Here, I didn't have to pay a penny and I got full surgery and discharge, no bother. Over there, I would've probably not even got an ambulance. I would certainly have been in ridiculous debt before I got out of the hospital.

I'm not. There's a reason I talk to my parents as little as possible.

I got hit by a car about 3 years ago. It took 30 minutes for a cop to show up, and 45 for an ambulance. Yeah. Though admittedly it varies by area, where my mom works, it there's trouble, there's a cop there within 5 minutes top. Usually several of them.

[Ash]

Dang. Well, it took an hour for the ambulance to get to me, but that was because Chester's roads (even the main roads - which I was hit on) are narrow, and I basically shut down the entire city single-handed.

But they did get to me in the best time they could.


I think every single American opponent of a state health service should be deliberately injured to experience the American hospital process. Then they should be shipped to Britain and deliberately injured again, so they can compare and contrast without being so reactionarily blinkered. The very idea that Obama is unpopular because he's providing something that will ostensibly benefit forty-six million people and probably benefit every single other American as well is rather difficult for me to digest. Put it another way, I'm sure you'd rather see some tangible and accessible benefit to an increase in taxes than see it being either a) thrown at another bank, b) swallowed by the great black hole that is the US Ministry of Defence or c)put into the money-grubbing corporates who currently bankroll the American healthcare system.



(( is the link in case you can't see the window))
Thank God for comedians, for making more sense than the American electorate.

[Bart]

I know several people who honestly believe Obama is going to force abortions and kill off the old people.

As evil as that would be, it would be a rather good long term solution to many problems.

[Puppeteer]

Dang. Well, it took an hour for the ambulance to get to me, but that was because Chester's roads (even the main roads - which I was hit on) are narrow, and I basically shut down the entire city single-handed.

When I got injured in Oxford Street (or thereabouts) some years ago it took less than 20 minutes for it to reach me.
We had some American diplomat give a rather boring talk today. He sounded like it was an achievement that around 80% of people had health insurance. He said the majority shouldn't cede to the minority, in this case... what a nob. 20% is a damn high figure.
He also said that there are frequent commercials where national healthcare is slammed with lies. Scare-scaremongering, including using someone with a quasi-English accent to make it seem like the NHS is an inferior system, extended waiting lists and people lumped together to die, due to rejection from a death panel.

Edited by Puppeteer, 11 September 2009 - 04:54 PM.

[Vortigern]

20% of America is 60 million people without health insurance. And Americans think this is OK? That's as many people as there are in Britain.

[Puppeteer]

20% of America is 60 million people without health insurance. And Americans think this is OK? That's as many people as there are in Britain.

Better clarify: that's the number of people in Britain, not the number of people without health insurance in Britain! That'd be like National Healthcare, covering no one.