Your report of your English friends reaction to arlen’s political evasion was interesting, but, considering they live with socialized healthcare, I’d like to know what they think about the issue at hand.
Interesting that you should ask that.
When they first arrived here, we asked them what they think of their healthcare system. Their response was, ‘We have no real complaints.’ It appears that they have not yet found themselves among the unfortunates who have had to wait many months for necessary surgeries, etc. And what inconveniences and lack of quality and availability in healthcare they have experienced, have simply been accepted as a way of life.
... which served to make us acutely aware of what we see as perhaps the most insidious aspect of this 'reform': the fact that, once a generation of Americans has lived under such an oppressive, tyrannical system, that generation will not know the beauty of what used to be. You cannot genuinely mourn something you have never known -- at least not to the degree that you will fight and sacrifice to restore it.
Since then, we have been describing to them how our system works, and what H.R. 3200 includes. We have also been watching quite a bit of Glenn Beck’s analysis of the healthcare ‘reform’ package, and giving them other material to read on the socialization of American medical care.
Since we have been stressing the unconstitutionality of the entire enterprise, they have begun to show a great deal of interest in our Constitution as well. (We gave them a copy to study, and they have been asking many questions, the most recent of which was, 'What would you change about the Constitution, as it stands now?' And our answer was that this republic would be immeasurably better off if our leadership would merely follow its dictates, and if we could somehow erase all unconstitutional laws from the books. If that monumental feat could be accomplished, the first major change we would then make to that precious document would be to repeal the Seventeenth Amendment.)
They appear to be realizing just how superior -- especially in terms of choice and availability of treatment -- our system is, as it stands now. And they are in complete agreement with us that a move toward government-care would be a disaster in comparison, especially as regards individual liberty, capitalism (or what is left of it), the expense of any government-run system, and the affect that universal healthcare will have on the availability of treatment to certain segments of society that are deemed ‘unproductive’ to the elitists.
They have lived all of their adult lives under the system they have now -- or one close to it -- and they really have not attempted to compare it to a system based on freedom-of-choice and free enterprise. What they have learned over the past few days has been something of an eye-opening education -- especially at today’s town hall meeting where they witnessed firsthand the fact that my husband and I are by no means alone in our anger, disgust and determination to see that this abomination does not become law.
~ joanie