Posted on 05/12/2012 2:21:57 PM PDT by Olog-hai
As the United States Supreme Court considers whether requiring people to have health insurance is unconstitutional, Germans are bewildered as to why so many Americans appear to be against universal coverage.
They also question the continued portrayal of US President Barack Obama and his health reform backers as socialists and communists, noting that healthcare was introduced in Germany in the 19th century by Otto von Bismarck, who was definitely not a leftist, and is supported by conservative and pro-business politicians today.
"It's a solidarity principle," says Ann Marini, a spokesperson for the National Health Insurers Association. "Not every 'S' automatically means socialism."
Marini and others say that mandated coverage is something that is simply not questioned in Germany. Furthermore, even the most pro-market politicians wouldn't dare to dismantle the country's health insurance system.
The requirement that everyone buy health insurance is based on a simple concept, healthcare experts agree. Allowing healthy people to opt out of having health insurance destroys the insurance community and leaves insurers covering only the sick. …
But there are other reasons why Germans are confused about the US healthcare debate. The US comes across to not only Germans, but to many Europeans, as a religious country. God seems to be part of many US debates, especially ones surrounding the presidential campaign. In secular European politics, the Almighty is rarely if ever invoked.
"For me the US is a very religious country. It doesn't matter which religion I look at—love thy neighbor is a very, very important point in religion," health insurance spokesperson Marini says. For her, the apparent deep religiousness of many Americans doesn't jibe with their unwillingness to be part of a healthcare community. …
(Excerpt) Read more at spiegel.de ...
The fact that the Germans (and other Europeans) can’t fathom the argument against mandatory purchase of coverage is clear indication that they do not ‘get’ America at all.
The invocation of multiple socialist concepts throughout this article certainly represents the European view, today. The American expat cafe owner fits right in with the Euro-Socialist view (Solidarity? Where have we heard that before?) and should stay right there and peddle her goods.
For us, the notion that the government should be so deeply entwined in our daily lives conflicts with the very founding principles on which this great nation was built.
Get the damn government out of the way, and the nation will heal itself...healthcare included.
FTR, der Spiegel is “center-left” by their standards, albeit in the same sphere as the NYT. They probably regard “Kulturkampf” as a valid secular thing . . .
They COULD fathom him perfectly well - he called for "solidarity" too and, as with national healthcare, they fell right in line and few spoke out. But, as Thomas Jefferson said, "one man with courage is a majority". Our tradition of honoring the individual over "solidarity" is what has kept us freer than Europe, and out of a dictatorship (for now).
“I was too dumb struck to ask him how the Grand Tetons and Great Plains figured in WWII from his point of view.”
I’ve heard even dumber ones from the krauts. I was in France on lance Armstrong’s year when he won TDF number 7. Anyways, you’d think the French were the most idiotic, but hands down the Germans and Spaniards were truly “one of a kind”.
There are a lot of misinformed people on both aisles.
I lived in Germany for fifteen years, so I know the system. They’ve peaked out at a point on cost....where the consumer will go ballistic if they stretch it again. So they invented a new fee system, for monthly payments...totally separate from the normal cost. Every year...that fee goes up another $5-$8 a month.
Anger amongst German doctors and nurses? Well, yes. They are very hostile over the few pay raises they get. So they tend to leave, for Canada, the US, and Australia...or private clinics throughout Europe.
Refurbishing German hospitals? Well...it’s a on a slow pace because there just isn’t cash from the profits to do that. So you walk into one entrance and you feel like you are in 1950s Germany, then exit one hallway to feel like 1967, and then finally hit one hallway that feels like 1997.
Treatment? No one complains greatly about the treatment in German clinics or hospitals, although everyone seems to notice more third-world doctors and nurses operating in the system. Germans don’t like that. But if you want to keep the German professionals...you’d have to pay more.
As for the American system? A heck of alot of Americans have learned that you might make it five years without ever going to the doctor, so why bother paying $2k out of your pocket for a marginal health insurance policy via your employer? So they turn down the chance to have at least a marginal policy.
Then you have those fantastic doctors who prescribe tons of pain-killers....which you get addicted to....and eventually require a second and third doctor to help keep your legal but illegal habit going.
Toss in the folks who believe an emergency room is a routine place to show up for a problem that ought to wait until you see a regular doctor...then they get all shocked that the emergency room visit was $500.
Sports injuries over a weekend? Probably five times as many in a US hospital as a German hospital.
Weekend drug binges and visits to the local American emergency room? Probably five times what you’d have in Trier or Heldelberg. Who pays for the drug visitors? Well...the American who has no health insurance just laughs when the bill comes to the house because he’s not paying for it....so it gets tossed back onto the folks who routinely visit and make the cost appear on their bills instead.
If you ask me....all of the systems are screwed up. And in ten years...it won’t matter if you are German or American...you won’t have the same care that you had in 1995. We all will be getting less care, and asking why. The answer will not be a satisfactory one.
>>Um, “solidarity” is another socialist catchphrase, guys.
In 1980’s Poland, it was an anti-communist catchphrase.
Oh yes, let's make sure all industries in the USA have to enter guaranteed losing business deals. That's brilliant. /s
“Inside every German is Nazi just dying to come out.”
That’s a really ignorant statement. Most of the German people did not agree or didn’t know what was going on or were scared out of their wits to do or say anything. I mean, we can see in our own country how hard it is to do anything about what’s going on with the Obama administration and we supposedly have the bill of rights to protect us...He’s moving right ahead with his agenda, and who’s stopping him???
healthcare was introduced in Germany in the 19th century by Otto von Bismarck, who was definitely not a leftistI'm not sure exactly what the word "leftist" meant in Germany in the 1880s but Bismarck did found much of the German Welfare State at that time.
healthcare was introduced in Germany in the 19th century by Otto von Bismarck, who was definitely not a leftistI'm not sure exactly what the word "leftist" meant in Germany in the 1880s but Bismarck did found much of the German Welfare State at that time.
One of the few exceptions. The word is all over the EU’s rhetoric though, and all through the Treaty of Lisbon and other Treaties on European Union.
I am re-reading “The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich”, my first reading was forty years ago. Hitler’s rise to power was an amazing time in history, a perfect storm as it were. But he was still an Austrian. He spent his youth named Adolph Shicklegruber, his mother’s maiden name. His father brought about the change only when an inheritance made it profitable for him to do so.
Thank you for the quote you provided in #32 from this site: http://therealrevo.com/blog/?p=74193.
Very well said.
I agree that the hospitals & doctors offices are a bit outdated...But I’ve never felt that we lacked for treatment...and I love that they don’t push antibiotics, and they’re very open to homeopathic or natural alternatives. I had so many bad experiences with pediatrician offices in Houston...Hard to actually get a “real person” on the phone...long waiting times...endless antibiotic prescriptions. We’ve experienced the opposite here. I have to admit, I’ve been pleasantly surprised.
>>> Allowing healthy people to opt out of having health insurance destroys the insurance community and leaves insurers covering only the sick. …>>>
Untrue! Most people buy health insurance when they’re well so that they’ll be covered if they get sick. The above statement is akin to saying that only people whose homes are on fire buy house insurance.
If you ask me....all of the systems are screwed up. And in ten years...it won’t matter if you are German or American...you won’t have the same care that you had in 1995. We all will be getting less care, and asking why. The answer will not be a satisfactory one.I'm afraid you are right.
Mark
And they have the money.
We have a diversity of total racist, amoral retards running our institutions and country. The left and the courts will race bait the nation into an early grave and call it “racial justice for Trayvon” or whatever their latest victim hate bandwagon is based upon.
Seriously, our government is totally abusive to us and has no respect for ethics, freedom, human life or dignity. They have no respect for anything good. I can not think of one area of government control where it does not crush and/or neglect people with power. Lately, they are into sexually molesting kids, the elderly and the handicapped at the airport in the name of stopping Islamic terrorism.
I can see us going from election to election, wiping out healthcare for this group or that group who does not “deserve” it. People would be watching the debates to see whose, child, mom, dad, aunt, uncle, etc. is going to be targeted for death by which candidate. It would be a socialist and libertarian dream come true!
Under their logic, we are obligated to pay for everyone’s housing, food, transportation, anything else that is deemed necessary to live. Foreigners just don’t get it. They don’t know where their logic leads them.
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