Posted on 03/08/2010 9:42:11 AM PST by Sub-Driver
Edited on 03/08/2010 1:01:32 PM PST by Admin Moderator. [history]
Original title: Palin: I snuck across Canadanian border for healthcare By Eric Zimmermann - 03/08/10 11:33 AM ET
Sarah Palin's family used to "hustle" across the Canadian border to get healthcare, the former Alaska Governor said this weekend.
In a speech in Calgary, Palin called it "ironic" that while growing up in a small Alaskan town near the Canadian border, her family used to sneak across to take advantage of the Canadian healthcare system.
"We used to hustle over the border for health care we received in Canada," she said, according to Medicine Hat News (via Dave Weigel.) "And I think now, isn't that ironic."
It's ironic, of course, because Palin and other Republicans have argued that Democratic healthcare reform will put the U.S. on the path towards Canada's "socialized" healthcare system.
According to the quote, she was six, and it was long before Canada had nationalized health care. Sounds like, because of the proximity to the Canadian border, the closest place to have the injury treated was in Canada. Makes sense to head for the NEAREST location to treat the injury, which, if left untreated longer, because of a longer travel time to an Alaskan location, could have caused greater problems.
Let’s ask Sarah.
LOL! Ain't THAT the truth!
The media has so beaten down Palin's image that even her SUPPORTERS fall for the hit pieces at first glance. People,PEOPLE,PEOPLE!!! Please remember the Tammy Bruce Rule re: Sarah Palin
Mis-leading headline. (never said “sneaked”)
Still a nice zinger from Sarah about the poor state of the Canadian healthcare system now as compared to then.
Well, that's not the whole truth either. Canada's health care system emerged in phases, at the provincial level, starting back in 1946. The Hospital Insurance and Diagnostic Services Act was passed in 1957, with the national government picking up 50% of any hospital costs in any province that offered health insurance.
Zimmerman is a DNC hack.
Tell me about it. I hope freepers realize thousands of Americans head to Canada every year for Lasik surgery. Why? Because cash is king and if you have cash, you get in right away.
I don't believe that Sarah said this. I read her book, and she's never lived close enough to the Canadian border to have "snuck over".
I suggest verifying the claim; if not true, get this thread pulled.
Or maybe some are just REALLY eager to toss Sarah under the bus to support their own brand of lesser conservative.
How would one get free health care if they were not a citizen....only we are stupid enough to do this. This is BS!!!
Yes, but a tad differently:
Man, I tell ya, we didn't even have a Band-Aid or an aspirin in the house, we used mud to dress cuts and bit down hard on old pieces of tire rubber until a headache passed. But we could get medicine right across the border in Canadia, er, Canada. One time we hustled over in minus 50 degree temperatures. Us kids had only one pair of boots between us so we took turns wearing them. At one point, stepping out right in front of us, just ten feet away, the biggest, most ferocious grizzly bear I had ever seen. Dad looks at the bear, then at us kids, and says, to me, "Champ, no matter what happens you always take care of your siblings". Dad then bravely walked up to that bear and put a hellacious Scranton ass kickin' on it. Scranton, I was raised there ya know..."
The people falling for this are NOT her supporters. I’ll bet within the next 3 hours, a certain Palin hater will post this article with a different source.
I thought that Sarah basically spent her whole life in Wasilla, which is a suburb of Anchorage and not particularly close to Canada.
There are some small Alaska towns where as a practical matter the nearest medical facilities may be across the border. (the hamlet of Hyder, AK comes to mind. Virtually all services are down the road in a much larger town in British Columbia)
UPDATE: The Calgary Herald has a fuller, slightly different version of the quote: “My first five years of life we spent in Skagway, Alaska, right there by Whitehorse. Believe it or not this was in the 60s we used to hustle on over the border for health care that we would receive in Whitehorse. I remember my brother, he burned his ankle in some little kid accident thing and my parents had to put him on a train and rush him over to Whitehorse and I think, isnt that kind of ironic now. Zooming over the border, getting health care from Canada.”
Fortunately, the way the comments were presented was an outright lie.
Yeah, this sounds strange.
The Canada Health Act defines a resident of a province or territory as:
“a person lawfully entitled to be or to remain in Canada who makes his home and is ordinarily present in the province, but does not include a tourist, a transient or a visitor to the province”.
How would one get free health care if they were not a citizen....only we are stupid enough to do this. This is BS!!!
At one time Canadian hospitals would treat you for free if you were a visiting American and became sick or injured. Then Canadians visiting down here started getting bills. That made them mad and now they charge us in the name of reciprocity.
Yukon first had medicare in 1968-1969. It was probably not single payer at the time.
Canada only went to single payer after LARGE numbers of doctors started opting out. So many did this that the government passed legislation making it a federal crime for a doctor to receive direct payments for medical services. This had the effect of enslaving doctors. Today there are probably more canadian trained doctors in the US than here in Canada.
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