A few Social Programs vs. "Socialism"

Jäger wrote:

Except maybe critical health care when you really need it. My experience watching my mother wait for ten months for cancer treatment in Canada, while her cancer became terminal, is only anecdotal at best. As is my experience watching my father a few months later die a painful death of bone cancer - patiently waiting for the pallative treatment at the same distant cancer treatment center that they told him would at least give him quality of life until near the end (they did follow up with a phone call three months after his death to inform him a bed was now available, which was nice of them).

I am sorry for your loss. Seriously.

However, your story sounds a lot like an acquaintance (and hero) of mine here in the US. Roger Nichols (http://mog.com/blog_post/content/723/2709506) did everything right and was still wiped out by medical bills. He went through the usual routine of being dropped by his insurance, being gouged for exorbitant high-deductible alternative insurance, and finally waiting to die as his expenses overwhelmed his resources. If this is the system you're so proud of, wait till you're in it.

Jäger wrote:

Toronto-area hospitals, concerned about lawsuits, ask patients to sign a legal release accepting that while delays in treatment may jeopardize their health, they nevertheless hold the hospital blameless. . . .

Does it bother you that you have exactly the same arrangement with your medical insurance company in the US?You should read the release form you sign when you are admitted into US hospitals, while you're at it.

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Canadians have an option Britainers don’t: proximity of American hospitals. In fact, the Canadian government spends more than $1 billion each year for Canadians to receive medical treatment in our country. I wonder how much money the U.S. government spends for Americans to be treated in Canada. . .

In a lot of cases that is a blatantly misleading bit of "information." In BC, where there are damn near no people and lots of territory between folks, buying a $1M MRI machine is silly. Hell, in most US hospitals the machine sits idle for a lot more hours than it gets used. So, it's cheaper to ship patients to the nearest US facility, Seattle usually, than to own and maintain one of those expensive devices. We could use similar conservative philosophies if we could do basic math. In the US, we have thousands of MRI facilities, but hardly anyone who can competently interpret the results. Some of these facilities are operating out of trailers and move from clinic to clinic, providing pictures but no information.

Jäger wrote:

What matters to me is I prefer the American ideals that were set forth in the Constitution. What people elsewhere choose - as long as they have the opportunity to freely choose with regular elections - is irrelevant to me. If I wanted the soft tyranny of socialism, Canada is much closer to the US than Sweden. If you're happy with socialism, then good for you, but that's not what I choose. . .

And yet you site Reagan as a paragon of capitalist philosophy. The man allowed his cronies to contaminate every area of federal government with patronage and outright theft. He was the posterboy for "socialism for the rich." Take a look at "The Man Who Sold the World., it's a long list of criminal charges unprosecuted and prosecuted. He left us in massive debt, corrupted the best federal agencies and purged them of talent, and damaged every part of our political and social system.

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Does it bother you that you have exactly the same arrangement with your medical insurance company in the US?You should read the release form you sign when you are admitted into US hospitals, while you're at it.

I Think that what you presented is neutral and belivable thougts instead of a dogmatic paranoid belif that some others perform. The system that we have in Sweden is ok but not more. I have never heard of sombody dieing in the wait list. But the problem with a public system is not relly about the healt care. In my region we are kind of rich in a Swedish view. That means in a progressive tax system that we pay more taxes than our poor neigbourgs. Moust of our healt care comes from the municipal and the advancedhealth care in not municipal. But the tax money that we pay to the system thas end up in onother municipal due to the big hospitals are placed in a bigger town than my town. That sucks big time !

In my case i am very lycky due to a very god employer that gives me a privat insurance ! So i have the priviligae of 2 systems ! Both public healt care that are fairly god in Sweden and the superior privat healtcare. If i get ill i can go to onother country for surgery.

twday wrote:

rydnseek wrote:

The problem with socialism, is the diminished motivation. That is why Cuba is introducing some 'capitalism' into it's economy.. just heard this in the news this week. They are allowing people to have small businesses.. taxing the heck out of them, but the people are starting the businesses anyway.. they are 'motivated' to get ahead & not be stuck in the dead end poverty that socialism brings. Of course, China also did this a few years back. The history & role models of socialism are not that impressive. I cannot fathom why anyone would prefer that system to live under.
. . .

Are you agreeing with Jager about the 47% in the US who do not pay taxes? I don't consider the US to be a pure 'capitalistic' system.. it is much more socialistic in it's function & form. But in a free market society, regulated to protect the rights of the citizens, those who make more will & do pay more for the infrastructure, defense, & management of the country. At least that has been the historical norm.. that is the reason for the growth of the middle class in the US. People have been free to 'pursue happiness', which means for most a better life for them & their children. I much prefer this system. I am not rich, but i am free. I would not trade it for all the tea at the bottom of the harbor.

I think part of the problem with the discussion in the US is our terminology. We equate "socialism" with "communism" and no grey territory between the two. 30 years ago, I took a US Government class with an Orange County College instructor who had been Richard Nixon's California campaign manager in the 70's. (That association dried up his political career path, but had no effect on his academic standing.) He separated economic systems into capitalism, socialism, and communism and had wonderful definitions for the three.

It is abnormal in the US, but rational to remember that these are economic systems, not political systems. As such, neither of the three includes democracy or any sort of representative political system. With that in mind, you are absolutely right that we (and most countries of the world) are some sort of socialist state. Capitalism, unchecked by government, runs to monopolies and a form of totalitarian dictatorship by the rich that has reared its head in large and small moments through history. (The traditional American western storyline is a great example of the small moments that were repeated in practically every newly "settled" area in the country.) I don't think we have experienced a democratic communist state in history, but I could be wrong about that. We have experienced non-representative and representative socialist states on every continent. So far, democracy has been rarely tried anywhere and is always terminated by immediate interference by more powerful economic interests.

I think 'socialism' was just a term to soften the prejudicial sounding 'communism'. They are basically the same.. have the same basic goals, etc. They both contrast sharply with capitalism. I don't see any point in bickering about definitions.. just make them & use them consistently. I seldom use the term 'communism' unless it was used by the founders of the state, like Lenin & Mao.

I see making a distinction between political & economic systems as another exercise in hair splitting. Pure forms of either cannot exist in the other's camp. Some forms of either can exist. Cuba is introducing some 'capitalism', as has china, russia, vietnam, etc. The capitalistic west is obviously rife with socialistic programs, parties, & philosophies.

Anyone who gets the power, unchecked, leads to corruption. I'm sure you've heard, 'Power corrupts. Absolute power corrupts absolutely'. Regulations & laws are needed to prevent the powerful from exploiting the weak. That's one of the good things about a republic. The citizens can agree on a basic list of rights, & the govt. can secure them. Those rights can be amended from time to time, & laws tweaked to reflect changing times. But whimsical laws cannot be passed during times of mob rule. We cannot declare all muslims to be terrorists & imprison them, for example.

twday wrote:

Our "socialism for the elite, capitalism for the rest of us" system seems doomed to me. The ruling elite are inbred and inflexible, for the most part, and grossly self-interested to the detriment of the national interests. I have had long conversations with foreign students from all over Europe at the college where I teach and nobody appears to be particularly interested in experiencing the flaws of our system. Having worked in the devices end of our non-socialized medical system, I'm completely unconvinced of the advantages of for-profit medicine. Having taught in the for-profit education system, I think that is a flawed and almost uselessly corrupt system. It ought to be obvious that our current for-profit military is sucking the life out of the nation's budget. Our for-profit prison system has made us the horror of the industrialized world. Some things are best dealt with as a democracy and a corporatocracy is a long ways from democratic.

? ..confused by your quote.. did you mean it the other way? I do agree with your assessment of 'the ruling elite'. Also, not sure what flaws you discussed with the foreign students. Our non-socialized medical system is in hybrid mode. It is under mandates from the govt & is regulated & restricted with many bizarre regulations. Medicare is one example. They will only pay a part of certain procedures. It doesn't know if it is free market, or socialistic. In it's confusion, the stockholders of hospitals appoint greedy profiteers to find loopholes & bring home a profit. Nothing wrong with making a profit.. or in providing a free market service. But the regulation need to be rational & have some sense to them. Most fed govt ones do not. The education system is for profit? Maybe in some ivy league or private schools, but the largest sector are definitely govt. funded, regulated, & socialistic in their philosophy & practice. But i will agree that it is 'a flawed and almost uselessly corrupt system.' The military is definitely run as a 'socialistic' arm of the nation. We fund it with taxes. It would not exist without them. It's function is for the corporate good. Funny how most socialists are against the most socialistic part of the govt! I know a lot of military people might disagree with & be horrified by my suggestion that the US military machine is socialistic, but how does it fit into the definitions?

twday wrote:

"Free" is a relative term, mostly relative to scope and perspective. As long as you limit your scope and perspective to "I'm free to buy anything I can afford," we're probably the most free nation in the history of the world. If quality of life is the measure, we're far from "number one" by practically every measure. One reason we're unlikely to address this is that our education system has been gutted and appears to be irredeemable. We're cranking out useless lawyers, MBAs, financial scammers, and obsolete trades by the thousands (for hundreds of thousands in education debt) and our public universities are educating more foreign engineers than domestic. The bottom 10% of graduating classes are going into education and even they give it up after a few years.

I agree that freedom can be relative. Someone in Vietnam might be functionally more free than someone in Venezuela or N. Korea, for example. But quality of life has noting to do with freedom. Freedom will not guarantee anything, just give you the opportunity to pursue it. It is interesting to see your perspective as an educator. Most of what i have heard corroborates your experience. I don't know what the problem is, either.. or why education is merely seen as a way to make money or get on the gravy train. It is also a stinging rebuke at the educational system that can only attract the lowest achievers. I'm going to assume that is a gross generality, & that there are exceptions.. exceptional ones, like perhaps you? :)

twday wrote:

A friend who was once a world-traveling manufacturing quality consultant used to pound on me for my lack of respect for our "buy what you can" medical system. Until she was struck down by a debilitating genetic disability, she was convinced that our for-profit insurance and hospital system was the best in the world. Once her medical insurance company discovered her disability, she was dropped and offered a $10,000/month policy with a $100k annual deductible. Believe it or not, she could afford that for several years. When the disease cut into her 80 hour/week, 500k miles/year travel capacity, she couldn't. Now, she's arguing the exact opposite position and only wishes that Obama had the guts to completely socialize our medical system. I thought that when I found that the British system paid 1/10th of the Medicare price for pacemakers and ICDs back in the 90s. The fact that Medicare is prohibited from bargaining for prices on devices, drugs, and procedures is beyond idiotic.

I don't know how to say this to soften it, but life sucks sometimes. You get old. You get sick. Sometimes you die. There's no real escape from it. No medical system can prevent it. There are multitudes of problems with universal health care & with pay as you go. The cost is the major one. Someone has to pay for it. We do not have enough rich people to tax them at 100% that would cover everyone's health issues. Something has to give. You either ration the care, like is done in most socialist health care systems, or you pay through the nose, or have insurance. Even being poor won't get you the higher end services in US healthcare system. You've got to have big bucks or primo insurance. The health care costs in the us are ridiculously high. I don't know how to solve this. Socializing it won't do it. Do we have cheaper military or police or firefighters with those services 'socialized?' I don't see how you can pick out the health care industry & suddenly tell doctors, nurses, etc, that they will now make $15/hr.. or $10.. or $5. Won't they unionize? Won't they demand higher pay? They will at least want to get what firemen or policemen get.. or perhaps congressmen.. Euro socialist countries can get by with it because they don't pay the providers. That's why they have the 'brain drain'. People come over here to study, then get a job here because the pay is so much more. Medicare is just another example of why the govt should not be in this kind of business. They are inept, can't negotiate, breed corruption, & are wasteful. We should try to limit the federal govt's management of things to a minimum. If they can keep the highways going, negotiate trade & international treaties, & protect the citizens, that is about as much as we should expect from them. Why on earth we think they can manage anything else with any degree of competence is beyond me.

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I think 'socialism' was just a term to soften the prejudicial sounding 'communism'. They are basically the same.. Have the same basic goals, etc. They both contrast sharply with capitalism. I don't see any point in bickering about definitions.. Just make them & use them consistently. I seldom use the term 'communism' unless it was used by the founders of the state, like Lenin & Mao.

Earlier you said that my country was a socialist country. Does that mean by the word above that you suggest that Sweden Norway Germany Finland France Australia Great Britain are communist countries and share the same goal? If you think or believe that which good forbid ( said by an atheist)I ask you why all these country’s end up under the us umbrella of nuclear weapons? Because we are friends we share 90 % of our values with USA. We have more in common than we have diferances that’s why

[quote="JägerLet's put aside for a moment your inability to separate your fondness for engaging in that aberrant sexual act from the Taxed Enough Already Party philosophy. Let's talk about what you're claiming happened, six months and a considerable amount of media coverage after the fact. I think it's safe to say the world's coverage of Loughner has gone beyond the "skin-deep" stage.

Here's what the rest of the world knows about Loughner to this point:

• He didn't listen to political radio of any stripe or watch TV, which means he wasn't listening to "wingnut hate mongers" or Tea Party supporters.
  
• He hated George Bush - just like you and your Truthout guru do.
  
• He believed voters were stupid and brainwashed - just like you do.
  
• He lived with Mom, on government handouts for the unemployed - not exactly the Tea Party way of life.
  
• His friends described him as an atheist - hard to reconcile with the left's screams that Tea Party philosophy is fundamentalist Christian.
  
• He was registered as an Independent - odd for anyone supposedly being a Tea Partier trying to put Republicans in office.
  
• He was uninterested in political issues - not exactly Tea Party material
  
• His reading material and viewing pleasure was stuff like The Communist Manifesto and the Zeitgeist Project - not exactly Tea Party philosophy.

And yet here you are, six months later, telling the world (or at least those reading your stuff) that the Tea Party is to blame and talking about hate mongers while posting something that is obviously, patently, false in claiming the Tea Party and the right/conservatives inspired the shooting of Giffords.

You seem to claim you spend a lot of time searching for the truth. You talk about "acadamia". Impressive.

So wtih the above in mind, could you point us to where you found evidence as late as a month ago that Loughner actually WAS inspired by Tea Party philosphy and the right to shoot Giffords? You can't have missed all the coverage on Loughner in the six months since that shooting, while searching for truth. And after all, without your accusation being backed up by some evidence, your claims wouldn't be much more than... oh... left wing hate mongering. And propaganda. And of course, maliciously false.
[/quote]

Speaking of "maliciously false," where di you find all of that "information" about Loughner? The news is decidedloy empty (outside of Faux News, which is a comedy program) of real conclusions about the boy. Imagining that this deranged kid is capable of the thought required to be "athiest" describes an unfamilarity with the word.

rydnseek wrote:

Of course you know that when an amendment is passed, it requires the states to approve it. But what has been happening for many years now is not an amendment granting more power to the federal govt. It has been the federal govt *seizing* power & spending the taxpayers' money.. or wasting it, more accurately. Socialistic programs (we should define that) are not part of the federal govt's responsibility.

Of course, it's obvious that the slave states had damn little to do with the passage of the 14th amendment.

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. . . So you feel it is reagan's policies that have brought the decline in manufacturing jobs in the us? That is the prime reason for our decline.. i don't doubt many corporations are getting rich.. as many others are going out of business. That seems to happen all the time, & even more so in economically troubled times. Corporations just take their jobs elsewhere.. & their profits.

I'm not that absolutist. "Prime reasons" are too simple for any complicated system. I worked in manufacturing management from the 70s to the mid-90s and there is plenty of blame to pass around for the country's decline in real work. However, the shift from production to speculation came about in the 80's and has yet to slow down. Reagan's folks were big believers in debt and imaginary money. Clinton, who was a closet Republican even yb his own words, helped that idiot move along nicely with Greenspan (anyone silly enough to call him a "liberal?") and the Goldman clan. Neigher Geitner or Sommers would quality as "liberal" even with Fox's standards.

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Education? You do know that we've spent more money per child than any other country, & education spending has exploded with the govt. boom. But of course, it has not improved our citizenry.. in fact, i agree with your assessment that it is worse. The socialistic educational programs have failed. The poor are still poor & have increased.. with generations being trapped in the ghettos. The education of the poor has no meaning to them in the concentration camp atmosphere that pervades in the ghettos. Crime, drugs, & corruption are the main constants there. Social engineering has not worked. The war to 'stamp out poverty' is lost. Give people freedom to fail or succeed & there will be many more who will succeed. Lock them down in racially defined socialist camps & they will only perpetuate themselves.

The war on poverty ended with Nixon, but a close look at what had been accomplished before Vietnam diffused LBJ's programs doesn't tell the story you have here. There were a lot ot successes, but they were all turned back in the me-first 80s. We swapped a war on poverty for a war on power people with Reagan's War on Drugs (which is the poster child for "failure") and there has been no turning back since.

Education is another messy picture made simple by poor analysis. The 8 years of Bush are often considered the "lost years" by teachers. Jammed with foolish testing and irrational standards, the No Child's Behind Left Untouched crap drove a lot of good teachers from the profession. The "cost per child" data can be looked at in a variety of ways, but here's one that might be enlightening: http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/edu_edu_spe-education-spending-of-gdp. We spend a lot of money in "administration" at every level of education and I think that could be dramatically improved upon.

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The only 'rich' who have benefited from the current govt explosion are the favored few in the financial sectors.. the 'too big to fail' guys, big unions, govt employees who have increased their wealth by jumping on the obama gravy train, & some academians who have gotten juicy grants. Manufacturing corporations have moved. Oil companies drill elsewhere. But even our war machine isn't cranking out enough bombs to make up for the losses.. probably that will be outsourced to china as well..

I wish that were true. The elimination of inheritance taxes, the shriveling of the upper tax bracket, the disappearance of corporate taxes, and some of the folks you've mentioned have all done well. Our corporate medical industry would fall over and die without Medicare and Medicaid. The military is one huge boondoggle with no accountants anywhere near the controls. It's tough to find where the average government worker is getting "rich," but the political appointees have done well for themselves, although a few have gone to jail for their efforts. I don't think you are clear on the work that goes into a typical government grant, but corporate America would be completely without research if public institutions didn't carry the water for them.

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I think it is time to stop the govt growth madness, & reduce the federal responsibility. Let's elect fiscally responsible people who will cut up the credit cards. I don't care who they sleep with, or what god they worship. If they can count & do basic math, they can do the job.

I am with you there, but I suspect a lot more than "basic math" is required. At the least, you need calculus to predict points on a nonlinear curve and the economy is a long ways from a linear equation as the boneheads who spewed the Black-Scholes drivel found out the hard way. I think the problem in government is exactly the same problem we have in US business, no leadership skills. Our ruling class has been so busy packing its pockets for the last 30 years that they have downbred themselves into something a lot like the British royalty class. We have a butt-load of execs who are skilled at "pulling credit up and pushing blame down," but hardly anyone who rises above floor manager in a typical company is capable of doing a real job.

I'm a huge believer in "top down" management. Meaning, if the people at the top are honorable, hard-working, talented and creative, that will filter down through the system (culture or individual businesses or communities). If the people at the top are scumbags, it's unrealistic to expect quality, ethics, or creativity frm the managed. We've proven, in the last 30 years, that money is not a motivator of quality people. In fact, the 1950-60 period of US history did a pretty good job of teaching us that quality education distributed to as many people as possible gives a major payback.

I don't see how pretending that Obama or any Fox-labeled "liberal" is a socialist provides any useful information. It obviously tags the speaker as ignorant and history-deprived and prevents that message from getting traction with anyone but folks who aren't smart enough to check their latest bit of spam for accuracy on Snopes.com. If the Bush years didn't raise these same protests from Constitutional violations like the grossly misnamed "Patriot Act," the years of no-bid contracts, and a grossly flawed election system, there is something else going on here. There are some serously smart people in the US, but few of them are willing to put up with the corporate smear tactics of modern media. If we are left with only those who are dumb enough to imagine themselves intelligent without evidence of any sort and those who are crooked enough not to care, we're doomed.

A while back, you said something about this being a poor format for political "discussion." I think you're right, but I think the US is a poor place for discussion these days. If anyone is crazed enough to believe that the corporately owned conservative mass media is "balanced" by meager contributions from average citizens, it's not only obvious why the Fairness Doctrine was necessary but equally obvious why information is now all but unavailable to the average, passive, going-broke, uneducated "citizen." For three decades, I've thought "Where is Teddy Roosevelt when we really need him?" He wouldn't have a chance in hell getting past the current media, so if he's out there we'll never hear from him.

I apologize for missing some of your replies on this topic. The state of US political dialog is incredibly depressing and I have to get away from it. For 40 years, I tried to live up to "My country, let me right the wrongs" and I haven't missed an election at any level since 1968, but I think I've given up on our system. It's broken and too many people like it that way. As the much-maliagned-by-Faux-viewers Tip O'Neil said, "all politics is local." I think I'm going to focus on what I can affect and give up on the crap that I can't stand.

Jäger wrote:

The belief that capitalism, socialism, and communism are merely economic systems and not political reality as well is a belief lacking a grasp on governance. We can ignore communism for the present discussion because we do not have that in the US, but we certainly do have socialism. Capitalism and socialism certainly are economic systems, but they are also political systems and operating philosophies.

It would be difficult to say with a straight face that our current Marxist president is a capitalist - or a constitutionalist either, for that matter. His administration is all about socialism, from Obamacare on down. Ripping up existing bankruptcy law to hand companies over to union officers is anything but capitalist or constitutional. Other presidents, like Reagan, were unabashedly capitalists and small government advocates - even when not one single budget escaped having Democrats tag more spending and taxes on it (a fact "dead on arrival" Tip O'Neill was proud of until his death). Furthermore, the philosophy of a country as defined in it's constitutional documents alone can define their political system as either capitalist/free enterprise or socialist/Marxist.

"Marxist President"? Do you mean the current Command-In-Chief of the US? The guy in command of all the largest military force on the planet? The man who can order 1000 sorties against Libya? The man who can authorize the marines to kill OBL? Is this the Marxist President you are talking about?




Do you also swear alligence to Grover Norquist like 234 "representatives" in congress did?

Just wondering?

twday wrote:

Capitalism caused economic crashes, high level corruption in corporations and, especially, the financial mobsters, much of the world's pollution and ecological catastrophes, and a host of unsolvable world problems.

So the same level of analytic reasoning that had you publishing just a few weeks ago As for the Teabaggers and wingnut hate mongers who inspired the shooting of U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords..., now brings you to this analysis?

twday wrote:

In the US, a lot of "government meddling" is the result of corporations working to preserve their monopolies and trusts to keep prices artificially high.

So the same level of analytic reasoning that had you publishing just a few weeks ago As for the Teabaggers and wingnut hate mongers who inspired the shooting of U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords..., now brings you to this analysis?

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The ranting about Canada's "death lists" is amazing propaganda.

My mother and father both died on those "death lists" aka waiting lists for treatment. Your assurances that their deaths were merely propaganda is about as believable as your claims that the Tea Party and the right wing inspired Laughner to shoot Giffords.

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I have spent a lot of time in Canada talking to Canadians about their healthcare, among other things, and I don't hear much US envy there.

I guess I believe that as much as I find your claims that the Tea Party and the right wing inspired Laughner to be believable.

But we certainly know you didn't talk to Jean Chretien, Belinda Stronach, Danny Williams, Paul Martin, and Jack Layton, don't we? Because they're the Canadian federal politicians and Premiers who, like you, shilled for the Canadian system (and had the power to do something about it either way), and when they got sick made a beeline for that despicable private health care, rather than suffering and possibly dying in the public waiting lines.

And you obviously didn't talk to the justices sitting on the Supreme Court of Canada who found that Canadians were dying on waiting lists, and held that provinces could no longer ban "for profit" health care because of that.

twday wrote:

And how soon we forget the 2000 and 2004 "elections."

So the same level of analytic reasoning that had you publishing just a few weeks ago As for the Teabaggers and wingnut hate mongers who inspired the shooting of U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords..., now brings you to this analysis?

twday wrote:

And yet you site Reagan as a paragon of capitalist philosophy. The man allowed his cronies to contaminate every area of federal government with patronage and outright theft.

Oh yes... So... the same intellect that has you just a few short weeks ago publishing accusations blaming the Tea Party and the right wing for inspiring Laughner to shoot Giffords is the one we're supposed to give credibility to when that same mind attacks Reagan?

rydnseek wrote:

The military is definitely run as a 'socialistic' arm of the nation. We fund it with taxes. It would not exist without them. It's function is for the corporate good. Funny how most socialists are against the most socialistic part of the govt! I know a lot of military people might disagree with & be horrified by my suggestion that the US military machine is socialistic, but how does it fit into the definitions?

Not at all. The results are socialist as well - the poor guy who doesn't pay a penny in income tax gets the same protection from his country's forces as George Soros does. The difference is, in the military, socialist theory comes as close to reality in practice as it ever will.

When it comes time to dig a fire trench and install overhead cover, EVERYBODY digs their own hole - you don't get 53% digging all the trenches while 47% sit on their ass talking about how they're too disadvantaged to dig. When we march somewhere, it doesn't matter whether you're the platoon commander or the new guy - everybody carries their own pack, their own rifle. We all eat out of the same hayboxes in the field. The boxes of rations don't get marked with one set of rations for officers and senior NCO's, and another box for the enlisted trash. When you're jumping, the parachute's don't come marked for being for officers or enlisted men. The ground is just as hard for everybody. The incoming bullets and shells aren't softer for officers and harder for enlisted men. If you're the platoon commander and you fall in the river and your sleeping bag gets soaked, you don't get to cry "unfair" and somebody more capable who didn't fall in the river has to hand over their dry sleeping bag.

Nope, the whole military/regimental thing is quite socialist. We succeed as a group, or we suffer as a group. And unlike the wastes of skin and rations that make up most of the teachers at our colleges and universities, you don't get a pass for life just because you got a job. You have to prove you can still do the business, every week. Everybody sweats just as hard - not some doing all the work and taking all the risk, while a bunch of others sit around theorizing about how the others had an unfair advantage and they're victims of the system.

The big difference is, unlike our resident socialists here, the military is extremely intolerant of those who won't carry their share of the load. There's even a charge for it: malingering. If you get hurt or are having a bad day, guys will fall all over themselves to carry your kit, help you along, carry your share of the work while you get well. But once they figure out you're not hurt, but just a lazy underachieving asshole avoiding your share of the work and risk, life gets really unpleasant in a hurry. Malingerers either change their ways very quickly, get out of the military, or end up doing military jail time.

Now, if socialism worked that way in the general populace, maybe it might have a chance of success.

And in the military, you work your way up. You don't become the sergeant major without having started as a private, and you don't become a general without first starting as a lowly lieutenant. You have to do the business at all the levels before you run the show. And yet here we are with a president who hasn't even run a lemonade stand, and colleges and universities populated by instructors who are long on theory but have never had to prove themselves to get there. Thus, we have Obama lecturing in a law school while the sum of his experience was community organizing. People teaching business in universities who have never started a business and made it a success in their lives. Profs teaching criminology who have never spent one day in uniform working the graveyard shift on a Friday night.

From the net. Intresting i think.

Cross-country comparisons Direct comparisons of health statistics across nations are complex. The Commonwealth Fund, in its annual survey, "Mirror, Mirror on the Wall", compares the performance of the health care systems in Australia, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, Germany, Canada and the U.S. Its 2007 study found that, although the U.S. system is the most expensive, it consistently underperforms compared to the other countries. A major difference between the U.S. and the other countries in the study is that the U.S. is the only country without universal health care. The OECD also collects comparative statistics, and has published brief country profiles.

The World Health Organization, in its World Health Report 2000, provided a ranking of health care systems around the world according to criteria of the overall level and distribution of health in the populations, and the responsiveness and fair financing of health care services.





WHO's ranking of health care systemsFrom Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The World Health Organization (WHO), in its World Health Report 2000, provided a framework and measurement approach to examine and compare aspects of health systems around the world. It developed a series of performance indicators to assess the overall level and distribution of health in the populations, and the responsiveness and fair financing of health care services. It was the organization's first ever analysis of the world's health systems. This is the ranking of health care systems (estimates for 1997 among 191 member states) according to the report.

1 France 4
2 Italy 11
3 San Marino 21
4 Andorra 23
5 Malta 37
6 Singapore 38
7 Spain 24
8 Oman 62
9 Austria 6
10 Japan 13
11 Norway 16
12 Portugal 28
13 Monaco 12
14 Greece 30
15 Iceland 14
16 Luxembourg 5
17 Netherlands 9
18 United Kingdom 26
19 Ireland 25
20 Switzerland 2
21 Belgium 15
22 Colombia 49
23 Sweden 7
24 Cyprus 39
25 Germany 3
26 Saudi Arabia 63
27 United Arab Emirates 35
28 Israel 19
29 Morocco 99
30 Canada 10
31 Finland 18
32 Australia 17
33 Chile 44
34 Denmark 8
35 Dominica 70
36 Costa Rica 50
37 United States 1
38 Slovenia 29
39 Cuba 118
40 Brunei 32
41 New Zealand 20
42 Bahrain 48
43 Croatia 56
44 Qatar 27
45 Kuwait 41
46 Barbados 36
47 Thailand 64
48 Czech Republic 40
49 Malaysia 93
50 Poland

While what Jäger said about the minding of the men is true when in exercises or in operation it is not the reality otherwise. There are unofficial distribution of the work that is done.

It is true that to become a general you must get through the ranks but you also need contatcs and that is as important as competences. There are less generals than lieutenant and it is normal. The process to get to the highest ranks are not only competence and hard work. And to become an officer money can help since you need the education.

It's like any organisation. The army is not an entity more virtuous than any other organisation. It is constituted with people that react like people do. If it was so perfect the suicide rate wouldn't be as high as it is. And this is not only for those who went to combat. Just the mobility needed when in the forces causes problems in family. Many carrier soldiers find it hard whn getting out. You get out of a system where you don't have to bother with many small details of life and you get in another one where you have to think about all the aspects of your life.

Being a socialist is not being a communist. In a socialist country one can accumulate more goods than others without problems. The difference is more at the level of distribution of wealth. More economic contribution is asked from the well fortunate than from the less. It is a simplistic equation to say that more work is asked from the wealthier. More work doesn't automatically gives more wealth as many workers can testify.

Individualists that want to live in society only to have a blanket to protect their private goods and to pay the less possible to attein that have problems with the notion of wealth or ressource distribution. They only see the people that take dishonest advantage of the distribution and they refuse to look at the effects on the others that benefit from it and that continue to contribute to society in other ways. And these are the majority. Let's not forget that what is asked from the wealthier is not to get poor. It's just to give a a higher contribution than those who can barely pay for the minimum. The general effects of distribution is less criminality and less social turmoil. This is particularly true in densely populated area. In less populated area where there are a lot of ressources there is less competition for the same ressources and social structure is less needed to keep a certain level of order. When the ressources are scare, population are regrouping where they think life will be easier and then problems arise if a more social approach is not taken. We can see it happening in the arab countries. A few had all the wealth and the population was getting poorer and porrer. It results in rebellions and unstability. There are some poorer countries that don't have these problems because of a more balanced distribution of ressources.

Another perception is that socialists programs automatically costs more. While it can be true the opposite can also happen. It is not the fact that it is administered by government or private interests that leads to unefficiency it is how the show is runned. There are some public and private administrations that are performant and others that are not. It is tied to the individual's motivations.

rokka wrote:

The World Health Organization, in its World Health Report 2000, provided a ranking of health care systems around the world according to criteria of the overall level and distribution of health in the populations, and the responsiveness and fair financing of health care services.

Definitely interesting. I do wonder about some of the statistics.. do the totals include what the states contribute, in the case of the US? Or is it just at the federal level?

It seems from this chart that the US spends way more per capita on health care than any other nation. ..more than twice as much as Sweden, for example. And considering our GDP is also the highest in the world, we spend a greater percentage of that than any other nation. So obviously money is not the key to good health care. But why does the US spend more than anyone, yet get the least return? Is it because of the evil capitalists who are in complete control of our health care system?

I don't think so. I also see some major factors in this chart that are not pointed out, as well as some major omissions. There are only 2 countries here in the top 10 populated countries of the world. The US is #3 with ~ 312m people. Japan is #10 with 128m. Most of the rest of the countries listed are the size of some of our states. The point being that it is easier to manage things like health care in smaller states, with smaller populations.

It seems whenever the US Fed. govt. gets involved in controlling an industry, that the costs go up & fraud & corruption increase. I would point to this as a source of our increased cost of health care. If the fed would get out of micro managing everything, & let some free market solutions come in, i believe we would see decreased costs in health care, as competition to provide a better, more cost effective product would drive the market. Certainly we need some regulation, but not the massive control the fed is trying to do.

I still have no problem with a state having universal health care if it wants it. Massachusetts decided to try it a few years back. Obama used them as a model. In a state the size of Sweden or New Jersey, it is easier to manage things without the accompanying fraud, corruption, & inefficiency that you get when you expand it 10 fold. To be fair, you should have included other larger countries in the chart... some that are more the size of the US. I'll list a few, & you can post where they rank in this same chart. This is from wikipedia list of world population.

1 China 1,339,724,852
2 India 1,210,193,422
3 United States 311,946,000
4 Indonesia 237,556,363
5 Brazil 190,732,694
6 Pakistan 176,873,000
7 Nigeria 158,423,000
8 Bangladesh 151,053,000
9 Russia 142,905,200
10 Japan 127,950,000


There are other factors as well. How multicultural is Japan? Not very. It is more like Sweden than the US. How much does Japan spend on defense? How much do they contribute to world security? How many Norwegians have gone to police actions in Iraq, Afghanistan, Korea, Africa, etc? How much immigration does Norway have compared to the US? How many Swedes pay taxes? How many are on the dole?

I suppose i am making counter points to points you have not even made. I'll just post this as some observations & analysis of your data.

I would say that considering the US is the 3rd largest country in the world, & spends the most per capita on heath care, & spends the most as percentage of GDP, we are doing surprisingly well, considering the other larger countries & the problems they have. Not too many Europeans go to China, India, Indonesia, or Brazil for health care. A lot come to the US.

Most of the larger countries of the world do not provide very good health care for their citizens, public or private. It is financially impossible. If the US tries to offer Swedish style services with the associated costs, we will end up looking more like India or Bangladesh than a western country. It will bankrupt us, as our higher costs drain our resources. Health care is a cost. It does not produce anything. It is more like money spent on defense. It is an industry that is supported by the rest of the citizens of the country. It is a luxury, not a divine right. Many of the countries with high marks on your other list (which i don't really understand) are in trouble financially. Italy, Greece, & Portugal have pretty high marks.. according to the WHO. I'm not sure of their data or agenda, but I'll take their rankings at face value.

Like most statistics, anything can be spun to prove almost anything. Either side of a debate can use the same data to prove their points. Charts & graphs are fun.. they look good & imply authority on a topic. That is why i mocked my own graphs in my earlier post. They provide interesting data.. but there are so many variables that it is hard to draw any hard conclusions about the data, except that there are a lot of variables! .. and that statistics are fun for bean counting nerds.

But i will draw one conclusion from this.. it is a conclusion i had already made so it was easy to spin the data to fit my pre-conceived notion:

Larger countries have more trouble providing good health care for their citizens. It is more practical to do it on a smaller, local level, where the actual services are offered.

If we can grasp this, we will return this sort of responsibility to the state & local level, rather than have the Fed. try to manage it. You get the least bang for your buck when the federal govt. does anything. Why would we even want them to do this? Keep it simple. Keep it local. Bigger is not better, when it comes to efficiency in govt.

Quote :

Definitely interesting. I do wonder about some of the statistics.. do the totals include what the states contribute, in the case of the US? Or is it just at the federal level?

The answer of that question would be somewhere here.
http://www.commonwealthfund.org Most of us have a life and waits for someone else to find out

Quote :

It seems from this chart that the US spends way more per capita on health care than any other nation. ..more than twice as much as Sweden, for example. And considering our GDP is also the highest in the world, we spend a greater percentage of that than any other nation. So obviously money is not the key to good health care. But why does the US spend more than anyone, yet get the least return? Is it because of the evil capitalists who are in complete control of our health care system?

I would guess that if every American could get the best care in that country the figures would be something else. It could maybe yeast maybe suggest that there is no curse of the common when it comes to health care. What could France achieve with the US budget?

Quote :

I don't think so. I also see some major factors in this chart that are not pointed out, as well as some major omissions. There are only 2 countries here in the top 10 populated countries of the world. The US is #3 with ~ 312m people. Japan is #10 with 128m. Most of the rest of the countries listed are the size of some of our states. The point being that it is easier to manage things like health care in smaller states, with smaller populations.

What would I know about over populated areas? Our problem is always that our towns and villages don’t have the critical mass for this and that. There are for sure other problems with populated areas. Ill guess demographics in the population matters, number of immigrants from the 3 world climate and a lot of variables. But I do think it says something.

Quote :

It seems whenever the US Fed. govt. gets involved in controlling an industry, that the costs go up & fraud & corruption increase. I would point to this as a source of our increased cost of health care. If the fed would get out of micro managing everything, & let some free market solutions come in, i believe we would see decreased costs in health care, as competition to provide a better, more cost effective product would drive the market. Certainly we need some regulation, but not the massive control the fed is trying to do.

Ill guess a compare between Alaska Canada Norway Sweden Finland Siberia would be fair.

Quote :

I still have no problem with a state having universal health care if it wants it. Massachusetts decided to try it a few years back. Obama used them as a model. In a state the size of Sweden or New Jersey, it is easier to manage things without the accompanying fraud, corruption, & inefficiency that you get when you expand it 10 fold. To be fair, you should have included other larger countries in the chart... some that are more the size of the US. I'll list a few, & you can post where they rank in this same chart. This is from Wikipedia list of world population.

1 China 1,339,724,852
2 India 1,210,193,422
3 United States 311,946,000
4 Indonesia 237,556,363
5 Brazil 190,732,694
6 Pakistan 176,873,000
7 Nigeria 158,423,000
8 Bangladesh 151,053,000
9 Russia 142,905,200
10 Japan 127,950,000


There are other factors as well. How multicultural is Japan? Not very. It is more like Sweden than the US. How much does Japan spend on defense? How much do they contribute to world security? How many Norwegians have gone to police actions in Iraq, Afghanistan, Korea, Africa, etc.? How much immigration does Norway have compared to the US? How many Swedes pay taxes? How many are on the dole?

I suppose i am making counter points to points you have not even made. I'll just post this as some observations & analysis of your data.

I agree that the statistics it’s not the whole truth and nothing but the truth.

Quote :

I would say that considering the US is the 3rd largest country in the world, & spends the most per capita on health care, & spends the most as percentage of GDP, we are doing surprisingly well, considering the other larger countries & the problems they have. Not too many Europeans go to China, India, Indonesia, or Brazil for health care. A lot come to the US.

Most of the larger countries of the world do not provide very good health care for their citizens, public or private. It is financially impossible. If the US tries to offer Swedish style services with the associated costs, we will end up looking more like India or Bangladesh than a western country. It will bankrupt us, as our higher costs drain our resources. Health care is a cost. It does not produce anything. It is more like money spent on defense. It is an industry that is supported by the rest of the citizens of the country. It is a luxury, not a divine right. Many of the countries with high marks on your other list (which i don't really understand) are in trouble financially. Italy, Greece, & Portugal have pretty high marks.. according to the WHO. I'm not sure of their data or agenda, but I'll take their rankings at face value.

Like most statistics, anything can be spun to prove almost anything. Either side of a debate can use the same data to prove their points. Charts & graphs are fun.. they look good & imply authority on a topic. That is why i mocked my own graphs in my earlier post. They provide interesting data.. but there are so many variables that it is hard to draw any hard conclusions about the data, except that there are a lot of variables! .. and that statistics are fun for bean counting nerds.

But i will draw one conclusion from this.. it is a conclusion i had already made so it was easy to spin the data to fit my pre-conceived notion:

Larger countries have more trouble providing good health care for their citizens. It is more practical to do it on a smaller, local level, where the actual services are offered.

If we can grasp this, we will return this sort of responsibility to the state & local level, rather than
have the Fed. try to manage it. You get the least bang for your buck when the federal govt. does anything. Why would we even want them to do this? Keep it simple. Keep it local. Bigger is not better, when it comes to efficiency in govt.

A nice post and I really like it when you develop your thoughts. I have very limited time with this debates now because holidays is over and I have to run my job, be a hockey dad and be at different boards that I have been chosen to.

rydnseek wrote:

Larger countries have more trouble providing good health care for their citizens. It is more practical to do it on a smaller, local level, where the actual services are offered.

If we can grasp this, we will return this sort of responsibility to the state & local level, rather than have the Fed. try to manage it. You get the least bang for your buck when the federal govt. does anything. Why would we even want them to do this? Keep it simple. Keep it local. Bigger is not better, when it comes to efficiency in govt.

What you write is interesting. I don't know how it is in US but here we have problems with the administration. There is a lot of money that goes in administration instead of care and that's was raises the cost.

As for people going somewhere else to get healthcare it is exceptionnal. Some do it for specialisation purposes, some others for experimental programs and others for the cost and speed and some because they want treatments because they are not authorized in their country. And let's not forget that a lot of these people are getting esthetical surgery. In any case the results aren't always happy. As an example we have a contreversy in Canada about a specific treatment. It is about multiple sclerosis and the Zamboni treatment. This treatment isn't approved here and some patients went to Italy to get the treatment. The effects of the treatment don't seem to last very long and it costs a lot to get it. And some patients are left helpless after since they are left with trombosis in addition to the sclerosis.

I agree with you that it should be better managed at a smaller level. If that's the question it's another discussion.

Jäger wrote:

When it comes time to dig a fire trench and install overhead cover, EVERYBODY digs their own hole - you don't get 53% digging all the trenches while 47% sit on their ass talking about how they're too disadvantaged to dig. When we march somewhere, it doesn't matter whether you're the platoon commander or the new guy - everybody carries their own pack, their own rifle. We all eat out of the same hayboxes in the field. The boxes of rations don't get marked with one set of rations for officers and senior NCO's, and another box for the enlisted trash. When you're jumping, the parachute's don't come marked for being for officers or enlisted men. The ground is just as hard for everybody. The incoming bullets and shells aren't softer for officers and harder for enlisted men. If you're the platoon commander and you fall in the river and your sleeping bag gets soaked, you don't get to cry "unfair" and somebody more capable who didn't fall in the river has to hand over their dry sleeping bag.

...Now, if socialism worked that way in the general populace, maybe it might have a chance of success.

I agree with you %100 here. My experience as an infanteer with the 2nd Battalion , Nova Scotia Highlanders...will confirm this. Nothing like fighting hypothermia as a team, with people you are willing to put before yourself. Putting the needs of others , before your own, as the theme, is the point at hand.

One may say that is easy to do this with a section or team...but to put that level of effort into society, hardly seems worth it. It doesn't seem worth it, to some...I call "them" lazy.
I know many enlisted who are lazy, unmotivated, and in general plain ignorant...but they would not provide the, good, example of military life that I wish to promote.
Everybody has a job to do. Infanteer or civilian. Both jobs are equally important and deserve the effort and respect.

To suggest that socialism, in general, breeds , laziness , in specific...shows a lack of understanding human nature.
Your description of how a section works together is my point.
That section was made to work together, and they accepted that. Their chance of success multiplied. Those who were working for the section benefited as well. Those against suffered,
Sounds like a working , socialism to me.
To suggestion society in general can't work like this...is a fatalist attitude.

If I have a choice, I pick the real fight, for society....my experience as a soldier has made it ok to accept the needs of others before my own....dismiss that as lazy socialism if you like.
I know there are many willing to do what is right...many soldiers willing to do their part to make things right.
Many civilians as well.

...And you must realize, that the best player on the team...doesn't, necessarily make the best coach...rather that is a rarity, and jem if found.
Most great coaches know people well first...and teach them a subject second.
Would you rather learn boxing from Mike Tyson...or from Mike Tyson's trainers?
First hand experience is great...but I've seen even those lessons wasted.
Motivation comes from within....others can inspire you....in the end, was there action that was motivated.
Frontline soldiers have invaluable information...but to suggest that they, only, have the valuable information is arrogant and ignorant.

You seem like a nice guy , overall, to me...no doubt a good soldier...but your mastery of Bovine Scatology, leaves me shaking my head.
I wish we could work together, and explore our differences in a context more suiting to the values we wish to portray...
But while typing with two fingers...I will submit , to being out matched.

I'll leave you with a Buddhist quote I read today...
"To satisfy ones wants , will not make them happy...
...to satisfy ones needs, will make them happy"

mucker wrote:

To suggest that socialism, in general, breeds , laziness , in specific...shows a lack of understanding human nature.
Your description of how a section works together is my point.
That section was made to work together, and they accepted that. Their chance of success multiplied. Those who were working for the section benefited as well. Those against suffered,
Sounds like a working , socialism to me.
To suggestion society in general can't work like this...is a fatalist attitude.

Your time in the military was apparently lost on you, as you obviously never quite grasped the concept. You talk about it making your point, when in fact it refutes the lazy socialism or whatever you wish to call it that you affect.

Soldiers in a volunteer army, by definition, choose to accept those rules - and the consequences that accompany those rules. Not just the QR&O's, but the consequences that will be provided by your peers. When it gets too hard and you cry for your Mommy, then you get out. If you're unmotivated and lazy, you'll be driven out, one way or the other. Not working and risking just as much as everybody else has serious, immediate consequences to correct that failure and lack of motivation (and you think it is fatalistic to think society can't work this way, right?). But those who remain are self selecting, and participants in the socialism of the military by choice.

You might be able to argue rather lamely that socialism doesn't breed laziness - although considering the increasingly documented generational nature of welfare recipients, that will be an epic fail. But there is absolutely no doubt that socialism in our society protects and encourages the lame and lazy, however you choose to argue they got that way. Where are the extras for the loser on welfare spending his days playing b-ball and hanging with his homies instead of knocking on doors looking for a job?

And that is indeed human nature - there will always be those in life satisfied with somebody providing for them, or accepting the status quo rather than deciding to put in the effort to make something of themselves. Some are even what we call "militia bums", and I suspect you have met a few.

We come again to the point that the vast majority of refugees who arrive on this continent come with little more than the shirt on their back and unable to speak any of the common languages here. And the great majority of them then proceed to make a success of themselves in our society - out of nothing. We like to focus on the criminals, and those who do abuse the system, but the fact of the matter is most become achievers and successful in fairly short order.

And yet, the millions of home grown "poor" who won't get off their ass to do anything to improve their lot... well, somehow or other they are victims. They were more discriminated against than refugees. Had less opportunities than refugees. Had less education opportunities than refugees. The banksters and the evil capitalists took unfair advantage of them but not the refugees. The teacher didn't like them but liked the refugees. The military wouldn't give them a job because they were from the ghetto. The oil patch wouldn't hire them because they were from the ghetto. Whatever. Somebody or some thing was always screwing them around so they couldn't work their way up like all those refugees do.

No, the majority of refugees can succeed, but our home grown failures, well, it's just not their fault.

You may remember this from your military days: "What color is the sky in your world, anyways?"

Quote :

If I have a choice, I pick the real fight, for society....my experience as a soldier has made it ok to accept the needs of others before my own....dismiss that as lazy socialism if you like.

There is a rather large difference in deciding to do something by personal choice, particularly for others willing to sacrifice just as much for you, and having somebody ram something down your throat that you don't want. Such as the majority of Americans who very clearly DON'T want Obamacare in the first place. One would think that difference is glaringly obvious.

Which of course doesn't even get to the issue if the socialism will actually produce the good it claims it will in the first place. Anybody want to pitch in another trillion in debt for "shovel ready jobs" and promises that government spending will stop the unemployment rate from going above 8%?

Quote :

...And you must realize, that the best player on the team...doesn't, necessarily make the best coach...rather that is a rarity, and jem if found.

Not so you've probably noticed, as clearly you haven't, but the US was founded on the principle of the individual, not some sort of team thing. And it ran pretty good that way until government started screwing with that concept in the early 1900's. Now we have a 'team" of Social Security, Medicare, etc which are little more than Ponzi schemes, for which we would throw private individuals in jail if they were running them as a business, on the verge of collapse for unsecured liabilities, where nearly every person in America (including the illegal immigrants who don't pay income tax toward them) would have to buck up nearly $200,000 today just to have them at break even tomorrow.

That's the wages of socialism. It's also reality, although I realize you somehow or other think it's 'bovine scatology' while you traipse along believing society can function like the military.

Quote :

You seem like a nice guy , overall, to me...no doubt a good soldier...but your mastery of Bovine Scatology, leaves me shaking my head.

That's okay. Your childish belief that society functions like an infantry section of self-chosen individuals is surely comforting to you. And you can probably take comfort in the theory that ignorance is bliss. That kind of youthful naivety kind of leaves me wondering what the possibility is that I have field kit that's older than you.

Quote :

I'll leave you with a Buddhist quote I read today...
"To satisfy ones wants , will not make them happy...
...to satisfy ones needs, will make them happy"

You missed the one far more directed towards the current topic of the nanny state and socialists (closet, lazy sort or otherwise). Here troop, let me help you with that oversight:

"Work out your own salvation. Do not depend on others... To be idle is a short road to death and to be diligent is a way of life; foolish people are idle, wise people are diligent."

Courtesy of my wife - a Quaker, raised in a Buddhist home, sliding back towards Buddhism. How does that quote work for ya?