And we have Bush, the Religious Right and Fox News to thank for this. Way to go, guys!
Americans have grown more concerned about the gap between rich and poor. Support for the social safety net has grown too, while our military appetite has shrunk, according to a recent Pew survey of public opinion.
More Americans agree with the assessment that “today it’s really true that the rich just get richer while the poor get poorer.” Today, 73% feel that way, up from 65% five years ago.
It follows that more of us believe the government should take care of people who can’t take care of themselves. Fifty-four percent of Americans say the government should help more needy people, even if it adds to the national debt, compared to just 41 percent in 1994.
Just five years ago, 43 percent of of us identified as Republicans, and same for Democrats. Now 35 percent identify as Republicans, and half the country as Democrats.
In other words:
Americans are getting in touch with reality.
32,
NOW you know why MOST of us are Pissed at the gov.
We cant figure out WHO is WHO…or What they might do..
The Labels fell off..
From dictionary.com, there are many definitions of liberal:
1. favorable to progress or reform, as in political or religious affairs.
2. (often initial capital letter) noting or pertaining to a political party advocating measures of progressive political reform.
3. of, pertaining to, based on, or advocating liberalism.
4. favorable to or in accord with concepts of maximum individual freedom possible, esp. as guaranteed by law and secured by governmental protection of civil liberties.
5. favoring or permitting freedom of action, esp. with respect to matters of personal belief or expression: a liberal policy toward dissident artists and writers.
6. of or pertaining to representational forms of government rather than aristocracies and monarchies.
7. free from prejudice or bigotry; tolerant: a liberal attitude toward foreigners.
8. open-minded or tolerant, esp. free of or not bound by traditional or conventional ideas, values, etc.
9. characterized by generosity and willingness to give in large amounts: a liberal donor.
10. given freely or abundantly; generous: a liberal donation.
11. not strict or rigorous; free; not literal: a liberal interpretation of a rule.
12. of, pertaining to, or based on the liberal arts.
13. of, pertaining to, or befitting a freeman.
–noun
14. a person of liberal principles or views, esp. in politics or religion.
15. (often initial capital letter) a member of a liberal party in politics, esp. of the Liberal party in Great Britain.
And, yes, I’m familiar with wikipedia. Here’s their first paragraph on modern American liberalism:
Modern liberalism in the United States is a form of liberalism that began in the United States in the last years of the 19th century and the early years of the 20th century. Arthur Schlesinger, Jr. described it by saying, “there emerged the conception of a social welfare state, in which the national government had the express obligation to maintain high levels of employment in the economy, to supervise standards of life and labor, to regulate the methods of business competition, and to establish comprehensive patterns of social security.
So I guess that I’m a modern American liberal, now that I know there are so many flavors.
Uncle Dave you’d look very liberated in your new undies….congratulations.
What’s interesting to me is how “Liberal vs Conservative” is use to define so very much of what we do, how we think, how we organize ourselves, how we self identify, etc.
As a Christian, it bugs me that “liberal vs conservative” has totally reshaped the church. No matter that there really is not basis for such a division either in the scriptures nor church tradition.
Still, almost every Christian and every church identifies breaks along these lines. I actually think it’s a kind of ecclesiological heresy.
#26
> If it meant 70% of my taxes and I paid no other taxes,
> sales, real estate, state, local, etc., which pretty much
> come close to that now, yes.
#26
> If it meant 70% of my taxes and I paid no other taxes,
> sales, real estate, state, local, etc., which pretty much
> come close to that now, yes.
That’s just it. It would not be in lieu of those other taxes, it would be *in addition* to those other taxes. Over the past five years or so, I have paid anywhere from 50% to 60% of my income to taxes or things to reduce my tax liability not including mortgage interest. So, it is not much of stretch to think that it might jump to 70% should they institute universal health care.
> Did you know that for that THOROUGHLY RIDICULOUS price that
> we already pay, we get, BY FAR, the worst health care of
> ANY developed democratic nation?
Bullshit. Proof? I suspect you are going to play with the term “developed democratic nation” and then the metrics by which you determine best.
If you want universal health care, why does it have to be Federal? Let the States institute it and let’s see how it works out.
RE: Liberalism
Primarily the reason this term is so maligned is that it is often associated with the doomed concepts of economic and political collectivism. In that respect, it deserves all the ill-will it has earned. However, I think most would defend it in terms of its social implications of encouraging open exchange of ideas and individual freedom and protect of individual rights.
I get the sense that there is a growing group of people such as myself that consider themselves fiscally and politcally conservative but socially liberal. That puts them at odds with both the Democrats (whom I consider fiscally and politicially collectivist but socially liberal) and the Republicans (who *were* traditionally fiscally and politically conservative but socially conservative as well).
That’s just it. It would not be in lieu of those other taxes, it would be *in addition* to those other taxes. Over the past five years or so, I have paid anywhere from 50% to 60% of my income to taxes or things to reduce my tax liability not including mortgage interest. So, it is not much of stretch to think that it might jump to 70% should they institute universal health care.
> Did you know that for that THOROUGHLY RIDICULOUS price that
> we already pay, we get, BY FAR, the worst health care of
> ANY developed democratic nation?
Bullshit. Proof? I suspect you are going to play with the term “developed democratic nation” and then the metrics by which you determine best.
If you want universal health care, why does it have to be Federal? Let the States institute it and let’s see how it works out.
RE: Liberalism
Primarily the reason this term is so maligned is that it is often associated with the doomed concepts of economic and political collectivism. In that respect, it deserves all the ill-will it has earned. However, I think most would defend it in terms of its social implications of encouraging open exchange of ideas and individual freedom and protect of individual rights. Thus, this is the reason there is a growing
Damn paste button…
#40 – Thomas,
You pick the nation you consider developed and democratic and worse off than ours. I’ll get the statistics on where they fit and where we fit in terms of both life expectency and infant mortality. I should also be able to find percentage GDP on health care. But, since I got that in a focus group on public funding of health care, it may be tougher to find.
Be honest though about developed and democratic. If you make a reasonable call, I think the comparison will make us look bad.
As for in addition to the 70%, please cite a nation that pays that and pays other significant taxes. And cite a real source too.
RE: Infant Mortality
42 USA (6.5/1000)
43 Croatia (applying for EU membership) (6.84/1000)
44 Lithuania (EU member) (6.89/1000)
46 Israel (7.03/1000)
49 Cyprus (EU member) (7.18/1000)
51 Poland (EU member) (7.36/1000)
61 Hungary (EU member) (8.57/1000)
Furthermore, we should question what we consider to be a significant difference. The difference between the US and the UK is only 1.34/1000 even though our health care system is supposedly totally broken. The difference between the US and France (ranked 12th) is only 2.24 deaths per 1000 yet France has 1/10 our GDP but only 1/5 our population (i.e. we’d expect that they’d have twice their GDP given their population as compared to the US).
RE: Life Expectancy
A cursory look as the above mentioned EU countries are ranked below the US. Yet, the more imporant statistic to look at is the actual numbers. The US is ranked by entity (as opposed to by soverign state) at 48th at 77.85 years. The UK (proper) is ranked 38th at 78.54 and France is ranked 16th at 79.73. That’s a whopping difference of just under two years…at near eighty. Yet again, France and England tax their populations substantially more to pay for that health care and our system is supposedly totally broken and yet there really is not much difference to show for it.
RE: Tax rate
I did not find anything specific in terms of tax rates as calculating them appears to be a challenge across countries (and even States). I do know this. For myself, in the past five years I have typically lost 45-60% of my income due to taxes or tax reduction expenditures. That of course does not include health care costs. Thus, factoring the government bullshit factor, it is not much of a stretch (in fact it is likely way too optimistic) to think that my tax liability would go up by 10%-12% in order to support universal health care (probably more like 20%). Oh and I have to deal with another government bureaucracy.
Like I said, if you want universal health care and you think it would be so great, vote for it in your State. There is no reason to make it Federal. Let’s see how it works on a small scale and then decide whether it makes sense to expand it to other States.
Thomas,
Your infant mortality rates make my point far better than yours. Going with your numbers, 6.5/1000 for the U.S. and (6.5 – 1.34)/1000 or 5.16/100 for U.K. and (6.5 – 2.24)/1000 or 4.26/1000 for France. These differences are enormous!
(1.34 / 5.16) * 100 = 25.97 % higher infant mortality in the U.S. vs U.K.
(2.24 / 4.26) * 100 = 52.58 % higher infant mortality in the U.S. vs France.
So, yeah, I’ll vote for this at the state or federal level. I’m glad to see though that we still beat some of the eastern European countries. I believe if you check say mutual funds for these countries or for central and eastern Europe, you’ll likely find them labeled as emerging markets, fitting my definition of non-developed nations.
I did notice one nation that we beat that I would consider both developed and democratic, Israel. I’m surprised they are so low on the list, especially for infant mortality. I’d expect terrorism and war to be keeping their life expectancy low. But still, I’ll concede that you found a single developed democratic nation that we beat.
I’m surprised you didn’t paste in a few of the countries that just barely edged us out, Taiwan, Cuba, South Korea, The Faeroe Islands, then finally the lowest ranking western European nation Italy.
As I expect, you did not understand. You are getting lost in the percentages and rankings and not looking at the actual numbers. 1.3 additional deaths per 1000 is tiny difference. Considering you think the US health care is broken and the UK is not (hah), you would think the difference deaths (not percentages) would be huge (10, 20, 100 more deaths per 1000) and yet it is not.
Similarly with life expectancy, the actual difference is a few years after 75 plus years of life.
Thomas,
Here is why percentage matters more than the number 1.3.
The U.S. had 4,089,950 live births in 2003. If we had the U.K. infant mortality rate, we would have had approximately 21,100 infant deaths. However, at our rate, we had approximately 26,580 infant deaths, a difference of 5,480 dead babies that should have lived.
So, privatized health care in the U.S. cost the lives of 5,480 babies in 2003 compared to the care given in the U.K.
And, I would remind you that the U.K. spends about 6% of their GDP on health care while we spend 15% of our GDP on health care. So, we pay two and a half times what they pay and our babies die more often.
When you read statistics, you can NEVER read the absolute numbers without considering the percentages. When a statistic is given in single digits, single digit differences are truly enormous.
The 5480 babies represent .000182% of the population. You are quibbling over an infinitesimally tiny numbers. More people are killed in automobile accidents per year than that. The difference in quality of health care between the major countries of the world is too small to argue any substantive difference.
Beyond the obvious lies, damn lies and statistics, you cannot look at percentages in a vacuum. The difference in GDP represents trillions of dollars. The difference in life expectancy represents only a few years over the span of 75. For example, if we were to look at percentages alone on infant mortality, then France’s record (ranked 12th with 4.26/1000) is horribly abysmal compared to that of Singapore (ranked 1st at 2.10/1000). France has twice as many infant deaths. Yet, in comparison to France’s population, that is ridiculously small and not even worth discussing.
We both agree that health care cost is an issue. Where we definitely disagree is the solution. IMO, the only type of solution acceptable is one that provides for freedom of choice, mitigates or eliminates the need for a government bureaucracy and puts the power back in the hands of the people while lowering their health care costs. The more a solution can leverage the market system while controlling the obvious and current market abuses the better.
Thomas,
I really think we’ll have to agree to disagree on this. I think 5480 babies that could have been saved while cutting our health care bill to 40% of its current total, which you claim is trillions, but is probably only billions, is very significant. Lies, damn lies, and statistics? Perhaps, but they’re lives that are being lost because of a way of thinking that chooses to ignore the facts about health care.
And, as I said, I was comparing to all other democratic developed nations. So, it’s true, we are only the second worst, since you successfully showed that Israel is worst.
But, every other nation that fits my description has nationalized health care. We, on the other hand, deny care to the poor and working class poor in our country everyday.
If this does not bother you, perhaps you have no morals.
As I said, we both agree *something* should be done. Where we disagree is the form of the solution. If “universal health care” takes the form of a huge government bureaucracy, then I most definitely do not accept that there will be a magic 40% drop in our health care costs when it is established. On the contrary, I would expect a substantial drop in GDP which dramatically *increase* the percentage of GDP that goes toward health care costs.
Frankly, the government has quite enough money and power. If they want to establish universal health care, then let them do it with the resources they have. If they can pull *that* off then more power to them.
As I said, if you want universal health care, then have your State institute it and *demostrate* to the rest of us that it can be done successfully in this country. I would much rather have 50 different but cooperative health care systems than one large monolithic beast.
I hope you have a way to guarantee health care for people that work in one state and live in another, as is common in the Tri-State area around New York City.
No, I don’t think it will be magic to reduce the costs. We’ve had years of corporations involved in health care getting greedier and greedier. It’s going to be difficult to turn around the trend that began when we failed to recognize a need that was recognized by all of those other countries years ago.
If you say you’re too afraid to try something new, you are also saying that you are so fearful of action that you are willing to maintain our despicable status quo where the poor are allowed to die of easily treatable conditions.
If you say you are too afraid to try something new, you are also saying you are OK with the way costs have been skyrocketing in this country for the last several decades.
I say this must stop. We have examples that work. Let’s pick a country similar to ours with better and cheaper care and come up with a model based on that.
> I say this must stop. We have examples that work. Let’s
> pick a country similar to ours with better and cheaper care
> and come up with a model based on that.
In addition, I would say pick a State and implement it there. Keep in mind that other countries (e.g. UK and France) have to deal with people that work in one country but live in another but have different health care systems. It should be no different for people that live in different States.
I’m not afraid to try something new. I’m afraid of giving a huge amount of power to the Federal government for something that may not work. That would put us in a far worse position than we are now. The smart way to handle this is have a few States implement a version of universal health care for their citizens and see how it works. We may find there are better ways of dealing with it than the European countries.