Canuck selling out Canada's Health Care on Fox News

[Smallc]

We also need governments to get out of the business of running hospitals and focus entirely on providing health care coverage.

The government doesn't run hospitals. They provide funding. Hospitals are charitable organizations.

[Radsickle]

Ignatieff's right; where was the Canadian Government while this twit spread her crap? Harper won't stick up for Canadian Health Care because he wants to dismantle it.

[Michael Hardner]

bush_cheney:

I keep reading you refer to your 'choice' of healthcare insurance. I don't see it that way.

I don't think the government should give you the freedom to make certain bad choices. There doesn't seem to be a lot of opposition to banning dangerous activities, or drugs. Why should the government let you 'opt out' of a healthcare program ? I don't like the idea of allowing people to make that choice. It creates a class of miserable and disadvantaged people, that I can't ignore.

Also.

I don't think that we're thinking enough about 'public' versus 'private' healthcare. We need to open up public healthcare so that the decisions and performance of public institutions can be scrutinized. The Canadian system currently has private involvement everywhere, so let's stop arguing about encroachment and start trying new approaches.

[Bonam]

I don't think the government should give you the freedom to make certain bad choices.

The only choices a government should prevent its citizens from making are those that would infringe upon the freedoms and safety of others. People should be allowed to do whatever they want with themselves.

[Radsickle]

The only choices a government should prevent its citizens from making are those that would infringe upon the freedoms and safety of others. People should be allowed to do whatever they want with themselves.

Sure, until they threaten Canadian Health Care. Then they start to threaten the freedom and safety of other Canadians. Then, they should be kicked out of the country or put to sleep.

At least told that their Mayo Clinic Bill will NOT be covered by the Canadian Tax Payer.

Edited July 24, 2009 by Radsickle

[Bonam]

Sure, until they threaten Canadian Health Care. Then they start to threaten the freedom and safety of other Canadians. Then, they should be kicked out of the country or put to sleep.

"Canadian Health Care" is not threatened by people speaking out harshly against the flaws within it. Any good, adaptable system is strengthened by criticism and the review and improvement that can take place based on it. Our system is also not threatened by the continued adoption of more private health care possibilities, they just provide some extra competition and more options for Canadians.

[Michael Hardner]

The only choices a government should prevent its citizens from making are those that would infringe upon the freedoms and safety of others. People should be allowed to do whatever they want with themselves.

Bonam - that sounds great as a philosophical idea, but practically it doesn't work that way - not even in the US.

People get to decide what their society looks like, and that also means constantly infringing on the freedom and safety of others.

[Radsickle]

"Canadian Health Care" is not threatened by people speaking out harshly against the flaws within it. Any good, adaptable system is strengthened by criticism and the review and improvement that can take place based on it. Our system is also not threatened by the continued adoption of more private health care possibilities, they just provide some extra competition and more options for Canadians.

You are a cog in the wheel. `More options' has always been the mantra of the private marketeers. "Private Health Care Possibilities" is a euphimism for "we're gonna rape you".

[Bonam]

You are a cog in the wheel. `More options' has always been the mantra of the private marketeers. "Private Health Care Possibilities" is a euphimism for "we're gonna rape you".

I'm sorry to inform you but the "private marketeers" are the cornerstone of how our entire economic system works.

[bush_cheney2004]

I don't think the government should give you the freedom to make certain bad choices. There doesn't seem to be a lot of opposition to banning dangerous activities, or drugs. Why should the government let you 'opt out' of a healthcare program ? I don't like the idea of allowing people to make that choice. It creates a class of miserable and disadvantaged people, that I can't ignore.

What you are proposing is antithetical to the very core of what it means to be "American". The US Congress is loathe to mandate required medical insurance because of the constitutional sea change that would represent. Massachusetts has gone this route at the state level, with some unintended consequences mostly involving costs. Few think that it can be criminalized, so pressure is created with taxes and surcharges.

I don't think that we're thinking enough about 'public' versus 'private' healthcare. We need to open up public healthcare so that the decisions and performance of public institutions can be scrutinized. The Canadian system currently has private involvement everywhere, so let's stop arguing about encroachment and start trying new approaches.

Correct....Canada already has a robust private health care system, including fee-for-service. Pretending that isn't the case is for the political ostriches. Are private schools also shunned as "anti-Canadian"?

[bush_cheney2004]

I'm sorry to inform you but the "private marketeers" are the cornerstone of how our entire economic system works.

Spot on....some people think that paying the bill is the same as providing health care services.

[Michael Hardner]

bush_cheney

What you are proposing is antithetical to the very core of what it means to be "American". The US Congress is loathe to mandate required medical insurance because of the constitutional sea change that would represent. Massachusetts has gone this route at the state level, with some unintended consequences mostly involving costs. Few think that it can be criminalized, so pressure is created with taxes and surcharges.

Ok, so your argument against my point is that "publicly supported healthcare isn't American" ?

I think that's true, given that the US is the only developed country that doesn't provide a healthcare system to all its citizens, but it doesn't strike me as an argument per sé. Times change, and countries need to change too.

The America of today would be unrecognizable to the founding fathers, but that's no rationale for the status quo.

[Machjo]

This is the problem with Canada: it has too many sacred cows, too many taboos not to be discussed. If you oppose socialized health care, you're accused of treason, of 'un-Canadian acts', of being a pawn of reich wing fascists, etc.

If you oppose official bilingualism, you're either a Francophone anti-English bigot or an Anglophone anti-French bigot or, if bilingual yourself, then some rabid libertarian.

If you oppose...

I'm sure you the picture. Just too many taboos, and so every election, politicians stick to the mundane and superficial debates to avoid ridicule.

[bush_cheney2004]

Ok, so your argument against my point is that "publicly supported healthcare isn't American" ?

I think that's true, given that the US is the only developed country that doesn't provide a healthcare system to all its citizens, but it doesn't strike me as an argument per sé. Times change, and countries need to change too.

Yes and no....the US has "public" healthcare insurance for many millions of its citizens (age 65 and over, disabled, veterans, children, vulnerable adults, etc.). But the idea of providing a new entitlement to able bodied individuals runs up against attitudes going back to Roosevelt and being on the "dole". Health care insurance is delivered by employers as a direct outgrowth of the labor movement and WW2 price controls. So as you have noted, there are specific reasons why the US has not joined the "free" universal healthcare party.

The US has a complex combination of public and private fee-for-service system of delivery with excess capacity. Canadian provinces take advantage of this on a routine basis, as do Canadian trained medical professionals seeking higher pay and more opportunities for specialization. Co-opting the system for a common denominator of universal coverage and access would have both positive and negative impacts from a provider and consumer perspective; resistance is rooted in the fear of losing what we know for an unknown scenario that we don't know....namely, the rationing of care unrelated to the ability to pay.

The America of today would be unrecognizable to the founding fathers, but that's no rationale for the status quo.

Some of the fundamentals remain unchanged. Forcing citizens to buy health care insurance is different from car insurance....you don't have to drive a motor vehicle (even then, many remain uninsured). The young and healthy are keenly aware that they would be subsidizing such a "free" system with little in return. There is no strong "social contract" in America for health care ...that could develop over time, but doesn't exist today. As in education, the ability to pay (city tax base or personal income)...matters.

[bush_cheney2004]

This is the problem with Canada: it has too many sacred cows, too many taboos not to be discussed. If you oppose socialized health care, you're accused of treason, of 'un-Canadian acts', of being a pawn of reich wing fascists, etc.

OK...so how did Canada transition to such an attitude nationally? How did notions from Tommy Douglas (and others) take hold and overcome strong oppostion from doctor's groups and consumers?

How did universal health care become "sacred"?

Edited July 24, 2009 by bush_cheney2004

[M.Dancer]

How did notions from Tommy Douglas (and others) take hold and overcome strong oppostion from doctor's groups and consumers?

Sound arguments and the promise they would no longer be paid in chickens and hogs..

How did universal health care become "sacred"?

Time.

Sort of like for a well organized militia to bear arms became the right for the individual to bear arms.

[Machjo]

OK...so how did Canada transition to such an attitude nationally? How did notions from Tommy Douglas (and others) take hold and overcome strong oppostion from doctor's groups and consumers?

How did universal health care become "sacred"?

First off, I'd just like to clarify that I'm not necessarily opposed to socialized healthcare; what I'm mainly opposed to is the way many of its proponents defend it not through facts but through demaning the opposition labelling it unpatriotic and such. Just ridiculous. Government policy should be based on ethical and scientific considerations, not on the fear of being labelled unpatriotic.

Now as to your questions, I don't know the answers honestly.

[bush_cheney2004]

...Now as to your questions, I don't know the answers honestly.

Understood, but I suspect that the political process embraced universal access over any consideration for cost or effectiveness. So it became the "third rail" in Canadian politics. Then the reality of paying for and delivering services had to catch up.

[Machjo]

Sound arguments and the promise they would no longer be paid in chickens and hogs..

Time.

Sort of like for a well organized militia to bear arms became the right for the individual to bear arms.

Good points. I think many people are blind followers of tradition. As such, they'll follow tradition uncritically. Only the more critical-minded will generally support change, especially significant or radical change.

Looking at it that way, it's reasonable to suppose that, in the beginning, the pro-medicare group consisted mainly of the more critically-minded type, willing to forego tradition based on sound ethical and scientific arguments; whereas the opposition would likely have been divided between the 'anti-medicare' group, (comprising mainly of unthinking traditionalist sheep who could do nothing but spew insults and slogans at the opposition) and the pro private health care group (comprising those who wanted to keep the system of the time not on blind traditionalist grounds, but rather based on critical consideration of certain ethical and scientific issues of their own).

We could say the situation, now that medicare has become the tradition, is now reversed, with the tro critical-minded groups still existing and left unchanged, but the traditionalist group now having shifted from being anti-medicare to being anti-private health care. You'll notice that while the critically-minded groups are pro something, the sheep are just anti-something, not really knowing why they're against it other than it's 'unpatriotic', 'unCanadian', 'treasonous', etc. In taht last respect, we could say that even the blind traditionalist group hasn't changed either in terms of the blind and baseless rhetoric it's likely to use.

In the US, we're likely to find a situation more like in Tommy Douglas' time (i.e. with the blind sheep being on the anti-medicare side), while in Canada the sheep are now on the anti-capitalist healthcare side.

In the end though, whatever decision is made, I hope the politicians ignore the sheep (even if they are the majority) and focus on the two mroe critically-minded groups that can actually come up with sound arguments without turning to 'patriotic' insults, making it into a sacred cow.

[bush_cheney2004]

...In the US, we're likely to find a situation more like in Tommy Douglas' time (i.e. with the blind sheep being on the anti-medicare side), while in Canada the sheep are now on the anti-capitalist healthcare side.

Very true....the US considered and rejected such an approach going back to 1945 (President Truman). Even Social Security and Medicare faced an uphill battle in the 1960's (Great Society programs). Now they will strangle the US federal budget to death.

[Machjo]

By the way, even the title of the thread suggests the sheep category:

Canuck selling out Canada's Health Care on Fox News.

Canuck: Why is that relevent? An idea is an idea regardless who expresses it. Throwing in the word Canuck is intended to suggest that it's not very Canuckish of one to hold this or that particular view.

Sell out: She said she took no money for this, so what did she sell exactly? It would seem to me that if no money was involved, it must have come from a more sincerely felt 'un-Canukish' desire on her part to express what she really believed in.

And just to throw a litlte more rehtoric to the flames, let's emphasize that it was on the dreated, Anti-Canadian Fox News that criticized the Canadian military not long ago. Hey, that association should shoot her down.

After all, if we can't argue logically, let's just spew out venom instead.

To be fair though, I'm sure many American sheep are using the same tactics to undermine socialized health care in teh US, suggesting it's 'un-American', or some other diatribe of the sort, instead of actually coming up with reasonable, coherent and relevent arguments.

[Machjo]

Very true....the US considered and rejected such an approach going back to 1945 (President Truman). Even Social Security and Medicare faced an uphill battle in the 1960's (Great Society programs). Now they will strangle the US federal budget to death.

True. I dont care whether the US accepts medicare or not. All I'm saying is that either way, they shouldn't make the decision on stupid arguments like 'it's anti-Amreican', or 'un-American', or 'unpatriotic', or thatit's a commie bastard idea, etc., and instead make it, either way, on rational grounds and cut out the rhetoric. I'm sure both sides are just as bad, just with the shoe on the other foot as far as the cow-worshiping sheep go.

[bush_cheney2004]

True. I dont care whether the US accepts medicare or not. All I'm saying is that either way, they shouldn't make the decision on stupid arguments like 'it's anti-Amreican', or 'un-American', or 'unpatriotic', or thatit's a commie bastard idea, etc., and instead make it, either way, on rational grounds and cut out the rhetoric. I'm sure both sides are just as bad, just with the shoe on the other foot as far as the cow-worshiping sheep go.

But that doesn't make for a great ratings share and more ad revenue. The hyperbole is all part of the game. Taken to the rational limit, all but hospice care would be denied to the very elderly or terminally ill. We wouldn't waste precious resources in such an unbalanced way so late in life. But you know how well that would go over.

[Radsickle]

How did notions from Tommy Douglas (and others) take hold and overcome strong oppostion from doctor's groups and consumers?

How did universal health care become "sacred"?

What "strong" opposition? Which consumers disliked the idea of taxpayer-funded health care?

[Michael Hardner]

bush_cheney

QUOTE (Michael Hardner @ Jul 24 2009, 06:24 AM) *

Ok, so your argument against my point is that "publicly supported healthcare isn't American" ?

I think that's true, given that the US is the only developed country that doesn't provide a healthcare system to all its citizens, but it doesn't strike me as an argument per sé. Times change, and countries need to change too.

Yes and no....the US has "public" healthcare insurance for many millions of its citizens (age 65 and over, disabled, veterans, children, vulnerable adults, etc.). But the idea of providing a new entitlement to able bodied individuals runs up against attitudes going back to Roosevelt and being on the "dole". Health care insurance is delivered by employers as a direct outgrowth of the labor movement and WW2 price controls. So as you have noted, there are specific reasons why the US has not joined the "free" universal healthcare party.

The US has a complex combination of public and private fee-for-service system of delivery with excess capacity. Canadian provinces take advantage of this on a routine basis, as do Canadian trained medical professionals seeking higher pay and more opportunities for specialization. Co-opting the system for a common denominator of universal coverage and access would have both positive and negative impacts from a provider and consumer perspective; resistance is rooted in the fear of losing what we know for an unknown scenario that we don't know....namely, the rationing of care unrelated to the ability to pay.

There's no way that the US would go for a purely public model as Canada has.

Is there room, in your opinion, for government to top up coverage for uncovered Americans ? Surely the richest nation on earth can afford to help its poorest citizens ?

Some of the fundamentals remain unchanged. Forcing citizens to buy health care insurance is different from car insurance....you don't have to drive a motor vehicle (even then, many remain uninsured). The young and healthy are keenly aware that they would be subsidizing such a "free" system with little in return. There is no strong "social contract" in America for health care ...that could develop over time, but doesn't exist today. As in education, the ability to pay (city tax base or personal income)...matters.

The young may get little in the short term, but luckily they age - and they have no choice in the matter. I do appreciate the fact that America offers the most choices to people, however some of these choices are dumber than others and people do need to be protected from abuse - not just physical abuse such as assault but economic abuse as well.

The fundamentals remain unchanged, but we can afford to give the country more than we could 250 years ago - when a great percentage of the workforce was engaged in food production and day-to-day subsistence was more difficult.