Comments

Eddie: talik_1@bellsouth.net

It is amazing everyone claims to know everything about Obama,but yet insists there is so much unknown about him.This is just a racist agenda to under mine Obama,because the only comfort you white boys had was knowing that you had more priviledges in America.You are afraid of Americans being treated equally and proving that blacks are not inferior to whites.6585

Jim Pakala: jim.pakala@covenantseminary.edu

I'm a Lincoln and "T.R." Republican abandoned by my party and embarrassed by its incompetence in everything from FEMA to the FAA. Obama is very appealing as an intelligent, charismatic, and evidently Christian leader, but the challenges any new President will face are incredible. Trinity UCC in Chicago saves souls and meets diverse physical needs, neither of which generally characterize the liberal white UCC, which has a membership with the oldest average age among major American denominations.

James White: jpwwhite@gmail.com

If you are after equality you might just be better off creating jobs rather than worrying about how to inefficiently re-allocate taxes through tax. Australia has just ended ten years of government by a market conservative government focused on jobs. The creation of jobs has led to a significant slowdown in the rate of growth for inequality. Taxes and transfers fail to make a real impact on the people that have it toughest; the long term unemployed. Raise them into jobs and inequality starts to trend in the right direction. Providing tax benefits and improving the relative earnings of low-income workers does less as it discourages these workers to continually upgrade skills and so their contribution to the economy.
Providing incentives for people to gain more skills, particularly lower marginal tax rates, is good policy. It creates jobs.

jim biles: jimbiles@verizon.net

Obama's "cure" for all the country's problems is based on Class warfare. This has been the Democratic "modus operandi" for the last 15 or more years and hasn't worked yet; it's right out of the Karl Marx "playbook'. How can you base your platform on this type of thinking and exclude certain groups of American society, especially "the average white person". All he will cause is division. His progarms are based on "hope". Really not a bad concept but as Aristotle stated, "Hope is a walking dream". He has no experience and is unrealsitic in his methodology. Once as someone else stated, the "vanilla veneer is removed" we will see what he really stands for. The recent episode involving Reverend Wright is only the beginning of loading up the baggage that will bury Obama.

Clare Krishan: Clare.krishan@comcast.net

Goog thread traffic, Mr Bradley.

David, in your search for examples of "laissez-faire government that has truly been successful at raising the living standards for all of it's citizenry" may I point you to the

* private equity estates of the Physiocrats,

and a millenium or more of so-called "dark age" Christendom's

* monastic grange economies

neither of which were 'universal franchise democracies' in the modern sense and were not secure from statist depredations such as Henry VIII's dissolution and "redistribution of wealth by government at the hands of those who did not earn it" (to quote Mr Bradley's wisdom on "black liberation theology") which gave birth to the Episcopal Church I believe and many a main-line denomination that predate Mr Wright's Trinity Church of Christ.

May I direct others to Acton's other thread on this topic:
blog.acton.org/archives/2263-Anthony-Bradley-on-Headline-News.html#comments

(my comments seem to have been censored by moderator....)

Here they are again (tracing the labor theory of value inherent in Marx to the intellectual heritage of Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations and Calvin's divinization of labor):

"Smith really set back economic thought by injecting the purely British doctrine of the labor theory of value, thus throwing economics off the sound track for a hundred years. Here I might add that the labor theory of value has had many bad consequences. It, of course, paved the way, quite
logically, for Marx. Secondly, its emphasis on “costs determining prices” has encouraged the view that businessmen push up prices or that unions push up prices, rather than governmental inflation of the money supply."

from "Rothbard on Kauder"
http://www.mises.org/rothbard/RothbardOnKauder3.pdf
http://www.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/rothbard56.html

a critique of corruptions inherent in the Keynesian dirigisme we are experiencing with the Treasury's plan to hand "vast new authority to the Federal Reserve" (see today's www.nytimes.com/2008/03/30/business/30regulate.html?em&ex=1207022400&en=fdd8c4dcdee4a685&ei=5087)
Ask yourself, what danger poses the greater threat to the greater number of citizens? The Worshipful Company of Disadvantaged, Intellectually-deluded Urban-decay Chicagoans (and their guild brethren in Wright's birthplace of Philadelphia)

or

the elite (and very advantaged) NON_CITIZENS who own the capital that our Treasury has leveraged the collateral of our Nation's indebtedness to? There is no "liquidity crisis," it's a solvency crisis... caused by a chronic misappropriation of capital resources under severe distortions to the money supply powered by FIAT CURRENCY inflation of credit... a DEBASEMENT of real purchasing power and a criminal DESTRUCTION [*] of private WEALTH by our public institutions... (equity accumulated over a lifetime of prudent investment choices, in ignorance of the risk to the vaulted yet vulnerable "bottomline" our government arrogates to itself. As with Marx, it seems.

Profit is the State's to give, and the State's to take away.

Where the purported grand expansion of wealth creation we've been peddled by our politicians this past decade... ?
Flowing to whichever illiberal tax-free haven it can find... staffed by indigent migrant labor denied basic human rights of title to participate in the wealth they create by the sweat of their brow...

If we do not act to reform our financial systems (and the political ones they pay for) will soon resemble those of the United Arab Emirates... or the military industrial complex of Communist China...

[*] as de Soto's "Money, Bank Credit, and Economic Cycles" elucidates from 2,000 years of the West's common law and social practices at
www.mises.org/books/desoto.pdf

Stuart:

In reply to the prats who have complained about Great Britains' NHS scheme, how dare they complain! As a visitor to our country, they received first class medical treatment at cost to British people! Could we expect the same in the US? Hardly likely!! Also, British doctors are some of the most highly trained in the world and those who work within the NHS do so because they want to make a difference!!

As for the donut who complained about having to wait for an x-ray, I think you are either lying or not telling the full story!! I used to work within the NHS and I have never heard of someone having to wait 3 weeks for an x-ray!! I really do hope our government starts charging visitors to our country, it would be less drain and we wouldnt hear prats such as within this page whinging about it!!

Evelyn Montgomery: evelinamontgomery@hotmail.com

E.Montgomery-Columbus Georgia
I agee with this article. The bottom line is that Obama comes with a hefty price tag. People are treating him like the Messiah and they have let their emotions overtake their judgement. I do have to say that Obama's faith gives one an indication of his social and economic philosophy. His church has done (and is doing) good things for the community; however, his pastor (past and present)is keeping them in a state of victimization. It seems like the leadership wants to keep their congregation in a state of "angst" instead of focusing on the growth black people and other minorities have made and where they are going. Am I saying that racism no longer exists? Am I saying that social injustices no longer take place? No, what I am saying is that there comes a point in one's life when he needs to move ahead. I too am a minority (latino). I have experienced prejudice and I saw my father being treated (at times) as a second class citizen. He served in the United States army, served in Vietnam, and was awarded 3 bronze stars for bravery. Not once did my father complain or bad mouth white people. He showed me that I am an individual that could make it on my individuality, hard work, and commitment. I hold a BS degree in Mental Retardation and a master's in Community Psychology. I am presently a counselor in a Department of Defense School. I made it on my own merit and I didn't need anyone helping me by constantly bringing up the plight of Hispanics in America. No sense of entitlement here!

David Tehcnalp:

It amazes me how the right wing inflates rhetoric to extremes. Obama and Clinton both offer a health care plan that will ultimately lead to insuring the nearly 50 million of uninsured Americans who can not afford health care. So fearful of this prospect, Anthony B. Bradley equates it with the former Soviet Union, not Canada, Norway, Denmark, Iceland or any of the other industrialized Western Democracies. You see what he Bradley did here was to resurrect the old Red fear that worked so well for the McCarthyites for half of the last century.

As to the statement about tax cuts: "Obama will protect tax cuts for poor and middle class families, but he will reverse most of the Bush tax cuts for the wealthiest taxpayers." I fail to see the problem here. On CNBC's Closing Bell, Obama said, "we should go back to probably a top marginal rate of 39% -- what it was before the Bush tax cuts. So I would roll back those Bush tax cuts, I would not increase taxes for middle class Americans and in fact I want to provide a tax cut for people who are making $75,000 a year or less."

Obama also said that the capitol gains tax could be raised from the current 15% to 20% or 25% without distorting "economic decision making." This would effectively shrink the tax disparity between Warren Buffet and his secretary. As it is the middle class shoulder's a higher tax burden than the top 1%. Obama's proposal would soften that burden.

As to tying the minimum wage to inflation, this is long overdue. Not doing so is essentially lowering the minimum wage every year as the cost of good and services increase. And again, I fail to see the problem with this. The right wing would like everyone to believe that a mandatory minimum wage hurts small business. What they won't tell you is that removing the minimum wage or allowing it to be out-paced by inflation hurts American workers. It is truly the race to the bottom.

It is important to point out that this use of extreme rhetoric by Bradley and others is a tactic that hurts the overall debate and minimizes the discussion to a series of black and white, good versus bad memes. The truth is that the model employed by most Western Democracies has been largely successful at creating a strong middle class while establishing a safety net for those that slip through the cracks. The Bradley's and Kudlow's of the world have never been able to produce one example of a laissez-faire government that has truly been successful at raising the living standards for all of it's citizenry. Yet, they like to site former communist models as examples of nations that have failed to do so. Thus ignoring the Democratic successes of our very own allies.

Paul H. Michalak Sr.: michalak6020@hotmail.com

Martin, I also hope that McCain can match his rhetoric because that, more than anything, is what the masses are swayed by. One thing for sure though, is Obama will never match McCain's leadership. Barrack has postured as the instrument of change. Whether he stayed in his church for 20 years with the Rev. Wright or not, he had the obligation as a Senator to challenge what he heard- and in 20 years he did hear! Something like this would have been proper." Rev. Wright! I strongly disagree with several points in your sermon today and would like the opportunity to address the congregation after you are through." THAT would have been leadership. How is he ever going to effect change in a country of 300,000,000 with a Senate and House of Representatives with stronger personalities, more qualifications and partisan views when ,for 20 years , he was unable and or unwilling to change one man and one congregation?

Matt Fowler: docmattf@yahoo.com

For those who complain about the cost of health care, please realize that excellent care as available in the United States costs money. Money is required to develop new drugs. If there is no financial incentive, no new drugs will be developed. Money is required for medical infrastructure. The entire country of Canada owns the same number of MRI machines as the city of Seattle. Money is required to hire doctors, nurses, physical therapists, etc., and keep them motivated to do their jobs. Sure, many such people have compassion and enjoy their work, but they would also rather be at home with their families if it's not financially beneficial to provide medical care. So yes, our medical care is expensive. But you get an excellent product. Of course, there is inefficiency in the system, as with any human endeavor.

Handing control of any system over to the government will worsen the waste in that system. Politicians who do not understand medicine will make bad decisions, shunt money in wrong directions, place unreasonable restictions on providers, etc. How can you even imagine the government in charge of your health? They will handle it the same way they handle schools, roads, public buildings, taxes, auto licensing, etc., with massive inefficency. Think about any government program and you will know what public health care will be like.

By the way, we can't afford it anyway.

ktthegreat:

Obama's whole philosophy and manner of campaigning mimics Hitler's almost to a tee. He uses some of the same phrasology, definately they way he speaks to the masses, playing on their victimization mentality and his plans to fix a country are dead on Hitler 101. The people of Germany were in the same state of mind when he gave them his hope speeches. They followed him like cows to slaughter. The first thing Hitler and his Nazi's did when he got control over Germany was stamp out democracy and put socialism in place so he could have complete control over the people. Just like Obamamaniac wants to do should he get elected. His policies are completely against what living in a capitalistic free country means. Our forefathers are rolling over in their graves at his audacity to hope he can usurp our country.

Donna Santulli: dsantulli@comcast.net

Having been raised by a father in the military, I understand socialized medicine first hand. It was horrific. There were a number of times I was saved from severe illness, infection or worse by Gods Grace alone.

The FACT is that you are far more likely to die ( 30%) from a severe illness such as cancer in England than in the US.
This is true WHETHER OR NOT you have medical insurance. The stat counts the whole of the population.
So sorry, but NUMBERS don't lie.

I also agree on race issues. My father, who passed two years ago at the age of 90 was a brilliant man who overcame many obstacles to achieve more than I can begin to print here. Truly, enough for ten lifetimes.
He was born in 1916...a black man in the south. You can imagine the racism he encountered.
He fought in three wars, was a Jag lawyer, earned two Masters, Principal of an all black school, designed a state of the art grade school in an all white town while serving on the school board, was a strong community leader in that all white town until his death, prospered financially...leaving a large legacy to our mother, raised hundreds of thousands of dollars for Deborah Hospital, started the still flourishing civic association in our community, and on...and on....

NOT ONCE did I ever hear him speak disparagingly about white people. He had been hurt, of course...but he was not a victim.

I remember as a child making the long trip from New Jersey to visit my grandparents in North Carolina. We would have to pee in a jar in the back seat of our Buick as dad was afraid to have us use the restrooms past a certain point on the trip, or have to pull over if there were too many cars around. My mother was white, and my father was afraid. Black families had fewer problems than "mixed" families like us. He explained to us that not all white people were racist and not to blame the ones who were because it was something they learned as children. He said it wasn't their fault.
The "pee-pee jar" was kind of a game. I have never felt anything negative around that memory.

Have I encountered racism. Yes. But I have never been hurt by it emotionally. That I owe to my dad.

This is the TRUE crime behind "black liberation" theology. It doesn't "liberate" anyone. It amplifies hurts to bone shattering levels....so that all one can see, feel or taste is their own pain. It paralyzes destinies, wiping out entire regiments of black Christians. It is wholly carnal.

Josh Cole: coleje@hotmail.com

Mr. Gasque.
I have a feeling you have never really needed socialized health care. I'm an American working in the UK. A few weeks ago I developed a very painful and potentially dangerous injury. I saw three doctors who assigned me three different antibiotics even though I was clear that the issue was an injury not an infection. After weeks of arguing I was finally granted permission to change clinics. I saw a doctor who listened and scheduled me an x-ray. The x-ray was three weeks later. I was in agonizing pain for over two months because the "doctors" had no incentive to do their jobs. Had my injury resulted in a blood clot I would have died. I pray for anyone in this country with a serious illness because that is about all the help they will get. Socialized health care is no health care at all. These doctors are little more than school nurses. I cannot wait to get back to a country where health care means solving actual health problems, not just shuffling paperwork to conjure up the statistics to justify extortion style taxes.

Clare Krishan: Clare.krishan@comcast.net

For example, Obama's man recognizes how government spending on things like NASA R&D is detrimental to private investment

links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0002-8282(199805)88%3A2%3C298%3ADGRPMB%3E2.0.CO%3B2-D&size=SMALL&origin=JSTOR-reducePage

and, for a chuckle, consider monetary policy from the point of view of astronauts:

www.marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2008/03/trading-in-spac.html

(perhaps while reflecting on the foetus afloat in the womb, for whom monetary policy likewise is quite academic)

Clare Krishan: Clare.krishan@comcast.net

Which candidate is more the "personalist" than the "individualist"? Is the person and the philosophy of personalism more relevant to contemporary economic affairs than individual and the philosophy of individualism?
see Edward J. O'Boyle "Person: an economic agent for the electronic age" International Journal of Social Economics

Currently our economy is held ransom in a kind of thrall to "Hal" the Arthur C.Clarkian protagonist, an anonymous 'l'Ordinateur' deep in the bowels of Wall Street: prognosticating profits for those privileged to feed his GIGO (garbage in garbage out) ticker tape entrails...

and he's hungry: the global market in financial derivatives is __10-fold larger__ than the gross national product of the whole global economy as we know it ($516 trillion vs $50 trillion) is that flatulence from his indigestion we hear whistling through the skyscrapers in Gotham? Or is it a run on the banks as real people try to salvage their real livelihoods from the maul?

Clare Krishan: Clare.krishan@comcast.net

Austan Goolsbee (Obama's advisor) may got into hot water with the MSM on the populace's dissatisfaction with the economy (falsely attributed to NAFTA) but he seems to be favorable to an Austrian worldview:

chronicle.uchicago.edu/070215/opine.shtml

Considering the populist antipathy to perceived usury that led to such disastrous consequences under the Dritte Reich, we would perhaps do well to return and study Fr Dempsey:

http://brandon.multics.org/library/Stephen%20Long/long1996bernard.html

J. Ankrom:

Does a 'Commitment to the African community" imply that black Haitians aren't in need? Or are Haitian blacks considered African too?

Would someone please explain the 'christian' ideal of a usurious economy?

How is usury Christian?
How is fiat currency Christian?

On the other hand:
I get a kick out of people who justify violating Christian principle in the name of ethics and conscience.
Group theft is just as unethical as private theft.
Group enslavement of a segment of the economy is no different than enslaving individuals.
Coveting anything that is your neighbors would include his chosen profession.
You can no more command a doctor to provide services for a price determined by fiat than you can command a man with a mower to mow every yard in the neighborhood for a fiat price. There is no difference.
Naturally we should follow the Canadians and the Europeans.
They believe in Socialism. So did the National Socialist Party.
They also believe in the divine right of kings.
So what?

Clare Krishan: Clare.krishan@comcast.net

And if Citigroup's jeremiad is a tad too acserbic for you, consider that the "saviour" of BearStearns was already leveraged at DOUBLE that cliff-hanging rate af 40:1 last Fall before they were bribed by POTUS and the Fed to "buy" even more unstable debt, see

http://bp2.blogger.com/_H2DePAZe2gA/R9sT8yG-HKI/AAAAAAAAA7k/A-SlM2Kotng/s1600-h/OCCpg1.png

I suggest we proscribe remedial vocabulary studies for all, so that we may know what is meant what we hear (as Confuciius recognized 1,000 years before Christ) or read, as in "Heparin formulated with a less expensive ingredient." Would seem to mean a harmless substitution of one permissible ingredient (at a certain quality) for another permissible ingredient (of equivalent efficacy but perhaps weaker potency, a lower quality) ?

Not when the financial pages at Bloomberg want to prevent a rush on Baxter shares, the truth is a little more "shaded" shall we say!

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601124&sid=aa5q6q6T3xtE&refer=home

"The contaminant, oversulfated chondroitin sulfate, isn't approved for use in medicine, said Janet Woodcock, the head of the Food and Drug Administration's drug division, in a conference call today. Regulators are investigating whether the substance was intentionally or accidentally added to raw heparin from China. "

The moral hazard in global trade? Intentional or accidental merchandizing of a product not fit-for-purpose (ie containing unapproved substances) is FRAUD... but it would be politically incorrect to accuse the Chinese of such wanton disrespect for the truth, or their Western capitalist business partners as deceitful, right?

Especially when the privilege of insuring oneself to enjoy the benefits of the medicinal marketplace's monopolistic trade with China's cartel in heparin is a question of conservative morals, and a vote for the GOP right? Killing 19.

And we're "fighting over there so they don't kill us here" with WMD and bioterrorism? Get real, the real threat is home-grown: the tyranny of relativism writ large in IV bags hanging beside bedsides of hospitals all across the land !

Let us recall the "Jeremiah of the Jesuits" (Mariana) view of human nature:
excerpted from Harald E. Braun's "Juan de Mariana and Early Modern Spanish Political Thought (Catholic Christendom, 1300-1700)"

http://www.amazon.com/gp/reader/0754639622/ref=sib_dp_pt#reader-link

"those who believe that human success as the art, medicine and war will improve their lot sadly deceive themselves. The things purporting to 'distinguish enlighten and adorn human life' are mothing but the result of man's bain struggle to escape death and alleviate the endless misery of this life."

Mariana held that the family was the only social unit to be trusted to function as natural law intended. He held that man's post-lapsarian frailty doomed societies to require regulatory institutional defenses to ward off base instincts of corruption inherent in widespread natural rights "freedoms":

"...if man really had the strength and robustness to repulse dangers and did not require the assistance of others, what sort of society would there be? Would men respect one another? Would there be any order to life? Would there be any mutual trust? Any love of humanity? (...) What could there be more monstrous and more savage that man unrestrained by law and the fear of judgement? Could any beast cause such carnage?"

"Power corrupts absolutely..." need I say more...?
(Forgive me for having said so much and hijacking your thread)

Clare Krishan: Clare.krishan@comcast.net

In case my point about "spatial inequality" is not clear, watch the red and green blinking digits in parentheses in the article on Citigroup's unwinding

http://www.marketwatch.com/news/story/great-unwind-has-started-avoid/story.aspx?guid={1DC25DFD-3543-4CF4-BE26-74EA4B9C9330}&dist=TNMostRead

When our democracy has that kind of transparency (forget googling your congressman's earmarks, how about citizens murdered in utero per minute, high-school tickers for federal deficit pay-forwards, we'll be able to eliminate Sallie Mae when today's kindergarteners realize they can't afford college until they've paid off their grandparents profligacy) I'm willing to debate First Principles with a theologian, but we're far off from that point currently... i'd settle for encouraging our politicians to learn the natural law foundations of Western Civilization, we can save sotierology for another day...

Clare Krishan: Clare.krishan@comcast.net

It's about trade in futures of POTUS's friend's "credit default insurance" auction subscriptions not his faith!

Stick to religious semantics, Mr Bradley, it seems the moral morass of the United States economy is above your pay grade, or Obama's, McCain's or Bush 43's.

Consider the "effect of spatial inequality of 'hard money' on prices and resource use" that Richard Cantillon's Essai first identified as the rot at the root of depressed economies:

Our domestic warfare economy currently ensures that the bearers of Carlyle Capital Corporation bonds (a hedge fund speculating in Defense-Contractor commercial papers) held by Wall Street's banks' brokerage clients are "bailed out" by the Fed's billion dollar "infusion" of capital (CitiBank last Fall, JP Morgan this Spring).

My father had successful elective aneurism surgery at no delay in the UK, and my family enjoyed affordable coverage in my decades employed in Germany, so beware the sin of calumny of domestic "free" marketeers. Manufacturers in Europe operate with lower labor costs since employee retirement benefits are discounted for health insurance in comparison to US firms struggling to make it by floating their pension fund obligations on an overheated, and possibly fraudulent, hedge-funded market in murky financial derivatives. Yesterday Chrysler papers were selling for 72 cents in the dollar after six months of failing to offload the loans at a discounted 95 cents in the dollar:
www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=newsarchive&sid=arVpbF62OT4g

Pray your 402K isn't loaded in that fiscal instrument! Health care will be the least of your worries, how will you feed yourself?
Democracy ought demand of its rulers that their free markets be operated truthfully, and in order to increase access to wealth creation, by reducing "spatial inequality" through strict credit oversight. Comparing suffering the current Keysenian dirigisme of the national military-industrial social complex of 40% GNP (with approaching 30% of the remainder of our economy spent in servicing our indebtedness) to a possible Obamian soft Marxism is not a markedly different prospect for the populace, truthfully. NAZI cartel corporatism or LENINist state capitalism are just two flavors of the same sin.

We people of faith need to examine our consciences in these coming days of celebrating Our Lord's Passion and consider a renewed Augustinian approach to humanity's post-lapsarian predicament ... mea culpa, mea maxima culpa!

Martin Wondergem: xmartinj@gmail.com

I enjoyed his speech very much. He has a great American story, and can speak to racial politics from a unique perspective, and can do so with authority based on his background. The key to his speech was in pointing out the complexity of the characters in his life story. He warns us not to oversimplify his black pastor or his white grandmother as simply racist/reverse-racist. And certainly pointing out the shades of gray doesn't justify their sins. He was clear about that. I agree with him completely that we can't really solve the problems associated with racism, when we oversimplify the problem.

That is why it was so disappointing when he attempted to point out the "real" problem: big corporations and profits. Are they really ALL bad? Or is that just an oversimplification as well? Certainly big corporations can make some bad decisions, and we should never justify their sins, and occasionally regulate (gasp) when needed. But to oversimplify prevents us from really solving the problems that need to be solved. Our economy is in desperate need of help, and I don't know how we can expect him to honestly help turn it around while demonizing corporations and profits at the same time.

I just hope that McCain can come somewhat close to matching his rhetoric of hope and inspiration, because the nation needs it.

Phil Lundman: phil@lundman.com

For a friend on mine, everything was great in the UK with the universal health care tending to most of his minor health issues. When he developed a serious heart problem his 55 year age put him down the list below many younger people also waiting. His only recourse was for friends to pay for the surgery that likely saved his life. Most people must assume they will not need expensive rationed procedures so are fine with health care paid and rationed by others. As is often the case, seemingly free cheese trips a fatal trap.

Miren Ivankovic: mivankovic@ac.edu

We all that reside in the US know that health care costs are rising too fast and due to the 3 party pay system, the provider, the receiver of health care and the insurer, the whole process is greatly mismanaged. However, to compare current US system to Canada or UK is plain silly, Mr. Gasque. Most of Americans that work can obtain the insurance at reasonable premiums. Let's not forget that some people simply choose not to receive it as well, like I did when I was younger. Choice is good. But if we try to socialize the medicine in this country, incentives to supply a high quality medicine will decline drastically, while, most likely, the demand will stay the same or grow with aging population. To summarize it with an example, if I need a hip replacement, I would like to have it within a month or two, not like one year or later. If I need a mamogram, I would like to have one done today or tomorrow, not be put on the list and wait, or be forced to fly to nearby country to have it done.
We need to repair our health care system in US, but by socializing the system, would be a wrong way to go.

W. Ward Gasque: wardgasque@gmail.com

As an American born evangelical Christian living in Canada and who has also lived in the UK, I find it incomprehensible that anyone can rail against universal health care ('socialized medicine').

Having returned to live in the USA for 7 years a few years back, I breathed a sigh of relief when I crossed the border to return to Canada, having been practically bankrupted by paying for health insurance in the USA.

To the majority of Canadians and Europeans (not to mention New Zealanders and Australians), the American health-care system is a sad commentary on the power of ideological thinking and a moral blindspot on the American ethical conscience,