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Fresh Prince
Joined: 05 Dec 2006
Location: The glorious nation of Korea
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 Posted: Wed Aug 01, 2007 2:52 am Post subject: |
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| I think most middle-class Americans that disagree with changing their healthcare system, disagree for ideological reasons rather than financial reasons. Many believe that the strength of America is that anyone who works hard enough can achieve higher social status and vastly improve their lives. There is a widespread belief that those who cannot afford healthcare are simply not working hard enough, and therefore should not be subsidized by the large hard-working middle-class. |
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butlerian
Joined: 04 Sep 2006
Location: Korea
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| Posted: Wed Aug 01, 2007 3:00 am Post subject: |
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| Fresh Prince wrote: |
| I think most middle-class Americans that disagree with changing their healthcare system, disagree for ideological reasons rather than financial reasons. Many believe that the strength of America is that anyone who works hard enough can achieve higher social status and vastly improve their lives. There is a widespread belief that those who cannot afford healthcare are simply not working hard enough, and therefore should not be subsidized by the large hard-working middle-class. |
That's a very sad, almost spiritual, belief. The reality is that life is not that simple. |
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smogdonkey
Joined: 19 Dec 2006
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| Posted: Wed Aug 01, 2007 7:14 am Post subject: |
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| butlerian wrote: |
| Fresh Prince wrote: |
| I think most middle-class Americans that disagree with changing their healthcare system, disagree for ideological reasons rather than financial reasons. Many believe that the strength of America is that anyone who works hard enough can achieve higher social status and vastly improve their lives. There is a widespread belief that those who cannot afford healthcare are simply not working hard enough, and therefore should not be subsidized by the large hard-working middle-class. |
That's a very sad, almost spiritual, belief. The reality is that life is not that simple. |
Very sad, indeed, and not one I've heard from many hard-working, middle-class, uninsured, ideological Americans. Even the insured middle class can't afford deductibles of serious procedures anymore, so the argument that you should work harder so you can afford insurance is becoming more moot by the day. Medical care costs have just gotten completely unrealistic for more than just low-income Americans.
Why should those more fortunate help pay to keep the less fortunate alive? Because we're not (allegedly) cavemen.
I love what the movie did to raise awareness, and spur campaign promises in the leadup to the elections. |
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KOREAN_MAN
Joined: 01 Oct 2006
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| Posted: Wed Aug 01, 2007 12:42 pm Post subject: |
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| VanIslander wrote: |
| Gopher wrote: |
| ...antiAmerican... |
This remark may have been meant to be about Michael Moore but it speaks volumes about the utterer
(so McCarthyesque) |
I'm curious. What does the word Anti-American actually mean? If I also want every American to be healthy, am I Anti-American too? |
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Gopher
Joined: 04 Jun 2005
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| Posted: Wed Aug 01, 2007 12:57 pm Post subject: |
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| KOREAN_MAN wrote: |
| If I also want every American to be healthy...? |
Sounds like an honest assessment of Michael Moore, his motives, and all that SiCKO represents. Thanks for the laughs. Next time, do bring a violin. |
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Adventurer
Joined: 28 Jan 2006
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| Posted: Wed Aug 01, 2007 6:12 pm Post subject: |
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| Fresh Prince wrote: |
| I think most middle-class Americans that disagree with changing their healthcare system, disagree for ideological reasons rather than financial reasons. Many believe that the strength of America is that anyone who works hard enough can achieve higher social status and vastly improve their lives. There is a widespread belief that those who cannot afford healthcare are simply not working hard enough, and therefore should not be subsidized by the large hard-working middle-class. |
Fresh, I don't agree with what you said, because you made it an either/or scenario. Some Americans don't want universal health care for both reasons. They go hand-in-hand. Those with a libertarian streak believe that if you want health care then pay for your own. However, the reality is that they are outnumbered by the Americans who want health care according to polls I've seen, but they aren't getting it. |
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Tiger Beer
Joined: 07 Feb 2003
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| Posted: Wed Aug 01, 2007 7:01 pm Post subject: |
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| Fresh Prince wrote: |
| I think most middle-class Americans that disagree with changing their healthcare system, disagree for ideological reasons rather than financial reasons. |
I agree with this statement.
Most that I know think that any social program means that unworthies get stuff that they don't deserve to get because they didn't work as hard.
I've gone round and round with my parents (who have healthcare through their employer) on healthcare issues. They are convinced they will lose and everything will become nothing or mediocre. Meanwhile, I've worked my whole life, but never had any insurance on my own - either working abroad or the U.S. largest employers - temp agencies who hire people permanantly and they receive no benefits or healthcare.
There answer is always the typical American answer. You should just go down to the local bank, try to apply as a teller or something. Stay there for 30 years for the benefits, healthcare and eventual retirement package. If you go outside the norm of that, you pretty much deserve whatever happens to you.
Frustrating to say the least. I liked how Michael Moore got around this fallacy by really examining what healthcare industries are really doing with people - denying everything, etc. So even if you play by all the supposed rules, you can still be seriously screwed over. |
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smogdonkey
Joined: 19 Dec 2006
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| Posted: Wed Aug 01, 2007 9:11 pm Post subject: |
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| Tiger Beer wrote: |
Most that I know think that any social program means that unworthies get stuff that they don't deserve to get because they didn't work as hard. |
Really? In taxation arguments, I've heard this opinion, but when discussing health care, it seems even quite a few of my financially conservative counterparts are willing to admit that even the lazy have a right to be healthy. We're not talking about HDTVs or SUVs, afterall. The majority of Americans are at least unhappy about the healthcare situation in the US. Many of them are disgusted. I have never heard someone say, "poor people don't deserve medicine," or anything similar.
It's interesting that whenever someone brings up the health care situation in America, very rarely (in my experience) will someone openly defend the notion that it is RIGHT to have to fend for yourself, but rather claim that it isn't feasible in America, regardless of evidence from other countries to the contrary.
Also, in today's America, working hard does not come close do guaranteeing affordable health care. You have to work hard in a chosen, profitable, in-demand field. Your focus has to be on making as much money as possible, not working as hard as possible, or doing as much good as possible, or even what gives you some sense of job satisfaction (though in some cases these coincide). Everyone wants their car repaired, but nobody wants to pay a dime to keep the mechanics of the country healthy. |
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Adventurer
Joined: 28 Jan 2006
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| Posted: Thu Aug 02, 2007 4:06 am Post subject: |
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[quote="smogdonkey"]
| Tiger Beer wrote: |
Most that I know think that any social program means that unworthies get stuff that they don't deserve to get because they didn't work as hard. |
Really? In taxation arguments, I've heard this opinion, but when discussing health care, it seems even quite a few of my financially conservative counterparts are willing to admit that even the lazy have a right to be healthy. We're not talking about HDTVs or SUVs, afterall. The majority of Americans are at least unhappy about the healthcare situation in the US. Many of them are disgusted. I have never heard someone say, "poor people don't deserve medicine," or anything similar.
[You would be surprised. I know a guy from who stated that if you didn't have a job that paid for your health insurance, then it was your fault and your health issues are not his problem essentially. I also knew a Libertarian who said the same thing. Believe me, there are people who say "Why should I pay for someone else". So they are essentially saying poor people don't deserve medicine, because they didn't get the job that provides it for them. It is the thinking "to each his own" or the French saying "sauve qui peux" which essentially means everyone for himself...
Still, more Americans disagree with this notion, but they are not empowering themselves to change things and the media distorts what universal health care would mean for them. It is scaring them to not
make changes. They are not going to a lot of objectivity from the media that is paid by those who oppose universal health care. In the end, if the American people push for it, it will happen. I hope it will happen. |
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Captain Corea
Joined: 28 Feb 2005
Location: Seoul
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| Posted: Thu Aug 02, 2007 5:42 am Post subject: |
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| Gopher wrote: |
| Adventurer wrote: |
| Plenty of Americans would forge degrees... |
Stick to the facts, Adventurer. Do they or do they not?
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Yes, Americans get busted for forging degrees here as well. Are you seriously saying that you've never heard of Americans getting busted over here?
As for SICKO, I thought it was decent. I understand why the States doesn't have universal coverage, and I'm glad not to be a part of it.
Personally, I liked the fear-mongering of it all.
The RED menace! They will tell your doctors where they can work!!! Boooooo!!!
Quite cute. |
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Adventurer
Joined: 28 Jan 2006
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| Posted: Thu Aug 02, 2007 10:14 am Post subject: |
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| Captain Corea wrote: |
| Gopher wrote: |
| Adventurer wrote: |
| Plenty of Americans would forge degrees... |
Stick to the facts, Adventurer. Do they or do they not?
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Yes, Americans get busted for forging degrees here as well. Are you seriously saying that you've never heard of Americans getting busted over here?
As for SICKO, I thought it was decent. I understand why the States doesn't have universal coverage, and I'm glad not to be a part of it.
Personally, I liked the fear-mongering of it all.
The RED menace! They will tell your doctors where they can work!!! Boooooo!!!
Quite cute. |
I was just researching the fake degrees thing, and I found this link:
http://education.guardian.co.uk/tefl/story/0,5500,1600962,00.html
Apparenty, people from Britain also have some teachers with fake degrees as well and the article mentioned some Americans were under investigation. This was an article from 2005. I am sure if it is easier to get away with it due to the visa status, people would do it. I knew a "friend" from California, and he is not here legally at all, so saying only Canadians are doing it is really a bunch bologne. The guy was working in the country, though he wasn't teaching. He was doing other stuff. |
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Gopher
Joined: 04 Jun 2005
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| Posted: Thu Aug 02, 2007 1:10 pm Post subject: |
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I referred to stories like this, which appear frequently.
| Adventurer wrote: |
| ...so saying only Canadians are doing it is really a bunch bologne. |
Again, show me where I ever said or suggested this. I asked you to speak on the facts and not hypothetically.
Now: are you suggesting that the problem is just as widespread among Americans and British as it is in the vast Canadian escape-from-a-life-of-Employment-Insurance exodus...?
If so, show me.
In any case, at the end of the day, with so many Canadian expats in South Korea's being there because it represents the only way they might get out of student loan debt (shouldn't higher education be free in the Canadian utopia, by the way?) or, for those who forge degrees and go there for work, the only way to live a life off Employment Insurance, Canadians have no business lecturing Americans on the American economy -- whatever its shortcomings and failings may be.
People who live in glass houses should not throw rocks -- and they especially ought not do so with the morally-superior attitude many Canadians, ranked no higher than No. 30 by WHO, which is not even in the top ten percent or anywhere near it, exhibit on such topics as American health care. |
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smogdonkey
Joined: 19 Dec 2006
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| Posted: Thu Aug 02, 2007 3:52 pm Post subject: |
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| Gopher wrote: |
| He said she said Canadians called me names blah blah blah |
(no offense to Canadians) Who cares about Canadians' attitudes about America? In regards to health care, it's not just Canadians who laugh at US policy, it's damn near everyone. So, why pick on just one country of 'non-believers' in the system? If they're not for us, they're against us, remember?
Take something you take for granted, maybe... taking a dump on a toilet, and try convincing someone in another developed country that only the well-off, hard-working people who work for large companies in that country should be able to do it. See if they take you seriously. |
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Adventurer
Joined: 28 Jan 2006
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| Posted: Thu Aug 02, 2007 7:04 pm Post subject: |
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| Gopher wrote: |
I referred to stories like this, which appear frequently.
| Adventurer wrote: |
| ...so saying only Canadians are doing it is really a bunch bologne. |
Again, show me where I ever said or suggested this. I asked you to speak on the facts and not hypothetically.
Now: are you suggesting that the problem is just as widespread among Americans and British as it is in the vast Canadian escape-from-a-life-of-Employment-Insurance exodus...?
If so, show me.
In any case, at the end of the day, with so many Canadian expats in South Korea's being there because it represents the only way they might get out of student loan debt (shouldn't higher education be free in the Canadian utopia, by the way?) or, for those who forge degrees and go there for work, the only way to live a life off Employment Insurance, Canadians have no business lecturing Americans on the American economy -- whatever its shortcomings and failings may be.
People who live in glass houses should not throw rocks -- and they especially ought not do so with the morally-superior attitude many Canadians, ranked no higher than No. 30 by WHO, which is not even in the top ten percent or anywhere near it, exhibit on such topics as American health care. |
Gopher, thank you for checking the passport of the OP and determining that he is a Canadian. I have no idea where he's from. He could be an American criticizing the American health system. Michael Moore is an American? Haven't you met Americans who think not having universal health care is not good? Did you look at the polls? I mean I would excuse such a rant above if you never spoke to Americans who are upset with the system.
You seem to be saying not having universal health care is what makes the U.S. economy vibrant. You may not be saying that directly, but it sounds like it. The Netherlands has a vibrant economy, it has universal health care. Many countries have lower unemployment than both Canada and the U.S. You keep on saying Canada when people from England or Ireland on here would say the same thing.
Yes, there are more Canadians out here paying off their student loans.
Also, a larger percentage of Canadians get a degree than Americans.
Less and less Canadians appear to be coming to Korea, because there are more and more jobs in Canada now. When comparing the U.S. and Canada somethings are better in the U.S. and somethings are better in Canada. It depends on what you're looking for.... Canadians do not really control their government anymore than Americans do otherwise
Americans would have universal health care and smoking pot would not be illegal in Canada.
Unemployment is higher in Canada though it has gone down as of late.
However, do we know the real unemployment figures from both countries? What about the crime rate? There are so many things to look at when examining two countries? Having a lower unemployment rate is not the only measure of how things can be rosy in a country. |
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laogaiguk
Joined: 06 Dec 2005
Location: somewhere in Korea
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| Posted: Thu Aug 02, 2007 11:11 pm Post subject: |
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Universal health care = good
America vs. Canada bashing = boring |
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