I'm back with a vengeance! 13, read it, 13 whole page views on Feb. 6th. Move over, Google, there's a new web traffic king in town. I may not be able to do things like host email or let you search for cat-playing-a-keyboard-but-it's-really-a-human-moving-the-cat's-paws-so-it's-really-just-sad videos, but I am giving the people what they want. Democracy in action! The will of the people! USA! USA!
So now, I should inform you all that I am a socialist.
BOO! HISS! "Burn him at the stake!"
So now, I should inform you all that I am a socialist.
BOO! HISS! "Burn him at the stake!"
Above: Socialists
I know that the word "socialist" evokes that inner medieval mob mentality in you, dear readers, but you really must resist until after I explain myself. First, an explanation of socialism as I see it. (I think I'll go ahead and keep the "s" of socialism as lower-case, so it's less threatening in case there are small children around or something)
Socialism, to me, means that certain goods and services in a country are provided for the citizens and payed for completely by the government. I don't think that the government should run everything. In a nutshell, look at those crazy Scandinavians and Northern Europeans with their free education and healthcare. Don't forget that they are usually in the top of happiness survey results done by country. And for those of you who cringe whenever I say "let's be more like those Europeans," knock it off, Dad.
Why shouldn't healthcare and education be free for the "wealthiest" country in the world? At the very least if Finland can provide those things to its citizens, then we sure as hell should be able to do it too. Because what's the point of being the wealthiest country in the world if your citizens don't enjoy that prosperity?
At this point in the discussion I would like to direct you to a great video. It's about 8 minutes of your time, but it gives a great explanation of healthcare costs in the US. (I encourage you to watch any other videos by these guys that catch your fancy. They're pretty great. I especially like the one entitled "Why does Congress suck?")
Now, I know all the standard conservative tropes to challenge free anything. I don't buy them. If you try to convince me that the US can't do something that other successful countries have done because of discouraging the up-by-the-bootstraps-because-Benjamin-Franklin-did-it-before-we-had-a-polio-vaccine mentality that we love almost as much as our cheeseburgers, then I think we're talking about two different things.
After thousands of years of what we would label human civilization and a couple hundred years since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution, not to mention it's been almost 45 years since we landed on THE MOON, we still can't provide all our citizens with healthcare. That's just shameful.
If we want to go on and on about the availability of opportunity in the US, we are ignoring the fact that if you ever didn't have insurance a simple hospital stay could have you owing thousands upon thousands of dollars. That's a lot of money to pay back if you're working for minimum wage.
A short break for you to look at rankings for GDP per capita in relationship to PPP, aka how much money does each country make per person vs what that money can buy according to the cost of goods in that country. The US is top 10 according to 3 different sources.
There is so much that I can say about healthcare and education. I don't want to exhaust your attention by writing thousands and thousands of words when the gist of my argument is this: if we are one of the wealthiest countries in the world, then how come we can't provide our citizens with free healthcare and education?
We give let Congress spend billions of dollars to fund war, yet we think that we can't figure out how to fund free healthcare?
We spend so much time bemoaning the state of affairs in our country all the while we forget that we are able to change those same affairs. We can protest, we can contact our representatives, hell, we can write letters to the president. You have to realize how much of an amazing concept that is. It's taken living in China to realize that; I've seen a man taken away by police because he held up a sign in a public place. Let me say that again.
I was in a public place, Tian'anmen Square to be exact.
A man help up a sign while someone else took a picture.
Whatever was on that sign caused him to be taken away by police.
He did not attempt to hurt anyone. He did not yell anything at other people. He held up a sign. He was taken away by police.
Something like that is so foreign to Americans, and it should be. But, we shouldn't forget that the people are the country, not its government or its corporations. If we cannot protect our citizens and give them the benefits of living in the so-called "greatest nation on earth," then we shouldn't be allowed to call ourselves that. We need to start walking the walk, dear readers.
I know that the word "socialist" evokes that inner medieval mob mentality in you, dear readers, but you really must resist until after I explain myself. First, an explanation of socialism as I see it. (I think I'll go ahead and keep the "s" of socialism as lower-case, so it's less threatening in case there are small children around or something)
Socialism, to me, means that certain goods and services in a country are provided for the citizens and payed for completely by the government. I don't think that the government should run everything. In a nutshell, look at those crazy Scandinavians and Northern Europeans with their free education and healthcare. Don't forget that they are usually in the top of happiness survey results done by country. And for those of you who cringe whenever I say "let's be more like those Europeans," knock it off, Dad.
Why shouldn't healthcare and education be free for the "wealthiest" country in the world? At the very least if Finland can provide those things to its citizens, then we sure as hell should be able to do it too. Because what's the point of being the wealthiest country in the world if your citizens don't enjoy that prosperity?
At this point in the discussion I would like to direct you to a great video. It's about 8 minutes of your time, but it gives a great explanation of healthcare costs in the US. (I encourage you to watch any other videos by these guys that catch your fancy. They're pretty great. I especially like the one entitled "Why does Congress suck?")
Now, I know all the standard conservative tropes to challenge free anything. I don't buy them. If you try to convince me that the US can't do something that other successful countries have done because of discouraging the up-by-the-bootstraps-because-Benjamin-Franklin-did-it-before-we-had-a-polio-vaccine mentality that we love almost as much as our cheeseburgers, then I think we're talking about two different things.
After thousands of years of what we would label human civilization and a couple hundred years since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution, not to mention it's been almost 45 years since we landed on THE MOON, we still can't provide all our citizens with healthcare. That's just shameful.
If we want to go on and on about the availability of opportunity in the US, we are ignoring the fact that if you ever didn't have insurance a simple hospital stay could have you owing thousands upon thousands of dollars. That's a lot of money to pay back if you're working for minimum wage.
A short break for you to look at rankings for GDP per capita in relationship to PPP, aka how much money does each country make per person vs what that money can buy according to the cost of goods in that country. The US is top 10 according to 3 different sources.
There is so much that I can say about healthcare and education. I don't want to exhaust your attention by writing thousands and thousands of words when the gist of my argument is this: if we are one of the wealthiest countries in the world, then how come we can't provide our citizens with free healthcare and education?
We give let Congress spend billions of dollars to fund war, yet we think that we can't figure out how to fund free healthcare?
We spend so much time bemoaning the state of affairs in our country all the while we forget that we are able to change those same affairs. We can protest, we can contact our representatives, hell, we can write letters to the president. You have to realize how much of an amazing concept that is. It's taken living in China to realize that; I've seen a man taken away by police because he held up a sign in a public place. Let me say that again.
I was in a public place, Tian'anmen Square to be exact.
A man help up a sign while someone else took a picture.
Whatever was on that sign caused him to be taken away by police.
He did not attempt to hurt anyone. He did not yell anything at other people. He held up a sign. He was taken away by police.
Something like that is so foreign to Americans, and it should be. But, we shouldn't forget that the people are the country, not its government or its corporations. If we cannot protect our citizens and give them the benefits of living in the so-called "greatest nation on earth," then we shouldn't be allowed to call ourselves that. We need to start walking the walk, dear readers.