American Suckage

[Ghastly]

Oh man don't even get me started on medications. The drug companies are total sleezoids.

They'll knowingly put defective and dangerous drugs on the market if they calculate the money they'd lose in lawsuits if caught would be less than the profit they'll make from the drugs.

But what really pisses me off about eh pharmacutical companies is the way they're playing the US and Canada against each other.

Canada negotiated a deal with the drug companies. You sell drugs at a lower price and we'll give you longer and stricter patent protections on your drugs. The drug companies agreed to this and swallowed up the deal eagerly.

Then they went to US senators and said "cheap drug sales in Canada is hurting our business in border states in the US. You need to put political pressure on Canada to get them to sell drugs at the same price they're sold in the US." So now we got a lot of senators huffing and puffing and trying to get washington to pressure Canada into raising drug prices.

Then as if that wasn't bad enough. They're complaining to congress "Waaaaah Canada offers us this great patent protection and you guys in the states are so mean and behind the times. We want the US to give us the same patent protections Canada has to make things fair."

The bastards are trying to have their cake and eat it too. Be able to sell for high prices and get longer, stricter patent protections. Bunch of miserable cocks the lot of them.

As for our public medical system. I've had the occaision wait for a proceedure for a non-life threatening condition. The odd slow emergency room wait. I'll take that over the US system. I knew a guy from the Atari collecting community in the US who had to sell everything he owned because he was between jobs and had no insurance for a simple proceedure that would have cost him nothing if her were Canadian.

A country should be judged by the social saftey net it provides not by its military might nor by how rich its top 1% of the population is. Most of us are only a couple of missed mortgage/rent payments away from the streets and jobs are able to disappear at a moment's notice. Our capitalist economy would grind to a complete halt if people were afraid to spend and invest for fear that an emergency could suddenly leave them starving in the streets. Welfare, unemployment insurance, pensions, and public health care give the citizenry the confidence to spend and invest which is neccessary for a capitalist society to thrive.

Ever since Trudeau was Prime Minister conservatives on both sides of the border have been screaming "Socialized healthcare will be gone in another 5 years. It just won't work, it can't work, it musn't work". 30 years later and it's taken some bumps and knocks but it's still working simply because it tends to be the #1 priority for Canadian citizens. A healthy population is a productive population and one never knows when some accident of fate will take their health from them. That's why it's political suicide for any politician in Canada to even hint they're thinking of scraping the public health system.

[Major Maxillary]

The only reason why i don't like socialised healthcare is because it reeks of socialism.

socialism runs counter to libertarianism.



I'd rather have affordable healthcare that's good anywhere in the US, so that no matter where you go, if your health plan covers it, then any doctor in the US would have to perform it.

I've had all this metal glued to my teeth for over a year past when i should have had them off simply because my heathcare is only good in Ft. Lauderdale, FL.

[Squidflakes]

The social safety net here in the US is more akin to a spiderweb. Yes, it will catch you just fine, but most people tend to stay caught.

[Major Maxillary]

That's true with just about anywhere.

people learn that they don't have to work for their money, and they start leeeching off the welfare state.

[Squidflakes]

That's true with just about anywhere.

people learn that they don't have to work for their money, and they start leeeching off the welfare state.

Not necessarily what I mean, but saddly true. The social net here in the US rewards dependence on the net. If we could change THAT, then we'd be in a much better position to offer something like Universal Healthcare.

[Ghastly]

Only if there's no options for them but welfare and if the safety net is going to be taken away from them if they begin to try and get themselves back on their feet again.

For the most part "all your woes are caused by the poor" is nothing but propaganda rich people use so you won't look at how much money they're getting from the government. More is paid out in corporate welfare than citizen welfare. Government spending on non-social projects is freaking rediculous. The military alone has an absolutely crazy budget. The working grunt gets paid sweet-dick-all but gets the pleasure of resting his weary ass on a toilet seat that cost $500 which would have cost you or I $5 at the hardware store.

Believe me, you trim all that pork out of the government budget you'd be not only able to provide a social saftey net, you'd also be able to provide people the education and opportunity so they wouldn't need the social saftey net.

Think how long most of you would last if a sudden downturn in the market wiped out your savings and lost you your job with no prospects of a new one. How long do you think you'd make it on the streets without any social services to help you pick yourself back up again?

There are always going to be some people who will try to cheat the system but they're in the minority. Most people want opportunity, most people want to work. Getting by on only $500 a month doesn't really appeal to most people. Most people want the big house and fancy car and widescreen projection TV and summer cottage on the lake and all those other perks that come from being employed in a well paying job.

The whole "blame the poor" is just a shell game and it's depressing as hell that so many people will play it because their TV tells them they should. Yep, don't look at how much money is being moved in the system to the rich people who run things. Nope keep focusing on the peanuts that are tossed to the poor. That's your problem there. The poor, the blacks, the homosexuals, and the filthy jews in New York. Rich people know what's best for you all, that's why they're rich. Accept your place in our corporate fifedom and you'll be a happy cog. Keep following our pipedream of "libertarianism" which is really just replacing the government with corporations.

It's sad to see so many people getting willfully played by higher powers being distracted by jingoisms, propaganda, and "I heard about some guy on welfare who was a billioneir with 20 cars therefore everyone on welfare must be playing the system" anecdotes.

Of course people arn't going to want to get off the social saftey net if getting off the net means they won't have health care, shelter, and food. Who wants to try to work their way up when the first step means letting go completely.

Believe me there's a lot of shit that needs to be cleaned up in government but the social safteynet is at the bottom of the list of abuses in need of scrutiny. First thing you need to do is get some real campaign reform to get the lobbiests and influence out of government. Of course that's going to be a very difficult thing to accomplish because the people in power are in power because big money put them there. They're in power because they know how to play the game and if they got good enough at the game to win it they're not likely to want to change the rules.

What needs to be done particularily in the states is to get rid of political parties. They put too many idiots in positions of power because too many idiots vote with the "well my pappy voted for this party as did his pappy a'fore him and his pappy a'fore him so I'm voting this party too". Not enough people vote on issues, they vote for party.

You know who really pisses me off? People who vote party even though they hate the party. I can't begin to tell you how many times I've heard conservatives bitch and whine and complain and rant about how much they hate, absolutely hate George W. Bush and the modern Republican party. But they still voted for him because.. well... they're republicans and that's what they do, you support the party no matter what.

Jesus fucking Christ! Any vote for a candidate you don't believe in is throwing your vote away. Yay, so the guy you voted for wins. Big deal. You just put some guy in power who goes against everything you believe in and who is going to fuck you in the ass but you feel it's a victory because you put an X beside the name of the guy who won? Please. If you're going to throw away your vote like that then at least have the balls to throw it away on some fringe party nutjob. Vote for the Future Communists For Tentacled Lust party or something like that.

Put the party system has become so polarized, yet so homoginized in the US that it's basically a 1 party system anyways. You just got one party who fucks you in the ass while saying "Jesus, jesus, jesus" and another party who fucks you in the ass while saying "poor people, poor people, poor people." They're both paid for by the same corporations (because smart corporations donate to both parties so no matter who wins, they win). They're both going to fuck you up the ass. All people are doing with their vote is picking a leader for the machine that's going to fuck them.

Have every candidate an independent, have every candidate free to vote for the best interests of the people he is elected to represent instead of having to vote along party lines. Get rid of all these moron voters who only vote for people depending on wether or not there's an R or a D after their name.

I guess that's one of the problems with democracies. The majority ends up getting the government they deserve.

Let's face it. The world is pretty much fucked until the people make me their supreme dictator for life. You'll still be fucked, but it will be by wet, squicky tentacles. That is my promise.

[Squidflakes]

Having been caught in the great US social safety net myself, I've seen first hand how fucking hard it is to get out. The system is NOT designed for upward mobility, its NOT designed to assist you in making a living, its designed to keep you down.

In order for me to get out of it I had to starve. I slept on the beach for 6 months, and the back porch of a friend's apartment for another 3. When I finally did get a job, the State of Florida came after me for several thousand dollars, sure that I had defrauded the system because I hadn't picked up my stamps in nearly a year, and yet I was now suddenly reporting income. Believe me, I know the problem isn't the poor, and if that's how I came across, then I apologize for that.

The problem is indeed the rich ass-fucks who exist only to get richer. I'm not a socialist, and I don't hate "the rich". The people I do hate are the ones with no scruples. The people who actively exploit the poor in the search for greater and great profit. The people for whom no profit is enough. The people who run the companies who have been putting Chemical X in the food for years even though their own researchers have told them its dangerous. Sure, Chemical Y provides the same great taste with 100% less death, but good god man, our profit margin will slip by 0.0001% (exaggerating of course)

Let's face it. The world is pretty much fucked until the people make me their supreme dictator for life. You'll still be fucked, but it will be by wet, squicky tentacles. That is my promise.

I sir, would like a job in your organization. I'm sure my resume speaks for itself.

[Wilmo]

I have some ideas:

We need more doctors. Do whatever it takes to get kids to go to medical school, instead of wimping out and getting degrees in history and stuff. By supply and demand, the cost of hiring doctors will go down.

Have the government produce certain essentail medications on the cheap. I don't know if this is possible; it certainly isn't under the Haliburton administration.

Have national insurance coverage, an optional plan. People should definately be able to get healthcare from whoever they want, be it Uncle Sam or whoever. We don't want to end up like Canada in that respect.

Ok, I might think of more later. By the way one of the biggest problems, especially in Florida, is that doctors are leaving because insurance costs drive them out. I don't know what to do about that....

easier said than done, lots and lots and lots of people go to college in hopes of becoming a doctor; however, there are only few that are accepted into medical school. One person has a GPA of 3.9 and an MCAT score of 25 and one person that has a GPA of 3.9 and an MCAT score of 24... Only one is allowed in, guess which, but which would make a better doctor? Impossible to know. I know at least 5 people that went to a medical school in the carribean in an attempt to 'backdoor' the whole doctor thing, and it works; but what is so wrong about allowing them in?

Doctors need quality training, but what we need are more quality medical schools; I know some future doctors, and let me tell you... there's no reason for these people to be put on fucking pedestals.

[Cuteswan]

To be fair, I don't hear a lot of people blaming the poor, though a lot of people blame the way the government tries to "solve" poverty. Cripes -- poverty is even worse decades after we "declared war on poverty." Blaming the poor or rich or corporations doesn't help, since it all goes back to the government that grows itself day by day. At least with private charity you could cut folks off for being irresponsible (based on community standards) and had more incentive to watch out for fraud and abuse.

Of course, I'm still sleeping in my car and waiting for an answer on the state health-care application I sent in four months ago, so that should warn one against relying on the government.

[Wilmo]

To be fair, I don't hear a lot of people blaming the poor, though a lot of people blame the way the government tries to "solve" poverty. Cripes -- poverty is even worse decades after we "declared war on poverty." Blaming the poor or rich or corporations doesn't help, since it all goes back to the government that grows itself day by day. At least with private charity you could cut folks off for being irresponsible (based on community standards) and had more incentive to watch out for fraud and abuse.

Of course, I'm still sleeping in my car and waiting for an answer on the state health-care application I sent in four months ago, so that should warn one against relying on the government.

true.

[Swordsman3003]

Here is what I always say: This is not about rich vs. poor, democrat vs. republican. This is plain old good vs. evil. There are people who want to fuck you up and tak your money too. That makes up the bulk of the government. But there are a few, wholesome, just, people left in the whole, but sadly people don't have the knowledge, scruples, and common sense to elect those people.

[Ghastly]

At least with private charity you could cut folks off for being irresponsible (based on community standards) and had more incentive to watch out for fraud and abuse.

The problem with private charity is it's not in the charity's interest to help anyone. The more disenfranchised people the more money the charity gets. 10 cents goes to keeping the poor surviving long enough to appear in a commercial for the next charity drive, 90 cents goes towards private organization. That's the problem with privatized services. It's not about helping, it's only about profit. Human life is only valuable in so far as it furthers the wealth of the organization.

Pirvatized services are great if you're rich because you get what you want when you want. But for those in the middle and lower classes you're fucked.

One of the worst is the privatized state prison system in the US. There's a service that should never be privatized. Shit most of the people who are being exploited by that system could be incarcerated just as well at home, still holding down a job still being productive, monitored under house arrest. Paying his own rent. Paying for his own food. Minimal burdon to the state. Try to suggest that non-violent offenders should be under house arrest and you end up with hysterical people screaming "OMFG! You want to let child rapists and murderers roam free in the streets!!!!!"

Personally, half the time I'm cheering for the great fall. Bring on peak oil. Bring on the complete and utter economic collapse. Let the blood and bullets flow and lets see what new system rises from it in a few hundred years. Problem is revolutions just tend to make things worse.

The United States and Canada are so similar in many ways but one big difference is paranoia. Canada isn't really afraid of other nations. The way our population is distributed, the fact that most of our country is vast, uninhabbited wilderness means even if the United States wasn't just below us there's no real way for anyone to invade us. In fact, when I was in the army we used to joke about how pointless our training exercises were becuase Russia simply wasn't a threat. Even if they came over the pole there's be no way for them to launch a successful invasion of Canada. They'd have to travel way too far over open land to get to our centers of power. Their supply lines could never carry them that far. The only nation that has ever had the means to invade Canada is also the only nation that ever has invaded Canada and that's the United States. They're the only credible military threat to this nation and their not likely to invade (unless we turn off the energy, the US imports more energy from Canada than from any other nation). The government of Canada doesn't really fear it's own citizenry the way the government of the USA fears theirs. Canadians just arn't likely to take up arms to solve a problem with government. There's never been an assasinated Prime Minister (and if anyone was itching to have been assasinated it was Mulrooney). We'd have to be pushed extremely far before we'd resort to violence (off the ice). The Canadian citizens likewise don't fear their government as much as American citizens do. We exercise our power of the vote to keep our elected officials in line. There are so many political parties that everyone can find a voice to support. If a political party gets too far out of line (like the Progressive Conservatives did in the 1980s) they'll get destroyed at election time (the PCs lost so many seats that they ended up losing their official party status and they never fully recovered and in the end were swallowed up by the Reform party). Canada achieved its independence peacefully, it lives peacefully, it solves its problems peacefully. For the most part we're a pretty laid back, easy going bunch of people.

The USA on the other hand acheived it's independence through armed revolt. This set the precidence of "if you've got a problem, you use violence to solve it" which haunts the nation to this day. It's what has created that culture of fear that touches every aspect of life in that nation.

No, I have a feeling that if the collapse comes chances are something even worse than what we have now will emerge from it. Still there's a chance people might be woken up and realize that unrestricted greed corrupts and without leveling mechanisms to maintain equality in a society you end up creating a breeding ground for violence and oppression.

Oh well... another four more years and my tentaclification beam should be perfected and then I'll rise.... oops. I've said too much.

[Major Maxillary]

In order for me to get out of it I had to starve. I slept on the beach for 6 months, and the back porch of a friend's apartment for another 3.

I did it by joining the Army.

Funny story about that;

i was talking to this one guy, and he kept trying to talk me out of enlisting. I told him it was partly for the money and 100% tuition assistance, and then he told me about how the Government has programs for that.

I said to him "No thanks, I've had enough of the government programs."

He told me I'll be sorry.

I said "No, I won't."

[Cuteswan]

I meant local, community (i.e. church, town, etc.) charities, not the monster corporations. I should have been clearer.

[Major Maxillary]

Personally, half the time I'm cheering for the great fall. Bring on peak oil. Bring on the complete and utter economic collapse. Let the blood and bullets flow and lets see what new system rises from it in a few hundred years. Problem is revolutions just tend to make things worse.

Thomas Jefferson once said, "A little revolution every now and then is a good thing."


In it's current state, Civilization is at the point where it has to get worse before it can be made better.

[Honor]

The only reason why i don't like socialised healthcare is because it reeks of socialism.

socialism runs counter to libertarianism.

Libertarianism runs contrary to having a heart, a concience, a sense of community, or a sense of decency.

[Wilmo]

Yes, the american healthcare system (if you can call it that ) is in desperate need of reform. It probably will never happen due to the fact that its a massive sluggish beast and that people are greedy and would never give up what would be necissary to do it, and politicians would never make it happen (their first goal, once elected, is to be re-elected).

The whole thing needs a teardown and rebuild, but thats absolutely not going to happen.

My advice is to find a job with good benefits and keep your head down, and pray you dont get too sick, thats what my plan is (like its even fucking working, my coworker had the flu and now I'm pretty sure I'm running a fever *damnable microorganisms *)

[RantinAn]

The only reason why i don't like socialised healthcare is because it reeks of socialism.

socialism runs counter to libertarianism.

Libertarianism runs contrary to having a heart, a concience, a sense of community, or a sense of decency.

*hugs honor* You beet me to it.
Most importantly of all, libertaranisim runs counter to the very society that has spawned it. Libertaranisim as political philosophy runs completly counter to both the tenents of clasical Smith capitolisim and marxisim. In its very core libertaranisim is a philosophy of selfish greed. It is hardly suprising that 95% of libertarians are while and male. It is a political philosophy that usualy apeals to quite literaly the "selfish fuck" element of society. Despite claiming to be capitolist, most libertarians usualy advocate a strong military and a strong police force to keep their posessions safe (and you wouldnt believe how many are in the army... strange that his whole big evil government doesent apply to what keeps THEM fed) and wqhen you get right down to it, their "ultimate freedom" credo certainly allows for such unfortunate occurances such as slavery.
A proper capitolist society as Adam Smith envisenged is one where by TRADE is not regulated, and trade alone. The essential theory behind capitolisim is that MONEY needs to circulate, and that monetary acumulation is not a puropose in and of it's self, but is undertaken ONLY as meens of investing further in capitol. The essental ideal of capitolisim is that what government there is should exist to provide an environment in which growth can occur perpetualy and at it;s natural rate, without artifical retardation.
Please explain, if you will how ensuring such things as universal education and healthcare retard growth over a nation. There is significant statistical evidence that shows this infact encourages growth. all you havet o do is look at the GNP of kenya over the last 20 years and compare it to their education program.
Now I dont know any single libertarian with a huge asset ballance and a very low cash one, all the well off ones I know have very large cash balances indeed. Keeping cash out of circulation is Anti capitolist. Please dont counter with "banks invest" banks will not use your cash reserve as seed money on risky ventures, and will usualy act in such a fashion as to lock said cash up in zero risk ventures. Zero risk = pritty damn near zero growth, and imposing artifical limits on growth, even if it's a private organisation and not a public one, is entirely anti capitolist. Libertarinasim, by being consistantly and prigishly selfish, infact encourages stagnation.

The natural state of the libertarinan is militaristic. Max, you aint the only libertarian i know in the US army, in fact I know a hell of a lot of em. Congratulaitons, you're anti big government and yet you've chosen to enlist in the single reason WHY the us has the most expensively run goernment in the world. Realistic healthcare subsidies for a whole state would cost less than half an F-22. The military isint guarding your freedom. It is infact the shackles that are holding you back.

[Ghastly]

Libertarianism runs contrary to having a heart, a concience, a sense of community, or a sense of decency.

For the most part, the biggest problem with libertarianism is it's either being promoted by corporations to try and incite people to get rid of the last weak threads of government that stand between them and complete unchallenged global power. "Hey gang! The government is giving your money to poor people. Get rid of them for us and you'll be super rich... don't worry, we promise once the laws preventing us from openly destroying our competition have been removed we won't charge you so much for services, like the right to breath the air we own, that you'll wish you were being taxed again. Nope that would never happen. We're your friends."

Or it's being promoted by inbred paranoid rednecks who resent the government not allowing them to own black people anymore and hang a couple from the trees for decoration.

It's just another social/political/economic extreme that sounds nice on paper but won't work in reality.

What's needed is balance. Perfect equallibrium between all parties with nobody having too much power. Unfortunately with greed in the mix we're not going to get that because everyone wants all the power in their court. In the end it's going to come down to who has the most power is going to take it all and let's face it, if people continue to sit back and watch allow the power of citizens to be eroded then the only ones present for the final smackdown are going to be government and corporate. My money is on the corporations in this one. It'll be a bloodless coup too. They'll just keep chipping away bit by bit at the system until they've completely assimilated the government. Once that happens your very right to exist will be determined by how much you enrich your corporate masters. If you can't be used for profit then out you go.

Nations won't mean a thing. What does a nation matter to an artificial entity that exists globally. So you screw over every last person living in North America. If it makes you more profit in China then it's worth it. In a few decades you reverse the trend. Maybe this time you screw over China for the sake of profit from South America. Then Europe, then Africa. A constant cycle of using human life for dollars. Firing your customers in one place to sell more in another place. The beauty is you enrich one nation at the expense of another you're constantly creating a new batch of future 3rd world paupers who will work for a bowl of rice. If you dismantle the social safety net that keeps them from starving and the trade regulations that prevent you from dumping labour then there's no end to it... until the resources run out, but that's not something we have to worry about. Enjoy the ride now and be thankful you won't be alive to see the world our great great grandchildren will be stuck with.

[Gengar003]

Darn. I was going to reinvigorate this thread with a rant about american restauraunts, but that seems trivial now.

Carry on. I'll wait.