Conservatives deal with facts and reach conclusions; liberals have conclusions and sell them as facts.
This discursive Bookworm Beat wanders from American black culture, to evil Leftists, to the wonders of Wal-Mart versus the horrors of socialized medicine. Everything Leftists hate about America. I’ve been spending some time of late in small town America — in Eastern Tennessee to be specific. Frankly, I can see why
Continue readingIn September 2011, I wrote a post about the way teachers constantly present themselves as the hardest working, most underpaid people in America. I have a great deal of respect for teachers and, to the extent I deliver my kids to their care, I want them to be decent, knowledgeable,
Continue readingMy very strong sense is that the shutdown will reveal how much of our federal government is inessential. I’m not the only one who feels this way. And no wonder, because the shutdown reveals waste everywhere. This shouldn’t be a surprise. Monopolies are invariably poorly managed and unchecked bureaucracies invariably
Continue readingWhen I lived in England, those who could afford to escape from government medicine by paying twice did so. I addition to their high taxes, they bought a private insurance that I remember rejoiced in the name BUPA. Things haven’t changed. I don’t know why I’m on the mailing list,
Continue readingA few stories from England’s Daily Mail, all showing that the country is not in the best of health. Each of these stories highlights, not the horrible things individuals can do, because those crimes transcend national boundaries, but the way in which England has rendered itself unable to react in
Continue readingIn a market economy, the marketplace drives the availability of goods and services. If there’s a big demand, the market will create a big supply; if the demand dries up, so does supply, as the market sends its resources elsewhere. Supply and demand, however, have no place in government controlled
Continue readingAs the Soviet Union showed, by the time medicine is fully nationalized, careers in medicine have been reduced to the lowest status level, somewhere around street cleaning. Learning medicine and practicing medicine (including nursing, pharmacy, technical jobs, etc.), is incredibly time-consuming and, in a society that still has the gloss
Continue readingBritain’s NHS, which is government-run (i.e., Communist) medicine, has, unsurprisingly, Communist outcomes. Lots of people die unnecessarily in England under the government’s beneficent care: British health care is little better than that of former Communist countries, which spend a fraction of the billions poured into the NHS. A survey published
Continue readingFirst, a joke, one I’ve told before: In long ago Japan or China (or amongst the Eskimos, or something else), a young boy came across his father carry a large basket on his back. In the basket was the boy’s grandfather. He asked, “Father, where are you taking grandfather?” “Shh,”
Continue readingFaced with an epidemic, England is already planning on rationing: Thousands of patients could be denied NHS treatment and left to die under ‘worst-case’ emergency plans for a swine-flu epidemic. The blueprint would force doctors to ‘play God’ and prioritise intensive-care treatment for those most likely to benefit – ruling
Continue readingAgain, Britain reminds us of the possible consequences of allowing the government to control health care. (See here and here.) As always, what amazes me about the Left is it’s never ending optimism about the government. Its members will cheerfully concede that the government pretty much bungles most of the
Continue readingI heard on Dennis Prager today a call from a British man who pointed out that, in the 10 years of Tony Blair’s socialism, every major institution in Britain declined. And the more the government meddled, the greater the decline. Today’s British papers offer yet another example: The dental portion
Continue readingBritain’s Telegraph has three interesting articles, and the London Times one: Read about the vast difference between Britain’s and France’s socialized medicine. I’d certainly like to know what accounts for the difference before I start making changes to the American system. Color me skeptical, but I bet Obama, who shows
Continue readingThere’s talk of Obama giving Hillary the green light to socialize American medicine if she’ll walk away from the primaries. Melanie Phillips gives us a good example of why the renewed specter of socialized medicine should worry us: To the Labour Party, the National Health Service is the talismanic proof
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