Xavier Gorce again demonizes the adversaries of global warming:• So, according to our latest scientific projec-tions…
• Global warming might precipitate a change of one meter…
• the drop of the climate skeptics into their inanities…
• Easily…
Behind the Façades in France: What expats and the mainstream media (French and American alike) fail to notice (or fail to tell you) about French attitudes, principles, values, and official positions…
Saturday, October 05, 2013
Again, "Dialogue" for the Left Amounts to Rejecting Any Argument by Their Adversaries as Nothing More Than Inanities
Xavier Gorce again demonizes the adversaries of global warming:• So, according to our latest scientific projec-tions…
• Global warming might precipitate a change of one meter…
• the drop of the climate skeptics into their inanities…
• Easily…
Friday, October 04, 2013
Russia's Gulag in the 21st Century 4: It Would Be Nice to Hear Our Leftist Activists React With More Vigor
“I am declaring a hunger strike starting Sept. 23. I refuse to take part in slave labor in the camp until the penal colony authorities start to conduct themselves in accordance with laws and start treating women inmates like people rather than cattle.”Pussy Riot member Nadezhda Tolokonnikova is starting a hunger strike in Mordovia's penitentiary colony # 14, report Marie Jégo and Masha Gessen.
Nadejda Tolokonnikova, l'une des militantes incarcérées du groupe russe Pussy Riot, … purge sa peine dans la colonie pénitentiaire n°14 en Mordovie, devenue récemment la nouvelle patrie de Gérard Depardieu, à 300 km au sud-est de Moscou. De sinistre mémoire, l'endroit est peuplé de "camps de rééducation par le travail" aux conditions de détention dignes du Moyen Age.
Selon son témoignage, les détenues y sont forcées de travailler quotidiennement jusqu'à dix-sept heures pour coudre des uniformes de police, au rythme de 150 pièces par jour. "On a les mains piquées par les aiguilles et pleines d'éraflures, le sang se répand sur la table de travail, mais on continue à coudre", écrit-elle. Les détenues ont droit à moins de quatre heures de sommeil par nuit et jouissentd'un jour de repos toutes les six semaines.
Les punitions sont cruelles et dégradantes. Ainsi, il est fréquent de laisser les détenues des heures à l'extérieur dans le froid, de les empêcher de se laver, d'aller aux toilettes, de boire et de manger. "Dans la 2e brigade, celle des invalides et des retraitées, il y a une femme qui a dû se faire amputer d'une jambe et de plusieurs doigts de la main parce qu'elle avait été trop longtemps punie dehors", écrit Nadejda Tolokonnikova.Devant la banalité dans les commentaires de lecteurs et, pour tout dire, la quasi-absence de réactions tout court, une lectrice réagit :
Ce serait bien d'entendre nos belles âmes de gauche (et de droite) réagir un peu plus vertement...
"Flexibility" Is for Putin; Not for Members of the Republican Party
Yesterday's debate (Note to Americans Who Believe Europeans' Health Care System Is the Way to Go) continues…
I'm looking at the government shutdown regarding health care from a different perspective…
Notably from a European perspective, where (believe me) a LOT of people would like it if hundreds of thousands of bureaucrats were sent home! (I read somewhere, "if they are "non-essential", why were they hired in the first place?" That certainly applies here in France, where the dream of most young people, according to one poll after another — you would hope it was to go out and start a business useful to one's fellow citizens — is to land a civil servant job with the administration — one that is safe and one where one doesn't have too much to do…)
Certainly I do not view us as enemy debaters on two opposing sides of one single issue…
Notice however, that my very first comment on this thread did address your main point (by quoting a Professor of Law at George Mason University School of Law):
As for "stable and reliable management", wasn't the revolutionaries' message of 1776 to their overlords, "we can do very well without management, thank you very much"? (And that they went on to prove that they could…)
There's an organization here in Paris, where the basic message is "Nous ne sommes pas des vaches à lait". That means "we are not milch cows" and it is a message to politicians, local and national, to "cease throwing money out the window".
And that, to me, is the main message of the Tea Party, of all Tea Partiers, left'n'right.
Now, if Tea Partiers have a bad reputation, it is for one of two reasons:
Either 1) they deserve the bad reputation,
or 2) the bad reputation is somewhat artificial and designed, serving the purpose of those who do not like their message of self-sufficiency, notably knight-on-white-horse-come-to-save-us politicians (and newspapermen!) who relish their (self-attributed) role of heroes in shining armor coming to the rescue of one group of poor innocent victims after another.
I am inclined to suspect that more often than not, the second reason prevails…
You mention death panels. True, that was/that is a (very) dramatic war of putting it, but there happens to be truth in the expression, although it is not active, but passive denial of care…
If a bureaucrat has two people who need an artificial knee or a back operation, and one of them is, say, a young 35-year-old athlete while the other is an old woman over 75, they are not unlikely to deny that care to the second person because he or she "is too old", who might even have trouble surviving, or surely benefiting from the operation for a great many years, and because the younger person is more in need of it.
That makes sense, somewhere, doesn't it? If you are a bureaucrat with an overview, and you see an operation required by a young healthy person and one close(r) to death, it makes more sense, and it is more humane, to choose the younger one.
The magic word, however, is "if"!
IF you have an overview! Maybe the solution is to take away the bureaucrat(s) and the bureaucracy. If no one has an overview, if an army of bureaucrats is not involved, both the younger man (in Denmark, say, or in Iowa) will make a decision with his doctor(s), while the 75-year-old woman (in France, maybe, or in Texas) would make her decision with her doctor(s), along with with her family and children.
And to the Americans protesting that this is not taking into consideration the poor, you need to remember that those despicable American capitalists are world leaders in charity and donations (also internationally, think of the Marshall Plan) — by contrast, here in Europe people will say, let the government take care of whatever the problem is.
Maybe you think this is only theoretical and you can continue to mock the term death panel. I don't know whether Forbes is also totally untrustworthy, but here comes a recent article that lends some truth to the term:
A French comedy took this on several years ago. In Les Ripoux (The Rotten Cops), a young trainee arrests a pickpocket (minute 25:05). His older partner typing the thief's testimony instead makes up a report that the thief was an honorable citizen who found the handbag in the street and brought it to the station. (And if the handbag's owner doesn't come to reclaim it, after a year and one day the thief can call it his own!) The younger cop is outraged. The older one says, this is doing more good than arresting him. Because local politicians want crime statistics to look good (they're already 11% higher than last year's), they've stopped counting pickpockets and other lesser criminals into the statistics — until next year. As the film progresses, Thierry Lhermitte becomes as manipulable as Philippe Noiret…
And this is the type of thing America wants in its health care system, to come between you and your doctor (who has changed from being "your" doctor to being "the community's" doctor)?! This is what you want to pay for at ever mounting prices?
Here's a proposition: your "broken" health system may be far better than you think, certainly than the Europeans ones that you laud so much (and that Europeans laud endlessly — and selv-servingly)…
As for the 1850s, you are correct, of course, to say that the Republicans were honorable as well as nation-oriented.
However… that is not how they were treated!
Look at how Republicans, or Tea Partiers, are treated today — as the ridiculous, despicable, mindless human beings whose condemnation is without the shadow of a doubt warranted; you might even go as far as calling people such as them reptiles (in fact, that is how James Carville described the Republicans in 2010). They are so despicable that Obama is willing to talk to people such as Medvedev (I will have "more flexibility" after the election), and Putin, and Iran's leaders, Venezuela's caudillo, easily, but to the Republicans he — and for this he is praised — will not give an inch. They are too despicable for him — for America — for the world. (No "flexibility" for people such as them!)
Well, guess what: that is exactly how Republicans were treated in the 1850s…
It went so far that one prominent frontier lawyer had this to say in 1860, as he told supporters how he would speak to the party's adversaries, in the Democrat Party as well as in the South, assuming they were willing to listen:
(Indeed, Republicans were then condemned, by Democrats North as well as South, forllll everything from hare-brained schemes to lack of respect for the status quo, through disregarding the unity of the nation (or the Union), mixing into the affairs of others, dissing the Constitution, and recklessly opposing duly-voted laws that should be regarded as the law of the land…)
I'm looking at the government shutdown regarding health care from a different perspective…
Notably from a European perspective, where (believe me) a LOT of people would like it if hundreds of thousands of bureaucrats were sent home! (I read somewhere, "if they are "non-essential", why were they hired in the first place?" That certainly applies here in France, where the dream of most young people, according to one poll after another — you would hope it was to go out and start a business useful to one's fellow citizens — is to land a civil servant job with the administration — one that is safe and one where one doesn't have too much to do…)
Certainly I do not view us as enemy debaters on two opposing sides of one single issue…
Notice however, that my very first comment on this thread did address your main point (by quoting a Professor of Law at George Mason University School of Law):
It is … worth noting that the Republicans are not the only side in this dispute who are willing to shut down the government if they don’t get what they want on health care policy.
President Obama and the Democratic-controlled Senate could just as easily avoid a shutdown by accepting the House bill.Later, I quoted the Washington Post, which said that shutdowns were commoner than thought, and even occurred when the three "parts" of government were in the hands of the same party (shutdown #4)…
As for "stable and reliable management", wasn't the revolutionaries' message of 1776 to their overlords, "we can do very well without management, thank you very much"? (And that they went on to prove that they could…)
There's an organization here in Paris, where the basic message is "Nous ne sommes pas des vaches à lait". That means "we are not milch cows" and it is a message to politicians, local and national, to "cease throwing money out the window".
And that, to me, is the main message of the Tea Party, of all Tea Partiers, left'n'right.
Now, if Tea Partiers have a bad reputation, it is for one of two reasons:
Either 1) they deserve the bad reputation,
or 2) the bad reputation is somewhat artificial and designed, serving the purpose of those who do not like their message of self-sufficiency, notably knight-on-white-horse-come-to-save-us politicians (and newspapermen!) who relish their (self-attributed) role of heroes in shining armor coming to the rescue of one group of poor innocent victims after another.
I am inclined to suspect that more often than not, the second reason prevails…
You mention death panels. True, that was/that is a (very) dramatic war of putting it, but there happens to be truth in the expression, although it is not active, but passive denial of care…
If a bureaucrat has two people who need an artificial knee or a back operation, and one of them is, say, a young 35-year-old athlete while the other is an old woman over 75, they are not unlikely to deny that care to the second person because he or she "is too old", who might even have trouble surviving, or surely benefiting from the operation for a great many years, and because the younger person is more in need of it.
That makes sense, somewhere, doesn't it? If you are a bureaucrat with an overview, and you see an operation required by a young healthy person and one close(r) to death, it makes more sense, and it is more humane, to choose the younger one.
The magic word, however, is "if"!
IF you have an overview! Maybe the solution is to take away the bureaucrat(s) and the bureaucracy. If no one has an overview, if an army of bureaucrats is not involved, both the younger man (in Denmark, say, or in Iowa) will make a decision with his doctor(s), while the 75-year-old woman (in France, maybe, or in Texas) would make her decision with her doctor(s), along with with her family and children.
And to the Americans protesting that this is not taking into consideration the poor, you need to remember that those despicable American capitalists are world leaders in charity and donations (also internationally, think of the Marshall Plan) — by contrast, here in Europe people will say, let the government take care of whatever the problem is.
Maybe you think this is only theoretical and you can continue to mock the term death panel. I don't know whether Forbes is also totally untrustworthy, but here comes a recent article that lends some truth to the term:
Why The Federal Government Wants To Redefine The Word 'Cancer'This is how government works! Now the bureaucracy has so many fewer people to take care of!
The federal government wants to reduce the number of Americans diagnosed each year with cancer. But not by better preventive care or healthier living. Instead, the government wants to redefine the term “cancer” so that fewer conditions qualify as a true cancer."
A French comedy took this on several years ago. In Les Ripoux (The Rotten Cops), a young trainee arrests a pickpocket (minute 25:05). His older partner typing the thief's testimony instead makes up a report that the thief was an honorable citizen who found the handbag in the street and brought it to the station. (And if the handbag's owner doesn't come to reclaim it, after a year and one day the thief can call it his own!) The younger cop is outraged. The older one says, this is doing more good than arresting him. Because local politicians want crime statistics to look good (they're already 11% higher than last year's), they've stopped counting pickpockets and other lesser criminals into the statistics — until next year. As the film progresses, Thierry Lhermitte becomes as manipulable as Philippe Noiret…
And this is the type of thing America wants in its health care system, to come between you and your doctor (who has changed from being "your" doctor to being "the community's" doctor)?! This is what you want to pay for at ever mounting prices?
Here's a proposition: your "broken" health system may be far better than you think, certainly than the Europeans ones that you laud so much (and that Europeans laud endlessly — and selv-servingly)…
As for the 1850s, you are correct, of course, to say that the Republicans were honorable as well as nation-oriented.
However… that is not how they were treated!
Look at how Republicans, or Tea Partiers, are treated today — as the ridiculous, despicable, mindless human beings whose condemnation is without the shadow of a doubt warranted; you might even go as far as calling people such as them reptiles (in fact, that is how James Carville described the Republicans in 2010). They are so despicable that Obama is willing to talk to people such as Medvedev (I will have "more flexibility" after the election), and Putin, and Iran's leaders, Venezuela's caudillo, easily, but to the Republicans he — and for this he is praised — will not give an inch. They are too despicable for him — for America — for the world. (No "flexibility" for people such as them!)
Well, guess what: that is exactly how Republicans were treated in the 1850s…
It went so far that one prominent frontier lawyer had this to say in 1860, as he told supporters how he would speak to the party's adversaries, in the Democrat Party as well as in the South, assuming they were willing to listen:
…when you speak of us Republicans, you do so only to denounce us as reptiles, or, at the best, as no better than outlaws. You will grant a hearing to pirates or murderers, but nothing like it to [Republicans]. In all your contentions with one another, each of you deems an unconditional condemnation of [Republicanism] as the first thing to be attended to.Abraham Lincoln — for it was he — added:
Indeed, such condemnation of us seems to be an indispensable prerequisite — license, so to speak — among you to be admitted or permitted to speak at all. Now, can you, or not, be prevailed upon to pause and to consider whether this is quite just to us, or even to yourselves?But maybe we shouldn't be too quick to deny the similarities…
Sure, you're right: many things are different from the 1850s/1860s.
(Indeed, Republicans were then condemned, by Democrats North as well as South, forllll everything from hare-brained schemes to lack of respect for the status quo, through disregarding the unity of the nation (or the Union), mixing into the affairs of others, dissing the Constitution, and recklessly opposing duly-voted laws that should be regarded as the law of the land…)
Thursday, October 03, 2013
French Ad Makes Fun of JFK Murder
50 years after the John F Kennedy assassination in Dallas comes a French ad that makes fun of the murder.
Actually, it isn't as bad as it sounds — in fact, the joke is not the JFK shooting itself, but the fact that it turns out to be a spoiler (which I've just spoiled for you), because only at the end of the 30-second ad do we find out what was going on at a seemingly harmless and innocent parade. In that perspective, it's not unreasonable to find the ad somewhat unobjectionable and rather amusing, moreover so when one knows that the PMU (aka France's nº 1 horse racing bookmaker) also has an ad on the Titanic (look quickly for the Leonardo Di Caprio and his sweetheart characters).
But still, you have to wonder: would they have dared make a similar ad over the violent deaths of Salvador Allende or Che Guevara?
Actually, it isn't as bad as it sounds — in fact, the joke is not the JFK shooting itself, but the fact that it turns out to be a spoiler (which I've just spoiled for you), because only at the end of the 30-second ad do we find out what was going on at a seemingly harmless and innocent parade. In that perspective, it's not unreasonable to find the ad somewhat unobjectionable and rather amusing, moreover so when one knows that the PMU (aka France's nº 1 horse racing bookmaker) also has an ad on the Titanic (look quickly for the Leonardo Di Caprio and his sweetheart characters).
But still, you have to wonder: would they have dared make a similar ad over the violent deaths of Salvador Allende or Che Guevara?
You like to bet?
You will love horse betting
PMU: we bet you are going to win!
Russia's Gulag in the 21st Century 3: In Russia, "the Spirit of the Gulag Is Alive and Well"
Zoïa Svetova is interviewed by Le Monde's Marie Jégo: but what information she gives, needless to say, is of no interest to Barack Obama and his followers (foreign and domestic), who want to get pesky foreign policy problems out of the way as quickly as possible, in order to focus on the real problems of the world: those despicable members of the American people who do not realize that Russians, Arabs, and Europeans are all basically kind-hearted and harmless while that their own society is a nightmare which needs the government's remedial intervention as quickly as possible…
Zoïa Svetova : The Russian prison system, a legacy of the gulag (the Stalin era camps), continues to exist as the authorities use it as an instrument of repression. Habits of the gulag have not disappeared. How could they when they have never been condemned at the state level? It must be kept in mind that those who now run Russia are the political heirs of Stalin and Andropov [KGB Chairman between 1967 and 1982, later Secretary General of the Communist Party of the USSR, he succeeded Leonid Brezhnev at the head of the Supreme Soviet in 1983], who used the prison system as an instrument of repression. It is clear that the heirs of the prison system use it in the same fashion today.
… The best known type of beating is the "registration". It goes like this: when new prisoners are entering the colony for the first time, a hedge of clubs are formed on either side of their path and they are beaten, in order to break them and force them to abide by the rules of the camp.
Zoïa Svetova : Le système carcéral russe, hérité du goulag (les camps staliniens), continue d'exister car les autorités s'en servent comme d'un instrument de répression. Les habitudes du goulag n'ont pas disparu des mentalités. Comment le pourraient-elles quand elles n'ont jamais été condamnées au niveau étatique ? Il faut bien avoir à l'esprit que ceux qui dirigent aujourd'hui la Russie sont les héritiers politiques de Staline et d'Andropov [président du KGB entre 1967 et 1982, puis secrétaire général du Parti communiste d'URSS, il succède à Leonid Brejnev à la tête du Soviet suprême en 1983] qui ont utilisé l'univers carcéral comme un instrument de répression. Il est clair que les héritiers de ce système pénitentiaire l'utilisent de la même façon aujourd'hui.
… Le cas de tabassage parmi les plus connus, c'est l'"enregistrement". Cela se passe comme ça : lorsque des nouveaux prisonniers font leur entrée pour la première fois dans la colonie, une haie de matraques se forme de part et d'autre de leur passage et ils sont tapés, histoire de les casser et de les obliger à se soumettre aux règles du camp.
Wednesday, October 02, 2013
Note to Americans Who Believe Europeans' Health Care System Is the Way to Go
This comes from a Facebook discussion that I got into:
First, you castigate all the claims a Republican makes — which is nothing bad, to be sure (it would maybe be better if you were consistent and did the same for Democrats once in a while); but then, every piece of Europe's never-ceasing bragging you accept as true (some of you even accept CUBA'S assertion that the country's health coverage is superior to America's; back in the day, we were told that the Soviet Union had superior coverage to America's)!
Note: In Havana, the élite goes to special dispensaries only for the élite.
The same was true in Moscow and in Leningrad.
And in Paris, when you want really good care, you go (that is, the rich person goes) to the city's private hospital (called — wait for it — the Hôpital… Américain!).
Europe:
How about putting Europe's claims into doubt, once in a while?
In short:
The reason that Europe has its "universal health
coverage" is because of, and thanks to, America.
Here's how it works!
(And let's skip over how America's military shield allows (and has allowed for the past 70 years) Europe gobs of money for its health coverage by spending no more than a pittance on their own armed forces — then again, the current administration wants to pay heed to Europe in that area also…)
Europe says it has better health coverage than America.
They said the same 20 years ago.
They said the same 50 years ago.
Well, in the meantime, came a lot of innovations.
The innovations help/helped everybody, from America to Europe to further afield.
The (supposedly evil) pharmaceuticals put more medicine at the disposal of everybody, bringing prices down (over time), and eventually this trickled down to the poor (poor Americans as well as poor Europeans).
But where did the innovations come from? More often than not, from America. Who wins the Nobel prize in medicine every year? If it isn't an American, it's usually someone working at an American university. Why? Because of innovation.
How do you have innovation? By reducing red tape and the presence of bureaucrats — not to mention reducing the presence of on-the-dole workers, due to entitlements — as well as the entitlement spirit…
(Some might say this was the message of 1776: we do NOT need all these rules, we do NOT need all these taxes, we do NOT need all these bureaucrats, we CAN build it ourselves, the average human being is quite capable of taking care of himself…)
Supposedly, medicine costs less in Europe. Well, most of the medicine used in Europe happens to have originated in America. When it is researched and developed in America, the (supposedly evil) pharmaceuticals need to recoup their costs. (FYI, the profits go to… more research; yes, that's how a business is run.) So when it is first marketed, the price starts out relatively high (America). Later, the price can come down (Europe).
MOREOVER, the price comes down because an entire government (France, Germany, Denmark…) is negotiating, using carrots and sticks to bring the price down.
That sounds smart to some of you, doesn't it?
Sure — except it gives you a false image of what is going on.
They can do this for the simple reason that there is a locomotive pulling them, a locomotive to pull them along — now the locomotive wants to imitate the carriages?! Who is going to do the pulling?!
With America ALSO adding an army of whole new bureaucrats, IRS employees, and other (sorry if I offend someone) parasites, we're going to — we're ALL (Europeans, Americans themselves) going to — kill the goose that lays the golden eggs.
We'll never know it, of course, because we won't see what was NOT invented/discovered.
Okay, maybe we won't stop the locomotive, maybe we won't kill the goose, maybe we'll just slow the locomotive down, maybe we'll just break one leg — but it this something to aspire to?
Compare telephones between now and ca 1980; which is better?
Prior to 1980, there were 20 to 40 years of little to no innovation, but nobody knew it, nobody complained about, because few if any people could imagine technological evolution in the sector. The common citizen (American or foreign) couldn't imagine it, the common bureaucrat couldn't imagine it, and certainly the common "I'm-here-to-make-your-life-better" politician couldn't imagine it. Only a few rare individuals could do so. Government got out of the phone business at about the time Ronald Reagan was president (although I don't think it was due to one of RR's own policies), the private sector was where "bold, new policy solutions" were created, and the field boomed — to everybody's benefit! And today the average "poor" person has more telephone "power" — he is richer, in a sense, regarding one's own communications capabilities — than the dirty capitalist pig millionaire of 50 years ago, of 20 years ago, and even of 10 years ago.
(But at least, back in the day, everybody was equal! Everybody — from prince (i.e., filthy rich capitalist) to pauper — had about the same rotary phone, black, although later came those sickly khaki and cream colors…)
Wouldn't it be better if medical innovations came at the rate of telephone innovations?!
To want to imitate the Europeans is insane!
(Indeed, it is even more insane for a European to WANT Americans to imitate them — unless he is a member of the élite wanting to keep his perks and privileges…)
As for this European message "America is a nightmare, we are so much more humane than those retards" (which liberals in America transfer to conservatives alone), it is a message to their own masses. It is PRECISELY a message not to look to (what until now was) America's far less and to put into question the tons of rules, regulations, and taxes Europeans live under.
And when Americans elect a president who promises to put in more rules and regulations, the European élites are ecstatic, because there will not be the nation that their tax-weary citizens can look to, and they bestow him with the Nobel Prize simply for… being like them!
(Being like those wise, generous, tolerant, visionary, etc etc etc beings that those enlightened Europeans — modestly — happen to be…)
More on health care here:
Never mind it's worked reasonably well in Canada and Europe. In the U. S., it would be "socialism," even though we have socialized education and socialized police, fire and transportation systems. And we are "exceptional" which is Tea Party speak for never allowing ourselves the indignity of learning and prospering from other countries' successes. We have to uphold the illusion that we are the best at everything by doing it our way, though the data clearly show otherwise.Speaking as somebody who lives or who has lived in Denmark and in France as well as several other European countries (besides the United States), I'm afraid some of you Americans take Europeans' self-serving declarations as fact and need to learn more about European civics and the "data" that they present to you (as well as, foremost, to their own citizens).
First, you castigate all the claims a Republican makes — which is nothing bad, to be sure (it would maybe be better if you were consistent and did the same for Democrats once in a while); but then, every piece of Europe's never-ceasing bragging you accept as true (some of you even accept CUBA'S assertion that the country's health coverage is superior to America's; back in the day, we were told that the Soviet Union had superior coverage to America's)!
Note: In Havana, the élite goes to special dispensaries only for the élite.
The same was true in Moscow and in Leningrad.
And in Paris, when you want really good care, you go (that is, the rich person goes) to the city's private hospital (called — wait for it — the Hôpital… Américain!).
Europe:
Oh we are so much more humane than those clueless Americans; Oh we are so much more generous than those egoistical Americans; Oh we take so much better care of our poor than those awful Americans; America is a nightmare for the poor, for minorities, for [fill out the blank], a nightmare of racism and egotism!You believe this nonsense! Then you turn around and go: "No no no, it is not all of us, it is only the reactionary Republicans; we liberals we're good, humane people, and now we're going to be wise and benevolent, Europe, and imitate your outstanding example of noble altruism!"
How about putting Europe's claims into doubt, once in a while?
In short:
The reason that Europe has its "universal health
coverage" is because of, and thanks to, America.
Here's how it works!
(And let's skip over how America's military shield allows (and has allowed for the past 70 years) Europe gobs of money for its health coverage by spending no more than a pittance on their own armed forces — then again, the current administration wants to pay heed to Europe in that area also…)
Europe says it has better health coverage than America.
They said the same 20 years ago.
They said the same 50 years ago.
Well, in the meantime, came a lot of innovations.
The innovations help/helped everybody, from America to Europe to further afield.
The (supposedly evil) pharmaceuticals put more medicine at the disposal of everybody, bringing prices down (over time), and eventually this trickled down to the poor (poor Americans as well as poor Europeans).
But where did the innovations come from? More often than not, from America. Who wins the Nobel prize in medicine every year? If it isn't an American, it's usually someone working at an American university. Why? Because of innovation.
How do you have innovation? By reducing red tape and the presence of bureaucrats — not to mention reducing the presence of on-the-dole workers, due to entitlements — as well as the entitlement spirit…
(Some might say this was the message of 1776: we do NOT need all these rules, we do NOT need all these taxes, we do NOT need all these bureaucrats, we CAN build it ourselves, the average human being is quite capable of taking care of himself…)
Supposedly, medicine costs less in Europe. Well, most of the medicine used in Europe happens to have originated in America. When it is researched and developed in America, the (supposedly evil) pharmaceuticals need to recoup their costs. (FYI, the profits go to… more research; yes, that's how a business is run.) So when it is first marketed, the price starts out relatively high (America). Later, the price can come down (Europe).
MOREOVER, the price comes down because an entire government (France, Germany, Denmark…) is negotiating, using carrots and sticks to bring the price down.
That sounds smart to some of you, doesn't it?
Sure — except it gives you a false image of what is going on.
They can do this for the simple reason that there is a locomotive pulling them, a locomotive to pull them along — now the locomotive wants to imitate the carriages?! Who is going to do the pulling?!
With America ALSO adding an army of whole new bureaucrats, IRS employees, and other (sorry if I offend someone) parasites, we're going to — we're ALL (Europeans, Americans themselves) going to — kill the goose that lays the golden eggs.
We'll never know it, of course, because we won't see what was NOT invented/discovered.
Okay, maybe we won't stop the locomotive, maybe we won't kill the goose, maybe we'll just slow the locomotive down, maybe we'll just break one leg — but it this something to aspire to?
Compare telephones between now and ca 1980; which is better?
Prior to 1980, there were 20 to 40 years of little to no innovation, but nobody knew it, nobody complained about, because few if any people could imagine technological evolution in the sector. The common citizen (American or foreign) couldn't imagine it, the common bureaucrat couldn't imagine it, and certainly the common "I'm-here-to-make-your-life-better" politician couldn't imagine it. Only a few rare individuals could do so. Government got out of the phone business at about the time Ronald Reagan was president (although I don't think it was due to one of RR's own policies), the private sector was where "bold, new policy solutions" were created, and the field boomed — to everybody's benefit! And today the average "poor" person has more telephone "power" — he is richer, in a sense, regarding one's own communications capabilities — than the dirty capitalist pig millionaire of 50 years ago, of 20 years ago, and even of 10 years ago.
(But at least, back in the day, everybody was equal! Everybody — from prince (i.e., filthy rich capitalist) to pauper — had about the same rotary phone, black, although later came those sickly khaki and cream colors…)
Wouldn't it be better if medical innovations came at the rate of telephone innovations?!
To want to imitate the Europeans is insane!
(Indeed, it is even more insane for a European to WANT Americans to imitate them — unless he is a member of the élite wanting to keep his perks and privileges…)
As for this European message "America is a nightmare, we are so much more humane than those retards" (which liberals in America transfer to conservatives alone), it is a message to their own masses. It is PRECISELY a message not to look to (what until now was) America's far less and to put into question the tons of rules, regulations, and taxes Europeans live under.
And when Americans elect a president who promises to put in more rules and regulations, the European élites are ecstatic, because there will not be the nation that their tax-weary citizens can look to, and they bestow him with the Nobel Prize simply for… being like them!
(Being like those wise, generous, tolerant, visionary, etc etc etc beings that those enlightened Europeans — modestly — happen to be…)
More on health care here:
- The French healthcare system, even if taken at its best, is like an expensive jewel on a beggar’s neck by Bojidar Marinov
- Call it the grass-is-greener syndrome: the French have their own problems that show there's no such thing as a free lunch — or a free doctor's visit by Investor's Business Daily
- Extra Charges, Bribes, and a Yoke that Fetters Innovation: The Reality of France's State Health Care Is "Rather Insidious" from Le Monde
Tuesday, October 01, 2013
Obama to Republicans: "Get in the back of the bus!"
Just saw this on Facebook:
Obama to Repubs: - "get in the back of the bus."
Russia's Gulag in the 21st Century 2: The Type of Thing That Obama's Democrat Party Have No Stomach For
Valentin Danilov, a Russian physician sentenced to 14 years in "a hard-work penitentiary colony", testifies to Le Monde's Marie Jégo.
Needless to say, such information is of no interest to Barack Obama and his followers (foreign and domestic), who want to get pesky foreign policy problems out of the way as quickly as possible, in order to focus on the real problems of the world: those despicable members of the American people who do not realize that Russians, Arabs, and Europeans are all basically kind-hearted and harmless while that their own society is a nightmare which needs the government's remedial intervention as quickly as possible…
Russia's Gulag in the 21st Century 1: "The Soviet Union has vanished, but the gulag is still alive"
In Russia, says Vladimir Osetchkine, the founder of the website gulagu.net ("No to the Gulag!") to Le Monde's Marie Jégo, "The Soviet Union has vanished, but the gulag is still alive!"
Complain in writing to the conditions of detention and the attitude of the administration is risking trouble. There will inevitably be a conversation with a member of the administration and then he will have to choose between the solitary and "pressure box", ie a cell number, in which there is "yellow" responsible all relate to the administration. They will have to convince the detainee that his complaint has no chance of success.Needless to say, such information is of no interest to Barack Obama and his followers (foreign and domestic), who want to get pesky foreign policy problems out of the way as quickly as possible, in order to focus on the real problems of the world: those despicable members of the American people who do not realize that Russians, Arabs, and Europeans are all basically kind-hearted and harmless while that their own society is a nightmare which needs the government's remedial intervention as quickly as possible…
The name of your website refers to the gulag. Is the comparison relevant?
The Gulag was designed, down to the smallest detail, to eliminate all forms of human dignity. The USSR is no more, but as for the Gulag, it is still alive. Over 90% of penal colonies originate from the camp system of the Stalin era. On the heating pipes you will see the years 1937, 1946, 1954, everything comes from that time [Stalin was in power from 1924 until his death in 1953]. Same for the "barracks" [inmates' housing] and canteens where 300 people have to eat in 30 minutes.
Se plaindre par écrit des conditions de détention ou de l'attitude de l'administration, c'est risquer les ennuis. Il y aura forcément une conversation avec un membre de l'administration et après il faudra choisir entre le mitard et "la boîte à pression", c'est à dire une cellule à plusieurs, dans laquelle il y a des "jaunes" chargés de tout rapporter à l'administration. Ils devront convaincre le détenu que sa plainte n'a aucune chance d'aboutir.
Le nom de votre site fait référence au goulag. La comparaison est-elle pertinente ?
Le goulag a été conçu jusque dans les moindres détails pour supprimer toute forme de dignité humaine. L'URSS n'est plus, le goulag, lui, est toujours vivant. Plus de 90 % des colonies pénitentiaires viennent du système des camps de l'époque stalinienne. Sur la tuyauterie du chauffage vous verrez toujours écrit 1937, 1946, 1954, tout vient de cette époque [Staline était au pouvoir de 1924 jusqu'à sa mort en 1953]. Pareil pour les "baraques" [logement des détenus] et les cantines où 300 personnes doivent manger en 30 minutes.
Monday, September 30, 2013
Obamacare is creating artificial scarcity; The leftists want the whole medical system to collapse financially so that it can be nationalized
From our circle of friends' debate on health care comes this nugget from No Pasarán's very own Joe N:
This post is No Pasarán's post number 12,000 since the blog's inception almost 10 years ago, so let this be an opportunity to write:They're creating artificial scarcity. They want the whole medical system to collapse financially so that it can be nationalized.It's a government acting directly against its people's interest.
We miss you, Joe, and we hope you come back — soon!
Sunday, September 29, 2013
Contentious public debates are nearly always won by those who hammer home the most easily repeatable catchphrases
This year’s climate news has been enough to give the even the most fanatical warmist a bad case of heartburnwrites Benny Huang on Patriot Update:
The primary setback to their cause is the revelation that the earth hasn’t warmed at all in the last fifteen years despite ever increasing levels of greenhouse gases.
Hypotheses abound to explain away the lack of warming. Is it a weak La Niña? Fluctuations in the solar cycle? Is more heat being captured in the depths of the ocean? Scientists aren’t sure and their uncertainty speaks volumes.
Contentious public debates are nearly always won by those who hammer home the most easily repeatable catchphrases. The public isn’t particularly informed about the question of climate change but it thinks it “knows” two things—the science is settled and scientists are in broad agreement.
Neither of these statements is true by any objective measure, and yet plenty of people who consider themselves eminently reasonable believe both of them. How then can these same people process the recent revelations coming from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) that there hasn’t been a lick of warming since Eagle-Eye Cherry topped the charts? We can now see that the science is not settled because the expected upward trend did not continue, just as easily as we can see that there is no consensus as to why.
… Several countries expressed their alarm that the IPCC would actually mention the net zero warming that has taken place since 1998. One must wonder why various world governments made their gripes known only in secret. Is it because they knew that they were essentially asking for the conclusions to be massaged to their liking?
Belgium voiced concerns that using the hottest year on record—1998—as the baseline would be misleading. Actually, when the hottest year on record was fifteen years ago, it’s not misleading at all. It’s kind of the point. The Belgians suggested using 1999 or 2000 instead because that would produce … an upward trend. And at the end of the day, ensuring that the chart displays an upward trend is really the goal, isn’t it?
… Germany wanted to delete all references to the lull supposedly because the time scale of ten to fifteen years was too short. Again, would it have been too short if had supported the sacred cause? Hungary worried that any mention of the lull would only be used as ammunition by skeptics. Did it ever occur to them that the skeptics might be right?