The American Dream

[fewwillfindit]

Today, I heard a political commentator say that Martin Luther King Jr's vision of the American dream was, "the same opportunity for all," and contrasted that with the modern progressive vision of, "the same outcome for all."

Questions for debate:

1. Is this an accurate representation of progressive philosophy?
2. Which is best for America?
3. Does the Bible promote or endorse either of these visions?

[nygreenguy]

63 % of those planning to vote for Democratic candidates have incomes that generally preclude having to pay taxes.

No, 63% of those who make UNDER $30,000 will vote democrat.

57% of those making between 30-50k will vote democrat.

44% of those making between $50-$75k will vote democrat.

Now, what this graph also doesnt tell you is what proportion of each makes up the democrats as a whole. We know the median income is in the 30-50 range. So if you are going to make assumptions about democrats, based upon their income, it should be in line with the average income.

All this graph describes is how people in income brackets vote, but gives no information on the parties themselves.

This is exactly how people are deceived by statistics.

[Wyvern]

..........and that, right there, is the problem. You are quite right; liberals think that
"the government" is going to do 'all the rest," as if "the government" obtained the money from thin, thin air. The problem is, Conservatives are well aware of where the government gets money; from the rest of us. It's not a coincidence that most conservatives pay taxes--and a huge proportion of liberals don't.

Unsupportable generalizations will get you nowhere. Care to both trying to show where any of this is true? Can you read the mind of liberals and know that they want the government to do "all the rest" and that they do not know how the government obtains funds? Do you also have any data to support that a "huge proportion" of liberals do not pay taxes?

According to one New York Times survey, which you can find here:http://forum.objectivismonline.net/inde ... topic=7967, 63 % of those planning to vote for Democratic candidates have incomes that generally preclude having to pay taxes. The fact that liberals are less likely to be charitable, and thus 'expect the government to do the rest" is illustrated in many different studies; you can see an article about that here: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/21/opini ... html?_r=3

Personally, I would call 63% a "huge proportion," but you might decide that more than half isn't quite huge enough. Up to you.

Do you know how to read graphs? I'm wondering because with your interpretation that means that 241% of those planning to vote democrat earn money. I understand that you want to skew the interpretation of the results in you favor but this is just sad that you would make this gross of an error regardless of whether it is intentional or not.

[Abraxas]

Affirmative Action serves to counteract systematic discimination against certain classes to create equal opportunity.

No, you are wrong. The counteraction of systematic discrimination is done by discrimination laws. So, if we go by your definition of Affirmative Action it is redundent, if we go by the actual definition of Affirmative Action it becomes reverse discrimination and antithetical to what Dr. King taught. Looks like you're stuck between a rock and a hard place.

I'm sorry, I must have missed the meeting where Doctor King became the gold standard by which all positions regarding discrimination, inequality of opportunity, and the solution to both were compared. Frankly, I haven't researched him enough to know what his thoughts are about affirmative action, what I do know is that study after study shows that discrimination against minority groups is alive and well. I further know that minority groups are disproportionately poorer than white Americans and that poorer groups have fewer opportunities (as you conceded). If affirmative action does anything, it provides a minor counterbalance to help equalize the opportunities available to a poorer demographic compared to those available to a richer one (and it barely does that).

Prison or getting away with crimes are not outcomes? Death from a treatable illness but for a lack of money or quick treatment and release are not outcomes? Not being able to go to school to get training for the jobs or skills that can get one ahead and so ever being denied both or buying your way into an upper crust school and all the rewards that come with it are not outcomes?

In the context of this thread and the national dialouge, no.

Says who? I hardly think you are in the position to dictate either the contents of this thread or the contents of the national discourse. Simply put, if neither consider other factors beyond the shallow surface ones like taxes and welfare payouts, then both the thread and the discourse are deficient.

Even if we were to pay attention to your factors they are irrelevant. Criminal Justice is determined by State Criminal Law that is administered by impartial Judges wherein both the plantiff and the defendent have representation by an educated attorney and is judged accordingly by a group of their peers. So we can throw that one out as it is no where near "unequal."

In theory. In practice those who can afford expensive lawyers can get away with crimes and those who want for nothing, don't feel the desperation of choosing between food and shelter, have little need to commit many of them. As for impartial, history shows us they are anything but, with minorities being more likely to be arrested, more likely to be charged, and more likely to receive harsher penalties for the same crimes.

As for the "death from treatable illness" that liberal talking point has been debunked so many times it's not even funny. Read the Code of Medical Ethics set forth by AMA.

And what does that link prove? That the AMA talks about it? The fact of the matter is, unless you have insurance, you can expect substandard and sporadic care, even from ERs. Even then, frequently by the time someone ends up in an ER, it is already too late to heal what ails them. nygreenguy pretty thoroughly demonstrated this has not, in fact, been debunked, with his link from earlier:

http://articles.cnn.com/2009-09-18/heal ... =PM:HEALTH

What it is, however, is a rather inconvenient fact that the right in the US likes to ignore, because, if acknowledged, they might have to face the fact that lack of proper health insurance has killed more people in the US than terrorism four hundred times over (conservatively) and yet at every opportunity they act to prevent the defense of Americans from that hazard.

They are relevant. The rich/poor gap changes opportunities for education which in turn changes their economic outcome.

No Abraxas, education in this country is free.

Yes, but living in school districts is not (and rich school districts are better funded, better equiped, and generally outperform poor community schools in almost every way). Nor are private schools. Nor is college. Nor are college related expenses.

The only difference is that rich people have the ability to send their kids their private schools while poor kids generally have to go to public schools. But liberals don't seem to see any sort of discrepency between private versus public education, so unless you admit that private schools outperform public schools your point is moot.

Who said there isn't a discrepancy? No, liberals don't say there isn't a discrepancy, they say the discrepancy is not caused by the free market being superior nor that switching to a purely private school model will help. When private schools can afford to cherry pick the best teachers and reject underperforming or poor students, they can, on paper, outperform everyone else. When there are so many private schools they have to compete for the best teachers and every student whether poor or rich is enrolled in one, the numbers would be no better for private education than public.

Government's the problem, not the solution.

A pithy, hollow, empty, insubstantial, soundbite. Government is the problem when people determined to make it not work are the ones running it so that the upper crust can prosper a little more at the expense of everyone else. When government is run for the good of the people, to advance the ideas of maximizing freedom and maintaining human rights and dignity, it is part of the solution.

Yea, I've seen similar comments like this made by other liberal users, never get's old. Friedich von Hayek in The Road to Serfdom and other members of the Austrian Schools have thoroughly debunked these assertions of of 'allegience to the State' and 'government must have a big role to take care of us.'

Firstly, I don't take the Austrian School even remotely seriously. I would be hard pressed to think of any bit of their methodology that remotely maps onto the real world. While Hayek was better than most of that line of thought, there were still very real, very serious flaws in his arguments to the degree they no longer hold much water beyond thought experiments and after accepting axioms shown false. I'll give you this much, at least you didn't cite the Von Mises Institute.

The key problem with this type of political philosophy is that it doesn't understand the relationship between the government and the people. When most of the market is privitized, and government regulation exists at a bare minimum then the people are the primary weilders of power and decision making.

No, wrong, stop. When it is deregulated, the biggest powers in the market have the most power, in our economy, those are transnational corporations and banks. We've seen what happens when you deregulate them and it isn't pretty.

When the government operates most of the market and regulates institutions such as healthcare, education, pensions, whatever, the power has been stripped from the people and put in the hands of a group of politicians.

You forget, in theory, this is a democracy/republic or something reasonably proximate to. That means the people rule, or at the very least, those accountable to the people rule. If the power rests in the hands of those accountable to the people, the power rests with the people. When the power rests with entities accountable only to shareholders, those are the only people who get served while everyone else gets trampled.

This is precisely why when moving up the government ladder, from municipal to state to federal, the higher you go the less power remains with the people.

I don't accept the premise. Each person has less power because they have to accumulate more votes to elect politicians the further from local government you get however, the people as a collective entity have the same amount of power wherever through being able to elect those who create the laws.

Liberals need to understand that. And no, a pauper child probably does not have the same oppurtunities that another child would have. Which is why we, as a thriving and advanced society, devote particular attention to this issue. Counseling, extracurricular activities, big brother programs, food pantries, clothe drives, christmas present drives are all things my church and other churches do for their community. Not to mention the many other private organizations devoted to alleviating these issues. I know what you're trying to get at, and the answer isn't to unleash the government and let it run wild and make this situation worse.

And yet with all those initiatives, all that private charity, all that support from the church, you have already conceded the pauper does not have equality of opportunity.

Because people are born into different situations. What would you have us do, use the government to stop the drug addicted mom, or have the government relocate the child to a proper home? Notice that low income communities in America have traditionally been associated with Public Housing sectors.

No, I would have us use the government to create equal opportunity for those born in different situations. You take it as a foregone conclusion that you have to alter the starting point to change the outcome, what I am arguing is that the government can be used to make it so the starting point is a less important factor in determining that outcome.

Also, as pointed out, public housing was created for low income families to begin with, so I don't really see what your point is.

The private sector has failed.

Read above, the public sector has failed at most everything it has tried to do and will continue to fail because that is the nature of government.

...he says, using the internet originally created through federal government funding via DARPA.

But really? I'll spare quoting all the government services that work just fine, as somebody else already has, and simply request you provide a couple of examples of government services that have failed not just in one iteration, but in all government attempts (and I mean any government, not just the US as if it is a failing of government in general it should always fail) but where the private sector has succeeded.

In Europe, in Canada, where broader government protections exist, the problem is not so great. Why then can it not be used to solve the problem here.

I am unable to speak to Canada. However, it seems that Democracy is all but dead in Europe due to these "broad government protections." Have you heard about the student riots in England, or the protests in Greece.

Yes, do you know why these people are rioting? I'll give you a hint, it is not because they want to see a reduction in the size of government, nor a reduction in the services they provide.

Seems like Dennis Prager was right, "The bigger the government the worse the citizen."

More hollow rhetoric.

Other than that, seems like European Economies are failing one after another. Guess that's what happens when you attempt to join into a single fiat currency and have bloated central banking policies.

Or have a world wide financial crisis created by unregulated financial institutions run out of the US, which happens to hold the US reserve currency. Before condemning their economy for failing, maybe you ought to look a little closer to home where the economy is just as bad (if not worse) for the reason of precisely the policies you are advocating.

Sure, schools hire tutors along with full time teachers at the taxpayers expsense. I've know problem with that, however it isn't the liberal solution and you know it isn't. The liberal solution would be to restribute the grade average amoung the class so that they all end up with the same, nice, equal outcome.

The problem with this is an incorrect assumption, namely that there is "the" liberal solution. There are many liberal solutions, among them, is, in fact, to raise taxes/fees and use that revenue for the benefit of those in need of additional assistance.

A form of wealth redistribution, we have already been over this. The working citizen will have to pay an extra $100 in taxes so that welfare checks and luxurious public emplyee benefits and be paid for.

So? They get use of the poor's labor and all the government service that protect their interests to a much greater degree than that of the unprivileged. Seems like a fair compromise to me, and indeed, under that system the US became the most powerful nation in the world. Compare the tax rates of our golden age to those now and become astonished that once the Austrian School's economics were implemented, the idea that tax cuts raise revenue and that unions must be broken that the US had its economy implode.

It's right out of the Marxist playbook.

And what if it were? This isn't an argument, it is a fallacy. Regardless of who said it, and by the way, this is not what Marx advocated, not by a long shot, it is in the interests of social justice and human decency to do it.

The Bible and Jesus were very much for giving to the poor and I find it remarkably hard to believe that were Jesus real he would favor a system that denied the poor as much care as the society could afford to give them.

Now whose arguing againist this? Are you saying that if I don't support your way of doing things then I must not care about it?

I never said anything about caring, I'm simply pointing to the fact that there are people dying in America from diseases we can cure, starving while we have food to spare, and homeless when we have more empty buildings than we know what to do with. That is largely the result of deregulation, the result of subpar welfare systems, the result of private enterprise being left to its own devices.

Why do people die in America if they have a disease, did you know that AMA Ethical Code and the Hypocratic Oath forces a physician to render care to a person even if they can't afford it.

And yet they are turned away from all but the emergency room which severely limits their access to things like preventative medicine and ongoing treatment for chronic conditions.

And I am unconvinced by the Food Wasting thing. Check out faith based food pantries, they are stocked by donations and feed the homeless on a regular to daily basis.

You are unconvinced there are families that go hungry in America? You think those pantries and charities get every single person in want of food and keep them reasonably well fed all year round? Yes, what they do is wonderful, that they give to the poor is tremendous. I am not going to slight what they do, but the fact is it is insufficient. Poor people still go hungry even with those resources and we, as a society, still waste a ton of food. Consider, every pizza restaurant I have ever seen requires any leftover pizza to be thrown away at the end of a workday instead of given to people who need it. This is to prevent employees from "ordering" a pizza right before close and keeping it. They have decided it is better to worry about preventing some minor losses from employees than it is to feed the poor and so every night all across America, a lot of perfectly good food get's thrown away for the sake of the profit margin while the poor still don't eat.

I'm not interested in cartoons. The fact is Jesus said pretty bluntly, "give to the poor or go to Hell". The idea Jesus was against coersive measures to give to charity is rather undermined by the way he spoke about it.

Unless you can find a passage that says "I command you to give to the poor even if you don't want to" you are simply misconstruing biblical verses to garner support for your case.

No, I say again, he said "give to the poor or go to hell." At no point did he qualify that with "unless you don't want to". Very simple, very straightforward. No negotiation, no nuance, no wiggle room. You have a choice, give to the poor or you will face the consequences at the wrath of God. By all means, if you can find another reading for this passage, go for it:

"Mat 25:41 “Then he will say to those on his left, ‘Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. 42 For I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, 43 I was a stranger and you did not invite me in, I needed clothes and you did not clothe me, I was sick and in prison and you did not look after me.’

44 “They also will answer, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or needing clothes or sick or in prison, and did not help you?’

45 “He will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me.’

46 “Then they will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life.�

EDIT: spelling

[WinePusher]

Seriosuly though, you are wrong. Discrimination laws have to deal mostly with outright obvious discrimination. AA goes further in trying to level the playing field.

No. Discrimination laws deal with all possible types of discrimination cases in all possible circumstances. I cannot say it any clearer. Leveling the playing field is unecessary if no institutional discrimination exists.

Reverse discrimination would be NOT giving a job to a white guy BECAUSE he was white, if no one else is applying. What AA says, of you have 2 equally qualified candidates, try to hire the minority.

No. Affirmative Action policy does not in any way, shape or form state such a thing. What Affirmative Action says is, in a given situation with two or more applicants, hire the minority regardless of qualifications. There is no such criteria of being "equally qualified."

Sorry, but the reality of the situation disagrees:

Research released this week in the American Journal of Public Health estimates that 45,000 deaths per year in the United States are associated with the lack of health insurance. If a person is uninsured, "it means you're at mortal risk," said one of the authors, Dr. David Himmelstein, an associate professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School.

The researchers examined government health surveys from more than 9,000 people aged 17 to 64, taken from 1986-1994, and then followed up through 2000. They determined that the uninsured have a 40 percent higher risk of death than those with private health insurance as a result of being unable to obtain necessary medical care. The researchers then extrapolated the results to census data from 2005 and calculated there were 44,789 deaths associated with lack of health insurance.

http://articles.cnn.com/2009-09-18/heal ... =PM:HEALTH

I generally don't entertain soundbites and biased articles from socialist academics such as David Himmelstein who is noted as being a strong advocate of National Healthcare, but I will this time. Considering the fact that Himmelstein did not mention anything such as a terminally ill patient being denied care due to his social and economic status, what relevance does this have? I also bolded and underlined the amazing rhetoric and language used by this article, things like "associated" and "extrapolate." Yea, unless he can give us some absolute terms without this loaded rhetoric, no rational thinking person is obliged to accept such convoluted and biased data.

Yea, I've seen similar comments like this made by other liberal users, never get's old. Friedich von Hayek in The Road to Serfdom and other members of the Austrian Schools have thoroughly debunked these assertions of of 'allegience to the State' and 'government must have a big role to take care of us.'

The problem about people like these is they only deal in theory. When we look at reality, we see a totally different situation. Anyone can come up with an economic theory that says anything because economics is not science.

Indeed, free market libertarianism is "unrealistic theory" while Marxist Labor Theory, Keynesian Spending Models and Keynesian Thrift Paradox are accurate models of reality. Anyways, that was not my point. My point was that Fiscal Liberal policies do not jive with liberty and freedom.

Because people are born into different situations. What would you have us do, use the government to stop the drug addicted mom, or have the government relocate the child to a proper home? Notice that low income communities in America have traditionally been associated with Public Housing sectors.

This is horrible logic. Public housing was set up FOR low income people.

I realize that. I said that low income communities are associated with public housing. As in to say the characteristics of what a person would find in a low income community are almost always found in public housing sectors. Crime, poor upkeep on property, etc. It is very clear that giving a person a free house i not the solution to homelessness, rather providing additional tax breaks or incentives to buy a home would be more effective.

Read above, the public sector has failed at most everything it has tried to do and will continue to fail because that is the nature of government.

It has built our infrastructure, educated our children, protected us from invaders, protected our natural resources, sent people to the moon, etc.. Your comment has no basis in reality.

Yea, I have no problem with the Government regulating transportation, foreign policy, national security, space innovation, etc. That's all well within its constitutional boundaries. I have a problem with government overeaching and abusing this sacrosanct document and regulating aspects of the market where it clearly has no businees doing so. And please, I don't want to hear from any liberals on here that the Constitution is not sacrosanct and is subject to change. I've already seen how highly you hold the constitution when it comes to the rights of terrorists.

Yet europeans are still happier, live longer, have a growing scientific community, have increased entrepreneurship, etc...One again, the facts disagree.

Oh, Europeans are happier than me? That's a foolish unit of measurement. Europeans live longer then us? No they don't, our healthcare system beats Europes and Canada's any day of the week regardless of the pityful moral charges liberals throw againist America. Quality of care is the goal we should look to achieve and maintain, quality is always more important than quantity. It is clear that European socialized medicine fails to meet the expecatation of having good quality care. Sure, they probably have more people covered but that doesn't atone for the immoral waiting lists and inaccessible coverage.

[Abraxas]

..... "Provide for the poor, go to hell, you have a choice, choose wisely." is not a misrepresentation of a great many of the passages regarding charity.

The short answers no. Augustine purports that humans have free will, the ability to choose between right and wrong, and the voluntary choice to either follow God and his commandments or reject them. It's a foundational doctrine of Christianity, so I probably won't defer the understanding of the philosophy and teachings of Jesus to liberals and atheists over theologians and church fathers.

How about defering to the Bible then?

Deut 15:9 Be careful not to harbor this wicked thought: “The seventh year, the year for canceling debts, is near,� so that you do not show ill will toward the needy among your fellow Israelites and give them nothing. They may then appeal to the LORD against you, and you will be found guilty of sin.

Or, put another way, if you withhold aid they can call on God against you.

Mat 19:24 Again I tell you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God.�

In other words those who do not unload their worldly possessions do not get into heaven.

Mat 25:41 “Then he will say to those on his left, ‘Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. 42 For I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, 43 I was a stranger and you did not invite me in, I needed clothes and you did not clothe me, I was sick and in prison and you did not look after me.’

44 “They also will answer, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or needing clothes or sick or in prison, and did not help you?’

45 “He will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me.’

46 “Then they will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life.�

Again, give to the poor or go to hell. Do you notice a pattern forming here?

I love all those quotes you have given...but I note a disconnect here; a very big one. Remember, Jesus was rather clear that He did not come to reform the current government, but to set up His Kingdom in Heaven.

In and of itself that says nothing about how humans should set up their own government. When he talks about behavior his commands are hardly phrased in terms of choice.

He was quite clear that the choice was that of the individual, and that what that individual believed was the motivator; after all, if the individual did not believe that God would 'get him,' then there wasn't any other restriction upon his actions, was there?

Irrelevant unless those people were to be held to a different standard on judgment day.

In fact, there is a rather famous quote from Jesus...something about giving unto Caesar that which is Caesar's, and unto God that which is God's. Jesus did not ever advocate the forced compliance of others.

No, just an involuntary command to give unto Caesar whether you want to or not and to give unto God whether you want to or not. You will note nowhere in that quote do the words "unless you don't feel like it" appear.

But you are.

And so was he.

I am reminded most forcefully of a fairly recent study, in which it was found that personal charitable giving was far more prevalent among conservatives than for liberals; it confirmed the idea I've always had about the two systems of thought:

Source?

Conservatives believe that we should care for our brothers and sisters, be charitable, and give aid and comfort to all.

And do so by cutting all of their support.

Liberals believe the same thing. They too think that Conservatives should do the caring. It's a win/win situation for them, actually; they get to LOOK compassionate, with everybody's money but their own.

Except when we look at who actually pays for what the opposite is true and areas that have a larger liberal demographic suffer a wealth drain to more rural areas which also tend to be more conservative.

[Wyvern]

Reverse discrimination would be NOT giving a job to a white guy BECAUSE he was white, if no one else is applying. What AA says, of you have 2 equally qualified candidates, try to hire the minority.

No. Affirmative Action policy does not in any way, shape or form state such a thing. What Affirmative Action says is, in a given situation with two or more applicants, hire the minority regardless of qualifications. There is no such criteria of being "equally qualified."

Unless you either chose not to go to college or went outside of the CA system and considering your age I'm surprised you would say this. In the CA university system white kids are being given spots in college over more qualified but over represented asian kids. There's a lot more to AA than just giving positions to minorities.

I generally don't entertain soundbites and biased articles from socialist academics such as David Himmelstein who is noted as being a strong advocate of National Healthcare, but I will this time. Considering the fact that Himmelstein did not mention anything such as a terminally ill patient being denied care due to his social and economic status, what relevance does this have? I also bolded and underlined the amazing rhetoric and language used by this article, things like "associated" and "extrapolate." Yea, unless he can give us some absolute terms without this loaded rhetoric, no rational thinking person is obliged to accept such convoluted and biased data.

Wow given this kind of logic you can't associate cirrhosis of the liver with drinking or lung cancer with smokers. After all those diseases are just associated with these behaviors but the obviously loaded rhetoric and biased data makes all those warnings meaningless.

Read above, the public sector has failed at most everything it has tried to do and will continue to fail because that is the nature of government.

It has built our infrastructure, educated our children, protected us from invaders, protected our natural resources, sent people to the moon, etc.. Your comment has no basis in reality.

Yea, I have no problem with the Government regulating transportation, foreign policy, national security, space innovation, etc. That's all well within its constitutional boundaries. I have a problem with government overeaching and abusing this sacrosanct document and regulating aspects of the market where it clearly has no businees doing so. And please, I don't want to hear from any liberals on here that the Constitution is not sacrosanct and is subject to change. I've already seen how highly you hold the constitution when it comes to the rights of terrorists.

Umm WP you do know that the Constitution has been changed a number of times I hope? After the bill of rights every amendment to the Constitution has come after the original signing of the document which means you guessed it it has been changed quite a bit. Things change over time whether you like it or not and if a mechanism wasn't put in place to allow the Constitution to change it would be just another document that would have little bearing on today, consider the difference between the Magna Carta and the Constitution. If the market was capable of regulating itself the government would not have to step in however as it has shown time and again when outside regulation is either absent or removed bad things happen.

Yet europeans are still happier, live longer, have a growing scientific community, have increased entrepreneurship, etc...One again, the facts disagree.

Oh, Europeans are happier than me? That's a foolish unit of measurement. Europeans live longer then us? No they don't, our healthcare system beats Europes and Canada's any day of the week regardless of the pityful moral charges liberals throw againist America. Quality of care is the goal we should look to achieve and maintain, quality is always more important than quantity. It is clear that European socialized medicine fails to meet the expecatation of having good quality care. Sure, they probably have more people covered but that doesn't atone for the immoral waiting lists and inaccessible coverage.

It's clear that on a cost/outcome basis Americas health system ranks pretty low. Yes the quality of the US health care system is as good if not better than any other nations on the planet however fewer and fewer people are able to afford it. Think of it in terms of cars, the US system is equivalent to a Ferrari it has all the bells and whistles and works incredibly well but most people can not afford it anymore. Most of the rest of the industrialized worlds health care systems are more in line with VWs still very good quality but a much more reasonable price. You want to talk about health care inaccessibility? Try getting medical care on a tribal clinic that is not supported by a casino. When I was going for my medical imaging license we had to serve in one of these underserved areas for our clinicals.

[nygreenguy]

No. Discrimination laws deal with all possible types of discrimination cases in all possible circumstances. I cannot say it any clearer. Leveling the playing field is unecessary if no institutional discrimination exists.

I hate to be blunt, but you are being a bit naive on this. Its just like when blacks got the legal right to vote, but for "some" reason or another, they never could end up voting. Even though its on the books, doesnt mean its applied.

I generally don't entertain soundbites and biased articles from socialist academics such as David Himmelstein who is noted as being a strong advocate of National Healthcare, but I will this time. Considering the fact that Himmelstein did not mention anything such as a terminally ill patient being denied care due to his social and economic status, what relevance does this have? I also bolded and underlined the amazing rhetoric and language used by this article, things like "associated" and "extrapolate." Yea, unless he can give us some absolute terms without this loaded rhetoric, no rational thinking person is obliged to accept such convoluted and biased data.

This was published in a peer-reviewed journal. As the statement goes, everyone is entitled to their own opinion, not their own facts.

Indeed, free market libertarianism is "unrealistic theory" while Marxist Labor Theory, Keynesian Spending Models and Keynesian Thrift Paradox are accurate models of reality. Anyways, that was not my point. My point was that Fiscal Liberal policies do not jive with liberty and freedom.

This is just a strawman.

I realize that. I said that low income communities are associated with public housing. As in to say the characteristics of what a person would find in a low income community are almost always found in public housing sectors. Crime, poor upkeep on property, etc. It is very clear that giving a person a free house i not the solution to homelessness, rather providing additional tax breaks or incentives to buy a home would be more effective.

Really? What are the statistics on this?

Oh, Europeans are happier than me? That's a foolish unit of measurement.

No, its not foolish it all. At least not to educated scholars.

Europeans live longer then us?

US is 36th

No they don't, our healthcare system beats Europes and Canada's any day of the week regardless of the pityful moral charges liberals throw againist America.

Lets look at some stats:
Out of 8 countries: Australia, France, Canada, Sweden,US, Norway, Japan, and Germany

Highest infant mortality rate, 7th for physicans per person (so much for the not enough doctors argument), per capita expenditure DEAD last at over 7,000 with the mean of the others being around 3,200, life expectancy, LAST.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_care_system

The WHO took all these facts into consideration and the and people in the U.S. rationed out by being unable to afford their care are simply never counted and may never receive the care they need, a factor that is often overlooked.] US ranked 37th in the world.


Once again, the facts disagree. And ignoring the facts for nationalistic pride, not THAT is immoral.

Quality of care is the goal we should look to achieve and maintain, quality is always more important than quantity. It is clear that European socialized medicine fails to meet the expecatation of having good quality care. Sure, they probably have more people covered but that doesn't atone for the immoral waiting lists and inaccessible coverage.

There is a frequent misunderstanding to think that waiting happens in places like England and Canada but does not happen in the United States. For instance it is not uncommon even for emergency cases in some U.S. hospitals to be boarded on beds in hallways for 48 hours or more due to lack of inpatient beds[160] and people in the U.S. rationed out by being unable to afford their care are simply never counted and may never receive the care they need, a factor that is often overlooked.

ibid

In reality, both data and anecdotes show that the American people are already waiting as long or longer than patients living with universal health-care systems. ..

There is no systemized collection of data on wait times in the U.S. That makes it difficult to draw comparisons with countries that have national health systems, where wait times are not only tracked but made public. However, a 2005 survey by the Commonwealth Fund of sick adults in six nations found that only 47% of U.S. patients could get a same- or next-day appointment for a medical problem, worse than every other country except Canada.

The Commonwealth survey did find that U.S. patients had the second-shortest wait times if they wished to see a specialist or have nonemergency surgery, such as a hip replacement or cataract operation (Germany, which has national health care, came in first on both measures). But Gerard F. Anderson, a health policy expert at Johns Hopkins University, says doctors in countries where there are lengthy queues for elective surgeries put at-risk patients on the list long before their need is critical. "Their wait might be uncomfortable, but it makes very little clinical difference," he says.

http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/co ... 042072.htm[/table]

[East of Eden]

EDIT: I forgot to mention the bible. My net impression is that both versions can be and have been well supported, with an argument favoring outcomes. Jesus was more of a socialist than a laissez faire capitalist.

I dont think the concept of laissez faire capitalist nor socialism were known during the time of Jesus. To claim that he was one or the other is foolish, he might have had ideas similar to some aspects of each though.

I didn't claim is was either. I'm simply saying that he is well known as a share the wealth, care for the poor kinda guy. He didn't seem very interested in wealth creation.

While this parable is not about wealth creation, I don't think Jesus was opposed to it. He was concerned with what you did with your money, i.e. are you rich towards God and your fellow man.


The Parable of the Talents

Again, it will be like a man going on a journey, who called his servants and entrusted his property to them. To one he gave five talents of money, to another two talents, and to another one talent, each according to his ability. Then he went on his journey. The man who had received the five talents went at once and put his money to work and gained five more. So also, the one with the two talents gained two more. But the man who had received the one talent went off, dug a hole in the ground and hid his master’s money.

After a long time, the master of those servants returned and settled accounts with them. The man who had received the five talents brought the other five. “Master,� he said, “you entrusted me with five talents. See, I have gained five more.�

His master replied, “Well done, good and faithful servant! You have been faithful with a few things; I will put you in charge of many things. Come and share your master’s happiness!�

The man with the two talents also came. “Master,� he said, “you entrusted me with two talents; see, I have gained two more.�

His master replied, “Well done, good and faithful servant! You have been faithful with a few things; I will put you in charge of many things. Come and share your master’s happiness!�

Then the man who had received the one talent came. “Master,� he said, “I knew that you are a hard man, harvesting where you have not sown and gathering where you have not scattered seed. So I was afraid and went out and hid your talent in the ground. See, here is what belongs to you.�

His master replied, “You wicked, lazy servant! So you knew that I harvest where I have not sown and gather where I have not scattered seed? Well then, you should have put my money on deposit with the bankers, so that when I returned I would have received it back with interest.

“Take the talent from him and give it to the one who has the ten talents. For everyone who has will be given more, and he will have an abundance. Whoever does not have, even what he has will be taken from him. And throw that worthless servant outside, into the darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.�

- Matthew 25:14-30 (NIV)

[East of Eden]

Really? What are the statistics on this?

Cabrini-Green is typical of these housing projects, there is no pride of ownership. As Larry Summers once said, "Nobody ever washed a rental car." Of course, a 70% illegitimacy rate doesn't help either.

"Poverty and organized crime have long been associated with the area: a 1931 "map of Chicago's gangland" by Bruce-Roberts, Inc. notes Locust and Sedgwick as "Death Corner": "50 murders: count 'em".[4] At first, the housing was integrated and many residents held jobs. This changed in the years after World War II, when the nearby factories that provided the neighborhood's economic base closed and thousands were laid off. At the same time, the cash-strapped city began withdrawing crucial services like police patrols, transit services, and routine building maintenance. Lawns were paved over to save on maintenance, failed lights were left for months, and apartments damaged by fire were simply boarded up instead of rehabilitated and reoccupied. Later phases of public housing development (such as the Green Homes, the newest of the Cabrini–Green buildings) were built on extremely tight budgets and suffered from maintenance problems due to the low quality of construction.

Unlike many of the city's other public housing projects like Rockwell Gardens or Robert Taylor Homes, Cabrini–Green was situated in an affluent part of the city. The poverty-stricken projects were actually constructed at the meeting point of Chicago's two wealthiest neighborhoods, Lincoln Park and the Gold Coast. Less than a mile to the east sits Michigan Avenue with its high-end shopping and expensive housing. Specific gangs 'controlled' individual buildings, and residents felt pressure to ally with those gangs in order to protect themselves from escalating violence.

During the worst years of Cabrini–Green's problems, vandalism increased substantially. Gang members and miscreants covered interior walls with graffiti and damaged doors, windows, and elevators. Rat and cockroach infestations were commonplace, rotting garbage stacked up in clogged trash chutes (it once piled up to the 15th floor), and basic utilities (water, electricity, etc.) often malfunctioned and were left unrepaired. On the exterior, boarded-up windows, burned-out areas of the facade, and pavement instead of green space—all in the name of economizing on maintenance—created an atmosphere of neglect and decay. The high "open galleries" were enclosed with steel fencing along the entire height of the building to prevent residents from falling or being thrown off to their deaths (giving the visual appearance of a large prison tier, or animal cages, which further enraged community leaders)." Wikipedia

Lets look at some stats:
Out of 8 countries: Australia, France, Canada, Sweden,US, Norway, Japan, and Germany

Highest infant mortality rate, 7th for physicans per person (so much for the not enough doctors argument), per capita expenditure DEAD last at over 7,000 with the mean of the others being around 3,200, life expectancy, LAST.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_care_system

The WHO took all these facts into consideration and the and people in the U.S. rationed out by being unable to afford their care are simply never counted and may never receive the care they need, a factor that is often overlooked.] US ranked 37th in the world.


Once again, the facts disagree. And ignoring the facts for nationalistic pride, not THAT is immoral.

Like most Americans, I don't want to trade our health care system for Europe's, and with good reason:


10 Surprising Facts about American Health Care
Brief Analyses | Health


Tuesday, March 24, 2009

by Scott Atlas

Medical care in the United States is derided as miserable compared to health care systems in the rest of the developed world. Economists, government officials, insurers and academics alike are beating the drum for a far larger government rôle in health care. Much of the public assumes their arguments are sound because the calls for change are so ubiquitous and the topic so complex. However, before turning to government as the solution, some unheralded facts about America's health care system should be considered.

Fact No. 1: Americans have better survival rates than Europeans for common cancers.[1] Breast cancer mortality is 52 percent higher in Germany than in the United States, and 88 percent higher in the United Kingdom. Prostate cancer mortality is 604 percent higher in the U.K. and 457 percent higher in Norway. The mortality rate for colorectal cancer among British men and women is about 40 percent higher.

Fact No. 2: Americans have lower cancer mortality rates than Canadians.[2] Breast cancer mortality is 9 percent higher, prostate cancer is 184 percent higher and colon cancer mortality among men is about 10 percent higher than in the United States.

Fact No. 3: Americans have better access to treatment for chronic diseases than patients in other developed countries.[3] Some 56 percent of Americans who could benefit are taking statins, which reduce cholesterol and protect against heart disease. By comparison, of those patients who could benefit from these drugs, only 36 percent of the Dutch, 29 percent of the Swiss, 26 percent of Germans, 23 percent of Britons and 17 percent of Italians receive them.

Fact No. 4: Americans have better access to preventive cancer screening than Canadians.[4] Take the proportion of the appropriate-age population groups who have received recommended tests for breast, cervical, prostate and colon cancer:

•Nine of 10 middle-aged American women (89 percent) have had a mammogram, compared to less than three-fourths of Canadians (72 percent).
•Nearly all American women (96 percent) have had a pap smear, compared to less than 90 percent of Canadians.
•More than half of American men (54 percent) have had a PSA test, compared to less than 1 in 6 Canadians (16 percent).
•Nearly one-third of Americans (30 percent) have had a colonoscopy, compared with less than 1 in 20 Canadians (5 percent).
Fact No. 5: Lower income Americans are in better health than comparable Canadians. Twice as many American seniors with below-median incomes self-report "excellent" health compared to Canadian seniors (11.7 percent versus 5.8 percent). Conversely, white Canadian young adults with below-median incomes are 20 percent more likely than lower income Americans to describe their health as "fair or poor."[5]


Fact No. 6: Americans spend less time waiting for care than patients in Canada and the U.K. Canadian and British patients wait about twice as long - sometimes more than a year - to see a specialist, to have elective surgery like hip replacements or to get radiation treatment for cancer.[6] All told, 827,429 people are waiting for some type of procedure in Canada.[7] In England, nearly 1.8 million people are waiting for a hospital admission or outpatient treatment.[8]

Fact No. 7: People in countries with more government control of health care are highly dissatisfied and believe reform is needed. More than 70 percent of German, Canadian, Australian, New Zealand and British adults say their health system needs either "fundamental change" or "complete rebuilding."[9]

Fact No. 8: Americans are more satisfied with the care they receive than Canadians. When asked about their own health care instead of the "health care system," more than half of Americans (51.3 percent) are very satisfied with their health care services, compared to only 41.5 percent of Canadians; a lower proportion of Americans are dissatisfied (6.8 percent) than Canadians (8.5 percent).[10]

Fact No. 9: Americans have much better access to important new technologies like medical imaging than patients in Canada or the U.K. Maligned as a waste by economists and policymakers naïve to actual medical practice, an overwhelming majority of leading American physicians identified computerized tomography (CT) and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) as the most important medical innovations for improving patient care during the previous decade.[11] [See the table.] The United States has 34 CT scanners per million Americans, compared to 12 in Canada and eight in Britain. The United States has nearly 27 MRI machines per million compared to about 6 per million in Canada and Britain.[12]

Fact No. 10: Americans are responsible for the vast majority of all health care innovations.[13] The top five U.S. hospitals conduct more clinical trials than all the hospitals in any other single developed country.[14] Since the mid-1970s, the Nobel Prize in medicine or physiology has gone to American residents more often than recipients from all other countries combined.[15] In only five of the past 34 years did a scientist living in America not win or share in the prize. Most important recent medical innovations were developed in the United States.[16] [See the table.]

Conclusion. Despite serious challenges, such as escalating costs and the uninsured, the U.S. health care system compares favorably to those in other developed countries.

Scott W. Atlas, M.D., is a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution and a professor at the Stanford University Medical Center. A version of this article appeared previously in the February 18, 2009, Washington Times.



--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

[East of Eden]

Actually, im not sure if you could say it like that. I think a lot of the personal contributions by both sides are affected by their political positions. For example, the reason I think liberals donate less is because they think the ogvernment is going to do all the rest. Im not really sure though if thats the case, just a possibility.

..........and that, right there, is the problem. You are quite right; liberals think that
"the government" is going to do 'all the rest," as if "the government" obtained the money from thin, thin air. The problem is, Conservatives are well aware of where the government gets money; from the rest of us. It's not a coincidence that most conservatives pay taxes--and a huge proportion of liberals don't.

I still have this vision of the woman who was celebrating the election victory of Barrack Obama, and how she was so excited that her bills were going to be paid, her rent paid, and money would be coming into her pocket. When asked where Obama was going to get that money to pay her bills, she said "from his personal stash? I dunno!"

That's the problem; they 'dunno.'

I will have to say, that is 100% nonsense.

A lot of the giving that Conservatives claim is 'tithe to the Church'.. which, rather than be giving' is basically directly benefiting them, by maintaining their membership in an organization in form of maintenance. That isn't charity, but it is counted as charity by the givers.

Baloney. That's like saying a PBS watcher who gives to them isn't really giving to charity. Religious Americans give more even to secular charities than non-religious, and even give blood more. See the book, "Who Really Cares".