It's generally recognised the American right are having a collective breakdown of sorts. Small state conservatives were sent into a tailspin by Bush's massive bail out of the banks. Fundamentalist Christian types are divided over Obama's weak nods toward economic justice. And the frothing Coulters, Becks and Limbaughs are outraged to find the world doesn't conform to their spiteful-minded view of it. In the mean time the more extreme the conservatives get, the more they will alienate mainstream Americans.
(Photo H/T Left Foot Forward).
WTF?
ReplyDeleteAnd they think we're the mental ones!
There's a whole website devoted to this stuff. The person running it isn't a supporter of these views, just a horrified collector of the worse ones. Go take a peek
ReplyDeletehttp://obamaisliterallyhitler.tumblr.com/
Who would have thought that trying to give a nation something it doesn't already enjoy, for free, would've caused such a backlash? I can hear them now, "Bah! I laugh in the face of your universal health care. I would rather fall sick than succumb to Obama's Marxism." And like Sim-O says, apparently we're the mental ones.
ReplyDeleteHitler comparisons? That's sooooooooo liberal. Ugh... unoriginal conservatives are the worst.
ReplyDeleteHave a look at this from Jon Stewart picking up on the hypocrisies of Sean Hannity and Glenn Beck.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.liberalconspiracy.org/2009/09/16/jon-stewart-slams-fox-news-protests-hypocrisy/
Luke
Utter idiots.
ReplyDeleteHere's some more insania from last weekend's 9/12 Project demo in Washington.
The Right in America really do look way more insane than anywhere else - except for the Far-Right in Europe.
ReplyDeleteBut these ideas in America are presented as mainstream opinion.
Oh no! The government might provide healthcare. But they'll kill us.
Send more troops to Afghanistan to save lives!
*heads desk*
Yes, the Right in the US are complete nutters, and yes the world has changed in a way that is causing them all sorts of convulsions, but the fact remains that Obama's poll ratings are tumbling sharply over healthcare.
ReplyDeleteUnless you beleive that workers are stupid, and swallow everything that these right-wing lunatics pump out - that is not to say that a small number of people cannot be misled for some of the time - then that has to be recognised as resulting from the fact that US workers (many of whom do have very good healthcare as part of union negotiated deals with large employers)and the lower middle class are concerned about that healthcare deteriorating, and htem losing control of it to the hands of the bosses state.
In my opinion that fear is well grounded given the inadequacies of healthcare for workers provided by the NHS, and the fact that workers should always be wary of an extension of the power of the bosses state which represents their most powerful enemy.
Its a pity that the Left is unable to provide an altertive for workers in either the US or Europe to the two alternatives for their healthcare offered by Capitalism - expensive and restricted, quality private healthcare, or publicly provided, rationed and lower quality state capitalist healthcare.
Mr Bough has a point but I think we have to factor into this the idea that some in the US are against Obama because they don't want to pay for the healthcare of "layabouts" and the "underclass".
ReplyDeleteIt's every man for himself and a pretty depressing state of affairs for socialists.
easy on damning all americans. there happen to be some decent (sociologically/lefty) minded
ReplyDeleteAmerican taxpayers i.e. mainly workers and the middle class DO pay for the healthcare of the "underclass" already! Its called Medicare and Medicaid.
ReplyDeleteRemember that both the Republicans and democrats are BOTH Capitalist parties. They represent the interests of different sections of Capital. On this issue the Democrats are representing those sections of Big Capital in the US like the Car makers who are getting crushed in competition with car markers from other countries who do not have to make the huge health insurance payments that US companies do. That is why these companies have been cmpaigning for some kind of socialised healthcare. This is not a Right v Left argument or a Worker v Capital debate it is largely a big Capital v small Capital debate.
The small Capitalists and the Libertarian/Conservative elements within the US don't want socialised healthcare because at the moment they don't pay at the huge sums that the big companies do, because in these companies weaker unions have not been able to negotiate such comprehensive coverage, if any. Workers in those companies that have negotiated such good healthcare coverage don't want to lose it, and quite right too!
Unlike the UK or Europe where State capitalist heaqlthcare already exists, and poses a problem for workers in trying to bring about a better alternative, in the US a simple answer would be for the unions to set up a Health Insurance Co-op, and enlist all union members into it. One of the biggest costs in US Healthcare is the bureaucracy of administering the insurance scheme, and this would solve it - the collection and adminsitration costs of Medicaid are something like a twelfth of private insurance.
The unions could then still negotiate for all employers to pay into this Co-op scheme, and could negotiate for the Government to contribute for all those covered by Medicaid. In the first instance they would still have to buy healthcare using this Co-op insurance from the private sector, but there are Co-op healthcare practices in the US too, and this could stimulate the development of such a sector.