Leftism and the Gospel: How Wide the Divide?

[_Droopy]

Of course I read them. I'll repost the evidence that you skipped over:

Apparently, you haven't done your homework, either, Droopy. Do you even read these or just do a search?

Reading the article in your link above (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/healt ... world.html), the last line says:

The report also found that United States ranks near the bottom in life expectancy among wealthy nations despite spending more than double per person on healthcare than the OECD average.

Yes, it says that. However, do you know how statistical rankings such as that are constructed, and upon what basis? Because if you don't, you're just blowing smoke and carrying water you don't understand for causes you only dimly comprehend (you're also assuming, as do most who support the day care center state in this area, that stats like life expectancy have always and everywhere a direct causal connection to a country's health care system. In the above case, there are a number of demographic realities and lifestyle factors among certain groups that drag the U.S. average down. The life expectancy statistics (which are, after all, only slightly different between the U.S. and other Western democracies), are a composite, not an absolute measure. If you had read through all of my sources, you would have seen that clearly articulated.

In any case, the overwhelming empirical evidence presented in the sources I linked to eviscerate completely the claims of the superiority of socialized medicine, especially in their most socialized manifestations, within Britain and Canada.

It also shows most of them to have been completely manufactured for propaganda purposes.

[_Morley]

Apparently, you haven't done your homework, either, Droopy. Do you even read these or just do a search?

Reading the article in your link above (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/healt ... world.html), the last line says:

The report also found that United States ranks near the bottom in life expectancy among wealthy nations despite spending more than double per person on healthcare than the OECD average.

This is the problem when dealing with extremist. They are not interested in real discussion. He regurgitates sources which have the same agenda and avoids those that don't. In the cancer issue, it really is not very relevant since places in Africa have much less incident and mortality rates, but I doubt anyone is going to argue a superior health care system. Australia and New Zealand score very well. http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.3322/caac.20107/pdf

The real issue is whether universal heath care is a good thing. I think it is, and I think the evidence supports it. It dos not mean most Americans do not have quality health care. They do, just as Canada, UK, Australia, and a whole host of other countries do as well. The US does not rank the best nor the worst of developed democratic nations, but it has a messed up system that does not cover everyone. And this from a conservative, but then to an extremist most people are leftists. :)

by the way this article shows that stats about the UK breast cancer rates are misleading, but that doesn't stop those with an agenda
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/aug/12/uk-lowest-cancer-death-rate

It's truly an honor to share a Droopy-discussion ban with you, Themis.

[_Droopy]

This is intriguing. The only time I have seen hospitals willing to treat uninsured without payment up front of part of the cost is in emergency rooms. I assume this was not.

Yes, it was.

When I was a bishop I had uninsured members needing procedure and never would the doctors do work with out payment, again of at least part of the cost of the procedure. My son in law recently needed surgery and he is uninsured. Again no treatment with out money up front.

Try the emergency room. Its the law of the land.

[_Droopy]

Dear Melchett. You do your avatar proud. I may just have to give up Knife Girl for a photo of Miranda Richardson as Queenie in tribute.

However, when conversing with Droopy, I suggest you adopt the demeanor of your later descendant General Melchett and pooh-pooh the pooh-pooh.

Blixa, isn't Justme putting up any titillating pictures in chat to look at?

[_Morley]

Yes, it says that. However, do you know how statistical rankings such as that are constructed, and upon what basis? Because if you don't, you're just blowing smoke and carrying water you don't understand for causes you only dimly comprehend (you're also assuming, as do most who support the day care center state in this area, that stats like life expectancy have always and everywhere a direct causal connection to a country's health care system. In the above case, there are a number of demographic realities and lifestyle factors among certain groups that drag the U.S. average down. The life expectancy statistics (which are, after all, only slightly different between the U.S. and other Western democracies), are a composite, not an absolute measure. If you had read through all of my sources, you would have seen that clearly articulated.

In any case, the overwhelming empirical evidence presented in the sources I linked to eviscerate completely the claims of the superiority of socialized medicine, especially in their most socialized manifestations, within Britain and Canada.

It also shows most of them to have been completely manufactured for propaganda purposes.

No, they don't show what you claim. One of your studies compared colon cancer rates of Britain with other European (read: socialized medicine) countries. It said nothing about how single payer health care systems (read: socialized medicine) compare to the US.

[_Morley]

Dear Melchett. You do your avatar proud. I may just have to give up Knife Girl for a photo of Miranda Richardson as Queenie in tribute.

However, when conversing with Droopy, I suggest you adopt the demeanor of your later descendant General Melchett and pooh-pooh the pooh-pooh.

Blixa, isn't Justme putting up any titillating pictures in chat to look at?

Seriously uncalled for.

[_Themis]

It's truly an honor to share a Droopy-discussion ban with you, Themis.

I'm happy to be banned, and in good company. :)

[Guest]

This is the problem when dealing with extremist. They are not interested in real discussion.

Here we go. Fumes used up.

He regurgitates sources which have the same agenda and avoids those that don't.

Let see, I source arguments and research that supports my views, and place them against your sources and claims, which argue against mine. Yes, Themis, extreme and dishonest. I also notice that you think that my sources have an "agenda" and that your sources apparently do not. I also notice you find something crafty or intellectually shoddy in the brilliant discovery that my sources are in -gasp - agreement with my own positions.

Is Sherlock Holmes hiring, Themis?

In the cancer issue, it really is not very relevant since places in Africa have much less incident and mortality rates, but I doubt anyone is going to argue a superior health care system. Australia and New Zealand score very well. http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.3322/caac.20107/pdf

Britain and Canada are abysmal, across a number of medical parameters, compared to the U.S and most of the rest of the EU. Those are the empirical facts of the matter

The real issue is whether universal heath care is a good thing. I think it is, and I think the evidence supports it.

The empirical evidence and documentary history of the system is dead set against you, but don't let that stop your emotional commitment. True, some universal systems in the EU and elsewhere do work better than the British and Canadian systems, but in those cases, the systems are still fundamentally free market in nature with a "safety net" supported by the state for those who have difficulty accessing the system. The British system is a socialized system - a non-market system based on the rationing of care and bureaucratic control of the personal health care decisions of both patients and their doctors, the worst possible system - outside of Cuba's.

by the way this article shows that stats about the UK breast cancer rates are misleading, but that doesn't stop those with an agenda
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/aug/12/uk-lowest-cancer-death-rate

What this shows is that, sometime beginning around 1989 or so, the U.K. woke up to its abysmal performance since the 50s and took action. All well and good, and there are other shake-ups afoot in the NHS (as there must be, as the entire thing, and the welfare state that supports it, are unsustainable, there, here, and everywhere else. The welfare state is a dead man walking across the Western world, and its only a matter of time before it puts the final nail in the coffin of the world's economic health already devastated by unsustainable and reckless fiat money creation and credit manipulation).

I'll have to do a bit of looking to see if the Guardian article has been critiqued from another perspective.

Or I could just go your route and point out that the Guardian UK is a notorious leftist echo chamber that agrees with your agenda, and forget the whole thing.

[_Droopy]

Dear Melchett. You do your avatar proud. I may just have to give up Knife Girl for a photo of Miranda Richardson as Queenie in tribute.

However, when conversing with Droopy, I suggest you adopt the demeanor of your later descendant General Melchett and pooh-pooh the pooh-pooh.

Blixa, isn't Justme putting up any titillating pictures in chat to look at?[/quote]

Seriously uncalled for.[/quote]

If you knew to what I was making reference, you would see that that is hardly the case at all.

Indeed, its an understatement (and as I've never yet seen Blixa make a substantive contribution to an intellectually serious discussion, timely).

[_Droopy]

As expected, all is still not well in Day Care Center: Avalon:


http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/79389 ... third.html


You see, it isn't me who has an agenda, but the person who does not look beyond what he wants to believe in the sources he wants to believe are substantive sources.