Healthcare

I'm a loser, I'm a loser,
And I'm not what I appear to be

      - The Beatles (written by John Lennon), "I'm A Loser"

Is it just me or are the Democrats a pathetic bunch of losers who are too spineless to stand up forcefully for anything they believe in?

a.k.a. Summer of Staggering Stupidity

"The best test of a civilised society is the way in which it treats its most vulnerable and weakest members."

      - Mahatma Gandhi

That the majority of the rich and powerful in America, particularly those on the right, are vehemently opposed to universal healthcare and instead support the present free-market private insurance system is hardly surprising. Clearly they have nothing to fear, as it's highly unlikely that they will ever find themselves without coverage and they're certainly never going to be choosing between treatment and bankruptcy.

This stance - though truly despicable, completely devoid of compassion and totally self-absorbed - isn't really all that difficult to understand. It's simply the latest manifestation of that age-old philosophy: "Hey, I'm alright. Screw everyone else!"

What IS extremely hard to figure out, however, is the mindset of all these regular, ordinary working class and middle class right-wing nut-jobs who have been showing up all summer long at these town hall meetings chanting:

"Socialism! Communism! Stalinism!!"

You got a lotta nerve
To say you got a helping hand to lend
You just want to be on
The side that's winning

      - Bob Dylan, "Positively 4th Street"

By now you've all probably heard of Shona Holmes, the Canadian woman featured in those TV ads that have been running all over American TV in recent weeks, the ones slamming Canada's healthcare system as some sort of nightmarish system from hell.

Well, the truth is now out and the fact is Shona Holmes never actually had a life-threatening brain tumor, as she's been claiming in those ads and interviews on American TV. Instead, according to the Mayo Clinic where she was treated, her "brain tumor" was actually a Rathke's Cleft Cyst on her pituitary gland and "Rathke's Cleft Cysts are not true tumors or neoplasms; instead they are benign cysts."

Last week, in honor of Canada Day, I decided to whip off a list of The Top Ten Reasons We Here in The Great White North Should Be Both Proud and Ashamed of Being Canadian.

However, I soon realized that it wasn't something that could simply be whipped off in a few minutes, so I decided to take a few more days to think about it and here, finally, is my official list of the top ten things I love and hate about this country:

Two nights ago I finally saw Michael Moore's new film "Sicko" and I'd have to say it was his best film yet. But before I even had a chance to see that "Sicko" I saw another one and it wasn't until afterwards that I realized just how much the one proved the other correct. The film is all about the not-so-funny joke that is the American healthcare system. And clearly, as is true with most things when you want to make a point, two Sickos is better than one.