[David]

To counter your Canadian free ride article here's another from the other side.
http://www.publicintegrity.org/rx/report.aspx?aid=723
That $800 million dollars the drug companies spent in lobbying congress over 7 years does not count the millions each company pays doctors to proscribe their drugs. Or the 2.5 billion spent every year telling us we are sick and need to see a doctor so they can give us their drugs.
Despite all that Pfizer still made a profit of 11.3 billion dollars on sales of 50.9 billion. That doesn't go into the coffers of the company to pay the scientist that do all the work but into the pockets of executives who decide what drug they can make a profit not on what would most help cure diseases but what will suppress the symptoms and who to pay off, sorry, who's campaign to contribute to so that they can avoid realistic prices.
Here's an example. For years the pharmaceutical industry has been after the supplement market. They have lobbied hard for more government regulation. A few years ago you could buy tryptophan at any health food store. Then 38 deaths resulted from one company in Japan's production run and it was put on the prescription shelf. What cost a dime or two a tablet now costs a dollar or so. Meanwhile prescription drugs with serious side effects are simply given a warning label until lawsuits start.
And then there is the insurance companies…

[cpbell0033944]

I know it's a bit late to mention this, but with reference to Lingster mentioning the National Front in the UK – they are pretty much dead and buried.  The BNP keep trying to reinvent themselves – they even stole a policy from the Tories a while back and passed it-off as their own, but they keep shooting themselves in the foot by having their party leader and other figures being arrested by the police for violent or inflammatory behaviour.  They do, however, have a worrying level of support in northern towns like Bolton where liberal ideas of muticulturalism have produced segragation and ghettoisation, although that support is stll limited to natural right-wingers – more reasonable people realise that an integrationist approach is needed to end the "them and us" culture, but the thinly-disguised "send them home" attitude of the BNP isn't the answer. 

Oddly, Lingster's description of the US as a country that cannot be nationalistic because of its diversity could equally apply here.  Successive invasions, influxes and migrations mean that our population is a combination of Anglo-Saxon, Celtic, Danish/Viking (especially in the North-East), Flemish (in my part of the country particularly), Norman French, German Jewish, Indian, Bangladeshi, Pakistant, West Indian, Sub-Saharan African and several more besides, yet nationalism is too often prevalent here because the myth of an homogenous, white British ethnicity which really doesn't exist.

As for free-market vs. Governmental control, I feel that UK experience shows that, whilst a "slippery slope" does exist between Socialist and Communist, it only starts towards the left edge of Socialism; i.e. there is space within a left-of-centre viewpoint for people that keeps them well short of loosing their metaphorical footing.  During the 1980s, Margaret Thatcher's administration privatised so many industries and services, some of which flowered, however, most are worse now than before.  Our rail network (an area in which I have interest and knowledge) is a joke, our utilities have had bad times since privatisation, and the NHS is still struggling to recover from being starved of resources and funds during the Thatcher years.  If Lingster and others wish to use the modern NHS as an example of the evils of nationally-run healthcare, then so be it, but I'd argue that its ills are more an example of what happens when a Government inherits a nationalised service in which it does not believe, and therefore neglects.  If one looks at the NHS during the 1950s and 1960s, we can see that it represented Attlee and Bevan's vision of "cradle to grave" care much more than it does now.  As with everything, extremes either way are dangerous – the far-left policies of 1980s Labour party leader-wannabee Tony Benn which would have led to national control of huge segments of business would have been just as much of a disaster as New Labour's introduction of schools run by businesses whose heads sometimes have odd religious or political beliefs has been, with some British schoolchildren being taught an almost purely creationist view of the world in science classes whilst the majority of their peers are being taught a Government-approved evolutionary model.

[Lingster]

I really only understood racism – or at least I came to understand it as well as I understand it now – one day about 10 years ago while walking through Dublin, Ireland.  I was surrounded by hundreds of members of my ethnic group – Celts.  As an American, I had never been in that circumstance before.  And walking by the Post Office in Dublin, at the foot of Grafton St., I had a kind of epiphany.

Being amongst a crowd of one's own kind is very seductive!  The Europeans here all know this already, but I didn't.  I'd never felt so relaxed in a crowd before.  Doubtless some kinship toggle in my brain switched into "home" mode for the first time in my life.  And my brain liked it.

I'd always thought of racism as simply an expression of anger or resentment, so the comfort of being around people who are ethnically similar to me took me by surprise.  It's a very dangerous thing – like an addictive drug.

[cpbell0033944]

The interesting thing is that England, being so diverse, doesn't create that same effect that Lingster describes.  By the way, boss, I've got a good bit of Celtic (mainly Irish) blood in me too.  It's probably what makes us lock horns over politics so much here – we're both fiery argumentative Celtic sods. ;D ::)

[Yaponvezos]

I really only understood racism – or at least I came to understand it as well as I understand it now – one day about 10 years ago while walking through Dublin, Ireland.  I was surrounded by hundreds of members of my ethnic group – Celts.  As an American, I had never been in that circumstance before.  And walking by the Post Office in Dublin, at the foot of Grafton St., I had a kind of epiphany.

Being amongst a crowd of one's own kind is very seductive!  The Europeans here all know this already, but I didn't.  I'd never felt so relaxed in a crowd before.  Doubtless some kinship toggle in my brain switched into "home" mode for the first time in my life.  And my brain liked it.

I'd always thought of racism as simply an expression of anger or resentment, so the comfort of being around people who are ethnically similar to me took me by surprise.  It's a very dangerous thing – like an addictive drug.

Firstly I thought that almost anyone knew that feeling. Obviously, I was wrong. But still, I don't get exactly how what you described relates to racism. In my opinion racism is based on one of humanity most basic survival instincts: fear of the unknown. And different quite usually equals unknown. At least that's what psychology and history tell us. But I believe we are at an evolutionary stage that we can afford to find difference intriguing instead of scary and what have you. But I'd better stop here since I can see I'm wandering off again. Sorry.

[ze fly]

Gosh! I so hate talking about politic! The best way to fall out with friends and even (especially ;D) family… ::)
So, i'll do it quick…

About Michael Moore: I concede that the guy isn't really objective.
When he points some real existing problems out to the public (sorry Lingster :- ), he takes other countries as models, but doesn't say that there are problems in [imthese models too.
For example, the french model if he's a good one, is effective only in a full-employment society with almost none unemployment, and with more actives than pensioners…  :- Trust me: I'm subscribing to pay my parents pension, but at the rate things are going, I'm not sure to have my own future pension paid… :-[

And as for nationalism, it's a sure value in countries in crisis.  😛
One is always blaming the immigrants to steal the jobs, when unemployment is too high…  ::)  Just look at Mussolini & Hitler: they came to power after the great economic crisis of 1929. 😛

I don't think USA citizens are more nationalists than the average. As for patriotism, then maybe they're sometimes a little too… …enthusiastic ;D
I still remember the veto we suffered from them (or is it still in implement ???), and going so far as to recall french fries, freedom fries… Arf! Arf!  😀

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