Well, it’s hard to bash the Canadian system when you’re an American without utterly lacking perspective and self-awareness… oh. I see your point.
I have met many a Canadians who wished for a hybrid system besides the two extremes of American and Canadian medicine. Where many have had surgery wait times that baffle my own experience. I also know a number of Canadian doctors who are dying to get out of there and work here. Kinda fucked up, eh?
If it’s a scare tactic (which I certainly had no knowledge of) then it’s been stolen like the words “freedom” and “liberty” by crazies. The only socialized medicine we have is Medicaid and Medicare, both of which are unlikely to exist for you and I and everyone else under 30 in its current state. Hospitals bear much of the cost burden of the uninsured, not those with insurance. Some, but not most of the cost is shifted to the insured.
ETA: blondebear, is there any language in your lease saying that the pool maintenance is provided for, just as (perhaps) the shrubs and flowers and gardening/mowing are taken care of as part of your rent? Or maybe some language about how if you hurt yourself/drown they’re not liable? The latter could possibly be used as proof they’re required to maintain it in the first place…
It has. So yeah, you actually nailed it on the head.
ETA: And when I say we already have socialized medicine, I don’t mean in the best sense of a system that would actually work. I mean that right now, health insurance involves everybody paying into a pool that only pays out for people who get sick, which is more or less the big scary bugaboo of the right wing, only it does it much less efficiently than if everyone were in the same system instead of being spread out among a brazilian different providers, all with their own eldritch restrictions on coverage and care, and with the distinct and easy possibility of a person having no coverage at all.
We have socialized medicine. It’s just that for us “socialized” has a “poorly” in front of it, as if it were a little dog snarling at you and biting your ankles.
I will happily punt our health care/insurance system over the fence.
<builds higher fence>
:shakes fist:
You made me laugh.
Hmph. Wonder how that escaped me. 90% of my (national) news comes from Reason.com and the Times. I steer entirely clear of Fox and MSNBC.
Borders.com, stop jerking my chain. You keep sending me tantalizing coupons good for 40% off any item, so I order Christmas gifts for my husband, and then a week later I get an e-mail saying my order is cancelled because the item isn’t available. Three times you’ve done this to me in the past six weeks or so. Yes, I know the items I want aren’t bestsellers, but when you say you have them in stock, you should have them in stock. One of them I was able to get on Amazon; the others are backordered. Assholes.
And WinterSilks. Against my better judgment I ordered a couple of items from you on Nov. 9 and paid the outrageous amount you charge for shipping ($14 for a sweater and a blouse? Really?) and when I received them, the sweater was immense. So I return it for a smaller size, and wait. And wait. Three weeks ago, November 29, I called to see if you received the package back, and you confirmed it. So I wait. And wait. On December 14 I called to see if I was ever going to get my sweater and you said that the package is at the warehouse and they haven’t opened it yet. Still sitting at the warehouse unopened after three weeks. I had to demand to have my exchange made or it probably wouldn’t have occurred to them till January.
ETA@lindsay:
I hadn’t had a TV in the house for a couple of years, listen to the radio, or follow news except for a stint where I was reading NYT articles online every day, but I still picked it up. It’s been a pretty common complaint that the right has hijacked the term “socialist” to mean something scary and bad, like “liberal.”
Of course. “Liberal” was losing it’s shock value.
Actually, I’m not exaggerating; Calgary wait times are very long, mostly because of former Premier Ralph Klein’s policies, and my wish is that he gets to experience the consequences of his actions like the rest of us do. ETA: Beyond the horrendous wait times, I have no complaints about our healthcare system.
As I like to say in discussions about healthcare, a little socialism goes a long way. 
I hate being sick. I hate coughing up a lung, and I hate the achiness that goes with the coughing up a lung. I get to call my doctor tomorrow to see if she can get me in, or if she wants me to go to the ER. I especially hate feeling wrung out and tired. My cough is more productive than I am.
I hate my life.
But… but… we love your life. At least, we love that your life brings you here. I’m sorry you feel like poop.
Why in hell is it not possible to find footie pajamas for little girls? My nieces (sizes 8 and 10) want footie pajamas for Christmas this year. I can’t find anything bigger than 4-6, unless I want to pay almost $40 each, which seems overmuch for something they won’t be able to wear for more than a few months before outgrowing it.
O.M.G.W.T.F!!!
One (1) centimeter of snow, and the entirety of northern Delaware turns into a vast pool of drooling morons!
Mini-pit of myself. I said something very awful about someone who didn’t deserve it. I should know better.
I should do better.
Just be glad you don’t get to experience the particular joy and wonder that is Rt. 422. At least, I hope you don’t. That commute makes me wish for hood-mounted nuclear land torpedoes. And when it rains, or snows, or gets dark, or gets sunny, or on random days ending in Y, it’s doubly so.
Turns into?
runs