Rantings of a Flaming Liberal

One thing I credit Spain with (along with the several years I’ve spent in graduate school) is my gradual shift from high school Young Republican to present day Flaming Liberal. The impressionable young girl that believed everything her conservative parents spouted at her evolved into a free thinker who started to ask questions and to reflect about a thing called ethics. What most astonishes me about this country is the hypocrisy of the conservative discourse here. Lately I feel like talking about these issues. I’m not one to get into arguments; I don’t feel the need to defend my ideas in the face of ignorance. But it's election year. And when an American tells me that her heart goes out to all those poor Canadian people living in a socialist system that need medical care and can’t get it, a little voice inside me tells me I must say something.

Said person claims, based on her chats with fellow motorhomers from Canada over the past two months (and I suspect also based on her incessant watching of FOXnews), that routine checkups are not thorough and that people with cancer don’t get care at the advanced level that they do here in the US. She thus concludes: “The only thing wrong with Canada is that it’s a socialist country.”

I snap. Maybe instead of criticizing the Canadian system we could be a bit self-critical of our own? People in Canada who need care and can’t get it? What about the millions of uninsured and those with insufficient care here in the US?

Health care isn't a privilege for those who can afford it; it's a right to which every citizen is entitled. The government, and all of us, has a responsibility to our fellow citizens to make sure that that right is upheld. You may argue that certain things are best left up to free markets, but health care is something that must be guaranteed to EVERYONE.

The promoters of the system here want us to believe that if each person plans properly, saves, and makes an effort that they will have the coverage that they need. It's simply not true, and this is a tactic to make it seem like it's the individual's fault if they're not covered, when the fault is in the system itself.

This is, from my point of view, the discourse of one notion of the American Dream used at its worst. “With hard work and grit, you, and anyone, can be successful.” This is at the root of the Republican ideology in this country and is manipulated as a way to relinquish not only the government but all Americans from any ethical responsibility towards our fellow citizens. Because what is implicit in this discourse is its flip-side: “Oh, you just didn’t work hard enough. Too bad for you.” Come on, a little solidarity people.