[syshum]

>>A lot of people would lose their job in the insurance industry if universal health care was adopted. But it's still the right thing to do.

No it really is not. but I also do not want to diverge in a debate over healthcare policy and how government run healthcare is not the Utopia people like you make it out to be, nor how many of the advancement in care the world enjoys is funded by the US Health system (which is one of the reason the US health system is so expensive) and if the US does go to be Government Run Single Payer we will see a HUGE decline is health care advancement worldwide

>>A hand-in-hat existence has absolutely nothing to do with freedom, if anything it's its opposite.

This is factually incorrect and ignorant of how these economic regulation actually impact the poor. Most of the time it causes business to fold, and the bottom rungs of the economic ladder to be removed, limiting options and forcing an ever increasing number of people in to poverty and into the welfare state. Which is then use ironically to justify more regulation which causes yet more people in the poverty and the welfare state, this cycle repeats over and over, and over again

Government regulations have NEVER lifted anyone out of poverty, free market capitalism does not, and only free market capitalism

[jahaja]

There clearly isn't much ground for a constructive discussion here with that kind of dogmatic market fundamentalism. Pretty much all of what you wrote is trivially refutable by just comparing the US to other western-European nations.

[throwaway201103]

Western Europe has more of a welfare state than the US, but they are still capitalist economies. They also depend on the US for many things, including but not limited to defense and world stability in particular. The "utopia societies" many see there have only existed since after end of World War II, and are directly tracable to the US provision of those things. Take a look at eastern Europe in the 1970/80s to see what a full-on welfare state looks like.

[jahaja]

I can't really see anything in your post that contradicts anything I've written in this thread so I'm not sure what your point it.

[syshum]

The contradiction is your belief that the US way of doing things is bad, while enjoying stability and advancement given to you by the US.

If the US pulled out of the European Theatre and stopped "world policing" like many in the EU (and the US) would like, then it would not be long before most of the EU was speaking Mandarin or Russian, and the EU can not stand alone with out the US backing both Militarily and Economically

the "western-European nations." you wish me to compare the US to would fall in about 3 seconds with out US backing, and their Large State Welfare systems would collapse

[jahaja]

That's just unsubstantiated nationalistic nonsense.