Obviously, there is some confusion here (which I have consistently said). The RIGHT thinks that the northern European countries are socialists. My point was that doing socially responsible things (society, as a nation, have responsibilities to themselves and others - I do not consider that activity to be 'socialist') is not particularly socialist so much as governments doing things for ALL of its citizens. They are able to do this without going bankrupt. The main quibble the Republicans seem to have is that any kind of state services, that provide for their citizens, will bankrupt America - sorry, obviously wrong.

The problem, I think, is that the Republicans think that gov should provide nothing but armies - anything else is socialist. They ignore things like public hospitals, highways, dams, libraries, police and firemen, etc. That doesn't count. On the other hand they want such gov owned enterprises to be privatized as soon as possible. They are currently going after Social Security, Medicare, public schools, etc. The shutdown, for instance, was actually considered a plus by many as they think it helped with decreasing the public payroll.

As far as 'socialism' is concerned its getting pretty interesting. Now there are "socialist democrats" which, I think, means socialism owned by democrats. It, obviously, doesn't really mean Democrat as many are not Democrats (Bernie is a good example of that silly). I still believe that a socialist state is one in which the gov owns EVERYTHING. For many that means "the workers" (another silly). In theory a Democracy is 'owned' by the workers as well, just not restricted to "the workers" but every citizen. These are not thoughts particular to me but how I was raised and taught.

I guess Jackass is not the only one trying, very hard, to actually change our language with doubletalk. Oh, I still believe a Socialist State is not the way to go and even the term "Socialist" has bad connotations. I do, on the other hand, believe that states are formed, in theory, by its citizens for their own welfare. That being the case, Those states actually doing this, have found that their government can provide certain services better than "capitalists".

I have, for a long time, believed that healthcare for profit is an abomination - it costs too much, its simply not the best solution, and costs a LOT less when run by gov. I also find it interesting that Europe is able to do this kind of stuff and succeed but not us. It reminds me of the Portuguese solution for drugs. They figured it out but, instead of fixing our own problems we are into punishment and criminal private industry. One can only wonder.

I have probably said this one before but a story. When Clinton was talking about healthcare the right went nuts. One of their lies (suprise!) was that Canadians were flooding down to our hospitals to get their healthcare. We have a public hospital here that figured they would get a bit of that business (mainly from Victoria) if they changed their name, dressed themselves up and spend big bucks advertising their marvelous services. That little exercise cost the citizens something like 100,000.00 - they didn't get a single Canadian customer. They could have known this had they simply taken the ferry to Victoria and asked anybody if they preferred the American for profit system or their 'socialized' system. They would have figured out, real quick, that what they believed were just lies but they didn't even check. I am not, incidentally, saying that the Canadian system has no problems, on the other hand they live longer than Americans,amongst other little things. I also continue to believe that Americans firmly hold to the "If it ain't invented here its no damned good" view and I think that's hurting us all.

So, basically, my only real quibble, has to do with the word 'Socialist", that's it! I am even a little embarrassed about it, as going to war over a simple word kinda puts me in the insane corner - sorry about that...........