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bg: that follows from a political choice, obviously.
typically, in the "debate" around universal health care, the choice has been restated to keep the ethical problems away--you know the problems that follow from a mode of distributing wealth that makes the lives of the children of the affluent worth more than the lives of the children of the poor.
people can get derailed by "principled" questions about the "role of the state" by way of some libertarian fantasy-land where there is happy market land and sad state land and neér the twain should meet.
because that's an easier route across which to argue that the current distribution of wealth produces no ethically problematic outcomes.
because confronting the question in ethical or political terms---not to mention medical terms----typically means that you can't find grounds to argue against some form of universal health care.
there is and should be a discussion to be had about what form that will take---i don't think the flaccid compromise that the obama administration made with the right goes anywhere near far enough----but regardless that debate seemed to me short-circuited, absconded with by insurance company lobbyists and policy wonks who must have decided that an actual debate about these questions would be too messy for teevee....
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a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle
spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear
it make you sick.
-kamau brathwaite
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