American Politics Day

For some reason today is American politics day, it may be that this is because American politics are more interesting than the grim inevitability I sense in UK politics - where anyone with a slogan "Yes we can" would have a little man following him around explaining that although technically we can we probably won't due to leaves on the line. Nor am I going to try and fathom the unfathomable politics of Ghana my home for the moment.

UNIVERSAL HEALTHCARE.....you would have thought that Barack Obama had suggested paying for healthcare for the Universe, martians included. Instead he proposed a modest reform to ensure that the land of the free meant free healthcare. I live in Ghana and the BBC Worldservice (Yes I am approaching mediocrity, or expat eccentricity can't decide which.....is that London calling) so as I was saying the BBC Worldservice is broadcasting disgusted of Tennesse's attitude to the principal that everyone should get healthcare. The average Ghanain doesn't get this, I mean you pay for everything here and if you don't have the money to pay you go are taken hostage until you can. The step from hospital to hostage is a short one. I mean they literally hold you prisoner in the grounds of the hospital until someone pays your bill. Universal healthcare is a good thing no?

I am not even going to take a stab in the dark at what kind of fear makes Americans so selfish as to not to want to fund a healthcare system to treat one another. I mean i might cough Macarthyism but I really would only cough it because it just seems that there is a disproportionate emotional attachment to not help the weaker guy that I don't get. Don't get me wrong there have been some amazing philanthropists, Getty, Rockerfeller and even Bill Gates but as a nation there is a selfishness that defies belief. Democracy surely suggest that people not only have rights as a citizen but also responsibilites to the citizen. My concern is that the UK has followed suit voting for ever diminishing taxes; eyes averted the ever diminshing services and the ever growing underclass.