On “White House drops public health care option”
So much for bringing change, or hope to America. Health care isn't a privilege; it’s a human right. With so many Americans among the working poor, the very least our government could, and should do is provide universal health care for everyone. What good can be said of any nation that does not care for the sick, or the poor?
Anthony B
Alaska, USA 18 August 2009
***
Just as it did when Bill Clinton made his feeble attempt to overhaul health care in the US, the insurance lobby has cast its heat ray at the weak leaf of Obama's attempt at “change” and wilted it within seconds. Reform is not possible as long as the capitalist system remains in place. Its entire raison d’être is profit, profit, profit. You cannot “reform” the profit motive into anything else any more than you can transform a pig into a gazelle. The power of the insurance and pharmaceutical cartels must be eliminated from the equation. Health care is a human right. The very idea of profit being the overriding concern when lives are at stake is obscene.
Rosa Luxemburg described the difference between reform and revolution. Marxists all know what the answer must be.
Carolyn
California, USA
18 August 2009
On “Healthcare and the social crisis in America”
Although I live in San Diego, California, and read widely on the Web, this is the first article I have read about this volunteer program providing free health care for the indigent.
Thank You
Roland
California, USA 17 August 2009
***
I can tell you one reason why there is little coverage of the free clinic, at least by single payer (HR 676) advocates like me—sadly, the RAM organization believes that health care is a “privilege” and they practically break their arms patting themselves on the back about their charity...very disappointing!
I tried to ask them about sending a video crew to the meeting RAM held in Virginia, and told them that Health Justice supported HR 676 (single payer). They spouted to me a series of right-wing, Cold War era “freedom and capitalism” emails that went on for weeks! They may be helping some, but they said that they have “stopped going to places where people feel that health care is a right” and that they only support “free market reform”!!
Shocked and dismayed are not the words...just thought I should let you know. They won’t get any contribution or good coverage for me until they decide to fight for justice in health care.
I do appreciate that your article was covering the scope of the problem.
In struggle and support,
Kyle C
Ohio, USA 18 August 2009
On “Vote for the Socialist Equality Party in the German parliamentary elections”
Relevant to this article, the USA is practicing the same program. Thousands of people losing their jobs, houses, and families due to Obama and his plan for the wealthy. The upper 10 percent of the population in the USA all get their billions from Obama, who gets a kick back on all legislation that benefits his wealthy friends, but they continue attempting to steal billions more from our health care that we now have.
We need the socialist party to take over the world so that the working class of taxpayers reap some rewards from their hard work; and all the wealthy thieves should go to prison for 100 years.
Paul W
18 August 2009
On “Four hundred years since Galileo’s astronomical discoveries”
We cannot imagine where science would be if it did not shift to the heliocentric model of planets. Opposition by the religious clergy takes different forms depending on time and place. For instance, we had modern science co-existing with superstitions. Instead of straight opposition, science is appropriated by claims that each and every modern scientific invention had a mention in some ancient scripture. While admitting the heliocentric model, Indian astrology is based on the influence of 9 planets out of which the sun is a star, the moon is a satellite and two (Rahu and Ketu) are fictitious! During eclipses, there are astronomical scientists who conclude the regular recording work with a symbolic bath taken at their homes to mark the “swallowing” and “releasing” of the sun by the two monster planets named “Rahu” and “Ketu.” Geological models of the Earth as a sphere co-exist with the Earth as a huge square guarded by 8 divine guards. There are attempts to mix up superstitions and unscientific claims with science such as successful “experiments” conducted to demonstrate the existence of a soul having weight and volume that can be photographed. On the social and religious front too, subversion was a more powerful tactic than straight suppression. For instance, Buddha’s propagation against the existence of God was countered by elevating Buddha himself to God. Saint Basava’s attempt to build a casteless society was subverted by labeling his followers as yet another caste. Scientists and social scientists should guard against smooth and deadly subversion tactics.
Prabhakar
India
18 August 2009
On “George Orwell’s Homage to Catalonia, Stalinism and the Spanish revolution”
I've been reading George Orwell’s Homage to Catalonia, and I really think it’s great how the Vicky Short article clearly explains the Trotskyist position. But I also like the way she is able to see Homage to Catalonia in a positive light.
Her article helped me understand a lot of the politics and the history of the Spanish Revolution, something George Orwell isn't able to do.
Crome
California, USA
18 August 2009
On “Funny People: Requiem for a paperweight”
This movie, and similar recent and soon-to-be released cinema movies shows clearly the crisis in film-making. As a conscious audience member I'm forced to ask, is this all the official cinema "industry" of Hollywood has to offer!?
Funny People may not be very funny and nothing like Sandler’s previous 90s movies.
The new Brad Pitt and Tarantino film Inglourious Basterds looks like a load of rubbish, with Tarantino applying his arsonist wrecking job to history!
The new film Fighting similar to 8 Mile is one of those abhorrent individualist phenomena where the individual admits he comes from and is “nothing” yet he can “save himself” through illegal street fighting and gets to enter the privileged world of the middle class while the rest are left to their own devices.
The soon to be released 2012 seems like the ultimate “end of the world” catastrophe movie, yet where's the scientific evidence for such prophecies of doom? The adherents to these “Mayan” views openly denigrate science and attempt to “synthesize” it with religion and mysticism...an impossible act.
I and a comrade recently watched District 9, produced by Peter Jackson and directed by Neill Blomkamp, based on aliens, derogatorily termed “prawns,” who are oppressed and come to Earth to get more oppressed, i.e., treated to apartheid in South African Johannesburg. It is a particularly brutal film, typically violent. To support the alien “workers” against the “humans” bourgeois and petty-bourgeois oppressors [one has to consciously steer clear of the Pabloite Posadas ideology], the portrayal of humans seems one-sided, callous perhaps reflective of the conditions in Africa and the official order.
Going to the cinemas is (should be) an enjoyable event, yet the kind of content in films being released is getting worse, especially those movies like Bruno and The Hangover, which appeal to the lowest common denominator. Nothing intelligent about it.
Regards,
Chris
New Zealand
17 August 2009