You can always rely on the right.

I am massively frustrated by the supposed debate about health care reform that is going on. Mostly I am frustrated by Obama and the Democrats. The Republicans could always be counted on to be Republicans (Just say no.) and the scare tactics of the insurance industry and the right wing government-can´t-do-anything-right idiots were completely predictable. Obama should have known better than to just give a broad outline of his vision of reform and then turn it over to Congress to fill in the details.

I recommend Nicholas Kristof´s piece in the NY Times today. Here is an exercpt, which is probably a copyright infringement, but I don´t think he would mind.

Throughout the industrialized world, there are a handful of these areas where governments fill needs better than free markets: fire protection, police work, education, postal service, libraries, health care. The United States goes along with this international trend in every area but one: health care.

Remember, we have "socialized fire fighting" and a "socialized postal service" etc. Which reminds me. Did anyone see the show on Fox (I think it was on Steve Ducey´s show....I´m embarrassed that I know his name, but I´m happy to say I don´t know his program´s name) where a panel of people were trashing the efficiency of the postal service? They displayed a graph to show that the price of a stamp had "doubled" from 1991 to the present. Doubled from 29 cents to 44 cents. No, I didn´t see it either, but thank goodness for Jon Stewart and Steven Colbert.

Always remember...the US has the best health care system in the world. A while back I said that at least nobody could still be saying that in the midst of the current "debate," but I was wrong. Apparently the Hannitys, Limbaughs and Becks are still pushing that line.

I was listening recently to the audiobook, "American Prometheus: The Triumph and Tragedy of J. Robert Oppenheimer," and it struck me that the right has always used lies and scare tactics to defeat its opponents. Why expect them to abandon a tactic that has worked so well for so long?

Tchau from Brasil, where all politicians take the high road, I am sure.