Priority list for H1N1 vaccine .
Someone like me would be no more a priority than anyone over 64. I don't see anything that states over-64-year-olds are at the bottom of the list.
And, while I really don't want to get into politics, I just have to comment on this, Nan:
He is grabbing control of one private industry after another and ramming through socialized medicine with the enthusiastic cooperation of the Democrats in Congress.
You and I are never going to agree on so-called socialised medicine, although I will say that I have lived in three countries where healthcare is largely free at the point of use, funded by government (
but run at arms-length - doctors make decisions, not politicians, or indeed insurance companies), and I wouldn't want to have any other kind of system. That's my preference. It's clearly not yours, or that of many Americans - although I do wish that some of the people throwing claims around on the Internet (I don't mean here; I haven't seen any specific discussion here) would check their information before making some criticisms of the NHS or Canadian healthcare.
But Obama
grabbing control of one private industry after another? Bush poured billions into the banks - and he had no choice, unless he wanted a repeat of the Great Depression. Talks were already in progress with respect to the automotive industry before Obama took office - and again, what choice was there, really? I can't see any government, Democrat or Republican, letting that great symbol of American manufacturing, the automotive industry, disappear, as Chrysler and GM might well have. And, again, the knock-on consequences would have been severe. Even as it is, with the companies able to continue trading and undergoing restructuring, I'm seeing the effect of the devastation of the automotive industry on the local community where I live and work as an employment counsellor: unemployment significantly higher in south-western Ontario than the provincial and national averages, and many thousands of people who will never work in their industry or occupation again and, in their 40s and 50s, are facing the prospect of having to retrain. Had Bush still been in power, I don't think he'd have done anything different from Obama on that score. Now, you may still disagree with the principle of investing government money in the banking and automotive industries, whether under Bush or Obama, but it hardly represents a 'grab for control of private industry'. Obama himself said he has no desire to run the car industry.
Yes, there's vague talk of a bailout for the newspaper industry, and I don't know whether that would go ahead or not - but that's a request from the industry, it's not a 'grab' for 'control'. Let's not let rhetoric run away from reality here.
Wendy
