Tourists held in US orphanage after mother falls ill

[Adrian Laguna]

Every time the topic of socialized health care comes up, Americans point out that Canadian-style health care would never work in the US, because apparently, everyone in your society and government is a bigger asshole than their counterparts here, and their assholish nature would cause the whole idea to collapse. Are you guys serious?

It's not so much that Americans are assholes as that, for complicated historical and cultural reasons, there a lot of people fundamentally opposed to any form of socialism. These people will do anything in their power to prevent, delay, cancel, hamstring, obstruct, and otherwise impede any and all socialist programmes. These people also happen to hold at least 40% of the legislature, and occassionally one of them becomes President. One of them is President right now, and thanks to the upcoming energy crunch and associated crises, there is a good chance one of them will be inagurated as President nine years from now.