Thread: Western Propaganda aka клюква lol

Originally Posted by Hanna

With the views you seem to have, you'd better make sure you are set up with insurances and well filled savings account so you can afford the new "choice driven" economy. And before you get on any high horses wrt ideology, consider what you've already received by the welfare state you seem to despise. Would you have gone to university, if you'd have had to pay for it? Would your parents? The real price, is 180,000 SEK per year. How would you have got hold of that, and paid your bills while at the same time studying. I won't even go there with medical care which millions of people in the US are losing sleep over but has been handed to you on a silver platter by the welfare state you despise. You won't appreciate it until you lose it. But by all means, enjoy the "choices" and don't forget to save every penny - if your dreams of living in a miniature replica of the USA come true, you will need it.

My husband and I were responsible American citizens. We both worked hard and never accepted any handouts. Then one day my husband caught a virus which settled in his heart, damaging it and causing him to have severe arrhythmia. For three years his condition worsened, and although doctors tried every procedure they could think of to help him they finally told him that his only hope to continue living would be a heart transplant. He was hospitalized for nine consecutive months while he waited for a heart. By then he had congestive heart failure and I worried every day that he would die. I continued to work while he was hospitalized and paid for his insurance, which - since he was now on an extended medical leave of absence - was only available through a program called COBRA and cost more than $1200 per month. He died, and was brought back to life, five times. They installed two artificial hearts - Ventricular Assist Devices (VADs), one for his right and left ventricles, to keep him alive until he finally got a real heart. He chest was sliced open and stapled shut five times and he was on life support for 41 days following the installation of the VADs.

He finally received a heart transplant and, though he worked hard to start walking again (all of his muscles had completely atrophied) so that he could return to work, his employers informed him that they had fired him while he was in the hospital and he had no job to go back to. He had been a loyal employee for 15 years but they cut him off because they did not want to pay for his insurance. The medical bills began to pour in, and even with the insurance which I had struggled to pay for, our out of pocket cost was $500,000. The total cost was $4 million and from what we have learned, his insurance defaulted and never was able to pay for that. We were forced to file for bankruptcy and we lost everything in our savings and almost lost our home.

It does not matter how "responsible" you are, how much you put away in your savings, or how hard you work - tragedy can strike out of a clear blue sky and I for one am very, very grateful for the social benefits which are in place, even though they are lacking when compared to other countries. My husband was granted disability and that has meant the difference between eating or going hungry many times.

People who think everything should be privatized and who blame all of our economic woes on the poor or the sick (instead of the last decade of nonstop wars in foreign countries) are living in a bubble of non-reality. They think that if you are just responsible and hard working, everything will be OK. They judge people like me and my husband and would like to cut all social programs and leave people like us homeless or dead, I suppose. Without Medicare and Disability, my husband would not be able to afford the $2,000 worth of prescription drugs he must take every month so that his body does not reject his new heart. But I suppose that the ultra-wealthy, who have millions of dollars in their banks, do not have to worry about such petty and trifling concerns and can just consign the rest of us away while they gamble with our economy as if it were one big game of gin - winner take all.

Originally Posted by Deborski

It does not matter how "responsible" you are, how much you put away in your savings, or how hard you work - tragedy can strike out of a clear blue sky and I for one am very, very grateful for the social benefits which are in place, even though they are lacking when compared to other countries. My husband was granted disability and that has meant the difference between eating or going hungry many times.

It doesn't matter whether you believe in a totally public (subsidized) system or if you want a 'mixed' system or one wants a libertarian/totally private system, it's always the same. You need it paid for if you want a 'social safety net.' Since, you and Hanna are both 'liberals' in the 'American' or 'Western' sense of the word, you just don't get it. You are totally clueless.

But, I presented a theory or reason why the system in Sweden is crumbling and she had no clue. Still couldn't comprehend it. That is the problem and why the system is breaking.

You think it's a simplified system of the rich beating down the poor. Yes, it is but it's more than that. The public and private system works in different ways and unfortunately, Governments utilize crony capitalism and many leftist policies to bankrupt the public system. One of the most noticeable consequences is what happens to public healthcare.