British Tea Party? Not So Fast
Tweet
I already see the American media, hunched over their keyboards ready to pounce on the story that there’s some sort of British Tea Party movement starting up.
Not so fast.
While there’s no doubt that some of our friends across the pond believe they are overtaxed (and frankly, who doesn’t) you should be aware that one of the major issues of contention for our domestic teabaggers is opposition to universal health care, or as they call it “socialized medicine” (many of those protesting seem to suspend their distaste for socialism when they cash their Social Security checks).
Nobody of any consequence in England is against socialized medicine. In fact, the British National Health Service (NHS) is a political football only with wrangling over which party can do the best job in keeping it up and running. David Cameron, the head of the Conservative party recently starred in a billboard ad campaign pledging to preserve the NHS.
Like in America when we do have progressive government programs – Social Security, Medicare – people really like them and would be pushed to rioting in the streets if they were taken away.
There is this consistent habit in the conservative movement and the mainstream press to take international political events and try to map them on to U.S. politics when it seems on the surface to benefit the right, when most of the world’s parties are considerably to the left of the Democratic party, let alone the GOP. It just happens that when it comes to the UK I know a little bit about it and why these parallels really don’t pass the smell test.
22 Responses to “British Tea Party? Not So Fast”
Jennifer Aniston Reportedly Pregnant With Twins
PHOTOS: Tamara Ecclestone At The Langham Hotel
Red Front? “Center For American Freedom” Logo Echoes Communist Style
Romney Calls For Defunding Planned Parenthood, Wife Was A Donor
GOP Fundraising Email Asks Supporters To “Knock Out” Obama
Romney Comes Up Limp In Nevada
Obama Opens Lead On Romney In New Poll
What Time Is Super Bowl 2012 (Super Bowl XLVI)?
Latest Entries
Why Do Liberals Support Drone Strikes?
Weekly Standard Rolls Out The Iraq Argument For Iran
Equal Polarization, My Ass
Some Crazy Stuff That Happened In World War II
Maryland Republican Campaign Funds Used To Defend Voter Suppression
The Obama Jobs Record In One Graph
Martin O’Malley All In For Marriage Equality
Newt Gingrich, Filled With More Excrement Than Your Average Politician
New Year, Powerline Still Stupid
Thanks Again
Meta
Blogroll
Disclaimer
The views on this site are mine and mine alone, and do not reflect the views of my employer, Media Matters for America
© 2000-2011 Oliver Willis
You’re right. Hell, I wouldn’t even term them as “parallels”, such is the yawning chasm between what’s been coming from the GOP recently and and what even hardline Conservatives in the UK would pursue.
Some of these idiots make the BNP look all warm and fuzzy.
You’re right that the NHS (like welfare programs everywhere in the world) is fairly popular in the UK and a political third-rail.
Your specific point here does fall flat here because Daniel Hannan (about whom the Atlantic blogpost you link is about) is one of the few British politicians who does actually oppose the NHS and socialized medicine. But I guess he is not of “any consequence.”
See: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xx0ktkr9s8I for example.
One MP who seems to think his job is getting on US right-wing TV.
MEP, actually. Member of the European Parliament.
Stand corrected, and even more irrelevant then.
British Tea Party?
Major history FAIL!
Hannan is the Ron Paul of the Conservative Party in the UK, only more out of touch with his nations own populace. I can admit there’s a small chunk of the populace who’s all for going back to 1889 as far as government goes. There is no real chunk of the populace in the UK supporting that. There’s a reason why Hannan is a MEP and not a MP. It’s a way to throw him to somewhere that he can make his speeches and not actually hurt the Tories. A Hanna-led Conservative Party would end up in 4th place behind Labor, Liberal Democrats, and the UKIP.
News flash! People like socialism when it’s socialism for the people! NHS is socialism for the people, not unlike Social Security and Medicare.
Socialism for the rich or socialism for the corporations… not so much.
If there really was a left wing version of Fox News, Sarah Palin would have been answering questions about the Alaska Permanent Fund from the first weekend she was chosen until the day of the election. Money is taken from hard working, productive corporations (and let’s be fair, oil companies give us what we want) and given to every toothless layabout who has an Alaskan address. Her popularity was boosted greatly by a one time bonus negotiated when oil prices blew up to $140 a barrel, and fortunately for humanity didn’t stay there.
This time.
More public meetings of the CCD Party, Conservatives Collecting Disability
So when you are in favor of overtaxing the populace to waste money on government programs, you become eligible for benefits?
Lemme try and break this down. Is everyone who is not receiving benefits obligated to vote Republican? No? Then why should those who currently receive benefits, ipso facto be in favor of expanding the role of government?
Perhaps there is a happy medium: If you are eligible for a benefit, as determined by the people who dispense said benefit according to regulations, you should be free to say and do whatever you damn well please, without being accused by spiteful “do-gooders” of being hypocritical.
“If there really was a left wing version of Fox News”? There is: ABCCBSNBCCNBCCNNMSNBC
You mean, “Were there a Matthew Hubbard version of FOX News”. Of course there is — as soon as you scrape up a few hundred million bucks and start it. Until then, as Edward R, Murrow put it, you’re just “Another voice shouting down the bar.”
Considering I am now paying more to my insurance company than I am in federal income taxes, I would very much like to see this particular middleman cut out of my life. At least I know that, were I to lose my job, I would still have insurance. And seeing as my insurance provider is looking to raise it’s rates by a whopping 40%, I would very much like to send it a nice big kiss off.
How do I create a link? mydavidcameron.com shows that (and another) poster as seen by some random Cameron spoofers. I’m also surprised that nobody has yet to find film of the chimp’s tea party, which years back was a big draw to any zoo in the UK. There’s definitely footage of this.
help making that into a link greatly appreciated.
As someone pointed out on Thom Hartmann’s show – If the American healthcare system is so good, why is it no other country wants to copy it.
When people argue that we have the best healthcare in the world (which we often do for those who can afford it), they miss the point that the debate is about the healthcare delivery system, not whether top notch treatment is available to some.
It’s like arguing that since many of the finest schools in the world are found in the United States, we clearly have the best educational system on the globe.
I’m afraid that many conservatives would argue EXACTLY that — while simultaneously asserting that those smartypants Harvard eggheads ain’t really all that smart.
I was recently discussing elsewhere how costly it is to have a baby without proper insurance (or if you’re still waiting for the maternity coverage to kick in). A frequent conservative commenter pointed out that one could just go ahead and get a midwife, ignoring the fact that if you have complications during the delivery your options are to get your pocket picked or let the baby die.
Saying that the country has the best health care in the world while telling huge swaths of its citizens that they can’t have any of it is mind-blowingly cruel. I’m living in America; why is it acceptable to tell me that I’m only worthy of the medicine to be found in Paraguay?
“If there really was a left wing version of Fox News”? There is: ABCCBSNBCCNBCCNNMSNBC
You’re delusional, Frank. Of those, only MSNBC is really slanted to the left. And even then, they are not as batshit fucking crazy and partisan and deceitful as Fox News.
Also ignoring the fact that legitimate, certified midwives don’t exactly offer their services for free.
I came across a description in Charles Stross’s novel “The Atrocity Archive” of a couple running a rooming house as ‘elderly High Tory sociopaths”. I think I now know what that looks like in real life.
Hey Rip-
They don’t want to copy it, they want to take part in it.
http://www.google.com/hostednews/canadianpress/article/ALeqM5h0QC7bditrEb3wYz_6_b-gsGGDxA
Also, Oliver, nice Redskins cap!! My nephew has the same one …. He’s 8
Stross is a great writer. Haven’t read that one though. Loved Accelerando.
As I said – the best if you can pay for it.
“But I wrote out the cheque myself and paid for it myself and to this point, I haven’t even looked into the possibility of any reimbursement. I don’t know what I’m entitled to, if anything, and if it’s nothing, then so be it.”
On a per capita basis, the United states spends roughly twice what other industrialized nations do on healthcare – I would hope that we excel in some areas for the money, but I don’t see anyone arguing that for the average American the current system is twice as effective as Canada’s.
The superrich will always pay extra for personal hand and foot medical care, just as they pay for servants and prime tables at a restaurant. But a Canadian will be assured that regardless of income, health status, age, will get the essentials and whatever is necessary after that. A Canadian superrich is paying for extra medical care above and beyond what’s available at home, but knows that vital life and death treatment is always available.
Canadian doctors have the same quality training and meds as we do, and the results are equivalent. Ordinary people aren’t flocking down here to get care, and they certainly aren’t demanding Canada end its system.