Too bad I've hit my limit of Times articles this month, otherwise I'd quote directly from the source, a.k.a., Davey the Salad Tosser at the Georgetown Applebee's:
Lyndon Johnson was right to use government to do more to protect Americans from the vicissitudes of capitalism. But he made a series of open-ended promises, especially on health care. He tried to bind voters to the Democratic Party with a web of middle-class subsidies.
A government that was energetic and limited was turned into one that is omnidirectional and fiscally unsustainable. A government that was trusted and oriented around long-term visions is now distrusted because it tries to pander to the voters' every momentary desire. A government that devoted its resources toward future innovation and development now devotes its resources to health care for the middle-class elderly.
Health care for the middle-class elderly? Clearly, a foolish misallocation of government resources. Thankfully we don't need to look far into the future for a solution. It's staring us in the face right now:
The Catsoula family, who live in the suburbs of Athens, are at breaking point. The two sisters and their elderly grandparents need various forms of medicine. Seventy-year-old Heleni Catsoula uses oxygen to help her with respiratory problems.
But she told Sky News: "The government reimburses me for the 100 euros I pay for the oxygen, but now they have stopped. They also used to pay the chemists for my drugs but they have stopped.
"Now I owe my local chemists 400 euros and I find it difficult to get my medication. If I have an attack, I don't even have petrol in the tank to get to the hospital. And nor can I afford the five euro entry fee" [...]
The family, who live in the industrial area of Aspropirgos, has sold all their jewellery including wedding rings and christening gifts to pay for food and medication.
Ms Catsoula's daughter Vicki, who is diabetic herself, now regularly makes a three-hour journey to a central Athens refuge centre to try to get hold of the drugs her family needs.
For the Catsoulas, austerity has meant the state no longer provides them with the support they need.
Their home sits in the shadow of the Aspropirgos power station and yet they cannot afford to service their electricity bills. One of the sisters lost her job at the factory three years ago.
It never fails to amaze me how Serious Persons like David Brooks get taken seriously by the other Serious Persons in Washington for waxing seriously nostalgic for the good old days of the early 20th Century, before left-liberal politicians overreached and shamelessly bought the loyalty of voters with unsustainable social-welfare programs like Medicare. Because, well, it's not like any of those voters actually needed those programs since their presence would upset the Jeffersonian-Hamiltonian Equilibrium, which I guess is some kind of Grand Unifying Theory that defines our values and has Made Us Exceptional. Perhaps if those greedy Greeks, like their American counterparts, would understand the universality of this principle and respect their own Platonic-Aristotelean Equilibrium, they'd once again be able to assume their rightful position among the league of democratic nations. Until then, however, more of them will apparently need to expire, victims of their own moral deficiency.
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Vitelius