Monday, June 15, 2009

Sunday Funnies & Arts (A Day Late)














As always, click to enlarge. For more Tom the Dancing Bug, Ben Sargeant, Funky Winkerbean, Calvin and Hobbes, Mother Goose and Grimm, Tony Auth, Tom Toles, and Zippy, click here, here, here, here, here, here, here, and here...


Though lawful, the bicyclists were offensive to some observers. Out for a stroll on Frenchmen Street, Jason Price, 40, grew enraged as the riders passed him.

"All I saw was a bunch of indecent people and perverts," he said.
In New Orleans?...


Yesterday, Wolf Blitzer had this edifying exchange with Sen. Judd Gregg (R-NH):
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I had a serious health problem when I was unemployed in France. I was able to choose all of my doctors, all of my treatments and my health care was covered at nearly 100 percent. If this had happened to me in the United States, I would have had to declare bankruptcy.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: All right, Senator. What do you say to Sally?

GREGG: Well, first off, I have no interest in turning the United States into France. We're not going to Europeanize this country, even though I regret to say that the policies that this government right now appear to be moving us down that road, toward the nationalization of an awful lot of stuff.

I believe that we produce the best health care system -- delivery system in the world. We're on the cutting edge of technologies, we're on the cutting edge of procedures. And the reason we're able to do that is because we have a private health care system in this country.
Now, set aside for a second that Judd Gregg, scion of a wealthy mill-owning family, son of a former governor of New Hampshire, and educated at Phillips Exeter, Columbia, and Boston University, has never had to sweat out health care access in his life. When he claims that the United States has the best health care system in the world, he's patently wrong. By the most basic of measures -- life expectancy -- our health care system ranks 45th in the world, behind every country in the European Union. (France, for the record, is eighth.) On the other hand, no one denies that the United States spends more on health care than any other country. By any definition, the bang for the buck here is terrible -- a scandal, really...

After hearing Gregg denigrate France, my father and I began listing the things about France that we would like to see in this country:
  • French food
  • French wine
  • cheese
  • mass transit
  • art
  • cinema
  • health care
  • Paris
  • Provence
Oh, and the language: You have to admit that French is a great language. Anyway, it turned into a real What Have the Romans Ever Done For Us moment...




Projections recalls growing up in Southern California in the 1940s...

We're Always At Your Service (thanks to Jacqueline T. Lynch at Another Old Movie Blog):

4 comments:

Steven said...

Quite simply, I don't understand how someone like Gregg can lie with a straight face. If I tried it, I would be found out in second. Well, I suppose it takes practice...

Thanks -

Sylvia K said...

There seem to have been a considerable number of those on the right these days that have become very accomplished liars! But then the truth has never been of much importance to the likes of limbaugh and o'riley.

Great post, K, as always.

Ima Wizer said...

IF I got any kind of major illness or even had to go to the hospital, I wouldn't be able to. I live month to month as it is....I'd have to lay down and die. And I'm being very serious here. I work three jobs and because each is part time, I have no health coverage and affording it would be a luxury that I don't have. I can barely afford groceries. Seriously. I worry about it every day.

K. said...

Republican hypocrisy knows no depths. It beats me how they keep a straight face unless they actually believe what they are saying. Which is really scary.

Things could be worse, Ima: You could have French health care.