It was painful to hear Rudy Giuliani's stand on healthcare during his run for President in the 2008 Republican Presidential Campaigns.
Now I would like to state that I do respect the man and admire him for the way he cleaned up the City of New York while he was Mayor and for his service before that while he served as New York Attorney General. During that time I was a lonely intern and medical resident living n New York and saw first hand the excellent job he was doing.
Having said that, I was very disappointed in his stance on healthcare. At every opportunity he equated universal healthcare coverage to socialism. What?!!
Government sponsored Universal healthcare coverage is a socialist program. Its more of big brother interfering in the lives of people. What I would propose and want to see is more competition among providers as this brings down cost. Socialism? More competition to bring down costs? Obviously no clue as to how to address healthcare, and a reason toward our understanding as to why we are in the mess we are in. Many of our political leaders and those in Washington don't have a basic, clear understanding to how our healthcare works.
First "socialism", "communism" are relics of the cold war. It reminded me of the black and white sound bites from the 60's, I had seen in my high school history class. Any politician who would compare or equates current policies to these terms in my opinion, is using scare tactics because they have nothing new to say. No new clear defined ideas, so use the scary words which conjure up fear and confusion. Shame!
Its as we are stupid or don't know any better. Its as if we cannot understand. I felt as though Mr. Giuliani was being condescending and talked down to us, treating us like a bunch of morons.
Is socialism so bad? Is socialism foreign to U.S.policy?
Then I would like to ask Mr. Giuliani what he considers Medicare to be? Isn't this a socialist program? Are we all as citizens not paying for this entitlement program? Do we not pay for Medicaid? How about our public school system, emergency services, road repairs? These are all services that we pay for through taxes and special assessments whether or not we use them at present or not, so Rudy needs to rethink before he speaks because it only shows just how ignorant he is and more importantly his condescension towards us.