I wanna be a socialist, just like Winson Churchill

[pecunium]

Churchill, that mythic touchstone of the right (rememeber all those appeals to "non-appeasement" in the run up to Iraq?), has been shown to be a raving Commie, and I, for one, can live with it.

Why do I say this? Because one of the things he considered important was universal healthcare for all:

The discoveries of healing science must be the inheritance of all. That is clear. Disease must be attacked, whether it occurs in the poorest or the richest man or woman simply on the ground that it is the enemy; and it must be attacked just in the same way as the fire brigade will give its full assistance to the humblest cottage as readily as to the most important mansion. Our policy is to create a national health service in order to ensure that everybody in the country, irrespective of means, age, sex, or occupation, shall have equal opportunities to benefit from the best and most up-to-date medical and allied services available.

The thing is, he didn't come out for a bastard child (the public option), nor even socialised insurance ((single payer), no, he came out for socialised medicine. Where all of it was to be run by the gov't. This was so successful (and popular) that Maggie Thatcher had to promise it was safe on her watch (so far as I can tell, she lied; British medicine now seems to be a patch-up job of social and private medicine).

Joe Conanson has the detailed write up in his Salon column

It's time for us to join the rest of the civilised world.

Comments

[fjm.livejournal.com]

it was always a bit of a patch up. Dentists more or less refused to join, with the result that our dental care service is pretty rocky (good in some parts of the country, absent in others). Also, the Consultants only agreed to join if they were allowed a portion of their time in private practice. By the 1970s this was becoming a real problem and it's only in the 1990s that they were brought somewhat under control with a clear line of obligation (in the 1970s it was not uncommon for a consultant first to issue a scare about waiting lists, then to offer private treatment straight away with him--always a him. My mother once called one on this and threatened to report him to the British Medical Association. He went green and backed down very fast).