Who care about tennis? What about baseball!!

[Mancklin]

What about those Yankees last night! Derek Jeter!! Chien Ming Wang! Absolutely crushed the living daylights out of those Minnesotans! 8-0!
mancklin

And how come there's only ONE baseball smiley and FIVE boxing smileys?

[technomc]

Sorry manks..
but is this relevant to anything important...or insignificant...for that matter...
 

[Mancklin]

Now now T, you lot have been rabbiting on about tennis for yonks, I just thought it was time to mention that there are other sports in the world besides tennis with that dumb little ball going back and forth. Baseball is all about communities, not individuals, see, that's why tennis is the sport of bourgeois individualists and baseball is the sport of the working class
Mancks

[technomc]

That sounds like fighting talk Manks... Do you want to take it outside...
We have discussed alternative sports before...in the TENNIS IS FINE BUT I SAY GO SPURS GO....topic [same category]
There were several opinions in there including naked Tour de France ...RADICAL....
 

[Mancklin]

Guess I missed that thread. Ah well--
off to see Sicko now
Byeee
mancks

[technomc]

Mancks,
Did i miss something..who is sicko???
I quite like baseball...i got a taste for it after watching 'Field of Dreams'...
We don't really do that sport here, or for that matter American football, or basketball...
The closest we get to those is rounders, rugby and netball....not really in the same league though are they?...and the coverage is very limited here to sports that our country do semi-well at...and then not terribly well even then..It tends to always be football, rugby, cricket, golf, snooker and darts...
Oh well...maybe we are not very good at team sports...
Catch up later...
Ta ta..
 

[biggerbirdbrain]

Hey, I think Manks meant that Michael Moore movie, "Sicko" -- his extremely biased diatribe against the health system in the US (my opinion, of course), by lauding the wonders of universal health care in the UK, Canada, and of course, in -- that haven of freedom, prosperity and equality -- CUBA!!!

It's the latest buzz in these-here parts.

[technomc]

Thanks for that threeb...
I didn't have a clue...
On a more political note...our Health service is pretty good....it is slowly going down the pan though...let us hope not totally..
 

[biggerbirdbrain]

I understand that about hoping it doesn't deteriorate in those next critical decades when you'll be needing extensive medical/psychiatric help and the body and mind start receding and decrepitude takes over.

Start jogging now, eat your veggies ... and drink all you can before it's too late!!! 

[Viz]

i think it is fairly widely known (or so i seem to reacall from my studies in health admin) that the US system is the most expensive (as in total expenditure of $ per capita) and the least effective as in access to health care. The economists call it market failure.  Haven't seen "sicko" but i quite enjoyed Bowling for Columbine, although M Moore is an irritating person i think.

[biggerbirdbrain]

I was just getting ready to run off, Viz, but I saw your post and didn't want to say hello to you!

Well, there are certainly big flaws in the system here. But are there not comparable horror stories elsewhere. What I hated was that Moore (who is just a nasty person, I think) pretty much cherry-picked his subjects. And, he only focused on everything that was the most negative aspects of health care in the US, and lauded (and believed) FIDEL CASTRO'S brand of propaganda!!

If Cuba is so wonderful, why are people risking life and limb (still!) to LEAVE?? Why didn't all the emigres to the US go back, if things are so terrible here??

Anyway, that's just my humble opinion. Good hearing from you. After you see the movie, tell me what you think.

[Mancklin]

I hate to have to disagree with the august Threeb, but Sicko simply confirmed for me what I already knew--that the US health care system is terribly broken and needs some radical intervention.
Being from the UK I know all about long waits for hip replacements etc, but the fact is, for most people health care is better and cheaper over there, and having lived under both systems--and with good health insurance here-- I know which I prefer. Everyone in the US should see this movie--after all, we are subjected to propaganda from the other side (endless advertising from drug and health insurance companies) all the time. As Viz so rightly says, M. Moore can be irritating, though he didn't irritate me this time.  The longevity studies and birth mortality figures are pretty convincing.
At least two articles in the NY Times this morning make reference to Sicko, so it is obviously making waves.
Re the UK health care system T--people were talking about it going down the can twenty years ago when I left. Maybe it's like people who think the world is coming to an end--they are always there, and things just carry on.
There are many reasons why people want to come to the US, and for most of them health care is not in the forefront of their minds when they make the decision to come here.
mancks

mancks