Title: A Lesson From Canada (and Detroit) : Single Payer Health Care is the Way to Go
Summary: A blog named “The Rag Blog” uses a political cartoon and a personal story to compare the health care systems of the United States and Canada. Blogger Tommie Sue Montgomery attempts to dispel some myths and rumors regarding Canada’s single-payer health care system.
Topic: Should the Obama administration attempt to convert the United States to a single-payer health care system?
Category: Blog
What is it? A blog by Tommie Sue Montgomery and a political cartoon by David Horsey
Publication Information: Dec. 13, 2008
Author: Tommie Sue Montgomery
Location: http://theragblog.blogspot.com/2008/12/lesson-from-canada-and-detroit-single.html
Accessed: Feb. 20, 2009. 5:50 p.m.
Support:
Tommie Sue Montgomery, blogger
David Horsey, political cartoonist
Dean Baker, Macroeconomist
Tommie Sue Montgomery is an American blogger who has lived in Canada for the last 7 and-a-half years. Montgomery has a political cartoon placed at the top of the blog post, the cartoon was drawn by David Horsey. Horsey works for the Seattle Post-Intelligencer and is a Puliter Prize-winning editorial cartoonist. In Montgomery’s blog post she references an article written by Macroeconomist Dean Baker, which addresses the flawed thinking of bailing out GM while neglecting the hurting health care system.
Audience and Agenda:
The “Rag” Blog” references an underground newspaper that was published in the 1960′s named “The Rag,” which protested War in Vietnam, and advocated for civil rights. The Rag Blog reaches a niche audience of about 8,600 people, and they go to the blog for alternative voices. The blogger, Tommie Sue Montgomery, placed her post on the blog because her story is not “newsworthy” according to mainstream media, but it does circulate among the alternative voices that are online.
Usefulness:
Personal testimonies regarding health care are very compelling because people sympathize with one another. Montgomery’s blog post helps put Canada’s health care system into perspective. The vast majority of Americans receive their information through the mainstream media, and that includes news on Canada’s health care system. The news often paints Canada’s health care system as a type of “socialized medicine,” which implies that it goes against our democratic values. Montgomery specifically writes, “this is not socialized medicine,” but it is an effective system. She does concedes that there can be long waits for elective procedures, but that Canadians never have to wait for critical care.
Works cited:
theragblog.blogspot.com
political cartoon
quancast.com
wikipedia.org
For other online Citizen sources check out…
19) Closed-Door Meetings
11) Brad Warthen’s Blog
4) Two Schools of Thought
I found the number on quantcast.com. If you have a more official number that would be great!
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[...] care or doctor visits. A portion of the public fears government run programs, and that “socialized medicine” will be a safe-haven for government abuse. A single-payer system will create the need for [...]