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Anyone who’s been observing the politically orchestrated crises in the UK’s National Health Service over the last few years would be aware it was just a matter of time before the vexed question of ‘charges’ began to raise its capitalistic head in a service that was once free at point of need, and the pride of the British nation.

Ever since Jeremy Richard Streynsham Hunt, MP, was given the plum post of Minister for Health…

…in the right-wing Conservative government led by his old Oxford University chum, David Cameron, the good ship ‘NHS’ has been lurching unsteadily towards the rocks of corporate capitalism, it’s helm abandoned, its once-gallant crew of doctors and nurses worn and broken by disgustingly long hours and ever more appalling working conditions.

One can only ponder on the reasoning that led Cameron to appoint a man to this position who, in 2005, had co-authored a book calling for the NHS to be dismantled and replaced with ‘an American-style system’. It would seem likely that, while he could never admit it publicly, Cameron supports Hunt’s views and placed him in the ideal position to carry them through.

Hence, it’s no surprise to learn this week that at the British Medical Association’s annual GP (family doctor) conference the call went out to begin charging patients for GP appointments. While the vote went against the proposal, it can surely only be a matter of time before Britain’s GPs are forced to begin making charges, given that they deal with 90% of patient contacts within the NHS, while their funding has been eroded to less than 9% of the NHS budget.^[1]

It’s sufficient that the call has been made. Even just a few years since, the very idea would have been preposterous. The purpose of the National Health Service was to provide health care for all, free at the point of service and funded by the National Insurance contributions paid by every working individual, according to their financial ability.

Aneurin Bevan, Labour politician, son of a Welsh coalminer and a lifelong champion of working people, spearheaded the introduction of the NHS in 1948, when he was Minister for Health. He must be turning over in his grave at the injustices being wrought by this latest incumbent.

^{Aneurin Bevan opens Park Hospital, Manchester in 1948}

Hunt is far from being the only close buddy of Cameron’s who is determined to replace the NHS with a US-styled system of private medicine. Back in 2009, as the British Guardian/Observer newspaper then reported, a row erupted amongst Tory MPs over remarks made by a British Member of the European Parliament, Daniel Hannan, to the right-wing, US TV station, Fox News:

The Observer can reveal that leading Tory MPs – who include Cameron’s close ally Michael Gove [now, Minister for Education] – are listed alongside controversial MEP Daniel Hannan as co-authors of a book, Direct Democracy, which says the NHS “fails to meet public expectations” and is “no longer relevant in the 21st century”.

Others listed as co-authors in the book, published shortly after the 2005 general election, include shadow cabinet members Greg Clark and Jeremy Hunt and frontbencher Robert Goodwill. Clark and Hunt were unavailable for comment last night.

Gove is also one of a group of more than 20 Tory MPs and MEPs who are cited as supporters of Hannan’s views in another book, The Plan: Twelve Months to Renew Britain, published in December last year [2008], in which Hannan and Tory MP Douglas Carswell describe the NHS as “the national sickness service”.

Both books call for the NHS to be replaced by a new system of health provision in which people would pay money into personal health accounts, which they could then use to shop around for care from public and private providers. Those who could not afford to save enough would be funded by the state.

The revelations follow a furious row over Hannan’s recent appearance on US television, in which he told Fox News that the NHS was a “60-year-old mistake” and urged Americans not to adopt a similar system if they wanted efficient, effective healthcare.”^[2]

It really is time the British people woke up to what Cameron, Hunt, and Co are up to. Given the opportunity, they’ll eventually sell off the British people’s National Health Service to private companies – most of which will be American. After all, who else will have the expertise to step in and run things – for a very healthy profit – even if patient health is hardly their top priority?

^{[1] “GPs say no to charging patients” BBC, May 22nd 2014}

^{[2] “Key Tory MPs backed call to dismantle NHS” The Guardian, August 15th 2009}

What can be done about Texas? Suffering it’s greatest drought in history, the majority of Texans still believe God’s in charge of the weather, and eventually ‘things’ll get better’.

^{Bridgeport Lake, Texas – 30 feet below normal levels}

Here’s a statement from the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ), in charge of guarding the state’s air and water, following the latest (2014) report on climate change:

There has been no significant global warming in more than 15 years, although carbon dioxide levels continue to rise. It is clear that the science of global warming is far from settled. Regulatory policy cannot be set without firm guidelines and the proven cause and effect that would dictate policy.”^[1]

At best, this can be described as 2,600 year old thinking -roughly the age of Old Testament writing. At worst, it’s a whole bundle of folks totally out of touch with reality and best confined somewhere where they can do no harm to their fellow beings. Perhaps Texas is as good a place for them as anywhere else.

This ‘head in the sand’, ‘God’ll sort it out’ attitude isn’t confined to Texas, of course. It’s just more prevalent there than anywhere else in America. Neither is it really true that Texans expect God to sort out their environmental problems for them. It’s more to do with Texan super-egos believing they have a right to expect the intervention of a Divine Power, even greater than their own, when matters get out of hand and even a Texan can’t handle it without help.

To put it another way: if God isn’t going to help Texans, then He sure as hell isn’t going to be helping anyone else.

HBO’s show, ‘VICE’^[2] this week highlighted not only the drought in Texas, and the population’s belief God had simply taken a vacation and would soon return to put matters right, but yet another example of international greed ruining lives and creating mayhem in distant parts of the planet.

Papua New Guinea doesn’t get much media attention in the West, so when Exxon-Mobil goes marching in there and turfs the locals off their land, while promising them big money and transforming the jungle into another New York, it hardly hits the headlines. After all, with the national crisis erupting around L.A. Clippers’ owner Donald Sterling not wanting his girlfriend flaunting her black amours in his face during his team’s basketball games, and an NFL player kissing his boyfriend in full view of American TV audiences, what chance have the goings-on in Papua New Guinea?

Thankfully, we have programs like ‘VICE’ to highlight the injustices with which this world seems overwhelmed, and Exxon-Mobil certainly creates its fair share.

There’s a plethora of natural gas, and other energy-rich goodies, under Papua New Guinea. Exxon-Mobil has not only become adept at dragging it to the surface, but in bribing government officials to turn a blind eye while they destroy the environment, trick locals into leaving their lands with promises of big money and a better life – promises that never attain fruition – and eventually leave in their wake a civil war that tears the country apart.

It’s a view of American corporate greed at its worst, but there’s a wealth of similar examples all over the globe, even back in the old US homestead, with fracking now commonplace and earthquakes, water pollution, sickness, and death the unfortunate result. Still, we can’t do without our cheap energy, can we? Though, it may turn out to not be quite so cheap in the long-term.

A far more ‘civilized’ example of US corporate incursion is presently on the cards in the UK, as that wondrous purveyor of magical elixirs, Pfizer Pharmaceuticals, makes a hostile takeover bid for the UK drug company, AstroZeneca. The move will prove a tax haven for Pfizer, saving that corporate millions (possibly, billions?) of dollars.

Pfizer’s Chief Executive Ian Read has promised not to cut jobs at AstroZeneca, stating he’s a “man of his word”. History warns us there is no such thing as, “a man of his word”, in the land of Corporatopia, where money dictates and ethical principles were long since thrown out the window.^[3]

There was a time when the rest of the world considered Americans ‘a bit eccentric’. They’d roll their eyes and grin sheepishly at the thought of meeting anyone from the ‘New World’. Now, that’s all changed. America is considered a pariah by much of the civilized world. Governments still bow the head and bend the knee to the ‘Mighty Power’, but ordinary folks are a bit more savvy as to America’s role in the decline of living standards and moral integrity permeating other nations on the planet.

While Texans still stubbornly believe their uniquely American God will eventually answer their prayers, the rest of the world has given up any belief in America the nation as its savior, and now views continuing allegiance towards this ‘deity’ as an empty dream resulting in a downward spiral to oblivion.

Unfortunately, while it may be possible to confine Texans to Texas, confining Americans to America is no longer feasible. ‘America’ is synonymous with ‘corporations’, and corporations are advancing across the globe like the Orcs of Mordor, swallowing up civilizations, destroying cultures, devastating the environment.

Perhaps the question should not be, ‘what can we do about Texas’ – but what can we do about corporate America?

^{[1] “It’s Aggie vs. Aggie on the Science of Climate Change” NPR, May 12th 2014}

^{[2] “HBO ‘VICE'”}

^{[3] “MPs give Pfizer stick as it waves carrot at AstraZeneca” Reuters, May 13th 2014}

If there’s one thing truly pleasing about John Oliver’s show, “Last Week Tonight”, it’s his gentle way of easing Americans down to size (and I don’t mean by warning them off Big Macs).

Oliver admits to loving America, and why shouldn’t he?

Just because this writer finds much of it overbearing, arrogant, self-obsessive, given to violence, awash with ghastly smelly stuff that labors under the name of ‘food’, full of bugs – and much bigger things that can eat you – and clumps of semi-derelict buildings colloquially known as ‘towns’, there’s really no reason why every Englishman who comes here should feel the same way.

Tonight he beguiled us with a lesson in remembering that there are other countries out there besides the US, also with presidents. His subject for this show was French president, Francois Hollande:

[cvg-video videoId=’9′ width=’420′ height=’250′ mode=’playlist’ /]

Anyone like to hazard a guess how many Americans have never heard of him?