Claude Code, Claude Cowork and Codex #5

Some Americans think the "democracy" vs "republic" distinction is extremely important, and that "democracy" means something like "tyranny of the majority", hence why it is good that America is not a _democracy_, but a _republic_ or a _democratic republic_.

Some other Americans (there is some overlap) also think that the US is so large and diverse that essentially its States are their own countries and the US is more like its own continent, and talking about the American _nation_ or even _country_ is meaningless. It is a union of States (though it is rare that someone argues that the US is not a country).

I think they're making a USA vs America (continent) distinction.

Don't you have private healthcare in the UK too, if you aren't satisfied with the NHS?

IMO universal healthcare is awesome as the final safety-net that provides critical care, no matter your financial or employment situation. Yet it doesn't need be the only option. If businesses or people with money want to pay more to get care faster from private sector, that's okay too. It's how the system works here in Finland.

"I have no option to go elsewhere with my £'s if a receptionist is extremely rude to me or a doctor won't listen."

In the UK, private healthcare is very much an option if you have the £.

That’s not inherent of universal healthcare at all. In Austria, you can go to a different doctor if you wish.

>Not to say the US system is perfect, just that adding even more government intervention (and associated plunder)

Uh huh. Because companies that have the explicit purpose of making as much money as possible don't "plunder". Why do you think it is that the US spends more public money per capita than many other countries and yet still has worse healthcare outcomes?

> I'm from the UK [..] I have no option to go elsewhere with my £'s

One of these is an obvious, outright lie. I wonder which.

It's easy, in this discussion, to get into the weeds and be distracted by details (like lots of people have by your "no option to go elsewhere with my £'s" remark).

If you want free at the point of healthcare, clearly you are better off in the UK than in the USA. If you want to pay for better care (like, well off middle class, not millions) then you're still better off in the UK than in the USA because we don't have perverse incentives for healthcare insurance, so the cost is lower even when you include the price of NHS services you aren't using. And if you're paying literal millions for healthcare then you ought to be paying for others' healthcare even if you aren't using it in principle.

Does it make logical sense that public healthcare should work better? That's irrelevant because, empirically, it does.

Unfortunately, useful idiot is a valid phenomena but much of what we observe in the US is disempowerment. The congress people believe that they don't have power outside the president's benevolence and hence does not assert their constitutional powers. The constitutional court is either partisan or outright corrupt and does not work as a corrective. The execution branch are ready to serve the president and not their assigned duties or the law. Many ordinary voters do not feel personal responsibility for acting, but prefer to rely on whoever promises them emotional validation instead of forming and empowering their communities. This is not a single thing, this is a combination of effects that influence and amplify each other.

Trump isn't doing anything out of the ordinary for an American president, so I would say it is indeed quite normal. If by "not normal" you mean "not acceptable" then I agree, but that doesn't change that "Department of War" is more correct than "Department of Defense"