And that reminds me. The American right is pelted daily with horror stories about the British National Health Service. However, you may notice that there are no such stories about the German, French, Italian, Spanish, Scandinavian or Dutch health services (apart of course from the unfortunate Dutch habit of killing the old and sick and calling it "good death" - a habit which, in spite of much rhetoric, has nothing to do with socialized medicine, and whose most famous proponent is an American doctor). Why is that? Is it because American journalists only speak English? Not really - that is a charge you may lay against the English, not against the more adventurous Yanks. It is more that such horror stories are much, much rarer on the Continent. And why is that? Because the British Health Service has been subjected, since the days of Margaret Thatcher, to a series of disastrous market-obsessed experiments and to increasing privatization. Contrary to freemarketeering wisdom, this has led to a marked increase in waste, overspend, bad practice, and corruption. If you want data to support this claim, get back to me or try to get hold the various dossiers on NHS privatization published by Private Eye magazine.