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@deathkitten

I had had little contact with Americans until I moved to Thailand back in 2015. Over there, there are a surprising number of American retirees who moved there to try to eke out their Social Security pension.

In conversation with the Americans in Thailand, the subject of universal healthcare or the absence thereof in America often came up. Any attempt by me to suggest that American healthcare was utter shit and that just about every other civilised country in the entire world has managed to implement universal healthcare one way or another would elicit an utterly explosive response. Suggesting, as I always did during these conversations, that Bernie Sanders is right and that Medicare needs to be the default healthcare insurance system for every single resident of the USA, seemed to equate to suggesting barbecuing human babies alive for supper!

I found that saying absolutely anything that could be construed as any kind of criticism no matter how mild of the United States of America would elicit a reaction that was totally and completely over the top.