Who will heal a sick nation?

America is a nation of so much promise, but we are stagnating - in large part - because of those who would freeze progress. Their goal is to deny that each generation builds upon itself, changes and moves forward. They are anti-evolution in a nation that has built itself on the energy of evolving through diversity. Every person in the United States, with the exception of Native Americans, is the descendant of an immigrant to this land.

A January 5 New York Times article emphasized what has been known for some time: economic mobility in the United States has been stagnating. The right-wing Horatio Alger myth may motivate some of the masses, but most stay mired in the quagmire of declining earnings:

At least five large studies in recent years have found the United States to be less mobile than comparable nations. A project led by Markus Jantti, an economist at a Swedish university, found that 42 percent of American men raised in the bottom fifth of incomes stay there as adults. That shows a level of persistent disadvantage much higher than in Denmark (25 percent) and Britain (30 percent) - a country famous for its class constraints ...

John Bridgeland, a former aide to President George W. Bush who helped start Opportunity Nation, an effort to seek policy solutions, said he was "shocked" by the international comparisons. "Republicans will not feel compelled to talk about income inequality," Mr. Bridgeland said. "But they will feel a need to talk about a lack of mobility - a lack of access to the American Dream."

While Europe differs from the United States in culture and demographics, a more telling comparison may be with Canada, a neighbor with significant ethnic diversity. Miles Corak, an economist at the University of Ottawa, found that just 16 percent of Canadian men raised in the bottom tenth of incomes stayed there as adults, compared with 22 percent of Americans. Similarly, 26 percent of American men raised at the top tenth stayed there, but just 18 percent of Canadians.

Canada, that bastion of "socialized" medicine, beats out the US in economic mobility - and it has a lower national unemployment rate.

So, is presidential candidate Rick Santorum symbolic of a "sick" nation? Santorum would hold a young man who had cancer at the age of five responsible for paying high pre-existing condition premiums as an adult - if he could get coverage at all (he would be entitled to insurance under health care reform, which Santorum vehemently opposes). In a New Hampshire town hall meeting, the young man's mother asked Santorum:

The comments I heard you make in New Hampshire, comments that you support insurance companies' right to refuse to insure people with pre-existing conditions and that you also agreed with higher premiums for people who are sick, well my son graduated college and I pray that he gets a good job. Why is it alright for him to possibly be denied health care insurance or have to possibly pay a fee that he would not be able to afford or for a company not to hire him because he was five years old and he had cancer?

Santorum's statement that it was basically the son's tough luck echoed Ron Paul's infamous answer and audience response in a 2011 Republican debate. At that time, pressed by Wolf Blitzer, Republicans cheered Paul on about a hypothetical 30-year-old man dying due to his lack of health insurance.

Mark Karlin
Editor, BuzzFlash at Truthout