Why America Needs A Monarchy: Some Vague Thoughts On The US Healthcare Debate

I’ve recently been reading a large book on the ‘History of Modern Political Thought’, and came across a section entitled ‘The Federalist’, which refers to a series of newspaper articles published in New York newspapers between 1787-88. The articles sought to persuade New Yorkers to vote in favour of a new constitution drawn up over the previous summer in Philadelphia, which sought to fix problems with the ‘Articles of Confederation’ – the original document defining the collective identity of the new American states following the War of Independence (…or something like that).

Anyway, apparently one of the problems with getting the new constitution agreed to was the general suspicion among Americans with regard to anything resembling strong central government. This suspicion is pretty understandable given that the Americans had just fought a war against the British to GAIN liberty from a strong, central (albeit overseas and imperial) government. The new American States weren’t about to give that liberty away again by acceding to another strong central government, even if it was this time on their side of the Atlantic.

While describing this background, however, the author of my book threw in a random aside which got me thinking about America’s big healthcare debate. (It’s worth noting, if you don’t know, that a lot of opposition to Obama’s public healthcare proposals are on the grounds, broadly, that too much central government power is dangerous and interferes with individual liberty). My author pointed our, that a major contrast between the public perception of governmental authority in Britain and America in the late 18th Century had to do with the recent history of the two countries. I quote:

“Because the British had used the supremacy – or at least the independence – of Parliament twice in the seventeenth century to overthrow royal absolutism, they tended to identify parliamentary supremacy with political liberty itself. Because the Americans had suffered under the actions of an unrepresentative imperial parliament, and had fought against its authority to achieve their liberty, no such identity was possible. Liberty was identified with rights held against government…” (p.204)

Now, I don’t mean to overplay this historical point (fear of an absolutist monarchy is not particularly potent in Britain these days), but it does seem to encapsulate something of the differences between Britain and America ideologically, and perhaps explains a little of the pre-rational, presuppositional ‘background’ which is shaping the American healthcare debate – a debate which has been, at times, quite unintelligible on the British side of the Atlantic.

U2 Album Hierarchy, August 2009

Four years ago I stuck a list up on Amazon which put U2’s (then 11) albums into a hierarchy, from best to worst. The list looked like this:

1. Achtung Baby (1991)
2. Joshua Tree (1987)
3. How To Dismantle An Atomic Bomb (2004)
4. Pop (1997)
5. War (1983)
6. All That You Can’t Leave Behind (2000)
7. Zooropa (1993)
8. Rattle & Hum (1988)
9. The Unforgettable Fire (1985)
10. Boy (1980)
11. October (1981)

My opinions have changed, however, over the last four years and so, with the addition of their latest album, here is my new list:

1. Achtung Baby (1991)
2. Zooropa (1993)
3. The Joshua Tree (1987)
4. Boy (1980)
5. How To Dismantle An Atomic Bomb (2004)
6. Pop (1997)
7. The Unforgettable Fire (1985)
8. All That You Can’t Leave Behind (2000)
9. War (1983)
10. Rattle & Hum (1988)
11. No Line On The Horizon (2009)
12. October (1981)

You will notice the latest album (No Line…) down the bottom, in 11th place. That’s because, having tried and tried and tried, I cannot find anything on the whole album that I really love. Magnificent is the closest, but I’ve heard that whole jangly guitar thing so many times from U2 that it just doesn’t stand out to me. Shame. I’ve even put the horribly disjointed Rattle & Hum above it simply because there are three or four incredible songs on that, which I can’t find on the new album.

Achtung Baby and Zooropa though, taken together, are just incredible. U2’s darkest, most ironic, most existential albums; critical of modern society (consumerism, celebrity culture etc.), but not in the bombastic or (almost) self-righteous manner of some of their other albums. Boy has caught my attention more as well, as a complete album with some brilliant stuff, like An Cat Dubh, Into The Heart, Stories For Boys, The Electric Co., and Shadows and Tall Trees, in addition to the usually cited I Will Follow and Out Of Control.