62.1 % of Bankrupticies caused by medical bills

[Tsukiyumi]

...really no offense meant.

None taken. You're completely right to feel that way, and what I said is the honest truth.

[Sionnach Glic]

So you believe that your political system precludes any real chance of it succeeding?

I think it makes it very unlikely it will succeed. The biggest problem is simple, the two party system. Once it become politicised its now an issue. In that case as a government run service it should be an issue, don't get me wrong, but with a two party system how do you deal with that? It's bad enough having just two options when it comes to stances on many, many, issues but now we're adding a HUGE one to the ticket.

I can see where you're coming from. I can't really suggest any ways around this, since most of the countries with socialised healthcare I know of have several stronge political parties.

Again, I can't really speak on that. So again I'll take your word on it.

Ask Tsuki what he thinks of the education system, a government run institution. Hell ask me, I think it's a colosal clusterfuck myself. I honestly find it bewildering that people have such issue with so many government run institutions and yet are so eager for the government to take over another.

Yeah, I've heard of the state of the US education system from various people. A few coleagues who went over there a few years ago in particular had nothing good to say about it.

Hmm, on an off-topic note (as if anyone cares), does anyone know of a site where I can find standardised tests that would be taken by students in the US when leaving high school? I'd be interested in comparing them to our own.

To be honest, I sometimes wonder why you're with the. It seems that you take the opposite stance to them on just about everything.

Actually, I consider myself a real conservative/republican, one who remembers what the party was supposed to be about. It's been taken over by a bunch of f***ing idiots who've forgotten that the whole point of party is serve the people, not beat the democrats.

Ah, a "classic" Republican. No problems there. There was once a time when the Republican party was pretty damn good. Now it's practicaly the Redneck and Fundamentalist party. A pity.
From what I can see, the Reps seem to have morphed into a pure opposition party. That is to say, their entire existance and plan of action is simply to single-mindedly oppose everything the Dems do or suggest and make themselves as big a problem as possible to a Dem-run USA, regardless of the consequences on the country itself.

I think I know where I saw it last. I'll look it up and get back to you on that. If not tonight, then tommorrow morning.

Any luck?

Unfortunately, no.

[Tyyr]

I can see where you're coming from. I can't really suggest any ways around this, since most of the countries with socialised healthcare I know of have several stronge political parties.

Personally I think our two party system is causing a lot of problems. While there's always an adversarial relationship, and there should be, we've gotten to the point where their only concern is beating each other. That's counterproductive. There are also so many issues now that many people find that their views don't actually mesh with either party. It really has become the lesser of two evils and your choices in your government should never be about who is the least objectionable.

Yeah, I've heard of the state of the US education system from various people. A few coleagues who went over there a few years ago in particular had nothing good to say about it.

It's mismanaged, lost sight of the actual goal of education (to educate), and has become it's own insular empire.

Hmm, on an off-topic note (as if anyone cares), does anyone know of a site where I can find standardised tests that would be taken by students in the US when leaving high school? I'd be interested in comparing them to our own.

You're looking for SAT or ACT tests.

http://www.collegeboard.com/student/tes ... /test.html
http://www.actstudent.org/sampletest/index.html

I make no promises about either site.

Ah, a "classic" Republican. No problems there. There was once a time when the Republican party was pretty damn good. Now it's practicaly the Redneck and Fundamentalist party. A pity.
From what I can see, the Reps seem to have morphed into a pure opposition party. That is to say, their entire existance and plan of action is simply to single-mindedly oppose everything the Dems do or suggest and make themselves as big a problem as possible to a Dem-run USA, regardless of the consequences on the country itself.

Which is how I see it, and I have no interest in an opposition party. We should be about our ideas, not about how awful those democrats are.

[Sionnach Glic]

Personally I think our two party system is causing a lot of problems. While there's always an adversarial relationship, and there should be, we've gotten to the point where their only concern is beating each other. That's counterproductive. There are also so many issues now that many people find that their views don't actually mesh with either party. It really has become the lesser of two evils and your choices in your government should never be about who is the least objectionable.

Aye, which is why I've never liked the US political system.

It's mismanaged, lost sight of the actual goal of education (to educate), and has become it's own insular empire.

Ouch. This is that whole No Child Left Behind thing, right?

You're looking for SAT or ACT tests.

http://www.collegeboard.com/student/tes ... /test.html
http://www.actstudent.org/sampletest/index.html

I make no promises about either site.

Okay, just to clarify, this is the sort of tests students would be doing as they leave high school, yes? As in, people of around 18 years of age?

If so, then ,no offense meant, but that's ridiculous. I browsed those two sites and the questions (multiple choice answers!!!) are insanely easy. If this is the sort of stuff kids know after so long in school then your system needs a serious overhaul in terms of what's thought.

I mean, this is the sort of maths that students would be expected to know at the age of 18, yes? Because even I can do that stuff, and I utterly suck at the subject. Compared to what students over here are expected to know in the subject (paper 1, paper 2) that's just crazy.

Which is how I see it, and I have no interest in an opposition party. We should be about our ideas, not about how awful those democrats are.

Agreed completely.

[Tyyr]

Ouch. This is that whole No Child Left Behind thing, right?

No, though it doesn't help. The school system has been mismanaged for a long, long time. To give you an example if you divide the eductation budget of Florida by the number of students there averages about $9,000 dollars per student. That means in your average class of 30 students there is over a quarter million dollars in the budget and yet somehow they can't keep text books up to date, computers in the classrooms, and build actual buidlings instead of clusters of portables.

The schools used to be about education but sometime in the late 70's or 80's it started to become about social programming. Rather than just teach they started to worry about making well rounded, politically acceptable students. This is most obvious on the college level where at one time free thinking was encouraged but today no viewpoint will be accepted except that with the teacher's espouse.

As for it being an Empire unto it's own, the Teacher's Union. It's become a massive political bloc with delusions of grandeur.

Okay, just to clarify, this is the sort of tests students would be doing as they leave high school, yes? As in, people of around 18 years of age?

Not a requirement to graduate, it's the kind of thing you'd take as a pre-req for college.

If so, then ,no offense meant, but that's ridiculous. I browsed those two sites and the questions (multiple choice answers!!!) are insanely easy. If this is the sort of stuff kids know after so long in school then your system needs a serious overhaul in terms of what's thought.

I mean, this is the sort of maths that students would be expected to know at the age of 18, yes? Because even I can do that stuff, and I utterly suck at the subject. Compared to what students over here are expected to know in the subject (paper 1, paper 2) that's just crazy.

I don't dispute that it's a joke. I got a 1360 out of 1600 on the test and never studied a day in my life for it. Hell I was barely awake for it. 1000 is average. I probably could have pushed my score up into the 1500 range if I'd bothered to study. It's a total joke.

Agreed completely.

I'm one of those nuts who thinks that our ideas are good enough to stand on their own without fear mongering. We're just doing what the Democrats did in 2004 and managed to absolutely FAIL at the election. Bush hate wasn't a good enough platform for them to win in 2008 and Obama hate wasn't good enough in 2004. I doubt it'll be good enough in 2010 or 2012. While "CHANGE!" is a hollow promise devoid of any actual meaning it's at least hopeful compared to "He's a muslim who's gonna sell us out!"

[Sionnach Glic]

No, though it doesn't help. The school system has been mismanaged for a long, long time. To give you an example if you divide the eductation budget of Florida by the number of students there averages about $9,000 dollars per student. That means in your average class of 30 students there is over a quarter million dollars in the budget and yet somehow they can't keep text books up to date, computers in the classrooms, and build actual buidlings instead of clusters of portables.

Holy shit, $9,000 per student? Jesus, we could only dream of that sort of funding, yet my school has two computer rooms with about 20 (old, but functioning) computers each, three well stocked science labs (one for physics, biology and chemistry), a Home Economics lab, a woodwork room, a gym and various other rooms for different subject. Now, while most of our equipment is usualy fairly old, they all work just fine.
Guess that just proves that shoveling money into something doesn't necessarily make it work well.

The schools used to be about education but sometime in the late 70's or 80's it started to become about social programming. Rather than just teach they started to worry about making well rounded, politically acceptable students. This is most obvious on the college level where at one time free thinking was encouraged but today no viewpoint will be accepted except that with the teacher's espouse.

Weird.

As for it being an Empire unto it's own, the Teacher's Union. It's become a massive political bloc with delusions of grandeur.

We've our own union as well. Problem is that we're the opposite: no one ever fucking listens to us.

Not a requirement to graduate, it's the kind of thing you'd take as a pre-req for college.

Yeah, that's more or less what I was talking about. Over here, when you finish secondary school (high school), you do tests in at least 6 subjects. You get points depending on how well you did, and you use those points (and various other requirements) to get into college.

I don't dispute that it's a joke. I got a 1360 out of 1600 on the test and never studied a day in my life for it. Hell I was barely awake for it. 1000 is average. I probably could have pushed my score up into the 1500 range if I'd bothered to study. It's a total joke.

The fact that they give you the answers is something I still just can't get my head around. Over here you're expected to figure it out yourself, and you lose marks if you don't show all your various calculations. Could you check out the links I posted? Given your familiarity with maths (you're an engineer, right?) I'd be interested in seeing what you think of our maths papers.

I'm one of those nuts who thinks that our ideas are good enough to stand on their own without fear mongering. We're just doing what the Democrats did in 2004 and managed to absolutely FAIL at the election. Bush hate wasn't a good enough platform for them to win in 2008 and Obama hate wasn't good enough in 2004. I doubt it'll be good enough in 2010 or 2012. While "CHANGE!" is a hollow promise devoid of any actual meaning it's at least hopeful compared to "He's a muslim who's gonna sell us out!"

Again, agreed. Ideals should stand or fall on their own merit, not on which side was able to scare the voters most.

[Tsukiyumi]

...Again, agreed. Ideals should stand or fall on their own merit, not on which side was able to scare the voters most.

I'm going to run on a "zombie outbreak preparedness" platform, myself.

[Atekimogus]

Wow, it is really interesting to read this as a complete outsider. So one argument popping up against national health care is that it would be run by the government and that things run by the government in the US doesn't seem to work at all, for instance the public school system.

Assuming that the US wants healthy and educated people isn't it a poor argument to say X can't work because Y doesn't work too instead of saying, F*** we need X and get Y working properly you bastards?


As for the Republicans vs. Democrats discussion.

The thing I kept in memory from the Bush-father-son-area are two Iraq Wars.
The thing I remember about Clinton is Monika Lewinski and (gasp) that you had a positive national budget during his last year. (That is really impressive from a european point of view, that doesn't happen often here )

[Mikey]

It doesn't happen often here, either.

Anyway - the mystery school budgeting probelms that Tyyr alludes to are due to the absolutely insane amount of money spent by public school systems on things that should properly be the province of parents. School lunches are subsidized; there is free early-morning care/tutoring (based on the grade level of the child,) as well as after-care programs, to the extent that a kid can be in school care for a full 12 hours per day - totally free of charge to the parent. Plus, medical/optical/dental care is often provided to children of underinsured parents.

Now, add the fact that a school psyhciatrist isn't, apparently, sufficient to address the psychiatric needs of a student body. There is an action committee, a social worker, said psychiatrist, a reading specialist, a math specialist, and intervention teacher. Is a kid a special education student? Well, he might be in a self-contained class - with enough aides to give the class a 3:1 or 4:1 professional:student ratio. Or, he might be in an inclusion class, with a dedicated paraprofessional of his own - plus said intervention teachers. Plus, "specials" teachers even for primary education students - art, music, science, phys. ed., and computers. Of course, each school is expected to budget for a computer tech, to assist the classroom teachers set up their own computer-assisted lessons, because the computer teacher obviously wouldn't have any ability to do that.

Now, add the fact that everything involved in the scholastic experience - books (including self-directed reading!,) pens, pencils, paper, scissors, pencil sharpeners, rulers, math manipulatives, etc., etc. - is expected to be supplied by the school. I'm going to say that again - School supplies are provided by the school, not the parents. No, really.

Now, add the fact that teachers who contribute nothing - who actually detract from the school experience - are allowed to work as long as they want and make it to full retirement, because of the tenure system; you'd literally have to beat a child to get fired. In my wife's school, two adult teachers got into a fistfight in the lobby of the school, and the principal was prohibited from taking disciplinary action because of fear of union reprisal.

[Tyyr]

Holy s**t, $9,000 per student? Jesus, we could only dream of that sort of funding, yet my school has two computer rooms with about 20 (old, but functioning) computers each, three well stocked science labs (one for physics, biology and chemistry), a Home Economics lab, a woodwork room, a gym and various other rooms for different subject. Now, while most of our equipment is usualy fairly old, they all work just fine.
Guess that just proves that shoveling money into something doesn't necessarily make it work well.

Yes, $9k a student. Admittedly that's just Florida but I've checked a few other states and again, money isn't an issue many places. It's a horribly mismanaged, outdated, idiotic system. I laugh when people say we don't fund the schools enough, they're swimming in cash. The problem is that the beauracratic ineptitude of the upper levels swallows it up and we're left with teachers not getting paid a living wage to teach in classrooms that have wheels with books that are falling apart. Frankly the education system needs to be decapitated and reorganized like a business. Minimal overhead with the focus on providing the customers, the children, with the product they want, an education.

Weird.

I had the gall to tell my sociology professor (yeah, that's a useful class for an engineer) that men and women were vastly different and treating them identically is idiotic. I got a D.

We've our own union as well. Problem is that we're the opposite: no one ever f***ing listens to us.

I wish. The teacher's unions swing a lot of money to the candidate they back so no one really talks about reform.

The fact that they give you the answers is something I still just can't get my head around. Over here you're expected to figure it out yourself, and you lose marks if you don't show all your various calculations. Could you check out the links I posted? Given your familiarity with maths (you're an engineer, right?) I'd be interested in seeing what you think of our maths papers.

Yes, mechanical engineer. To be honest I think your tests are far more appropriate to what you should expect a highschool graduate to be able to handle. It's pretty basic stuff really. Given the length of time you're in school (which is ridiculous) simple pre-calculus should be easily doable for a high school grad.

The multiple choice thing, I think it's got to do with the number of SAT's that get taken. Grading them all by hand would be a huge undertaking, and people over here don't like that. They'd prefer an impartial machine do it rather than a human who might not like the way they did something.

Wow, it is really interesting to read this as a complete outsider. So one argument popping up against national health care is that it would be run by the government and that things run by the government in the US doesn't seem to work at all, for instance the public school system.

Assuming that the US wants healthy and educated people isn't it a poor argument to say X can't work because Y doesn't work too instead of saying, F*** we need X and get Y working properly you bastards?

No. In fact it makes sense not to give them more responsibility until they can prove they can handle what they've gotten so far.

For example. Lets say there's one mechanic in town, the problem is he's a total smacktard. Every time you take your car into him to "fix it" he fucks it up worse than when you got there. Now does it make sense to take your other car to him to "fix" when he's still fucking up your first but demanding that he get both right now? If a guy can't handle a BB gun you don't hand him a rifle and hope he magically gets his shit together before he kills someone.

The thing I kept in memory from the Bush-father-son-area are two Iraq Wars.
The thing I remember about Clinton is Monika Lewinski and (gasp) that you had a positive national budget during his last year. (That is really impressive from a european point of view, that doesn't happen often here )

Yeah well you drastically cut the military and surprise surprise, money just seems to be everywhere.

I'm going to run on a "zombie outbreak preparedness" platform, myself.

Sorry, I vote a strick Mossberg line on that platform.

[Tsukiyumi]

...School supplies are provided by the school, not the parents. No, really...

I think I remember some of it provided by my elementary school in California, and my grandparents covered it in middle school, but it sure wasn't in high school - which is why I came armed only with my trusty pencil.

[stitch626]

And then there are the schools that are ridiculously underfunded to the point where they can't afford to pay for any subs.
So the main problems with US ed is teaching to the test and mismanaged funding.

[Tyyr]

And then there are the schools that are ridiculously underfunded to the point where they can't afford to pay for any subs.
So the main problems with US ed is teaching to the test and mismanaged funding.

Are you sure they're actually underfunded? In many cases they're not, the money they get is frittered away by incompetents.

[Sionnach Glic]

Anyway - the mystery school budgeting probelms that Tyyr alludes to are due to the absolutely insane amount of money spent by public school systems on things that should properly be the province of parents. School lunches are subsidized; there is free early-morning care/tutoring (based on the grade level of the child,) as well as after-care programs, to the extent that a kid can be in school care for a full 12 hours per day - totally free of charge to the parent. Plus, medical/optical/dental care is often provided to children of underinsured parents.

That's just insane. Over here, schools do none of that. You want to eat? Bring your own lunch, go home, or bring money to spend either in the school caffeteria or any of the nearby shops (I swear, the only thing keeping the local Texaco petrol station going is the income from our students looking for food). You want someone to look after your kids beyond school hours? Take them to a creche. You want extra tutoring? Pay a teacher to give grind lessons. Etc.
We get various medical stuff done in the schools (a month or so ago there was a country-wide vaccination of all 2nd level students that took place in the schools, and I remember an eye-test being done a few years ago as well), but that was paid for by the health system and not the schools. It just took place there because it was a convenient location for the students.

Now, add the fact that a school psyhciatrist isn't, apparently, sufficient to address the psychiatric needs of a student body.

Our schools don't even have a psychiatrist. Though the one I'm at has a very friendly priest (we're owned by a religious order) that fills in as a general "guy you can talk to" role. And as far as I'm concerned, we've never needed one.

There is an action committee, a social worker, said psychiatrist, a reading specialist, a math specialist, and intervention teacher.

We've none of those, again. Hell, I don't even know what the hell half of those are. I've never even heard of an action committe or an intervention teacher.

I presume reading and maths specialists are to help students that are terrible at maths or reading? While we've none for reading (we take the view that if you can't read then you shouldn't be wasting our time, so just go back to primary school until you can), we do have a Foundation Level maths course, which is basicaly "maths for dummies". Though looking at their course it doesn't actualy seem all that different from the US maths exams, which I must say is pretty damning.

Is a kid a special education student? Well, he might be in a self-contained class - with enough aides to give the class a 3:1 or 4:1 professional:student ratio. Or, he might be in an inclusion class, with a dedicated paraprofessional of his own - plus said intervention teachers.

If a kid has special needs then they're not admitted to a standard school over here. They're sent to a school purely for special needs kids. The only student I've ever seen that was even close to a special needs student was a guy who'd lost his right arm in some sort of accident, and so needed a scribe.

Plus, "specials" teachers even for primary education students - art, music, science, phys. ed., and computers.

In primary education over here (which I'm presuming is from 5-12 years of age, yes?) all that's thought by the same teacher. The only exemptions are music (which is often a voluntary course that takes place after school hours) and drama classes (I fondly remember my old drama teacher, who always seemed high as a fucking kite every single day).

Of course, each school is expected to budget for a computer tech, to assist the classroom teachers set up their own computer-assisted lessons, because the computer teacher obviously wouldn't have any ability to do that.

We've one teacher, the Computer Studies teacher, who deals with anything computer related, including the instalation of any new computer equipment and maintanence of the system. He also doubles as the school's career guidance teacher, one of the three SPHE teachers, and one of the two Psychology teachers.

That's another feature of education over here. Teachers will often teach more than one subject (hell, I'm a good example of that). Of the three Irish teachers, for example, one also teaches history, the other teaches physics and maths, and the other teaches music and art. This also means that despite having (presumably, given what you've described) a small staff relative to US schools of a similar size, we often have three of four teachers per subject, easily allowing us to fill in for any absences or illnesses without spending money on substitutes by simply switching teachers who may be unoccupied at that time to fill in for the absent teacher.

Now, add the fact that everything involved in the scholastic experience - books (including self-directed reading!,) pens, pencils, paper, scissors, pencil sharpeners, rulers, math manipulatives, etc., etc. - is expected to be supplied by the school. I'm going to say that again - School supplies are provided by the school, not the parents. No, really.

Seriously? That's just insane. You want stationary? There's a perfectly good petrol station down the road that sells that stuff. Books? Buy them at a shop. Or if you can't afford new ones, get them second hand in the annual student book sales where older students sell the books they no longer need pretty cheaply.
Hell, even at exams you're expected to bring all your own stuff with you. The only exception is log tables, which are handed out to prevent people smuggling notes into the exam hall in theirs.

Now, add the fact that teachers who contribute nothing - who actually detract from the school experience - are allowed to work as long as they want and make it to full retirement, because of the tenure system; you'd literally have to beat a child to get fired. In my wife's school, two adult teachers got into a fistfight in the lobby of the school, and the principal was prohibited from taking disciplinary action because of fear of union reprisal.

That's a pretty serious problem. A bad teacher can seriously fuck up a kid's chances of getting through a subject. What sort of restrictions do you have on teachers over there? What sort of classes and courses do you need to pass? Over here you've got to get through a shitload of training to be a teacher, most of which focuses on dealing with students and conflicts in the class (which can be pretty damn amusing at times. Imagine two middle-aged guys pretending to start a fistfight over a stolen Walkman). Of course, we do get sub-standard teachers getting in over here as well. Most of them quickly end up getting kicked out after the annual teacher inspection, but some of them continue to slip through.

Yes, $9k a student. Admittedly that's just Florida but I've checked a few other states and again, money isn't an issue many places. It's a horribly mismanaged, outdated, idiotic system. I laugh when people say we don't fund the schools enough, they're swimming in cash. The problem is that the beauracratic ineptitude of the upper levels swallows it up and we're left with teachers not getting paid a living wage to teach in classrooms that have wheels with books that are falling apart. Frankly the education system needs to be decapitated and reorganized like a business. Minimal overhead with the focus on providing the customers, the children, with the product they want, an education.

Agreed completely. I hadn't a clue just how bad the education system was in the US until now. Sure, I'd heard a lot of complaints about it from US residents, and a few colleagues of mine seem to take particular pleasure in deriding it at any oppertunity (which I mostly ignored, given that this badmouthing started in ~2004, when anti-Americanism was cool). But I'd never actualy realised just how utterly fucking insanely the thing is run. Why the fuck doesn't anyone do something about it?

I had the gall to tell my sociology professor (yeah, that's a useful class for an engineer) that men and women were vastly different and treating them identically is idiotic. I got a D.

Fucking hell. Dissent should be encouraged. How else are students going to learn to be critical of things, and think for themselves?
I mean, my biology class annualy ends up in a debate on evolution once we swing around to that section of the course, which is generaly started by the three or four religious students in the class bringing up the ideas of alternate explainations. Although it annoys the hell out of me I'm glad they bring it up, as even if they go away with their minds unchanged on the subject they and other students in the class will at least have been made to think criticaly about the subject and will have learned the basics of how to debate and scrutinise a topic.

I wish. The teacher's unions swing a lot of money to the candidate they back so no one really talks about reform.

In the grand scheme of things I suppose being ignored is mostly for the better. Sure, teachers over here sometimes have to put up with the government screwing them over, but at least the kids seem to turn out alright. Which is the important thing.

Yes, mechanical engineer. To be honest I think your tests are far more appropriate to what you should expect a highschool graduate to be able to handle. It's pretty basic stuff really. Given the length of time you're in school (which is ridiculous) simple pre-calculus should be easily doable for a high school grad

Okay, cool.

The multiple choice thing, I think it's got to do with the number of SAT's that get taken. Grading them all by hand would be a huge undertaking, and people over here don't like that. They'd prefer an impartial machine do it rather than a human who might not like the way they did something.

Hmm. But what about subjects that don't have a set, right or wrong answer? Like writing an essay for English, or how good your Spannish is in a letter you're supposed to write? Not everything has a black/white right/wrong answer.

Over here, examiners paid by the state correct the exams. There are, of course, set marking schemes (which are all publicaly available for free) which they have to follow. But a fair bit of it is down to the examiner himself, who'll give you a certain amount of marks for each question depending on how well he thinks you did. When the results are published, you can go and see how your test was marked. If you think your examiner was a jackass, you can have it recorected by a completely different examiner.

Yeah well you drastically cut the military and surprise surprise, money just seems to be everywhere.

Clinton has an excellent reputation in Europe, for reasons mostly unknown. He's popular in Ireland due to his help in getting the guys up North to stop killing each other, but I've no idea why everyone else likes him. It's probably his personality. Say what you will about his policies, that guy knew how to get a crowd on his side.

[Atekimogus]

No. In fact it makes sense not to give them more responsibility until they can prove they can handle what they've gotten so far.

For example. Lets say there's one mechanic in town, the problem is he's a total smacktard. Every time you take your car into him to "fix it" he fucks it up worse than when you got there. Now does it make sense to take your other car to him to "fix" when he's still f***ing up your first but demanding that he get both right now? If a guy can't handle a BB gun you don't hand him a rifle and hope he magically gets his s**t together before he kills someone.

I understand your example but I think you are oversimplifiying things a bit here. Also what is missing in your example would be the fact that this mechanic is also dutybound to - or at least try - repair the cars of people who would normally not be able to avord a mechanic. So you may very well replace this mechanic with a private, more competent and more efficient one but at the end of the day - let's just say 62,1% - of the townsfolk goes bankrupt because their car broke down.

If you are looking for a perfect solution there isn't probably one but there clearly is a middle-way.

Clinton has an excellent reputation in Europe, for reasons mostly unknown. He's popular in Ireland due to his help in getting the guys up North to stop killing each other, but I've no idea why everyone else likes him. It's probably his personality. Say what you will about his policies, that guy knew how to get a crowd on his side.

Because we europeans all got a god laugh out of the lewinski affair . No seriously most of us really didn't understand the fuss you were making.