A recent report from the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development cuts through the right-wing rhetoric boiling the U.S. healthcare debate and destroys the notion that Canadian healthcare is inferior to that found in the U.S.

Our costs are lower - 47% lower - and our outcomes are equal or better. We live two or three years longer than our U.S. neighbours. Contained costs and as good or better outcomes - these are indicators the U.S. should be looking at, not the propaganda being flouted shamelessly by healthcare reform detractors. From Bloomberg: Canadian Health Care, Even With Queues, Bests U.S.

"The real difference has been [Canada's] ability to control technology costs," said Anderson, who directed reviews of health systems for the World Bank and developed U.S. Medicare payment guidelines for the Health and Human Services Department. "The only thing the U.S. is consistently No. 1 in when it comes to international comparisons with Canada and other OECD countries is cost."

Maybe HarpEr Hard At Work (HEHAW) will become a regular feature here.

Today's HEHAW installment, quoting The Globe and Mail:

They asked for help and got body bags.

Aboriginal leaders said they were outraged and confused by deliveries of dozens of body bags to remote Manitoba reserves, as native communities demanded federal resources to fight a second wave of the H1N1 outbreak. (Globe and Mail, Wednesday Sept. 16 2009) More >

Related update:

Swine flu hits Ahousat First Nation on Vancouver Island

The expected "second wave" of H1N1 flu has hit on the west coast of Vancouver Island, according to the Canadian Medical Association Journal. (The Tyee, Thursday Sept. 17 2009) More >

This post was borne out of a comment I made in response to a revelation noted by Warren Kinsella -- a secret sole-sourced (not put out to open tender), contract, issued by the Prime Minister's Office to a U.S. political operative.

One 24K sole sourced contract is almost interesting, but what we really ought to be hammering the PMO and government about is where the millions of other dollars being spent, and hidden, are going. Accountability is an issue which transcends parties and individual governments.

Every party talks about running (I'll put the words in quotes because someone surely has said this) "the most open, transparent, and accountable government the country has ever had" yet every party in my waking life has failed to deliver on this promise.

To the Liberal's I issue a challenge: if your guy and your party were really serious about reforming Canada's governance in a positive way, ultimately even the most jaded Canadian apathetic voter might perk up and notice.

Is it too alarmist to claim that Canada's democracy is on life support? Not in my opinion. Our representatives are often no better than puppets. Rather than representing regions and their constituents, our parliamentarians at all levels of government more often than not are whipped to adhere to the party line and that is decided by a few, mostly unelected people, in the Prime Minister's Office. Parliament is side-stepped at every turn. First among equals is a concept many prime ministers, notably our current one, have trouble identifying with.

The weakening of parliament in favour of increased power in the PMO - to the point where today the U.S. system is actually more democratic than ours - is as a result of intentional design by both Conservative and Liberal government leaders dating back almost four decades.

Manning's "Reform" movement recognised some of this, to their credit; but despite being one of the architects of the Reform Party, Harper wasn't so much interested in democratic reforms, only in power that would allow him to "re-form" (quite a different notion) Canada in his own vision.

I want to see a truly open government. We have the technology available to us now that can easily permit all to see spending done by almost every department in near real-time. Open all the doors and windows, pull back all the curtains. Lets see not only who is lobbying who, in real time, but what they are talking about. Lets have more citizen involvement than a token election every year or every four years.

Years ago amid great fanfare Gordon Campbell made a promise to make B.C. the best educated and most literate jurisdiction in the world.

His grade? Whether one assigns an "F" for fail, or "Did Not Complete", the result is the same.

The recently minted education minister gets to wear the problem but won't have the clout to do anything about it.

B.C. schools face cuts to libraries, lunch programs (Globe and Mail, Wednesday Sept. 9, 2009) Maintenance, extracurriculars had to be cut to protect core funding, Education Minister says -- Ms. MacDiarmid said this is an "unusual year" and suggested money will be found if emergency repairs are needed. "The ministry is not suggesting that maintenance never be done again," she said. "If student safety could be in jeopardy, clearly we will work with the school districts."

I wonder if Ms. MacDiarmid, a medical doctor, believes that seismically unsafe schools - more than 300 in the province, almost 100 in Vancouver alone, some at high risk of collapse in a major earthquake - puts "student safety" in "jeopardy"?

Heard this morning: Harper/CPC spin that we "can't be having an election every year just because the Liberals want one".

Uh, no, it was Harper who called the last one, because he wanted to get one last election in before the economic poop hit the fan.

Of course some of us more alert types had already warned that Canada was rapidly sinking deeper in debt with Harper and Flaherty at the helm, even if the Finance Ministry games with words were still hiding it during campaign 08, only to own up to the badness a few short weeks after the polls closed.

Incidentally the BC "conservatives", Premier Gordon Campbell's mis-named "BC Liberals", pulled the same fast one this year too. You can see the movie playing in your head - finance officials chasing Campbell and Finance minister Colin Hansen down the halls of the BC Legislature, with Campbell and Hansen running away with their hands covering their ears "we can't hear you! Talk to us after the election!"

Like Harper and Flaherty in fall '08, Campbell and Hansen lied in spring '09. BC revenue was tanking long before spring 08 and oil and gas revenues could easily be forecast, before the spring election, to continue to remain low for many months if not a year or two. Both should be recalled for gross incompetence / wilful negligence in the discharge of their duties, or for outright lying to the public.

Maybe the average Jill and Joe don't pay attention to the minutia of BC and Federal finance reports like political junkies like me, but I'm sure most Canadians have the good sense to sense they've been lied to.

Why not change the game and promise, and actually deliver on the promise, to do government better?

I'm tired of being lied to (in the quest for seat count) and I'm tired of politicians and political ops banking on being able to spin and slide things past the everyday attention span of Canadians.

There is very little "democratic" (in the purest sense of the word, by, of, and for the people) in our current political tapestry and public discourse. A huge injection of openness and transparency and an elevated level of public discussion is needed.