I hear a lot that people say the US Democratic Party would be right wing in Europe. But I see a lot of Europeans online say that their (left) parties are corrupt and right wing. What am I missing?
I hear a lot that people say the US Democratic Party would be right wing in Europe. But I see a lot of Europeans online say that their (left) parties are corrupt and right wing. What am I missing?
No healthcare is free. It is paid. Whether through taxes or mandatory insurance schemes. The money doesn’t grow on trees.
It is a US BS narrative that ‘socialized healthcare’ is lefty silliness. And while there are conservatives in Europe who float the idea of abandoning government-organized healthcare every once in a while, every time they do they are met with a lot of frantic finger-pointing across the Atlantic. Everybody else sees a societal value in taking care of each other without any, or at least many, preconditions, like employment.
Europe is not one homogenous political body. Much like the US on the state level isn’t. The only difference is that the US shares a party structure on both state and federal levels. But there are just two relevant parties, twice as many as in North Korea! The party spectrum has always been broader in European democracies. As a result, the European Parliament often creates strange bedfellows.
There are marked differences between European countries and what they consider left and right. You’re looking at a lot of separate and shifting Overton windows. The suggested social cuts of the center-left Labour UK government would probably cause another revolution in France. The right-wingers of France are pro-Russia. The right-wingers of Poland absolutely aren’t. The list goes on.