“We cannot mistake absolutism for principle, or substitute spectacle for politics, or treat name-calling as reasoned debate “.   President Barack Obama.

Were  Epicurus alive today he would applaud Obama’s words.  Intransigence masquerading as principle is directly contradictory to everything Epicureanism stands for.

On the other hand,  with a hugely growing number of elderly people the cost of the American welfare state does have to be trimmed and made more efficient if it is to survive.  The amount Medicare recipients pay should be means-tested (I speak as a beneficiary).  The system should focus on outcome, not fee-for-service, quality, not quantity.  And there should be a disincentive for doctors and hospitals to use an array of expensive procedures unnecessarily (scanners being the most over-used).  Surely, some sort of compromise can be achieved on the entitlements that does not gut them.

The level of spite and fury among opponents of the welfare state has to be reduced for the sake of peace mind.  But not at the expense of some of the most civilised aspects of modern life – universal health and security in old age.