29th on Infant Mortality

I wish I knew the name of the jackass who wrote this article. These editorials are the type of crap I argue against.

Read the editorial. The author says that we should hold off on being too proud of ourselves regarding shaving 15/100ths of a point from our Infant Mortality Rate. Who does this person compare the United States against? Let's take a look at our competition:

Poland. Slovakia. Scandinavia, which means Norway and Sweden. East Asia, which probably means South Korea and Japan, in this case.

Yeah, you know, the last time I checked Poland had 300 million people and was the third-ranked country in terms of population and area. Wait, so was Slovakia. And Norway. And Sweden. In fact, all of the regions mentioned have so much in common with the United States that I wouldn't know where to draw the line between where one country begins and the other ends ... voice dripping with sarcasm

We cannot go around comparing the United States to Norway. Or Sweden. Or Japan. Or Poland. They are not us; we are not them.

We have 300 million people. We are the third largest country on the planet, in terms of population and area. We have a population that is as culturally diverse as any place on the planet.

If we look at our states as real 'states' and by that I mean as countries, then let's start making comparisons. Compare Maryland to Norway. Compare Maine to Sweden. Compare New York to Poland. Now, we can compare apples to apples.

For the most part, our country, the United States, does very well in terms of IMR. We do need to examine what is going on in three states. Mississippi, Alabama, Louisiana, the District of Columbia, and Tennessee. Those four states, and our national capitol, are holding us back.

But, to say the United States is the same as Poland or Slovakia is asinine and ridiculous, and speaks more of the ignorance of the author than any real, lurking social disease.