Why Are We Hearing So Much about Those Damn Danes?

[marmar]

Why Are We Hearing So Much about Those Damn Danes?
Bernie Sanders’ presidential bid is putting Denmark on the map.

By Josh Hoxie


If you ask Bernie Sanders about his version of socialism, you’ll probably hear a lot about the small Scandinavian country perhaps best known for inventing Legos.

Anderson Cooper experienced this firsthand when he asked about the Vermont senator’s embrace of democratic socialism during the first Democratic presidential debate. That prompted the full Sanders rap on the wonders of Denmark, including the Nordic country’s strong safety net and egalitarian ethic.

As a longtime fan of all things Danish, from their bike lanes to their Viking hats, I’m excited to see this northern nation enter the spotlight here at home.

While studying abroad in Denmark as a college student, I compared its universal health care system to our own — and found Denmark’s far superior.

This was in 2009, a time when this was anything but an academic exercise.

Back home, Congress and the Obama administration were brushing the so-called “public option,” which would have given all Americans a chance to steer clear of private insurers, off the table. Progressives were outraged when they realized that the Affordable Care Act wouldn’t bring on anything remotely like Denmark’s single-payer health care system. ..............(more)

http://otherwords.org/why-are-we-hearing-so-much-about-those-damn-danes/