Obama and universal healthcare as symbolic struggle
example ·
retold in 6 talks
Universal healthcare, which exists unremarkably in Canada, was the specific 'point of impossibility' for American ideology, even a modest version brought Obama to the Supreme Court and provoked accusations of communism from Chuck Norris.
≤2000talks it is told in, per year2026
As told 5
“the point of impossibility for united states... was obviously universal healthcare... he was brought to supreme court and so on. it was traumatic.”
“He stirred up an incredibly crucial debate, which rendered visible the limits of American notion of freedom.”
“Healthcare, universal healthcare. I know that the result is a total compromise. But can you just imagine what kind of a traumatic sore point this was for the American establishment.”
What it carries
one story, many jobs: the ideas this anecdote is deployed to argue, one tally mark per use (an idea page shows the same relation from the other end, as its shelf of stories)
contents · one story, 1 jobsuses
point of impossibility
×2
Its cast and sources
populated by
Chuck Norris2Stathis Kouvélakis1Karl-Heinz Dellwo1Kyle MacLachlan1Jean-Paul Badiou / Badiou reading of Genet1Christine Lagarde1Robert Solomon1Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri1
alongside works
Every retelling 5
Universal healthcare, which exists unremarkably in Canada, was the specific 'point of impossibility' for American ideology, even a modest version brought Obama to the Supreme Court and provoked accusations of communism from Chuck Norris., illustrating point of impossibility,ideology of healthcare
Obama's universal health care, though a total compromise in practice, triggered a crucial debate that rendered visible the limits of American freedom, the Republican readiness to shut down the state showed the true stakes of the argument., illustrating catalyst for change,American politics,small demand triggering avalanche
Žižek holds up Obama's Affordable Care Act as a model of effective left politics: a realistic, concrete demand that nonetheless strikes at the ideological foundation of American freedom-of-choice ideology., illustrating strategic political intervention,particular demands with systemic consequences
What in Western Europe would be an unremarkable policy was enough to have Obama called a communist in the US by Chuck Norris and others, a modest demand that reveals the radical limit of American capitalism., illustrating small demands triggering structural contradiction,TINA / ideological limits
Obama's healthcare campaign was modest by international standards but touched the impossible point of American ideological space, provoking denunciations of communism, proof that system-threatening demands need not be radical., illustrating point of impossibility,ideology,liberalism