I am ashamed of my generation for allowing it to get this bad. When we were young, we were a powerhouse that effected real change. Then we got middle aged and lazy and complacent and just fucking stupid. Maybe, in our golden years, we can do some good again. Like take over AARP and make them REALLY represent old people.
I really do honestly, maybe it sounds pretentious or rude (isn't meant that way) but its nice to hear responsibility for what has happened in the US. My parents are late 50s and diehard republicans (I am 28) and I look at the world they helped create politically. We are $10 trillion in debt (much of the debt is due to Bush, Bush II and Reagan), we don't have universal healthcare, half the country struggles to make ends meet, the world has lost respect for us, the rich are richer than ever, the tax system is barely progressive anymore, the middle class hasn't gotten a raise in 30 years, we are in debt to China. I've asked them about the world they are leaving for their grandchildren, aka my brother's kids (the national debt or the lack of policies that make life easier on the middle class for example) and they either don't know or don't care about any of it. Of course there were alot of liberal or moderate people in the last 30 years, but alot of the damage that has happened to america can be traced back to the 1970s onward, which was the time the religious right went into grassroots overdrive in an effort to overturn Roe v. Wade and the rich realized they could use the religious right as unpaid foot soldiers to overturn the new deal, business regulation and progresive taxation. And everyone fell asleep at the wheel while the rich and the religious right were working together to hollow out America. As a result in the last 30 years the rich have had their incomes go up 300-700% and their tax rates cut in half while the rest of us struggle for basics and we all fell asleep at the wheel.
I'm not trying to be rude or anything, its just good to hear someone admit that things have gone wrong and hopefully the young (who are very progressive) can work alongside those in their 50s and 60s to reverse alot of this damage. I look forward to spending the next 10-20 years working in grassroots abilities, donating money and registering voters to overturn the damage.
As for your friend, I would seriously look into medical tourism. It can be India, Singapore, Thailand, Mexico, Malaysia, etc. In fact the quality of Indian healthcare can be superior to US healthcare because the insurance company isn't trying to push you out the door so fast and nursing care is supposedly better. The Indian hospitals that cater to westerners are designed to be top notch. If they were shoddy or dangerous, then word of mouth would have them shut down. My understanding is alot of the doctors there were trained in the West, but wanted to move back for nostalgia or to provide healthcare in their home country and work to treat westerners to help raise money to help the poor in their home countries.