Canadians are passionate about their health care system. It is part of our national identity and the third rail in Canadian politics.  When our national broadcaster, the CBC, held a contest to choose The Greatest Canadian ever, the winner amongst thousands of entries was Tommy Douglas, a former political leader and Depression-era preacher who is considered the father of our modern medicare system.

Americans, as we are quickly learning, are just as passionate. But what’s puzzling to us is why half of the population would not want to extend health care coverage to all Americans?

The title of this blog is a play on the title of a 1964 essay (and later book) in Harper’s Magazine called, "The Paranoid Style in American Politics." In it, historian Richard Hofstadter writes about a long-standing current of suspicion and discontent in American politics, especially among the extreme right who may feel threatened at a moral level or feel a threat to order and stability. And again, opponents of “ObamaCare” may be tapping in to this sentiment.

On this side of the border, we’re seeing commercials aimed at scaring Americans away from “Canadian socialized medicine,” such as the commercial featuring Shona Holmes, a woman from Waterdown, Ontario who sought medical treatment in the U.S, instead of waiting months to see a specialist for her brain tumour.

We’re seeing town halls — and we commend Americans for opening up this important issue to as many voices and opinions as possible — where meetings devolve into shouting matches and terms like Nazi are being thrown around.

But if you want to know how Canadian health care works, I urge you to watch our show. It’s not a perfect health care system — far from it and you’ll hear what works and what doesn’t from a great group of experts tonight. You’ll also hear many myths dispelled — about both our systems. The Canadian and American healthcare systems are probably more alike than most people realize.

Doctors for Canadian Medicare is an advocacy group which posted this video to youtube.com in hopes of dispelling such myths.

Tonight’s show is not only for our large Ontario audience but also for our viewers and viewsers across Canada and in the States. We often hear from our viewers in Michigan, Ohio and New York. I urge you to send the link for our show when it goes up tomorrow afternoon, to family and friends. The show can be streamed online or downloaded as a podcast.  If your health care system in the U.S. is about to undergo considerable reform, you should understand what lies ahead.

I would love to hear your thoughts. You can also follow me on Twitter!