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The leader of Canada’s New Democrat Party, Jack Layton, linked the future of his country’s universal health care system to President Obama’s proposed health reforms in a Washington speech Wednesday.

Many conservative groups have pointed to Canada’s health care system as a reason to keep the American system in the private sector.

Americans for Prosperity, for example, launched an ad campaign last week featuring a Canadian woman named Shona Holmes who was diagnosed with brain cancer and says in the ad the only way she survived was by seeking treatment in the United States.

Mr. Layton accused groups like this of “sowing the seeds of fear with myths and lies about Canadian health care” and said the futures of the two health care programs are dependent on each other in an address delivered at the Woodrow Wilson Center.

“There is no doubt that strengthening of our system in Canada will be easier with public health care in the United States,” Mr. Layton said. “Just as Canada built a strong public health system through a united effort, and just as America must do the same, so too can we strengthen and reinforce the health of all of our citizens through partnership.”

When reached for comment Ms. Holmes quipped, “The only partnership we have is a place for desperate Canadians to run.”

Mr. Layton’s trip comes at the beginning of an aggressive effort to ramp up grassroots support for Mr. Obama’s health care plan by Organizing for America. While in Washington, Mr. Layton met with Democrats on Capitol Hill as well as White House Communications Director Anita Dunn.

Huffington honored

Liberal media maven and Huffington Post founder Arianna Huffington has been selected for the Fred Dressier Lifetime Achievement Award from the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications at Syracuse University.

“Arianna Huffington was ahead of the curve with HuffPo,” says Newhouse Dean Lorraine Branham. “She embraced the use of new media, but never forgot that no matter where or how you tell the story, content is still king. This is what we teach our students.”

Ms. Huffington’s Web site is frequently targeted by conservative commentators for its liberal slant. Media Research Center President Brent Bozell also criticized the award as premature.

“The Huffington Post has been a successful Web site for three years. That does not a lifetime of journalism make. If they want to recognize the success of the Huffington Post as a Web site that’s good - the Huffington Post is a successful Web site. That’s it. There’s no lifetime achievement. You might as well say that if you walk for three years you’ve got a lifetime achievement in track.”

Ms. Huffington has also come under fire from other outlets for underpaying her writers and lifting content without permission from the Chicago Reader, among other things.

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