Why Are People Mean?

Meanness is abundant.

It lives in the car at the intersection, the checkout line at the grocery, the cop on the beat.
It lives under burkhas and in churches, in alleyways and mansions.

But meanness is a peculiarly human institution. Dogs are not mean, unless they are mistreated by humans. The animal world is not unkind to itself. They do not take potshots at other individuals just for fun. They don't have egos. They don't hold grudges. They don't kill for sport.

Fidel Lopez endured unbearable cruelty at the hands of his attackers at the flashpoint at Florence and Normandy during the LA Riots of 1992. He has lived a subdued life, without bitterness; but his life was irrevocably altered, from promising, to difficult. He has suffered the after-affects and his family have born the years of desperation and recuperation that resulted from their losses.

Rev. Bennie Newton, saved his life. Holding a Bible aloft, he warned rioters: "Kill him, and you have to kill me too."

Another story that caught my attention today, the same day, was a brief about a woman who was starved, beaten and tortured in Afghanistan AT THE AGE OF 15 - so that her in-laws could force their new daughter-in-law into prostitution. The girl had her nails pulled out, among other things, before she was finally rescued.

Afghan child bride Sahar Gul, 15; mutilated for refusing prostitution and rescued from a toilet-prison.

And lastly, there is the story about Junior Seau, a man who is close to my heart because at one time, my deceased husband helped finance his football scholarship at USC... Seau is remembered as kind, generous and warm-hearted to a fault. What happened to him?

Cruelty exists and is tolerated, even encouraged by governments.

For the last seven months, at the end of each day, and first thing in the morning, I pray to be kind today. It is the hardest thing I have ever done, and the best.

May we all be kind to one another today.

Thoughts On Taxes, Health Care and the Politics of Dependence

First, the Presidential Election.
How in the world can there be a virtual tie in this race?
The country is in the can. No one is hiring. People are becoming wards of the state, claiming unemployment insurance, disability, food stamps, section 8 housing - in droves. Our national debt exceeds our current GDP! How can that happen? Welfare spending is up 41% under Obama!
Where is America? Who are we? Are we dependents for life? Are we a people who give up hope and turn in our independence for a shekel? When did that happen?
How do we get past this and create jobs? Do we continue to expand the government? Is the government the only acceptable employer anymore? I think that is BS!

The president gave a speech yesterday in which he said congress should only extend the Bush-era tax cuts to those who earned under $250,000. Excuse me, but aren't those so-called "wealthy" the people who will hire Americans and put them back to work? We need to lower taxes, provide incentives for hiring and free up businesses from all this tax and regulation so we can get people back to work!
Lose the taxes, baby!
Give incentives!
Freedom from all these burdens would ease businesses back into business!
What is wrong with this picture? If I could afford more gas, I would drive more, but taxes are too high.
And if employers are penalized for hiring - ie, have to pay taxes and fees; if they are penalized for being successful in business and therefore earning more, and forced to pay higher taxes; if employees cost more to hire, ie. healthcare and payroll taxes, regulations and entitlements, liability and other compliance issues - why would anyone who is in business to make money hire?
And let me add this:
There is no reason to hire someone who is over 45. Why should they? That person will cost between two and three times more in health care benefits. Their experience is usually not that valuable when compared to the benefit of hiring a young whipper-snapper with social media skills and techno-savvy, au-courent with trending culture - who can do the job, albeit from another perspective that is perhaps, more aligned with the modern young consumer.

Health Care:
How many times have I heard someone tell me they are going for their colonoscopy at the end of the year because they have met their deductible and it is "paid for"?
The price of healthcare goes up when people don't look at the bill and have to pay it themselves out of their own pockets. With medical insurance, a third party pays for it. If it came out of your own pocket, you would be looking for a better deal. You would be searching for quality, cost, service. 
Now - we are all screwed. There is no incentive to provide any of those things. 
What is more, doctors who will have to contract with the self-limiting insurance companies, and deal with non-physician bean-counters who will determine treatment based on cost - will be leaving the business in droves, reported the Doctor Patient Medical Association.

"Nine out of 10 doctors say medicine is on the worng track, most think about quitting and find it hard to practice ethical medicine. They say government's to blame for the mess, but are quick to add neither Congress nor the President - can be trusted to fix things."

These physicians are thinking of quitting. ONLY 5% are happy about Obamacare. 

"The survey includes 699 doctors, 23% Primary Care Providers, 10% General Surgery, 11% Hospital-based specialists and 56% Office-based specialists in active practice across 45 states."

This is real.

What throws me through a loop is this: when did "health care" become synonymous with "health insurance?"

Health insurance is a product that was designed to pool resources against the possibility of a health care crisis. 

It is not meant to be a pool of money out of which consumers and physicians select the benefits they will take advantage of.

In the former case, health care is determined by the doctor in accordance with the needs of the patient.

In the latter, health care is determined by the services that are covered under a specific health care policy. If what you need is not covered, too bad. You don't get it. 

On the other hand, even if you don't need it, what the hell, its covered! So a smart physician or physician's medical group, will own the facility that you will be sent to for lab work, MRI, CT scan, physical therapy, prosthetics, after care, etc. That way, its kept all in the family. So what if you really don't need that physical therapy? It's covered by your insurance! So what if you need another 6 months of physical therapy after your surgery? You are only covered for ten sessions. Too bad.

And what about your 90-year old mother?

She is a poor return on the investment. Give her pain meds to shut her up and be done with it. Forget the fact that she is mentally alert, capable, fun, a part of your life, your children's life, a brilliant artist and scholar who contributed so much to society -

She is still a bad return on the investment. Her insurance, Medicare, doesn't cover that procedure. Too bad.

But she can have all the pain meds she wants!

One provision of the new PPACA is reporting and measuring. Anyone who has been involved with the health care system in a critical way, when someone had a catastrophic illness, knows that this "measuring" is arbitrary, inhumane and horrendous.

These metrics are standards that set precedents for levels of care. For example, is the patient ambulatory? continent? able to administer their own medications? cognizant of the date and time?

These metrics determine a patient's coverage; as they are met, treatment is revised. From the outside looking in, it may sound like a good idea. But when you are in it, with a patient in critical need of care, it is highly insufficient. 

When the patient is deemed to have met certain standards according to the authority, usually not a physician, they can get kicked out of a facility and returned to the home to be cared for by family members. These are usually people in the home who must work and maintain a household without help for their loved one. They change diapers, help the patient to the bathroom, feed and care for a loved one who is in need of in-patient care that is not covered by their policy. 

In one example, what if a person is suffering from a brain injury, something that is more and more common as the veterans return. Their behavior may be unpredictable; they may have holes in their cognition that are hard to recognize until faced with a specific situation; continued therapy may afford these patients greater resolution of their problems, but it is not available to them.

That the patient would indeed, benefit from continued treatment on a staid course - has no bearing on the decision by the insurance company. 

In our current system, this is indeed the case. It is a problem that will only become worse. 

May I also say this: 

An article today in the Wall Street Journal, The Crushing Cost of Health Care reports once again, that the bulk of medical costs go to a very small percentage of ill patients.

A goodly percentage of health care costs are wracked up by lifestyle choices - including overeating, drug and alcohol use, risky sports and jobs, sitting on the couch watching tv and eating chips and dip while you smoke and drink beer -

Should someone who is conscientious about the maintenance of their health have to go into a pool with people who risk their health on lifestyle choices? Shouldn't we be allowed or afforded the opportunity to opt out and pay for our own health care out of pocket if we want to? Could people be afforded the opportunity to join a collective for catastrophic care only - such as broken bones and ER visits, and catastrophic illnesses? 

Living a healthy lifestyle, exercising and eating well, refraining from habits that are known to cause illness - should allow a person to opt out. This bill provides no incentive for taking responsibility for oneself. It favors the person who opts to take a pill to diet, to control cholesterol, to fight depression, to control heart disease - and taxes the person who uses health providers sparingly because that person prefers to take responsibility for their well-being. It also removes the freedom of the health care savings plans that afford the opportunity for people to spend their dollars where they think the money is best spent, on alternative medicine, such as acupuncture or massage, on therapy or a gym. Instead, it encourages the "take a pill" mentality. Take a pain pill, take an anti-depressant, take a diet pill - 

We saw this coming when we fought off Hillarycare in the Clinton administration. There is a historic link between Big Pharma and the Democratic party that continues in the Obama administration. See this article in the HuffPost. And look at how drug costs have skyrocketed!

I don't know if any political party is interested in the actual welfare of the public. No one seems to care about getting America back to work. No one seems to care about this ridiculous approach to "health care" that is really a big pay off to the insurance companies and a huge tax increase on the American public that will force every American to be dependent upon a third party payer for their most basic health needs, no matter what. 

For me, give me Liberty or Give Me Death!