This clip is about the single-payer health option--and contrary to the Republican propaganda blitz, this is not part of the plan Obama is proposing. Maybe it should be.
The current health care system isn't working. Currently, if you have the money the system works well enough, but for many, many people adequate care is a luxury--and even if we don't care about others their loss will come back and bite us on the ass, because when people don't get prenatal care, say, or preventive medicine, they show up in the ER with full-blown medical problems and the costs are shifted onto us payers (witness the nine dollar aspirin on your hospital bill--this is called "cost-shifting").
Not everyone will benefit from health care reform (unless community health is a value). There are powerful vested interests who want to keep things just as they are--the most prominent being the insurance companies, and some doctors who don't mind unlimited health care costs, but what surprises me are all the low income people in the Heartland who rally against their own interests out of fear of change. They would benefit from such a bill (and may already be on Medicare). They're being duped.
Health care should be a luxury--according to some people
Worried about the health care "death panels" that Sarah Palin keeps talking about? We already have them. They're called insurance companies. Read the Salon article, The "Death Panels" are Already Here." Click here.Here's a good article from MoveOn.org addressing the common Republican talking points opposing health care reform, Top Five Health Care Lies--and How to Fight Them. Click here.
2 comments:
Thought of you, Bob: http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/cosmicvariance/2009/08/11/inherent-vice/
I'm a big Pynchon fan, and I also enjoy habanero peppers but neither are for the faint of heart. I've already started the new book, "Inherent Vice," and feel it's not one of Tom's heavier books but more of a light romp through psychedelic noir. Pynchon's having fun with the hard-boiled genre, and there are plenty of gags and 1960s cultural references to keep his fans happy.
Another favorite literary writer of mine who came out with a neo noir this year is Denis Johnson, who won the National Book Award last year with "Tree of Smoke." "Nobody Move" plays with tough old Chandler and Hammett style dialog and plot, and is an enjoyable summer breeze. It was originally serialized in Playboy, a magazine with a good history of publishing fiction (it also has pictures of naked women, by the way).
So this summer you can pull up a hammock and a mai-tai (and maybe a little Thai stick) and read a couple bonafide literary masters slumming their way through some enjoyable, if lightweight, noir.
Post a Comment